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/lit/ - Literature

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22298040 No.22298040 [Reply] [Original]

The Harry Potter series of books (excluding films and addons) is as close to a perfect work of art as exists anywhere. Consider the following:

Harry Potter offers a fully engrossing experience to its target audience which simulates a living a breathing world that readers go on to discuss and enjoy forever. When Harold Bloom savaged Harry Potter he feigned bafflement at how Rowling's books can be so popular while works like Alice in Wonderland are not (when it comes to child reading habits), and that's ridiculous because Harry Potter is about 10x more enjoyable for child readers, and the proof is their willingness to read more pages than Shakespeare ever wrote, and often many times over. That's a lot of reading.

The books contain a lot of cleverness and knowledge, and are well-written, atmospheric, creative, witty, and funny all throughout. Children will learn real names of esoteric figures, actual examples of astrology and divination, and lots of new words and concepts as they read through the HP books.

The characters are very strong. The setting is very strong. The main plot is dark and epic in scale but wasn't paid off perfectly in my opinion. Still, that she ended the series in a way most people don't despise is in itself something of a triumph for how much was expected of the outcome.

She makes use of a clever meta idea in having her books move from being aimed towards children in the beginning to being aimed towards young adults in the late middle and end. She timed her releases to the actual age of her (first few generations of) readership and presented them with an intriguing serial story. In my opinion it wasn't all concluded perfectly but we're also not all waiting for decades on a finale she's too afraid to write either.

>> No.22298045
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22298045

>>22298040

>> No.22298068

>>22298045
If you're an adult and you stop reading and thinking at Harry Potter, that's very stupid.

For the genres of children's and young adult fantasy it's basically the greatest ever in terms of what it achieves and how many people it reaches.

>> No.22298543

>>22298045
What if I accept I'm a brainlet and just want to enjoy myself?

>> No.22298638

These books are perhaps the last great expression of white British culture. The aesthetics are reminiscent of a period-piece and the concept at its core is about escaping the urban banality of modern England into a world where all the quaint uniqueness of English culture is distilled and preserved; the fantasy element just serves to enable this. Nobody would care much to read about wizards in a globalised metropolis like London. This is one of the reasons women like it so much, though you won't catch them admitting to it.

>> No.22298651

>>22298543
well u might started enjoying yourself

>> No.22298768

>>22298040
I wouldn't have read a single book if it wasn't for some random auntie giving me a gift of Harry Potter the first book, and the same is the case for gorrilions of kids.

The experience of reading those books when they were coming out was special in its own right, lines outside of stores every few years.
I was 12 when the final one came out and we stayed up all night outside the bookshop and we bought the book and started reading it right there on the streets with all the fans.
The consoooming was glorious.