HARDY FORUM ARCHIVE H0092 11/6/00 "HARDY'S USE OF DUMBLEDORE" ====================================================== From: "Patrick Roper" > Subject: Dumbledores Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2000 11:22:01 -0000 I have been told that J. K. Rowling, the author of the Harry Potter books, claims to have got the name of her character Professor Dumbledore from Thomas Hardy. (I know he uses the word 'dumbledore' in Under the Greenwood Tree). The term is said to refer either to bumblebees or cockchafers (may bugs) and I thought it was also used to describe dung beetles (often called 'dor beetles'). Does anyone know in which sense Hardy used it? Patrick Roper ========== Date: Mon, 06 Nov 2000 06:58:34 -0500 Subject: Re: Dumbledores--"Humble Bees" From: "Philip & Andrea Allingham" In *The Mayor of Casterbridge* Hardy uses the dialectal expression to mean "humble Bees"; see Chapter 20: Elizabeth starts to use the King's (i. e., 'standard' or London) English--"she no longer spoke of 'dumbledores' but of 'humble bees'...." Philip Allingham ========== From: "James Gibson" Subject: Fw: Dumbledores Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2000 18:23:43 -0000 Ê ----- Original Message ----- From: James Gibson To: TTHA Forum Sent: 06 November 2000 18:04 Subject: Dumbledores Hardy uses this word in 'An August Midnight' (CP No.113).ÊÊ In William Barnes' Glossary of the Dorset Dialect (Dorchester & London 1886) 'dumbledore' is defined as 'the humblebee'.Ê In Dorset Up Along and Down Along (Bridport 1935) it is defined as 'bumble bee', and in the O.E.D. as "'a humble-bee' or 'bumble-bee'; also dialect, a 'cockchafer'".ÊÊ Respectable bumblebees go to bed when darkness falls, so what was one doing in Hardy's study at midnight?ÊÊ Must have been a cockchafer (Maybug) in the poem, but could be a bumblebee elsewhere. Ê In Under the Greenwood Tree the old choir are fulminating against the mechanical nature of the latest musical instruments used in churches - harmoniums and barrel-organs -Êwhich probably made a droningÊnoise, hence the comparison with the insects, both of which make a loud, droning buzzing sound.ÊÊ 'Right, William, and so they be--miserable dumbledores!' Ê James Gibson ==========Ê Date: Tue, 07 Nov 2000 16:55:12 -0500 From: Rosemarie Morgan Subject: Re: Dumbledores--"Humble Bees" : So here's a puzzler, Philip: OED lists "dumbledore," together with humble/bumble bee, as standard and "cockchafer" as dialect! Rosemarie Morgan ========== Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2000 15:37:09 -0800 From: Betty Cortus Subject: Dumbledores in the Archives. Dear Patrick, Defining the real meaning of "dumbledore" has surfaced on the Forum before. Here is an archive file from a thread that developed just after the 1998 Hardy Conference in Dorchester. Betty Cortus HARDY FORUM ARCHIVE H9874 9/18/98 "DUMBLEDORES AT MIDNIGHT" ===================================================== Date: Fri, 18 Sep 1998 1:21 pm EDT (17:21:48 UT) From: "Robert C. Schweik Dr" Organization: State University of New York - College at Fredonia Subject: Did Hardy Notice That? In "An August Midnight" Hardy pictures a scene in a study where there enter a "longlegs, a moth, and a dumbledore." A "dumbledore" at midnight? In every source I've consulted, a "dumbledore" is glossed as a "bumblebee" or "humblebee." But every naturalist I've consulted tells me that's not right: bumblebees do not fly at night, and for one to fly into a study at midnight strains credulity. Is there another sense for the word "dumbledore"? "Dore" does, among other things, refer to certain flying beetles which do fly at night. Or was Hardy in this case merely taking poetic license and a vacation from his usual habit of observing nature closely and accurately? Bob Schweik Robert Schweik Department of English State University College Fredonia, NY 14063 schweik@fredonia.edu ********** Date: Fri, 18 Sep 1998 12:18:29 -0800 From: Betty Cortus Subject: Re: Did Hardy Notice That? This subject is of particular interest to me because one of my most vivid memories of the recent Hardy Conference was of Andrew Leah reciting "An August Midnight" by heart, standing by the very window in Hardy's study window in Max Gate where the poem was apparently composed. He too pointed out the fact that bumble bees don't fly at night. The _OED_, however, states that a certain dialectal use of the word "dumledore" applies to the cockchafer, a kind of beetle that I would image does fly at night. The _OED_ also cites a line from Hardy's poem "The End of the Episode" which runs "The dumbles thin their humming." I wonder if he may have been using the word generically for any kind of humming insect. Betty Cortus hardycor@mailhost2.csusm.edu ********** From: "Julian W. Whipple" Subject: Re: Did Hardy Notice That? Date: Fri, 18 Sep 1998 19:12:46 -0400 Dear Friends, Yes, that was a memorable moment in the study, but I cannot resist putting this bit in: not only have I seen "bumblebees" at night here, I have seen them in Dorset at night. Perhaps they were resting under an eve and were attracted to the light, perhaps they were already indoors but had gone unnoticed, perhaps they were simply stunned earlier and were making their ways back to their hives, but such anomalies DO occur, and I don't think TH strains a bit of credulity by having one fly in. I tend to distrust naturalists who make definitive statements. Incidentally, I have always been struck by the similar tone and subject matter in Frost's "To a Moth Seen in Winter", "A Considerable Speck", and the startling "Design". Julian ********** From: enl090@abdn.ac.uk Subject: Re: Did Hardy Notice That? Date: Sat, 19 Sep 1998 15:44:30 +0100 (BST) Dear all The only other occasion when Hardy used 'dumbledore' in a poem (this time as a plural) is in the fourth stanza of 'Molly Gone', and the scene is very reminiscent of that in 'An August Midnight': The 4th stanza is as follows: No more singing by Molly to me In the evenings when she Was in mood and in voice, and the candles were lit, And past the porch-quoin The rays would spring out on the laurels; and dumbledores hit On the pane, as if wishing to join. It's poem 444 in Jim Gibson's edition. All the best Martin ********** ========== Date: Tue, 07 Nov 2000 22:51:28 -0500 From: Rosemarie Morgan Subject: Re: Dumbledores in the Archives. Betty, I'm so glad you revived this correspondence from 1998. Until I read Julian's letter, which I must have missed the first time around, I thought I was alone (aside from TH) in having humble-bumble bees in my room at night. As a young girl growing up in Sussex where bees hived under the elevated eaves it wasn't rare to find them inside at night. We thought they came in to die -- drawn perhaps by the light. I watched it happen once. The seemingly dazed bee orbiting the upper-half of my bedroom gradually falling in ever decreasing circles and droning loudly, lower and lower, and finally, in its last feeble attempts to keep the heavy body airborne it would cruise in eerie slow-motion down to a stumbling crawl upon the floor until the ghastly drone and twitching motions ceased. Thanks Julian! Rosemarie ========== "Julian W. Whipple" >Subject: Re: Did Hardy Notice That? >Date: Fri, 18 Sep 1998 19:12:46 -0400 > >Dear Friends, > > Yes, that was a memorable moment in the study, but I cannot resist >putting this bit in: not only have I seen "bumblebees" at night here, I >have seen them in Dorset at night. Perhaps they were resting under an eve >and were attracted to the light, perhaps they were already indoors but had >gone unnoticed, perhaps they were simply stunned earlier and were making >their ways back to their hives, but such anomalies DO occur, and I don't >think TH strains a >bit of credulity by having one fly in. I tend to distrust naturalists who >make definitive statements. Incidentally, I have always been struck by the >similar tone and subject matter in Frost's "To a Moth Seen in Winter", "A >Considerable Speck", and the startling "Design". > > Julian ========== Date: Wed, 08 Nov 2000 06:55:46 -0500 Subject: Re: Dumbledores--"Humble Bees"--"Bumblebees" From: "Philip & Andrea Allingham" Rosemarie: My 1938 *Webster's* (while I admit that it's hardly up to date) indicates that "dumbledore" is "provincial," whereas "bulblebee" comes from the Latin "bombus" (buzzing). It may be that all three terms are equally "provincial" or equally "standard," and that Elizabeth-Jane is deluding herself in preferring one form to the other as "respectable," i. e., more appropriate to her new station in life. Since Hardy loved those old Dorset expressions, he may be exposing his heroine to a little satire here. ==========