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/lit/ - Literature

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6575220 No.6575220 [Reply] [Original]

Can we agree that they were pretty solid as far as a teen book series goes?

>> No.6575235

Okay

>> No.6575256
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6575256

Pretty solid. Not as terrible as some snobs will say, but if you're an adult calling it the greatest masterpiece ever, you have an immature sense of taste.

Also because I never tire of Proffessor Bloom complaining about HP:

>You know, child, my electronic mailbox overflowing with daily mesages from Potterites who still cannot forgive me for the article I published in Wall Street Journal more than a year ago, entitled "Can 35 Million Harry Potter Fans Be Wrong? – Yes!" These people claim that Harry Potter does great things for their children. I think they are deceiving themselves. I read the first book in the Potter series, the one that's supposed to be the best. I was shocked. Every sentence there is a string of cliches, there are no characters – any one of them could be anyone else, they speak in each other's voice, so one gets confused as to who is who.
>IL: Yet the defenders of Harry Potter claim that these books get their children to read.
>HB: But they don't! Their eyes simply scan the page. Then they turn to the next page. Their minds are deadened by cliches. Nothing is required of them, absolutely nothing. Nothing happens to them. They are invited to avoid reality, to avoid the world and they are not invited to look inward, into themselves. But of course it is an exercise in futility to try to oppose Harry Potter.

>> No.6575260

Nah. It's badly written and morally asinine. Series like The Chronicles of Narnia, Redwall and His Dark Materials are leagues ahead of it. Harry Potter is just a cheap distraction and I doubt it will stand the test of time.

>> No.6575296

I enjoyed them when I was a kid. About a year ago was with some friends on vacation and found out a couple of the books. As we had been high for a couple of days already we decided to read them out loud. We couldn't get past the first page, it is incredible how poorly written they are, absolutely incredible.

>> No.6575298

>>6575220
If I had to rate it out of... say... µ, I would give it a concrete unbiased series of unfortunate events.

>> No.6575301

>>6575260
Maybe the films will save it from falling into obscurity. A lot of people were deeply into them and the books, so I guess they will survive for a while still

>> No.6575305

>>6575220

If Harry Potter was magic realism instead of urban fantasy how would the opinion on it change?

>> No.6575316

>>6575260
Harry Potter suffers from being incredibly generic, which is probably also the reason for its popularity.

I honestly wonder what impact being a brand will have on its longevity, the Narnia books are almost objectively better, but Harry Potter has fucking theme parks.

>> No.6575365

>Have gf with tumblr-tier tastes
>Love her to death
>Harry Potter is legitimately her favorite book series.

Goddamn, she's great and all, but I really have to hold back to not go full autist on her sometimes

>> No.6575431

>>6575365
Blog of the century.

>> No.6575435

>>6575365
don't worry, she'll leave you soon

>> No.6575461

>>6575305
>If Harry Potter was magic realism instead of urban fantasy how would the opinion on it change?

>2015
>Believing is marketing spooks

Nigga it's the same fucking thing.

>> No.6575466

It had some comfy parts

>> No.6575483

>>6575435
( ._.)

>> No.6575520

>>6575365
Is it really that wrong for her to cherish the book series that accompanied her since her childhood?

>> No.6575522

>>6575461

>Magic realism and urban fantasy are on in the same

Absolute bullshit, there's clear distinctions on what makes one different from the other.

>> No.6575531

Do Harry Potter books still sell?

>> No.6575594

>>6575256
Honestly looking back on how I felt while reading HP as a preteen Blooms pretty much correct here. It was like a pleasurable addiction thats almost a chore at the same time.
As for characters all having the same voice, thats true for all YA more or less.

>> No.6575606

>>6575522
You tell yourself that kiddo. I bet your at starbucks right now, posting in other threads on your macbook about how reading Joyce but not understanding a fuckin word of it somehow makes you superior to "genre plebs".
Face it, youve been brainwashed by marketing. Yes even classic authors still have a subtle cultural form of marketing going on, /lit/ memes (both the humor kind and the Dawkins kind) are a prime example.

>> No.6576569

>teen book series

Children's book series

>> No.6576590

I read the first 6 as a kid, feels good to have never as much as touched the last one.

>> No.6576613

>>6576590
I look down on you all the same.

>> No.6576629

>>6575220
They should be given to children between 6 and eleven, entry-tier lit should suffice actual young-adults.

>> No.6576652

Yeah, compared to Twilight, Hunger Games, Divergent, etc they're god-tier.

>> No.6576710

>>6575220

Praise what deserves to be praised, and J.K Rowling and the HP series have things which do. She does have an exceptional talent to make colourful characters which dance off of the page and a rich and lively world in everything from candies to castles. Her prose may be pedestrian but she can fit more colour in one book than most 'great' writers can fit into their whole back catalogue.

>> No.6576827

>>6575520
>this whole sentence

I love you /lit/

>> No.6576861

>>6575316

no, the narnia books are leagues better -- just as long as you're not anywhere near middle school. I read them all between 1st-3rd grade and it was a really incredible experience. By the time you hit 5th or 6th it's almost too late honestly.

But HP is garbage.

>> No.6576882

If it got kids reading, it's great.
Unless by reading we're talking about slashfic on live journal.

>> No.6576885

Fuck y'all the first three were all right.

>> No.6576941

>>6576710
That's bullshit and you know it, any of JKR's characters are shallow and one-dimensional, the exact opposite of colorful: necessary to create the cliche good vs evil plot.

The world and plot are pure escapism though, which is like crack for kids and childish adults alike.

>> No.6577299

Wizard People Dear Reader > Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

>> No.6577452

>>6575520
There are books from my childhood that I still love and reread from time to time for the comfort and associated warmth/memories, but they're in an entirely different category to the books I read now. People-particularly 18-25 year olds-get into a frenzy defending Harry Potter like it's profound and well-written, when it really isn't. There's nothing wrong with cherishing a book you read when you were a kid, but don't act like it's intelligent, profound literature and don't let it be the only thing you read. It shows a lack of growth/maturity imo

>> No.6577487

>>6576941
>any of JKR's characters are shallow and one-dimensional

The entire series takes place from the POV of Harry, who is kind of an idiot and sees people very superficially.

>> No.6577512

>>6576652
Underrated post

>> No.6577535

hey you guys ever notice all the bad guys in Harry Potter have evil sounding names and are from slytheryn and are basically evil racist nazi white cis males that don't like interracial breeding? It's like a metaphor for real life, fucking bravo Rowling.

>> No.6577547

>>6575298
you incoherent idiot

>> No.6577560

>>6576629
rewrite that as nabokov, pls

>> No.6577570

>>6577535
it's so not subtle I hate her
even if it were, it'd be disappointing

>> No.6577604

>>6575260
Harry Potter revolutionized an entire subsection of an industry, and gave birth to the incredibly profitable Young Adult Fiction genre. Regardless of it's lack of good literary content, it will be remembered no matter what.

>> No.6577761

The books as a whole were solid all around. I enjoy them.

>>6575256
>Quoting Bloom

Are you not aware that pretty much all of his claims about how the series is 'shallow' have been proven wrong by the very same fans he's dismissing? Even in this cherry picked quote, you can tell he's full of it, considering how famously distinct all of Rowling's characters are. Are you really telling me that Vernon Dursley is indistinguishable from Hagrid, when they meet for the first time?

The simple fact of the matter is that Bloom is a tryhard fool who doesn't know what he's talking about. There are dozens examples of him trying to slander a series for children just to make himself look more sophisticated, regardless of how little sense his actual complaints make.

It's not a perfect series, to be sure, but to outright dismiss it for such petty reasons? Absolutely laughable.

>> No.6577782

>>6577761
>Are you really telling me that Vernon Dursley is indistinguishable from Hagrid

I can distinguish my diarrhea from my vomit, so what? Neither character is remotely interesting.

>> No.6577844

>>6575220
they probably should have wrapped it up by the 4th book

>> No.6577852

>>6575305
Magical realism is shit, so my opinion wouldn't change.

>> No.6577857

Books 4-7 are too long.

>> No.6577906

>>6575220
I wasn't even that big on them when I was a kid. It's overrated shite all across the board.

>> No.6577916

>>6575220
I mean, sure.
I think that the reason Harry Potter gets away with it, for me, is that at least the first books are fairy tales, and you can get away with whatever shit you like as long as its in a fairy tale and is sufficiently entertaining and *magical*, I don't see anyone complaining about how much of a Gary Stu Prince Charming is.
But then someone got the notion that YA was actually a serious literary medium, and we have books like "Hunger Games" and "Eragon" grinding all the magic into the gritty dirt to be EDGY and SERIOUS and TOTALLY REAL BOOKS MOM GO AWAY.
They're cliche, they're trite, but they're still very entertaining fairy tales, and I think that is a thing worthy of praise.

>> No.6577917

>>6575220
1-2 Comfy Entry Tier
3 God Tier
4- Last Hurrah Tier
5-7- Oh shit ninja what you doin'

>> No.6578089

>my father got me Great Expectations when I was in 7 or 8?
>this is good, read this
>hp comes along
>this is ok, read the book I gave you first
I did the opposite...
I still feel bad to this day tbh

>> No.6578100

>>6578089
he had great expectations for you anon

>> No.6578104

>>6575305
If you are a fag and you're not you, are you still a fag?
Yes you are.

>> No.6578122

>>6578100
I know, I know... it could've been truly Great, but now it's just OK and I shitpost on /lit/

>> No.6578167

>>6578089

> tfw dad threw actually good lit at me instead of the trash I wanted

> read both anyways, but always read the stuff he handed me (mostly Wells, who I grew to love by 4th grade, and tons of war history books which I loved over time)

Though I'm the one giving recs to him now. Last recs he gave me was a Michener when I was in 8th/9th grade and 1984 when I was in either 7th or 8th. Enjoyed both then, probably would only enjoy Michener now, and more as a pulpy thing more than anything.

What do you guys think of Michener by the way? I actually have pretty fond memories of Chesapeake and Mexico

>> No.6578950

>>6575256
Who the fuck told Bloom Stone was the best? Prisoner or Goblet is.