/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.23231046]

How did Harry Potter get popular?

This is an honest question. Before Potter, there was never a phenomenon like it. Not even Narnia was that big. Sure, some kids may have been excited for the next Roald Dahl book, but Dahl didn't become an overnight millionaire after publishing his first novel. His first novel didn't automatically sell hundreds of thousands of copies.

Was there a lack of hero's journeys in children's lit in 1997? What was it?

[Anonymous No.23231055]

>>23231046
Marketing, it quickly became the big tool that it was today. That is not to say that there was no marketing for books before this, but the marketing, in that case was a little more subtle.

Potter spawned cash-ins, which also turned quite popular, again, thanks to marketing. Without Potter, Riordan and Collins would be literary nobodies.

[Anonymous No.23231059]

>>23231055
I understand, but why was that book chosen to be marketed in such a way that did wonders for the author when there were hundreds if not thousands of books that could've been pushed to the public like HP.

[Anonymous No.23231074]

>>23231059
Because it ticked all the boxes of a child's imagination, it was unique and thus very easy to market to people.

[Anonymous No.23231078]

>>23231059
It stems from the concept of a fantasy novel. Magic is marketable, the characters, being school-aged, are relatable, everything else did not matter, just market it enough and if enough copies sell, then sequels, spinoffs and merchandising can be made, which means that the publisher receivers more money in the form of a licensor and so does the author. It is a win-win situation by that definition.

[Anonymous No.23231082]

>>23231046
Concurrent with pokemon and other international fads, new media technologies such as satellite transmissions made news current and global. Combine that with the 24 hour media cycle that was also in full swing, and you had a kind of storm of coverage on top of the marketing. A lot of things were caught in it.

>>23231059
It was a moderately successful book in bongland (selling 7000 copies in the first year is considered successful), had a mythology already forming around the author that looked good in the press, and had a massive bidding war for international rights because of the clear chance of film options for the publisher. 360 deals and multimedia were fully developed and the chance to make buckets of cash from merch was obvious.

It's not that anything else could have been pushed, because most of them were, and are, total shit. We like to dream that there's some great novel on the slush pile, but the truth is that it looks more like wattpad, on a good day. There's also the fact that it plays to all the psychology to make it appealing: a secret world, consumerism, wish fulfillment, school but magic and fun, orphan (dead parents give a character authority), monomyth bullshit, and did it in a way that wasn't cheap and blatant like all the shit that kids drop when their balls do. And the characters are clear and well-developed and the dialog is full of wit and reads well.

[Anonymous No.23231085]

>>23231046
Goosebumps and Cabbage Patch Dolls

[Anonymous No.23231093]

When I was a kid there were no real books on those fucking Scholastic book order forms except childish shit like Captain Poopoopants or boring family problems / growing pains shit like The Girl With the Purple Sweater, and I distinctly remember scanning every Scholastic pamphlet for any "real books" (novels) with actual meat to them. Harry Potter was one of the only ones that fit the bill so I remember being incredibly eager to get it.

[Anonymous No.23231099]

>>23231046
>Before Potter, there was never a phenomenon like it.
Tom Brown's School Days.

[Anonymous No.23231117]

>>23231085
Yeah there've been other equally wildly popular kid's media series before, even back into the 1800s.
What was weird about Harry Potter is that it was the first one to get a sizeable adult audience as well.

[Anonymous No.23231144]

>>23231117
There haven't been many "general audience" books in history, the Hobbit maybe, I wouldn't count even classic children's books as far as this goes. YA was a ghetto at that time and fantasy was practically a swear in the mainstream, I think that led to it reaching a wider audience, once it was clear that there was more to it, or at least a media image of it being popular and socially acceptable for adults to read.

[Anonymous No.23231230]

>>23231117
>What was weird about Harry Potter is that it was the first one to get a sizeable adult audience as well.
That says more about the infantilisation of culture than it does about HP itself. Many more YA series have become popular with "adults" these days.

[Anonymous No.23231275]

>>23231046
>after publishing his first novel.
It didn't get mad hype til the fourth book. I started reading it really early on, back with the old dumbledore cover, and everyone considered it pretty mid. For the age group, Philip Pullman's books were huge with the age range (along with long time franchises)
Somewhere around the third book, adults knew about it, and by the fourth book when adults were going fucking nuts for it, I'd aged out and was like, the fuck am I reading something as thick as a bible when there's better shit.
I remember being forced to go see the movies as a field trip when most of my class hadn't yet read it but the adults were starting to go insane.
Dark Materials fans were about the same time going to find Pullman and tape him to a typewriter, because actual teenage girl fans of magic books are insane and always have stationery supplies.

I think there may be a clue in marketing tactics at the time. Coraline came out around the hype train starting, specifically as a book which could be read by a child and an adult, and have the adults see a different horror. Most girls who read it before the movie, around that time, seemed to have a speech which made it clear
>The mother had been told it was a book adults and children would interpret differently
>implying most kids are too dumb to see horror
>BUT MY MOM KNOWS I'M MATURE AND SMART
At the time I was like, okay, your mom's telling you some bullshit so you read the fairytale book, but in retrospect, a lot of those mothers probably believed their bullshit. Hidden code the enlightened can see in fiction was a big meme in advertising books around those years, with Dan Brown rising around then, probably on the same demographic that housed adult Potter fans around the movies. It's arguably more like cult spiritual texts that have a boom, in some ways.
>This is unprecedented
No, you're just dumb. There's whole riots and mental illnesses named after book releases. It's not a terribly mentally stable demographic in any time period.

[Anonymous No.23231629]

>>23231059
Honestly, a lot of children's lit are written by writers who write what they think Children would like. Rowling actually used her experience in an English college (school) and people from her life, memories, experiences, etc.

Most children's lit is shit like "Jenny's bad hair day" or "who put that hair on my toothbrush" or whatever. Or a single protagonist goes into a secret world, does a bunch of stuff, returns by his/herself, and we wonder if it was all a dream. A somewhat recent example is Coraline.

Rowling gave Potter friends to have actual adventures with. Kids love friendship, they love mystery, adventure, magic, etc.

[Anonymous No.23231640]

>>23231046

[Anonymous No.23231658]

>>23231275
Not exactly true.

>In 1997, producer David Heyman searched for a children's book that could be adapted into a well-received film.[39] He had planned to produce Diana Wynne Jones' novel The Ogre Downstairs, but his plans fell through. His staff at Heyday Films then suggested Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, which his assistant believed was "a cool idea."[39] Heyman pitched the idea to Warner Bros.[40] and in 1999, Rowling sold the company the rights to the first four Harry Potter books for a reported £1 million.[41]

[Anonymous No.23231672]

>>23231046
There was a small baby boom in the late 80s and early 90s. Coincidentally Harry Potter came out right around the same time that demographic started reading books.

[Anonymous No.23231674]

It's a really easy frictionless read

[Anonymous No.23231689]

>>23231046
They're really fun.

[Anonymous No.23231971]

>>23231046
Go back and read children's books from the 90s. With the exception of a handful of series like the aforementioned Goosebumps, and maybe Animorphs, Harry Potter is the first children's book that treats the readers as intelligent being, it's not written like a children's story, it's sophisticated, it's why the books are still good. Rowling is a good writer.

[Anonymous No.23232026]

Basically, the deal with Scholastic meant that it was shilled at all the books fairs and in every classroom, and then when the first film was announced Pottermania really kicked into gear. It also came out before the death of the monoculture and when the internet was just starting to become widespread. They are also very well written and possibly the comfiest books ever. Was a freak accident really; will never happen again.

[Anonymous No.23232056]

>>23231971
>With the exception of a handful of series like the aforementioned Goosebumps, and maybe Animorphs, Harry Potter is the first children's book that treats the readers as intelligent being
What is Northern Lights?

[Anonymous No.23232067]

If anyone on 4chan knew the secrets, they'd be billionaires

[Anonymous No.23232071]

>>23232056
Idk if it's his Anti-Christian (no, not Atheism. A person can be an Atheist and not seethe or gaf about religion) beliefs that seek through, but Pullman's writing felt so cold. There was a feeling of detachment.

[Anonymous No.23232087]

>>23232071
Well each to his own. As a young kid (and I was about the right age for HP and HDM, being 34 now) Northern Lights was by far my favourite book, and I'm not even, nor was at the time, an atheist.

But yeh as far as mass popularity goes I guess the quasi-controversiality of the themes of HDM held it back.

[Anonymous No.23232854]

>>23232067
how do you know we're not?

[Anonymous No.23232889]

>>23232071
That's my only complaint on His Dark Materials. Awesome story, world, characters and themes, but then suddenly you would get a random essay on religion. It was heavy handed and the message would've been clear even if he had decided against spoonfeeding it

[Anonymous No.23232961]

>>23231074
It wasn't unique, it was a ripoff of Earthsea by Le Guin, among other books. The difference is that Harry Potter had a wider mass appeal.

[Anonymous No.23232964]

>>23231658
Idk what this is disproving. Anon's first sentence is it didn't get "mad hype" until the fourth one, and your Wikipedia quote says she sold the company the rights to the first four. It tracks that it wasn't that popular til Hollywood set in.

[Anonymous No.23232988]

>>23231046
it was just a brand new publishing house that got really lucky with a totally unknown author. don't ask any questions, goy

[Anonymous No.23233251]

>>23231046
it's the most based book ever published, denial is coping that it was written by a woman

[Anonymous No.23233262]

Am I weird for only reading Azkaban and onwards? Books 1 and 2 seem too kiddish.

Even 15 years ago when I was 16, I read from book 3 to Hallows.

[Anonymous No.23233403]

>>23231046
> Before Potter, there was never a phenomenon like it.

Sherlock Holmes.

[Anonymous No.23233428]

>>23231046
Harry Potter is extremely comfy because of its sort of New-age neo-Christian type metaphysics. Specifically the role of 'love' as a magical force acting as a mechanism for divine providence. This sort of thing is like crack for people living in secular, materialist culture.

Added on to this is the secret aristocratic castle setting, the memorable characters, the mystery plots, boarding school stuff, etc, all of that is competently done and appealing for the usual reasons. But I don't think there is any way it would have been so popular without the metaphysical stuff I mentioned; it's what gives the whole world its sort of mystical comfy feeling. I don't read much fantasy but I get the impression that the way Rowling designed the magic to incorporate things like sacrificing yourself out of love is actually kind of unique, at least the emphasis that is put on this over and over again throughout the series.

[Anonymous No.23233776]

>>23231046
>comes out in 97
>movie talks somewhere in 98
>show up in best sellers lists in 99
>movie out in 2001
Got picked up by a big studio really early on. That really is it.

[Anonymous No.23234111]

>>23231046
Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone is 90% wish fulfilment.

[Anonymous No.23234393]

>>23231046
Harry Potter appeals to, and reinforces covert narcissistic traits. Forgive me for mentioning “psychopathology” terms, but it gets the idea across.
Ron’s a narcissist. Harry too. Hermione isn’t a character, so much as a light critique on women.

[Anonymous No.23234402]

>>23231672
>>23231658
>>23234111

Yep. It was about timing. If Harry Potter had come out 5 years early or 5 years later, I truly believe it wouldn't have been as successful.

Personally, I don't think Rowling got the idea on a train in 1990. I think she either consciously or unconsciously borrowed from Worst Witch and Chrestomanci, with a sprinkle of Greek Myths and Lord of the Rings.

It's not hard to believe since Dumbledore is Gandalf and Dobby is Gollum. I recall the description of the Great Hall being EXACTLY described TO THE WORD in Worst Witch as it was in Philosopher's Stone.

[Anonymous No.23234519]

>>23234402
I've seen The Worst Witch and read Chrestomanci and it's really obvious Harry Potter was a mash up of those two series. Not necessarily a bad thing, I never liked Harry Potter and likely never will but I think it's got to do more with how popular it was, shit just seems absurd levels of overrated for that, that and that for some reason it tries to go from Worst Witch like "Silly Halloween school story for kids!" to Lord of the Rings style "Le Epic Medieval Fantasy" when it simply doesn't have the basis to be something like that. I think Chrestomanci is a much better example of being set at a magic boarding school but the school being part of a bigger fantasy world so that you can "take it seriously" when it wants to get more actiony or expand the lore and world and such.

[Anonymous No.23234570]

>>23234402
As someone who writes, it's no uncommon to sometimes come up with the same or similar ideas as other writers. I've annoyed myself a few times by thinking I've had an original idea and then a few months later finding the same idea in another book or people tossing the idea around online in a forum somewhere. It's not uncommon for this to happed to famous writers as well. I was listening to an interview for one of my favorite authors and a fan asked if they had read a particular book because it's so similar to their work, they answered with a no, which I believed to be truthful because this writer has never been shy about telling fans exactly where they pull their ideas from. I read the book the fan mentioned and it's crazy how close it is to this author's work. It's just like music, there are only so many chords, and sometimes you're naturally going to hit them in the same sequence as somebody else, especially if you are operating within the rules of a genre.

[Anonymous No.23234798]

>>23231046
Because HP is better than most kids novels. Simple as, rest of the thread is mental gymnastics