Blog by Sumana Harihareswara, Changeset founder
Disorder of the Phoenix
Hi, reader. I wrote this in 2003 and it's now more than five years old. So it may be very out of date; the world, and I, have changed a lot since I wrote it! I'm keeping this up for historical archive purposes, but the me of today may 100% disagree with what I said then. I rarely edit posts after publishing them, but if I do, I usually leave a note in italics to mark the edit and the reason. If this post is particularly offensive or breaches someone's privacy, please contact me.
Man Finds New Harry Potter Novel In The Middle Of A Meadow:
May 6, 2003 | LONDON (AP) --A walker found two copies of the new Harry Potter novel dumped in a field, The Sun tabloid reported Tuesday.
It said two unbound copies of J.K. Rowling's latest offering, "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix," which will hit the bookstores on June 21, were discovered in eastern England close to Clays Ltd., a firm contracted to print hundreds of thousands of copies.
The 40-year-old man who found them -- he was not identified -- handed over the books to the newspaper, The Sun said.
They are now stashed in a safe at its headquarters in Wapping, east London while The Sun makes arrangements to return them to publishers Bloomsbury, the newspaper said.
I have so many questions. First of all, why did the guy give them to The Sun, of all entities? Why not, say, keep them for himself (finder's rights), or give them to the police or publisher himself, or give them to his favorite child? Also, did he even flip through the book when he had a chance?
What was going through the guy's head when he saw the books?
How did the book get into that field? Maybe it did something wrong and was buried alive. Or those copies were defective and blew out of the dumpster. Or a disgruntled employee hopefully placed them there deliberately, wishing for a leak.
Finally: how hard would it be to crack that safe?
