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Privateer · Joined: 31 Aug 2005 Location: Easy Street.

Well, the article writer talks a lot about holes in the plot, character inconsistencies and inexplicable behaviour but doesn't give any examples so I'm not going to bother arguing against that.

She makes the point that Rowling's magic doesn't seem to work like either athletic achievement or academic achievement, but she forgets there are other analogues. "Potions" is an obvious analogue for chemistry, in which both experience and close attention to details like timing and measuring are necessary for success. Other magical 'subjects' are also obvious equivalents to real academic subjects, like 'Arithmancy'. However, the magic she's talking about is mainly spoken spells and these seem to involve acquiring skills loosely analogous to language learning: you need to practice the right gesture, pronunciation, and mental focus for each spell to 'acquire' it, rather than just say it.

It does seem ridiculous to have wizards who are 'poor' in any real sense, but then again you can justify it by saying the magician economy works the same as our economy, i.e. by exchange of (magical) goods and services. She (the writer) doesn't seem to take into account the variety of different types of magic and levels of skill. Not all magicians can make wands, for example: so you have a wand shop. Not all magicians are skilled enough or inclined to be 'Aurors' so those that are receive a salary. There are also examples of wizards who choose to ignore the conventions of wizarding society and its economy so it's perfectly possible to be a contented eccentric. In other words, it's not so much a survival imperative for wizards to make money as that they wish to gain a place in society: much like ordinary people do.

For me the most ridiculous thing of all in Rowling's work is the idea that people, like the Dursleys and other 'Muggles', would somehow see magic as not 'respectable' and deny it to themselves. But the writer doesn't mention that.

Now I feel like a geek for writing this but damnit if 'respectable' journalists can sound off about Harry Potter so can I!

Big_Bird · Posted: Sat Jul 21, 2007 3:54 am Post subject:

Geeks are cool. Cool

Kuros · Joined: 27 Apr 2004

Its obvious Rowling never sat down and thought about the mechanics of magic in her world, and that detracts from it quite a bit.

I would extend the same criticism to Star Wars, as well. The force, as presented, is very amorphous and esoteric. I hate, I absolutely hate, whenever Yoda or someone says, 'The force is within you.' Its absolutely decadent. Luke does have to work for his powers a little at least, whereas in Harry Potter there's no evidence of any struggle at all.

Compare this to Batman Begins, in which the hero does not have any superpowers. Bruce Wayne tries to pull off the whole, 'but I'm a good person on the inside,' and the female lead replies pricelessly, 'good people are defined by what they do.' It's about struggle, right conduct, and action.

The lack of mechanics in the magic and the utter 'wishfulness' of it is harmful to our children. It reinforces the decadence and complacency of the worst aspects of our culture. And its sloppy writing.

kotakji · Joined: 23 Oct 2006

As an avid fantasy/sci-fi reader myself, I agree a lot with what the author said. I've always been annoyed when a portrayed 'universe' lacks any sense of coherent physics. Sure magic or advanced technology can be integrated into the physics of that universe, but it should obey some rules of consistency. Sure, as the author mentioned, the rules of physics may be poorly understood by their practitioners, leading to a sense of unexpectedness or randomness, but the world should work in a semi-logical fashion.

The issue that turned me off about the Harry Potter series is that while hes the hero of the story, he really doesn't deserve much credit. Basically his whole life is driven by luck or someone else's hard work. Hes hero worshiped because of a feat of hereditary outside his own control, most all hard work is done for him by his coterie of followers, and half of his magical prowess comes in the form of artifacts granted to him out of the blue. Dues ex machina is great in small doses, but it shouldn't be intruding at every step.

The writer is correct in that some authors write themselves into corners with their details. I have been recently re-reading the 'dragon-prince' series by Melanie Rawn which I had read as a child. I've been having trouble getting into it because of some of the glaring inconsistencies in the world. (IE X Kingdom somehow only has some 200 able bodied men, yet an unworking nobility equal in size). Now I am not one to nitpick over tiny details like you sometimes see among fantasy buffs, but I do expect a world to be somewhat plausible given the extra extenuating circumstances such as magic laid down by the author.

The Bobster · Joined: 15 Jan 2003

Kuros · Joined: 27 Apr 2004

jkelly80 · Joined: 13 Jun 2007 Location: you boys like mexico?

As a fantasy geek myself, I'd like to recommend George RR Martin and his Song of Ice and Fire series. It's more political than magical, but as realistic as any fantasy I've ever read.

mumblebee · Joined: 26 Jun 2004 Location: Andong

People love Harry Potter because it is an engaging read, not because it is amazing children's literature. It is a real pot-boiler series, completely plot-driven. It's strengths are charm, wit, and whimsy, rather than deep character development etc. Actually, it's most wonderful strength is that kids all over the place are turning the pages on a 700+ page tome, that has rather sophisticated vocabulary (although this may be less so now with so many of the books turned into movies.)

Big_Bird · Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2007 6:04 am Post subject:

Kuros · Joined: 27 Apr 2004

What a great article.

Blockhead confidence · Joined: 02 Apr 2008

Personally I found Rowling to lack negative capability

daskalos · Joined: 19 May 2006 Location: The Road to Ithaca

Oh, just f-ing stop it. It's called escapist fantasy, and it was intended for children, not for idiotic adults to parse its every plot device. If JKR has gotten even one more child interested in the magical possibilities to be found in fiction, brava, bravissima.

"Oh my god, her magical world doesn't comply with the laws of suppy and demand, what a horrible person she is, what a wreck her books are."

Sweet Jesus, give it a rest, you wankers. Next thing you'll tell me is that Encyclopedia Brown was a Down's Syndrome child, that Harriet the Spy was just a nosy bitch, that Charlie's chocolate factory tour couldn't, just couldn't have happened.

Oh stuff it, all of you. Harry Potter was great fun, and that's all reading needs to be when you're the intended audience of children's books.

Christ in heaven, spare me.

(Dear Kuros, sorry if my opinion here doesn't sound original enough for you, but I promise, if this all seems to be banal, boring twaddle, I didn't consult any other source for it - I thought of this wan crap all by myself. Which, being the case, is no doubt all the more damning. Still, I'm trying not to feel devastated, and doing pretty well at it, actually, especially after reading this thread.

Das.

P.S. Nothing personally against you, I just can't quite credit some of your opinions as having been spoken by any reasonable person.

P.P.S. Some other opinions of yours, to be quite honest, I do agree with completely, even if I don't find each of them to spring from a completely fresh and original source, but then I get that there is indeed nothing new under the sun.)

Kuros · Joined: 27 Apr 2004

Thunndarr · Joined: 30 Sep 2003

I think it would be more accurate to say that you simply don't care for the book than that it is overrated. This is a personal pet peeve of mine. Obviously everyone has a personal preference for certain things over certain other things, that's pretty much a given. However, in the interest of being rational, it behooves one to simply acknowledge that there are things that we can logically say are actually good, despite the fact that one, personally, may not care for them.

(I generally don't like Coen brothers movies. However, several people whom I know to have good taste, and people in general seem to find them enjoyable, from which I conclude that my dissenting opinion is not the norm. I also don't like tomatoes. I don't find them to be overrated.)

In this case, with sales figures of over 400 million copies sold for the series, I don't see how you can make a serious case that the books are overrated. You would have to argue that people are buying the books not because they like them, but because of some other reason (peer pressure, marketing, etc.)

Of course, one would then have to go back to the beginning of the Harry Potter phenomenon and see that it was not a heavily marketed book in the beginning and in fact had a very small first printing. What then led to its success? The fact that people liked it and bought it, which pretty much precludes it from being overrated.

From which I conclude that you simply don't like the book.