Pensieve > Book 5: Random stuff from the 'Queen of Angst'

Angst: (German) n. worry; anxiety

Saturday, June 21 2:15 pm: started reading Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

Saturday June 21 6:15 pm: finished reading

My boyfriend recently dubbed me the 'Queen of Angst', and it does fit me very well. My morbid and pessimistic outlook on life, my wardrobe mostly various shades of black and blue, and my love for angsty fanfiction-although I do appreciate humor on occasion. Most of the stories I have written have been angsty, since I usually only write when I am losing my battle with depression. Also, I would rather watch a war movie or something suitably mind-twisting such as the anime Weiss Kreuz rather than any romance or romantic comedy as many other females do.

So what does this have to do with Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix?

Everything.

J.K. Rowling said in an interview with the BBC's Jim Paxman that (referring to Harry):

He's a lot, lot, lot angrier in this book. He really is quite angry a lot of the time and I think justifiably so, look at what he has gone through. It is about time he started feeling a little bit miffed at the hand life has dealt him.

This made it obvious, that OotP was going to be different from the other four books. When I started reading the books, SS and CoS appeared to be a little cuter simply because of Harry learning about his world and having to fight off evil at the same time. However, by the time PoA and GoF came around, I started seeing more angst in Harry with each book.

OotP picks up and takes off with the angst, and rightfully so. What Harry saw at the end of GoF would not be easy for an adult to take-let alone a fifteen year old boy. In OotP, there are many people keeping Harry in the dark about matters that he should know about, especially the ones that involve some of the people closest to him. To put this into perspective, take normal teenager anger and angst and multiply it, oh, about a hundred or thousand times to get an idea of just how angry and angsty Harry is in this book. Harry has already had to deal with one death from GoF, and the death of one of the people who could have been very close to him piled on top of that doesn't help matters.

Also in Harry's world, war is breaking out. I am a huge fan of the Gundam anime saga, some of which has come over to the United States. Gundam was designed to show that war is never pretty-and Harry is finding that out first-hand in OotP. What wonderful fodder for my sick twisted mind!

Are you sure you want a large serving of angst with that Phoenix?