This novel contains the
shortest time spent at the Dursley’s, only Chapters Three and Four as the next
morning Harry wakes up to the postman delivering the mail with an invitation to
the Quidditch World Cup from the Weasley’s which is covered in stamps. The Dursley’s don’t want Harry to go, but
they let him once he mentions that he has been writing to Sirius who the
Dursley’s think is a murderer. It’s an
interesting bit of characterization for Harry showing just how cunning he
actually is and how he would have done had he been placed in Slytherin house,
and is almost always missed when reading this novel. The Weasley’s come to pick him up through the
Floo Network which makesd Aunt Petunia go crazy as the soot makes the house a
mess and Fred and George accidentally drop a candy for Dudley to eat which
causes his tongue to grow to five feet long.
This puts light on not only their characters, but also Arthur Weasley’s
character as Mr. Weasley is angered that they would take advantage of a Muggle
like that as he is part of the minority that still treats Muggles as equals to
wizards in their own way. He and Molly
have raised their children to respect Muggles, but in all their antics Fred and
George only play horrid pranks on people who they think deserve it. In the minds of Fred and George, giving
Dudley that candy was payback for the way he treats Harry on a daily
basis. This is really the point of
Chapter Five as well, to provide characterization for the Weasley family as
Bill and Charlie are home from their jobs and we find Percy has become the
assistant to Bartimeus “Barty” Crouch.
Chapters Six, Seven and
Eight take us to the Quidditch World Cup which the underage members of the
Weasley family along with Harry, Hermione and Cedric and Amos Diggory go to by
Portkey. A Portkey is a magical object
that is bewitched to transfer those who touch it at a specific time to a
different location. We get to see just
how Cedric still hates that he beat Harry in Quidditch in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, while his father Amos
revels in this fact that his son beat the famous Harry Potter. Chapter Seven introduces us to Ludo Bagman
and Barty Crouch who are in charge of transportation for the British wizards
and keeping the Muggles away from the gathering. Bagman is a good natured gambler while Crouch
can only be described as a total and complete stick in the mud. Bagman as a gambler even makes a bet with
Fred and George about the outcome of the match and we see several other
Hogwarts students including Seamus Finnegan, Dean Thomas, Neville Longbottom,
Cho Chang and Draco Malfoy are present to see the World Cup. It is interesting to see just how many people
come out to the cup and also how the Malfoy family has Cornelius Fudge in their
back pocket. Chapter Eight is the actual
match which fulfills the Quidditch requirement for this novel and is again a
great read as Bulgaria gets the Snitch while Ireland wins. This allows Fred and George to win the bet
against Bagman in a complete game of chance.
It also introduces us to Barty Crouch’s House Elf Winky which sets off a
desire in Hermione to start fighting for the rights of Elves although Winky and
many other House Elves don’t really want rights or even freedom.
Chapter Nine takes place
in the evening after the match where a group of Death Eaters, supporters of
Voldemort, take the four members of the Muggle Roberts family and hoist them
into the air, parading them around and forcing them to do acrobatics in the
air. This is another indicator of the
tone as Rowling makes the description of what is happening to the Roberts is
stomach churning and treated by the Death Eaters as fun. They scatter however when the Dark Mark, the
mark showing that a Death Eater has attacked, is shot up into the sky. The impact of this mark is elaborated on in a
single excerpt of dialogue that gives off this sense of foreboding by Arthur
Weasly, described as thus:
“You have no idea, you’re too
young. Just picture coming home and finding the Dark Mark hovering over your
house, and knowing what you’re about to find inside. Everyone’s worst fear… the
very worst…”
The chapter ends with Winky being freed by Crouch for finding Harry’s
wand which went missing which gives Hermione further excuse to campaign for
House Elf Rights. This brings us to
Chapter Ten which shows how the rest of the wizarding world reacts to the
events of the Quidditch World Cup. The
Daily Prophet reports on it as the Ministry having no control while everyone
becomes worried while Mr. Weasley has to work several long hours at the
Ministry in light of this.
Chapters Eleven and Twelve bring us to Hogwarts introducing us to Colin
Creevey’s little brother and revealing the Triwizard Tournament being hosted at
Hogwarts. The Tournament consists of
three tasks where three champions compete for glory and a one thousand Galleon
grand prize. New rules have been added so
that only students of age can compete in the tournament. Chapter Thirteen introduces a lot of the
problems this novel has, mainly the overabundance of filler subplots that pad
out the novel to its longer length. We
get the plotline with Care of Magical Creatures and the Blast Ended Skrewts, creatures
bred by Hagrid which are extremely dangerous, and Hermione’s S.P.E.W. campaign
for House Elf rights. They both tie into
the main plot but they are forced in and become distracting to the reader as
they rear their ugly heads every so often.
Chapters Thirteen and Fourteen actually give us the new Defense Against
the Dark Arts teacher for this year, Alistor “Mad-Eye” Moody whose big
introduction is turning Malfoy into a ferret after he tries cursing Harry. He shows in this scene that he is no
nonsense, yet in his first class with Harry he shows he does understand his
students. He still shows them the three
Unforgivable Curses, the Imperius, Cruciatus and Killng Curses, as ones to
watch out for, but like Lupin boosts Neville’s confidence by encouraging him to
pursue Herbology, the only subject he is good at. There is also a Divination class scene that I
think is meant to be comedic and it is a bit funny, but feels a little bit out
of place.
Chapters Fifteen, Sixteen, Seventeen and Eighteen actually get us to
start the Triwizard Tournament. Chapter
Fifteen sees the arrival of the candidates from the two wizard schools,
Beauxbatons from France and Durmstrang from Bulgaria. The way they arrive at Hogwarts is a complete
spectacle as Madame Maxine, head of Beauxbatons is a large woman who arrives in
a flying carriage a la Cinderella and Igor
Karkaroff arrives with Durmstrang from a giant ship rising from the Great
Lake. Bagman and Crouch will also be at
Hogwarts for the Tournament and the welcome feast for the guests leads into
Chapter Sixteen where the Goblet of Fire is revealed to be the manner of
selection for the Champions for the Tournament.
Prospective champions have twenty-four hours to submit their names. Anyone under the age of seventeen who tries
to cheat the goblet have their plan backfire with Fred and George aging to old
men after taking a few drops of aging potion.
The next evening the Goblet of Fire spits out the names of the
champions, Fleur Delacour from Beauxbatons who is half veela, a creature that
ensnares men with charms, Viktor Krum from Durmstrang, the Seeker for the
Bulgarian Quidditch team and Cedric Diggory from Hogwarts, giving Hufflepuff
some well-deserved attention for once.
Once the three champions have left the hall to be briefed on what they
must do, the goblet spits out a fourth name, Harry Potter. Chapter Seventeen is a short chapter
displaying the reactions of Hogwarts to Harry being picked as fourth
champion. The staff of every school is
outraged, but still have to allow him to compete with only Dumbledore, Hagrid,
Moody and McGonagall actually believing that he couldn’t have put his name in
the Goblet of Fire. The Hufflepuffs,
Ravenclaws and Slytherins mostly are adverse to Harry as Champion, many even
wearing “Potter Stinks: Support Cedric Diggory” badges. Gryffindor House is very split on the issue
with people like Colin Creevey and Angelina Johnson being happy for Harry,
Hermione understanding Harry’s troubles and desire to actually watch the
Tournament and Ron getting the wrong idea and becoming jealous. We really get to see Harry grow up and change
as he has to avoid everyone he was once best friends with. Chapter Eighteen isn’t any better as Rita
Skeeter arrives at Hogwarts for the weighing of the wands, a precaution to see
that the champions’ wands are in working condition. She takes Harry aside for an interview which
she takes and warps into her own narrative.
This makes Harry’s troubles even worse as everyone reads the article and
makes the torment much worse.
Chapters Nineteen and Twenty bring us to the First Task as Hagrid shows
Harry and Madame Maxine whom Hagrid is attracted to, that Charlie Weasley has
been brought in with four dragons which the champions will have to defeat. This information allows Harry to make peace
with Cedric as he gives up the secret as Fleur and Krum most likely know. Most of the chapter is then devoted to the
research Harry and Hermione do to figure out how to defeat the dragon. Moody shows how much he likes Harry by
nudging him in the right direction by using the Summoning Charm to get his Firebolt
and use that to defeat the dragon. The
chapter ends with a conversation between Harry and Sirius through the fireplace
in the Gryffindor Common Room where Sirius tells him to be on his guard, but
cannot give him any advice as they hear noise.
Chapter Twenty is entirely devoted to the actual First Task where Harry
gets the most dangerous dragon and actually has the most interesting solution
when having to get a golden egg. This
gets him a decent amount of points from the judges. More importantly after the task he and Ron
make up after Ron wakes up to the idea that Harry really doesn’t want any more
glory than he already has.
The golden egg is the clue for the second task, but that plot thread is
held off for Chapters Twenty-One, Twentey-Two, Twenty-Three and
Twenty-Four. Chapter Twenty-One wraps up
the S.P.E.W. plot by revealing that Dumbledore actually treats the house elves
very well and Dobby is actually being paid to work in the kitchens at Hogwarts
along with Winky. It also reveals that
Crouch actually disappears for a period of time and hasn’t been going to work
at the Ministry with Percy taking over his duties. Chapters Twenty-Two and Twenty-Three actually
addresses the growing emotions of Harry and Ron as they have to ask out dates
for the Yule Ball. They have their egos
diluted when everyone they are close to have dates. Ginny and Neville are going together, Fred
and Angelina Johnson are going together and even Hermione has a date. This really addresses that Harry and Ron are
starting to notice girls as Ron asks Fleur out who is using her veela powers at
the time, but gets rejected, while Harry asks Cho, but she’s already going with
Cedric. They eventually go with the Patil
twins, but they actually are stunned that Hermione goes with Krum and are so
jealous of her and Cho, they totally ignore their dates. The ball is a chance for everyone at Hogwarts
to let their hair down and it is an extremely fun read as every character gets
described when they are dancing, even some of the teachers. Harry and Ron do get some information however
that Snape and Karkaroff know each other and that Hagrid is actually a
half-giant. Chapter Twenty-Four actually
deals with this as Rita Skeeter writes an article about Hagrid, although she
was banished from the grounds with testimonies from Slytherin students about
how awful he is as a teacher and a person.
The chapter is dedicated to outlining the prejudice of the wizarding
world as an explanation to how the Ministry’s mindset and Voldemort’s mindset
are different.
The second task is picked up again with Chapters Twenty-Five,
Twenty-Six and Twenty-Seven with Cedric tipping off Harry to the fact to open
the egg underwater. It sings a song
saying that a treasure of Harry’s will be dragged to the bottom of the Black
Lake and he has to rescue them. The actual
task takes up the entirety of Chapter Twenty-Six and shows just how moral Harry
is as the treasures are actual people.
He only has an hour to save Ron from the bottom of the lake, but he also
saves Fleur’s sister when it is apparent that she isn’t going to make it to the
bottom of the lake. This does give him
enough points to be tied with Cedric for first place in the tournament. Chapter Twenty-Seven is the aftermath with
another article by Skeeter this time slandering Hermione and getting her sent hate
mail and a meeting with Sirius in Hogsmede where we get a perspective on
Voldemort and his followers as to how evil they actually are.
The next three chapters serve as a set up for the climax of this long
story, as the third task is announced and Mr. Crouch is found, but is then
killed and Harry going to Dumbledore’s after another dream of Voldemort. He goes into Dumbledore’s memories of Death
Eater trials which shows just how awful Crouch was and that he had a son who
died in Azkaban. This brings us to Chapter
Thirty-One which is the Third Task, a giant maze which is perilous with Fleur
being attacked, Krum using the Cruciatus Curse on the others and Cedric and
Harry actually win. All is not well as
the Triwizard Cup is a Portkey that transports them to a graveyard. This is the climax where in Chapter
Thirty-Two, Cedric is killed cementing that nobody is safe and Voldemort is
resurrected. Chapter Thirty-Three is
then devoted to characterizing Voldemort as a ruthless killer calling out his
Death Eaters by name who originally remained secret. He then in Chapter Thirty-Four duels Harry
wanting to kill him but Harry escapes with Cedric’s dead body exclaiming that “He’s
back, Lord Voldemort’s back”.
The Final Three Chapters are used to wrap up everything in what could
have been a completely rushed sequence, but it is not. Chapter Thirty-Five reveals that Moody isn’t
actually Moody, but Barty Crouch Jr. using Polyjuice Potion. Now this twist is great as it had been hinted
at and Rowling points everything out in this Chapter. Fudge has a Dementor come to Hogwarts and
perform the kiss while in Chapter Thirty-Six we get to see Cedric be given
tribute. Harry does get the winnings but
gives it away to Fred and George to start a joke shop while Chapter
Thirty-Seven actually explains how Rita Skeeter was able to get all those
stories once she was banned, she is an unregistered Animagus. The final lines
of the novel give us the sense that everything has changed and a new chapter is
being written in Harry’s life.
To summarize, Harry Potter
and the Goblet of Fire is still a great novel in its own right,
but it really fails in the aspect of pacing as several subplots actually get in
the way of telling a story. Everything
does connect, but it really makes it harder to get through in just a few
places. 85/100
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