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Underground > Books, Criticism & Writing >

My anti-Harry Potter rant

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Tryphena Absent

12:43 / 29.06.03

And what's not intelligent about wanting to be entertained. Perhaps bio we're just slightly more emotionally healthy than you because we're not getting uppity about the forms of entertainment we choose or the fact that ohmygod we actually enjoy books written for children (and hell lets not get in to Earthsea, Susan Cooper, DWJ, Chalet School and of course the it's Bliss books but stick only to HP because none of us would ever read children's books that weren't haunted by constant media coverage!).

Mister Six, whom all the girls

14:22 / 29.06.03

Jeanette Winterson children's books.

I'm calling her agent.

We'll make millions.

14:39 / 29.06.03

Perhaps bio we're just slightly more emotionally healthy than you because we're not getting uppity about the forms of entertainment we choose or the fact that ohmygod we actually enjoy books written for children

Jesus. I read comics, how uppity can I be? My point is "adults that don't like these books should shut the fuck up because they aren't written for you." Thats all.

16:13 / 30.06.03

if you dislike children's books and prefer not to read them then obviously HP is not going to be for you.

Have to say here that the reason the HP books aren't for me is because I like children's books: I know the source material Rowling is using, I know the tradition she's working in, I know how good, thoughtful, challenging, honest and exciting children's books can be, and I get angry with the flaws in Rowling's universe. Particularly the adult/children relationships. But I hear that she actually tackles the way all the adults are trying to force Harry to become his dead father in Phoenix, so I won't get back into this thread till I've read it (just come back from a glorious weekend with three Potterslashers - Predatrix, Fuchsia and Lexin - which was like the "comfort" in advance for the "hurt" of reading, and am fully prepared to dive into the joys of a book premised on Harry having to spend every evening alone in the dungeon with Snape).

My anti-Harry Potter rant hasn't changed a great deal in its essence from the rant on the webzine on this site, by the way, although it has become rather more vitriolic and I've added to my reasons to hate Dumbledore this paraphrase of his arguments at the end of the third book:

The guardian chosen for you by your dead parents, who has been wrongly imprisoned and tortured for 13 years, is to be executed tonight. I cannot move against the authorities, so I want you to break the law and risk your life in rescuing him. What? Yes, I am the most powerful wizard in the world - not to mention your headmaster - and you are a 13-year-old boy, but I really do feel you should be the one to do this. Because you owe it to your dead parents. Did I mention you're only at this school and not living with your abusive relatives on my personal say-so, since you should technically have been expelled? No pressure, Harry.

I think I'd rather have Chrestomanci. Even if he did box Cat's ears once.

17:55 / 30.06.03

Imagine you're responsible for promoting the Harry Potter books. How would you sell the idea to the public at large?

i haven't read any of the HP books myself, but i'd have to say that i'd be damn impressed if anyone on this board or anyone else could come up with a better way to sell these books than whatever's delivering them frothing crowds lining up at midnight to get the book the moment it comes out.

19:48 / 30.06.03

I actually really like these books. I think they're pretty darn well-written - great, page-turning, clever, fun stuff for children AND adults. I don't know what you all hate so much about 'em, but everyone's entitled to their opinion.

09:40 / 01.07.03

I can't believe this thread's reached a second page before I've noticed it and decided to stick the boot in.

first thing - I have no interest in intelligently debating this matter with others, because I know I'd lose. The very mention of Potter reduces me to a red-faced, drooling bigot.

Now where to begin?

Now hold on a minute. I'm all for uninhibited Potter bashing, which as near as i can tell is twee, sterile enlgish schoolboy fantasy

That'll do nicely. The ultimate expression a particularly insipid, bland, unthreatening, retrogressive English middle-class mindset - if these books were a newspaper they'd be the Sunday Express or something.

The instantly stereotyped characters and joyless good vs. evil storylines have all the originality of cheapo cable TV cartoon.

And the whole thing seems to consists almost entirely of watered down steals from much better childrens/fantasy books..

I mean, am I the only one who thinks classic childrens stories (ones that adults consider worthy of their attention anyway) should be a bit dark, a bit eccentric, with weird psychological depths to be investigated? As opposed to just a parade of safe middle-England conceits and recycled Disney?

I'm talking Moomins, I'm talking 'Wind in the Willows', 'Dark is Rising', 'Alice in Wonderland', 'Watership Down', 'the Owl Service', the Tripods.. c'mon! That's a completely different level to this Harry Potter nonsense..

Have I read it? no, of course I haven't, I've got better things to read. I'm being a bigot here, shut up, I hate you! I'm fed up with having to give civil answers to "so, have you read the new Harry Potter book?". No, sorry, I still prefer reading those hard grown-up books, but I'm sure the next few blitzkrieg promotional campaigns will dim my reistance.

10:10 / 01.07.03

Ahh, fark off to the Untamed Hate and Anger thread, dagnabbit. :P

13:03 / 01.07.03

And for the record, we all know the Harry Potter books ain't amazing, high-level literature -- J. K. Rowling ain't no Tolkien and I'm sure she knows that and isn't trying to be. But they do succeed, in my opinion, as really damn fun, pretty intelligent yarns for this kind of page-turning fantasy story. The Harry books are always just a little more clever than you would expect. Unless you're expecting T.S. White's THE ONCE AND FUTURE KING, in which case you're bound to be disappointed. They ain't Alan Moore, but they are lots of fun.

13:39 / 01.07.03

I admit I have problems with massively distributed products in general, but fuck, people seems to need them. And today's kids will much likely regard Harry Potter in the future just as most of us regard the first Star Wars film.

I think of Harry Potter as being sort of Occultism As A Commodity. I discovered my mother in law was reading the first book, two years ago. I couldn't reach the third page without an unsormountable effort from my part. Literally, my mind had not collected anything about whatever was being told. It was for me worse than reading a food delivery flyer, it just didn't stick to my mind in any form or aspect.

The Natural Way

10:25 / 03.07.03

I mean, am I the only one who thinks classic childrens stories (ones that adults consider worthy of their attention anyway) should be a bit dark

There definitely ARE dark moments in Potter. The description of a town that's been magically *bombed* (and whose inhabitants are basically stumbling around with shell-shock) in '.....Azkhaban' is very nasty indeed. Made me feel a bit sick, actually.

10:52 / 03.07.03

Have to agree with Runce - there are some extremely dark moments in the Potter books. Such as the Dolores Umbridge Punishment Pen in OotP... and what makes them even darker is that even the 'good guys' - Dumbledore, McGonagall - are prepared to let children and teenagers risk themselves all the time. Even Quidditch is a very dangerous game. I dunno - I have mixed feelings about this - but I think it's disturbing that even the adult figures in the books are complicit in HP's reckless behaviour.

We're The Great Old Ones Now

11:48 / 03.07.03

The very mention of Potter reduces me to a red-faced, drooling bigot.

And mysteriously, you're proud of it.

The instantly stereotyped characters and joyless good vs. evil storylines have all the originality of cheapo cable TV cartoon.

I've noted elsewhere that Rowling's initial characterisations are giving way to rather more nuanced renderings. One thing I find interesting is that she's growing up as a writer, and she's taking her first work and re-perceiving it as she does so: she's starting to poke holes in her own earlier simplicity.

I mean, am I the only one who thinks classic childrens stories (ones that adults consider worthy of their attention anyway) should be a bit dark, a bit eccentric, with weird psychological depths to be investigated?

Winnie the Pooh. The Hobbit. Arabel's Raven. Karlson on the Roof. Emil and the Detectives.

Sure, you've got your James and the Giant Peach, Northern Lights, and Skellig, but dark doesn't spell quality and quality doesn't require darkness. It's always interesting to me that we accept 'gritty' as truer than 'happy'. The recent dispute over Babyfather (2) is an interesting case in point.

As opposed to just a parade of safe middle-England conceits and recycled Disney?

Show me a Disney story in which a child is forced to torture themselves repeatedly by cutting gouges in their own flesh. Umbridge's magic pen, which cuts the message written ('I must not tell lies' - he's being punished for telling the truth) into Harry's hand and later his forehead, is as dark a concept as I've seen anywhere recently.

Have I read it? no, of course I haven't, I've got better things to read.

Like the Sunday Express, apparently.

Tryphena Absent

14:03 / 03.07.03

'Dark is Rising' c'mon! That's a completely different level to this Harry Potter nonsense..

I read Greenwitch a couple of days ago and I was shocked at how rushed it is. The bond between the kids seems half-arsed because the books are so short. I don't think it is at a completely different level to HP, I just think it's older, old fashioned, and the style of writing is very different.

14:15 / 03.07.03

I think that might be partly because the bond between the Drews and Will isn't that strong anyway - certainly Simon continues to be suspicious of him through into Silver on the Tree, doesn't he?

I always think of Susan Cooper as one of the writers (along with Alan Garner and some others I've temporarily forgotten) who read The White Goddess during the Fifties and were hugely influenced by it. And you're right, it is older and the style is different to HP - it fits in more with Rosemary Sutcliff and early DWJ (Charmed Life, Eight Days of Luke).

The Grey King is the scariest, but I love The Dark is Rising best - reminds me, also, of The Box of Delights, but perhaps that's the Herne connexion.

We're The Great Old Ones Now

15:24 / 03.07.03

Yeah, I'd have to agree with Kit-Cat - Dark Is Rising was somehow definitive, and Grey King was very spooky. Although I have a soft spot for Greenwitch because I grew up in a big white house on the Cornish coast, which looks out over a stretch of water called the Tregiffian Lady.

I think though, that to say it's on a 'different level' from HP is a stretch. The storylines are a kind of Blyton remix, and the world is openly Arthurian/Christian/Fisher King. Will is apprenticed to Merlin to pave the way for Arthur/Bran, as Merlin was, in some versions of the myth, apprenticed to Gervaise or half a dozen others. There's also, frankly, not a lot of laughs in Susan Cooper's writing, and I'm always very grateful for a few of those. Not that I didn't love the Dark Is Rising series when I was a solemn twelve-year-old (I think - I'm a bit hazy about what I read when).

If you want to take Rowling to task, I'd say a comparison with Mary Stewart might serve better - Stewart's writing is more elegant, measured, and assured; but then the aim of the 'Crystal Cave' series - and her target audience - is different, and she was a rather different person from the Rowling who created Harry Potter.

I grow increasingly uneasy with the attacks on Rowling; the complaints about the quality of her prose - which has been improving book by book, and which was never worse than stilted, unlike much print journalism and many other published writers - and the idea that she draws on existing sources to a greater degree than other writers, all seem to be an attempt to squash anyone who has the temerity to be make large financial gains from creative work and be well-received by some of the critics. I'm also suspicious of any judgement which asserts that one need not consider the evidence. Quite a lot of people say as Riz did that they have better things to do than actually look at Rowling's books - especially those awful long ones she's been writing recently (which are, of course, the most developed). I get the sense of, not a conspiracy, but a tacit acceptance that Rowling, by making money and being praised, has become fair game for the best we can throw at her. It's the same idea which underlies the tabloid assumption that Rowling and her family are a legitimate target for snooping.

15:31 / 03.07.03

Well this point of mine..

I have no interest in intelligently debating this matter with others, because I know I'd lose.

..still stands.

We're The Great Old Ones Now

15:53 / 03.07.03

Well, that's reassuring. Always nice to find your friends unafraid to stand by their prejudices.

You know, it's not like saying you're not a complete human being unless you've read these books. I'm not suggesting that they're important beyond the obvious fact that lots of children are reading them, and in no way will they change your life. They are not transformative or educational (except maybe in conveying a kind of centrist, tolerant, conscience-driven approach to morality).

What I don't understand - and am increasingly nervous of - is the vast upwelling of poorly-framed and sometimes snobbish denunciations ex cathedra. What is the sin?

Whisky Priestess

16:27 / 03.07.03

DEVA: "I think I'd rather have Chrestomanci. Even if he did box Cat's ears once."

I hear ya, and how. Loved those books as a kid. Intelligent, "grown-up" children's authors are awfully thin on the ground. Interesting that the biggest publishing phenomenon of the last few years (since Terry Pratchett in fact .. hmmm) has not smartened up what children read, but in effect dumbed down what adults read. It's the end of the world, fings ain't wot they used to be, etc. etc. A fiver says that JKR will be a Dame of the British Empire before her 50th, mind.

Having said all the above I feel I should explain myself. I don't and hopefully never will read HP for two reasons

1) Knowing my own propensity to become addicted to the most laughable trash (A-Team, etc.) I'm not sure I could afford a full-blown HP habit

2) If I read them and really loved pretty much everything about them, as I do with (say) Mervyn Peake - if they turned out to be the very books I've been wanting to write all my life, and bearing in mind that they're successful and amazingly lucrative as well, I think I might actually die of envy.

NB - what does boxing someone's ears actually consist of?

We're The Great Old Ones Now

17:20 / 03.07.03

A closed fist applied to both ears at once, or even a cupped palm. The result is disorientation and discomfort, or ultimately burst eardrums. It's one of those little punishments. You know, for kids.

ONLY NICE THINGS

19:12 / 03.07.03

I grow increasingly uneasy with the attacks on Rowling; the complaints about the quality of her prose - which has been improving book by book, and which was never worse than stilted, unlike much print journalism and many other published writers - and the idea that she draws on existing sources to a greater degree than other writers, all seem to be an attempt to squash anyone who has the temerity to be make large financial gains from creative work and be well-received by some of the critics.

Just as I grow uneasy with the implication that a critical opinion different to one's own can be written off by the aspersion that it is motivated by envy.

Like so many Harry Potter threads, this seems to be turning into a discussion of people who like or do not like Harry Potter books, rather than actual Harry Potter books. I have yet to decide whether this is because HP defies literary criticism, or more credibly because the broad sweep of readers and opponents *denies* it.

The Knights Templar Boogie Machine

21:47 / 03.07.03

Hmmm, apparently in the next harry potter book he meets austin osman spare....In the next one after that its hogwarts vs the 93 current, and the series ends with harry buying boleskine house and forming his own school....

La de da,
Harry Potter:- can be fun in the fact that is sometimes a charlatan who can be the initatior on the occult path in spurring interest, but over trivialising magick for children is obviously a stupid thing...I think...

We're The Great Old Ones Now

21:50 / 03.07.03

Just as I grow uneasy with the implication that a critical opinion different to one's own can be written off by the aspersion that it is motivated by envy.

I have yet to see a fully-expressed critical negative opinion of the books. I have seen and heard a large number of un-examined rants about mass marketing and 'low quality', often followed as Rizla's is by "of course I haven't read them, and I'm not going to". As if reading the thing might sully the clear mind.

And I genuinely don't write these rants - or actual criticisms - off to 'envy'. I'm looking at something a little more complex than that.

I am, however, bemused at times by the literary/critical world's reaction to works which I would consider to possess considerable good qualities - and I'd happily admit to some low tastes, but I'm not a bloody idiot - which somehow rule themselves out of being 'proper' novels. One complaint often raised is that a book is 'genre' and therefore 'not literary'. I was at a party recently with a woman who explained that she wrote 'literary fiction' - as opposed to what?

21:52 / 03.07.03

I wouldn't say she trivialises it (and in any case, the magic she writes about has very little in common with what I can gather about occult magick such as that people here practise). The unforgivable curses, Dementors, Azkaban etc. - this is not trivialising it. Other aspects of the Potterverse such as the sweets, moving pictures, Hogwarts dinner etc. may be entertaining, but of course that is not the same thing as trivialising.

08:11 / 04.07.03

I have yet to see a fully-expressed critical negative opinion of the books.

When me and my gf get round to reading Order, we're going to write a full-length critical article on the lot, expanding on some of the ideas in my webzine article and adding some more:* I'll mail you an offprint,** Nick.

*which might explain why I'm too lazy to post much here about it: feels too much like work.

**unfortunately this will be in, like, 2005 knowing the rate of journal publishing.

[PS and further threadrot: for the record, Chrestomanci boxes Cat's ears one at a time, which I think lessens the risk of a burst eardrum.]

Whisky Priestess

09:24 / 04.07.03

Haus: "Like so many Harry Potter threads, this seems to be turning into a discussion of people who like or do not like Harry Potter books, rather than actuall Harry Potter books. I have yet to decide whether this is because HP defies literary criticism, or more credibly because the broad sweep of readers and opponents *denies* it."*

I think it's probably because most of the people who have an HP allergy are so turned off by what they (cannot help but) know about the books and the enormous hype surrounding them that they haven't actually read any of them, (and why indeed ought they to spend £16.99 on a book they're pretty sure they're going to hate?) However, this ignorance renders them unfit to provide literary criticism.

I think another real reason I can't be bothered with Harry Potter is that life, and my reading time in particular, is too short. If I'm going to read light fiction I'll read something I know I'll enjoy, like trashy sci-fi. Not better, just different ...

* Haus, can you explain that last bit? I'm not sure what you mean.

10:33 / 04.07.03

I think it's probably because most of the people who have an HP allergy are so turned off by what they (cannot help but) know about the books and the enormous hype surrounding them that they haven't actually read any of them, (and why indeed ought they to spend £16.99 on a book they're pretty sure they're going to hate?) However, this ignorance renders them unfit to provide literary criticism.

That's a very good point.

Personally, I'm not necessarily going to be put off by a book (or anything else for that matter) being over-hyped. Neither am I going to disregard it because it's labelled as children's fiction. But none of the hype surrounding HP has drawn me in so it's intriguing to hear exactly what it is that does draw other people in.

11:23 / 04.07.03

I think somehow the elements that make up the Potter books/films just combine in some indefinable way that completely infuriates me. In the same way that Pratchett infuriates Haus, possibly.

We're The Great Old Ones Now

20:04 / 04.07.03

I loathe Pinter. I don't go around claiming he can't write. I find China Mieville's work unreadable, but I know that's my problem.

The resistable rise of Reidcourchie

14:02 / 05.07.03

Thanks to this thread I have to use the phrase "I think I'm more emotionally healthy than you." (Yes I'm badly paraphrasing here.) and the word "bingohead" as quickly as possible.

I have problems perceiving practioners of magic as a put upon minority in the context of the represantation magic in the Harry Potter books. I noticed in the Matrix thread many people scoffed when a link was provided to an article citing a dermatologist who claimed that the Chinese Ghost Twins where unfairly misrepresenting albinos (Chinese Ghosts where almost conspicuous in their lack of comment on the matter). I'm more tempted not to take complaints of this nature seriously.

Deva, I'm also intrigued by the idea that you somehow have to force yourself to read a book you know you're going to dislike. Presumably this is somehow involved with your job otherwise it smacks of Mary Whitehousism.

And whomever pointed out that Rowling wasn't Tolkein, you're absolutly right. Rowling can do elementary characterisation, can get the point, can structure a story and whilst you could level accusations of racial exclusion (despite the token attempts she makes) isn't blatently racist. Not should she be exhumed and have her corpse mutilated for crimes against the fanatsy genre.

Anyway that's enough of me missing the point.

21:01 / 06.07.03

While this responds mostly to the stuff at the begining of the thread...

Yes, while the Potter books don't teach children a realistic view of magic, Rowling has managed (probably on accident) to illustrate one of the points that most often tends to be misunderstood about magic; the difference between "white" and "black" magic. Whenever you see Potter and the gang battling baddies (especially in the latest book) both sides are using the same spells. There are no "special spells for evil bad people eeeeew!". And the Defense against the Dark Arts classes, more than anything, teach the kiddies to fight the people who want to hurt them.

And as for avoiding things because they're read by the masses... I read the first Potter book before they became popular in the states. I thought it was an engaging piece of fantasy, enjoyed it, and wished I were younger, so I could enjoy it more. Then, more and more people began to read them, and by the time the second book came out I was completely turned off the series by how popular they had become. Then, about a year-and-a-half ago, I realized that it was stupid not to read something just because other people like it. I had stifled my own preference just to appear more "enlightened". Which is just as ridiculous as jumping on the bandwagon and reading something because everyone else is. Yeah, I know this point has been made, but this part of the discussion has really struck home with me. Don't read because of the hype, and don't read in spite of the hype. Just read, because they're good books.

ONLY NICE THINGS

21:45 / 06.07.03

In the same way that Pratchett infuriates Haus, possibly.

Nah. I've read perhaps a dozen Pratchett books, maybe more. Much of the actual word-by-word writing is not bad, in a workmanlike sort of a way. But I could tell you precisely and with a fair degree of accuracy what annoys me about Pratchett, in a perfectly definable way. I think they're different processes.

Whisky P - I mean that there is simply no way to get a universally comprehensible critical language going with which to look at Harry Potter without alienating or ignoring some of the correspondents, since those correspondents may or may not have read the books, may be children, may be adults, may read a lot, may only read Harry Potter books - so, whereas it is almost impossible to find a universally comprehensible way to discuss the written object, the more general and familiar examination of who is and is not afflicted by a personal failing, and why, is both a more achievable and a more user-friendly process.

Jack The Bodiless

18:45 / 07.07.03

Well, I asked a question... fair enough if the only real answer available is "because they're fun." It's why I read Leslie Charteris, after all, so I guess I can't grumble...

However, without meaning to start another bitch-fest, I find it a little rich to say that and then to snark at people for putting out under-examined negative opinions about Potter. And I'd also like to point out that the only reason I asked the question ("so why do you likethem, then?") was because I wanted to know the answer, not because I wanted to pick apart the answer, or because I thought it was unanswerable or something. Can't stand the books myself, think they're utter drivel, in the worst and most patronising way, but then I'm not really the target audience, so, you know, live and let live. I'm trying to be a nice nailbunny these days...

ONLY NICE THINGS

20:39 / 07.07.03

A very fair point. Because they're fun is basically a value judgement along the lines of "because I like them, and as such I think you may like them too". It's fine as far as it goes, but it's inexact.

Personally, I think Harry Potter books have many, many flaws. Like Deva, I see reading them as more of a duty than a pleasure. And yet I do not find them unenjoyable, just less enjoyable than more enjopyable books, in the same or different genres.

So, on "why should I read Harry Potter?". My suggestions might be:

1) It won't cost you anything. The first five books will be in public libraries by now.

2) It won't take long. "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" takes about about two hours to read. You can comfortably do it in an evening.

3) It is anthropologically interesting. You can see what the fuss is about, and start to form opinions on why it might be so successful as a series.

4) Some of the ideas aren't bad, and there are occasionally some nice bits of characterisation.

5) You'll have something to talk about with your nieces.

I realise that only one fo those is about it's qualities as a piece of writing, but if you are making a list of all the books you will like best in the world and working down it, I have no idea whether you would reach Potter before you die.

If you have read some and don't like it, then it seems wise not to read more, at least not for reasons of literary enjoyment, and reasonable to criticise it. If you have read some and liked it, the obverse applies.

.

20:59 / 07.07.03

Two reasons not to read Harry Potter:

1) It's hugely unoriginal (even for a children's book). It might be fun, whatever, but fun doesn't have to be mutually exclusive with original, thought provoking or challenging.

2) It's a big book, well five big books. Imagine the money and time you could have spent on something more worthwhile.

So as a fan of WWE or lego or whatever, I'm not one to criticise pointless fun fluffy diversions. But it's not as simple as that. I think the HP phenomenon has parallels in the film industry- HP is the Charlies Angels of the book world. Only there's less money in the book world that the film one, so while Charlies Angels and Donnie Darko exist together, I can't help feeling that for every copy of HP bought by an adult there's one less Murakami/ Zadie Smith/ Houellebecq/ whatever bought. *

It's like unchallenging film/ music/ books in general- there's nothing offensive in the products themselves, it's just the fact that they absorb precious cultural bandwidth.

* OK, actually there's probably one less Terry Pratchett or "chick-lit" book bought, but I'm sure you get the point.

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