I Admit it. I'm a Fanatic

We started reading Harry Potter just before the first movie came out. Cameron was 6, easily able to handle the reading (we did read together) although (in retrospect) perhaps a bit young for that final scene in the movie between young HP and Professor Quirrel). We took to it right away and have loved every minute of reading and watching Harry. I think one of the appealing things for Cameron is that the story is non-stop action and humor. As the books have progressed to include much darker themes and some adolescent "snogging" they do become more difficult for the younger set. I think Cameron rereads them so often because he picks up on new insights each time.


For me, it's been such a great experience to share with Cameron. We have read and discussed all sorts of theories and possible endings, especially in this last buildup. They are an easy read for adults but not simple in their themes. There are no "good" and "bad" characters. People are complex and flawed, even the hero. There's a level of complexity in the situations the characters face, yet there's always an undergirding spot-on understanding of teenagers, too. Anyone who loves reading, and especially loves reading with their kids, knows exactly when an author succeeds in perfectly balancing the level of writing for a child and the sophistication required for adults. I think there are many books that fit that category. For me, these have been the best.

Then I read the "infamous" New York Times review--infamous because they posted the review 2 days before the book came out, causing a huge uproar about spoilers. Well, I read it and it's been great--just enough to pique our interest while we wait for the book. I thought the article was terrific in the description of the world and the characters Rowling created, a world that is fantastical but absolutely real, perfectly adolescent and terribly adult. I'm posting parts of it here, with NO SPOILERS--I took any possibility of those out.


J. K. Rowling’s monumental, spellbinding epic, 10 years in the making, is deeply rooted in traditional literature and Hollywood sagas — from the Greek myths to Dickens and Tolkien to “Star Wars.

From his first days at Hogwarts, the young, green-eyed boy bore the burden of his destiny as a leader, coping with the expectations and duties of his role, and in this volume he is clearly more Henry V than Prince Hal, more King Arthur than young Wart: high-spirited war games of Quidditch have given way to real war, and Harry often wishes he were not the de facto leader of the Resistance movement, shouldering terrifying responsibilities, but an ordinary teenage boy — free to romance Ginny Weasley and hang out with his friends.

Harry’s journey will propel him forward to a final showdown with his arch enemy, and also send him backward into the past… At the same time, he will be forced to ponder the equation between fraternity and independence, free will and fate, and to come to terms with his own frailties and those of others. Indeed, ambiguities proliferate throughout “The Deathly Hallows”: we are made to see that kindly Dumbledore, sinister Severus Snape and perhaps even the awful Muggle cousin Dudley Dursley may be more complicated than they initially seem, that all of them, like Harry, have hidden aspects to their personalities, and that choice — more than talent or predisposition — matters most of all.

It is Ms. Rowling’s achievement in this series that she manages to make Harry both a familiar adolescent — coping with the banal frustrations of school and dating — and an epic hero…This same magpie talent has enabled her to create a narrative that effortlessly mixes up allusions to Homer, Milton, Shakespeare and Kafka, with silly kid jokes about vomit-flavored candies, a narrative that fuses a plethora of genres (from the boarding-school novel to the detective story to the epic quest) into a story that could be Exhibit A in a Joseph Campbell survey of mythic archetypes.

In doing so, J. K. Rowling has created a world as fully detailed as L. Frank Baum’s Oz or J. R. R. Tolkien’s Middle Earth, a world so minutely imagined in terms of its history and rituals and rules that it qualifies as an alternate universe, which may be one reason the “Potter” books have spawned such a passionate following and such fervent exegesis. With this volume, the reader realizes that small incidents and asides in earlier installments (hidden among a huge number of red herrings) create a breadcrumb trail of clues to the plot, that Ms. Rowling has fitted together the jigsaw-puzzle pieces of this long undertaking with Dickensian ingenuity and ardor.

The world of Harry Potter is a place where the mundane and the marvelous, the ordinary and the surreal coexist. It’s a place where cars can fly and owls can deliver the mail, a place where paintings talk and a mirror reflects people’s innermost desires. It’s also a place utterly recognizable to readers, a place where death and the catastrophes of daily life are inevitable, and people’s lives are defined by love and loss and hope — the same way they are in our own mortal world.


Wow. Who wouldn't want to read a book like that? Dickensian, Shakespearean, Tolkien-esque. Not to mention a review that can accurately use words like "exegesis" and "bildingsroman." It perfectly describes what I think the appeal has been for these books for the past 10 years for so many people. I am so excited to get the book in my hands, yet disappointed that the ride is coming to an end.