Tea Leaves and Travesties: J.K. Rowling’s Fourth Drama

J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter novels benefit considerably from Rowling’s use of the Mendlesohnian portal-quest exposition, which sets the protagonist up for neo-Romantic apotheosis. That topos is hardly subtle, however, and can easily lose effect if spotted by the reader. The purpose of this article is to properly develop a proposed explanation of how Rowling avoids this degradation of effect. Her narrative very clearly instantiates Mikhail Bakhtin’s notion of the classical “fourth drama,” using scatological humor to undermine the sententious rhetoric typical of the portal-quest topos without directly attacking the discourse that rhetoric delivers. The character of Sybill Trelawney in particular exists not to produce portal-quest effects but to travesty the seriousness and authority with which they are typically enacted. By doing so, per Bakhtin, Rowling preserves the effect of her portal-quest while also giving readers cause to pause and reflect on the ennobling effect of the topos as used by other writers. This reading demonstrates both a potential reason for the vividness and resonance of Rowling’s characters and accords her an important position within the broader rhetorical framework of modern fantasy.