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Jan. 21st, 2006 02:42 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
timepiececlockOpening line:
"Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much. They were the last people you'd expect to be involved in anything strange or mysterious, because they just didn't hold with such nonsense."
--Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, J.K. Rowling
I was browsing the internet and came across some people gnawing on the furniture over HP's first opening line. Since I read that book like 20 years ago and never bought it (I only own the 5th), I had to hunt around google for a while to find what the opening line of HP actually was.
Looking at it, I have three thoughts:
1) she totally ripped that introduction from Tolkien's descriptions of the residents of the Shire, didn't she? That two-line description could be half of Hobbiton. The Sackville-Bagginses! You know it.
2) doesn't everyone know it's spelled "thankyouverymuch" ?
3) even forgiving number two, there has to be something wrong with the grammar of that part of the sentence. There's something.
For myself, I don't have a worst opening line. But my favorite opening line is still (has for several years now) been this bit, from Clive Barker's The Thief of Always:
Chapter 1: Harvey, Half-Devoured
Now isn't that an awesome opener?
Hmm. You know, that book would make one creepy kid's film. ...OMG, Hayao Miyazaki should do it! Oh, that'd be a PERFECT movie for him. He'd get the sense of visual wonder, and imbue it with the eerieness that the book has but most American children's movies shy away from.
Or it could be done by M. Night Shayamalan. If he could restrain himself to stay loyal to the text.
Edit: OMG! Score by Danny Elfman. Yeah. That'd be rad.
"Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much. They were the last people you'd expect to be involved in anything strange or mysterious, because they just didn't hold with such nonsense."
--Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, J.K. Rowling
I was browsing the internet and came across some people gnawing on the furniture over HP's first opening line. Since I read that book like 20 years ago and never bought it (I only own the 5th), I had to hunt around google for a while to find what the opening line of HP actually was.
Looking at it, I have three thoughts:
1) she totally ripped that introduction from Tolkien's descriptions of the residents of the Shire, didn't she? That two-line description could be half of Hobbiton. The Sackville-Bagginses! You know it.
2) doesn't everyone know it's spelled "thankyouverymuch" ?
3) even forgiving number two, there has to be something wrong with the grammar of that part of the sentence. There's something.
For myself, I don't have a worst opening line. But my favorite opening line is still (has for several years now) been this bit, from Clive Barker's The Thief of Always:
Chapter 1: Harvey, Half-Devoured
The great gray beast February had eaten Harvey Swick alive. Here he was, buried in the belly of that smothering month, wondering if he would ever find his way out through the cold coils that lay between here and Easter.
Now isn't that an awesome opener?
Hmm. You know, that book would make one creepy kid's film. ...OMG, Hayao Miyazaki should do it! Oh, that'd be a PERFECT movie for him. He'd get the sense of visual wonder, and imbue it with the eerieness that the book has but most American children's movies shy away from.
Or it could be done by M. Night Shayamalan. If he could restrain himself to stay loyal to the text.
Edit: OMG! Score by Danny Elfman. Yeah. That'd be rad.
