How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #4
Sophie sewed buttons on Michael's shirts and listened to Howl going through a spell with Michael. "I know I'm slapdash," he was saying, "but there's no need for you to copy me. Always read it right through, carefully, first. The shape of it should tell you a lot, whether it's self-fulfilling or self-discovering, or simple incantation, or mixed action and speech. When you've decided that, go through again and decide which bits mean what they say and which bits are put as a puzzle. You're getting on to the more powerful kinds now. You'll find every spell of power has at least one deliberate mistake or mystery in it to prevent accidents. You have to spot those. Now take this spell …" (6.15)
Howl's Moving Castle was published in 1986, twelve years before the first Harry Potter. Looking back, it's hard to remember how exciting it might have been to think about spells as something you could actually study, in the same way that you study chemistry or math. With the huge popularity of Hogwarts we've gotten totally used to the idea of a wizard school, but Jones got there long before Rowling with Michael's apprenticeship in this novel.
Quote #5
The room turned dim. Huge, cloudy, human-looking shapes bellied up in all four corners and advanced on Sophie and Michael, howling as they came. The howls began as moaning horror, and went up to despairing brays, and then up again to screams of pain and terror. Sophie pressed her hands to her ears, but the screams pressed through her hands, louder and louder still, more horrible every second. Calcifer shrank hurriedly down in the grate and flickered his way under his lowest log. Michael grabbed Sophie by her elbow and dragged her to the door. (6.67)
Howl's magic makes him a drama queen on steroids. he doesn't just throw huge tantrums—he also has the power to make sure that the entire town of Porthaven can hear his wails of distress over the fact that Sophie messed up his hair dye. This ability to throw giant fits is kind of handy, since we always know—or think we know—how Howl feels.
Quote #6
"But," [Sophie] panted, "seven leagues is twenty-one miles! I'd be halfway to Porthaven in two strides!"
"No, it's ten and a half miles a step," said Michael. "That makes Upper Folding almost exactly. If we each take one boot and go together, then I won't be letting you out of my sight and you won't be doing anything strenuous, and we'll get there before Howl does, so he won't even know where we've been. That solves all our problems beautifully." (8.24-25)
The seven-league boots come up in the very first paragraph of the novel and here they are again. They basically work as a kind of magic ornament to the novel: Sophie has to get places that are far away, and the seven-league boots are an easy way for her to do it. You could substitute any number of fantasy elements—a transportation portal, Floo powder, what have you—to perform the same function.
We think that Jones chooses seven-league boots because they are more traditionally fairytale-like: they appear in the tales of classic French author Charles Perrault, who wrote the best-known early versions of Little Red Riding Hood, Sleeping Beauty, and other famous stories. Check out his story Little Thumb for another example of seven-league boots.