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Some short history on my engagement with Harry Potter fandom:
+ Show Spoiler +I used to be somewhat engaged in Harry Potter fandom in 2005, shortly before the release of Harry Potter & The Half Blood Prince, which is the sixth book in the series. It rather disappointed me and being very young this affected me emotionally to the point that I withdrew from fandom. By 2007 and the release of the final installment, Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows I was already jaded and I merely shallowly read it to discover the resolution of the story firsthand, and I escaped noticing the downward turn in quality had continued.It's been seven years now and I recently felt I had sufficient distance from those emotionally turbulent days as a teenager to make an attempt at rereading them, to see how I would respond to the books as an adult. I also decided to try to catch up on fandom reception to see if it would complement my own perspective. And while before I would mostly read mainstream sites, I would now try to draw on more independent sources.
I don't think the wounds have completely healed. It turned out that J.K. Rowling really is, at times, a hack writer with an appalling vision for her story, and this translates into some rather disturbing messages that become apparent by the final volume, as well as the odd fact that the story ends with the world in a dystopian state that nobody inside the story, and least of all the writer, seems to notice. I was especially annoyed that this tarnishes the first few books in retrospect, while I had always managed to like those without reservation. Fortunately, several fandom resources I found managed to help me achieve, well, catharsis and work through my hostility and confusion, so that I think I now have a healthier and altogether more mature perspective on the series.
Why you should engage in fandom and some general thoughts on fandom:
+ Show Spoiler +(sorry, I couldn't resist complaining about TL in this spoilered paragraph, but you can skip it if you want to) + Show Spoiler +In my opinion discourse on TL site is often intellectually barren and we do rather take after sports communities. We worship teenagers that excel at performance , but it's a very rigid one as Starcraft is not something that rewards an idiosyncratic view of the source material; typically you're victorious if you can execute standard play perfectly and your personal interpretation of the game is a weakness that leads you astray from the true path of the universal macro style or whatnot. By focusing our community on competition instead of enjoyment of playing the game we cultivate this sort of sparse mentality that takes away from the broader potential of gaming.
Meanwhile many of our more popular casters and industry commentators actually have no broader education whatsoever, and this is painfully obvious whenever you hear, say, Destiny babble about feminism or linguistics after which he is acknowledged for his great insight. There are a lot of intelligent people in the community, and generally I don't want to commit to saying that education equals intelligence, but I think it's still fairly obvious that there is some anti-intellectualism present in the scene. I think it's a pity, because many people that are part of this community (or reddit) inadvertently shut themselves off from other perspectives simply by spending most of their time relating to the world through the filter of team liquid. And anti-intellectualism is already a dangerous facet of the 'geek culture' that the starcraft scene is part of, which is hostile to self-reflection and obsesses about the utility of STEM fields, and about the primal importance of competition and other such things.
Also note that our community is like 95% some variation on male science student, while relevant HP fandom is like 80% female liberal arts grads, and this is really noticeable if you see how these two different communities operate. And actually, I should say I find it sometimes refreshing to switch perspectives because you become more aware of how you implicitly frame all sorts of issues etc. I felt that the Harry Potter (or even WoW-)fandom allows you to be creative, first of all by giving you near unlimited freedom in interpreting the books (or your characters), indulging in whatever pet theories you might have, approached from whatever perspective you like to use (say, literary analysis, fan fiction, academic writing); and second of all by letting you actually create something, using inferences and speculation to actualize the 'Potterverse'. This is of course a natural process that happens when you read fiction as obviously you have to extrapolate from the source material to create a more fully realized world because the author can't possibly describe every detail. I will honestly say that this realization was very influential for my intellectual development back when I was a teenager: the thought that a work of fiction is a collection of words with no intrinsic meaning but what you as a reader assign to it. You can freely interpret the books and you're never 'wrong', however the power of your ideas is dependent on your imagination and the inner logic of your theories. That's not to say you can't read books without calling on fandom, but doing the latter does force you to more critically reflect on your interpretation and it can therefore be more stimulating. And of course it can get to the point that fandom becomes almost self-sustaining and together with the books starts to form a universe into itself with rather high addictive potential, so that one day you find yourself having "missing weeks" where you've been so absorbed in the escapism this can provide that you completely forgot about interacting with the real world. (but that can be fun as well) Somewhat related to this, I often read movie reviews after watching one because I'm personally a bit addicted to discovering additional perspectives on what I was watching, and also because I want to find someone who spells out what it was that intrigued or bothered me about the movie so that I can borrow and absorb the language. But many reviews really are kind of boring, they seem to think merely try to inform the reader if they should or should not watch the movie, as some kind of public service. Where's the engagement? I dislike reading those reviews because they are not taking part in a creative process of finding meaning in the movie, which interests me a lot more than having someone tell me whether it's good or bad. And at least I like to think I've transcended the idea of desperately wanting to know whether someone shares my preferences, another function that movie reviews serve even if one that tends to ignite flame wars. I imagine this is common: reading a review of a game you really enjoyed like, say, World of Warcraft or Starcraft and realizing that this review is beyond useless for you because as a frequent player and person involved with the community and such, you have reflected far more on the game than the reviewer who played it for 10 hours could possibly have. And I would always prefer an evaluation and critical assessment by a long-time player to a review by a newcomer. The latter simply didn't have the time yet to form a fuller understanding of the game.
A list of fandom resources that are interesting and / or relevant:
+ Show Spoiler +So, this is a collection of sites that I especially loved / found useful. Some of them are honestly rather wonderful, containing comprehensive and imaginative theorizing covering all aspects of the book to reveal a lot of hidden potential in the material, and I would recommend them to everyone that wants to learn more about the subtleties (real or imagined) of the plot. Red Hen PublicationsJOdel is our highest earthly authority on the potterverse and her compendium of theories is the most comprehensive attempt at making sense of the story. I think she is the originator of many theories and characterizations that later became accepted 'fanon' on sites like deathtocapslock and such. Make sure to check out both her Hallowed & Unhallowed section. And look at her collection of fan fiction publications by other authors, especially recommended are stories by Arsinoe de Blassenville. I actually don't really have any good collections of fan fiction since I never liked reading it in 2005, presumably because I was worried it would taint my enjoyment of the novels, but nowadays I find it more enjoyable. Supposedly fanfiction.net is where a lot of it is published but I've never thoroughly checked it out for myself. Elkins' Submissions to the Harry Potter for Grown-Ups Yahoo group:I thought this was a great series of posts taken from a Harry Potter discussion forum in 2002, sort of a giving you a peak into a different universe back when we could still think rather well of the series and there was palatable excitement about the continuation of the story line. Swythyv's livejournal:Swythyv is a totally mad theorist who I'm really in love with because of her delightful writing style. She has a collection of intriguing essays dating to 2005 or so hidden on her livejournal that you should check out. -- These are sporking communities which look at the series in retrospect with a critical and sometimes bitter point of view. I'm not going to fully recommend them, but certainly they can be very cathartic: Deadly Hollow, Half Blood Prince sporking, Death To Capslock. I liked the first one a lot, which vividly demonstrates that Deathly Hallows is a train wreck and that something went horribly wrong in writing it. Dan H at Ferret Brain has some good critical articles as well. Terri-testing's live journal:She's affiliated with the Death to Capslock community, but she also has some enjoyable Snape-centric fan fiction which typically doubles as criticism of the series.
If you have any questions about the Harry Potter story line then feel free to ask.
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What is the dystopian ending you're referring to?
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I can't say I had the same reaction to the series. I felt that the later books were overly moralizing and overly dramatic, but I wouldn't describe my experience reading them as traumatic.
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Urgh. Overall quality of the Harry Potter fanfics on fanfiction.net are disastrous and I never bother to check out specific communities or other stories posted among "stray" blog and websites. Although I sometimes check darklordpotter forums because I find their outlook on the former site uproarious (Fanfiction's Worst Summaries, anyone?).
In the past, I used to mine over hundreds of entries to find a diamond worth following (albeit those for the games mostly because I think the medium offers more opportunities), but now I don't even bother looking around for fanfics anymore unless I happen to stumble onto good recommendation for years, and I am satisfied with this situation.
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I personally grew too old by the time HP ended to care anymore. In the meantime I had gone on to read other stuff.
That being said, I have the same view as Hesmyrr on the matter. I believe you when you say that you can find litterary creativity and talent in fandom-derived works, Grumbels, but I've read my fair share of boys-love Twilight fanfics written by 12 year old girls to know that you're better off moving on and reading something else. I really can't believe that "80% of relevant HP fandom" are grads of anything :D. Or "relevant" is really restricted then. In the end, the fact that there is quality among the vast sea of mediocrity accounts for nothing more than statistics and luck.
Like I said, now I prefer moving on (onto other fictions, I mean) and go read something I'm sure I'll like rather than trying to desperately hang on to a fictional world I liked and in doing so, reading countless awful lines of fanfic and theories just to find the one interesting thing that'll keep my addiction sated.
I also don't know if you can compare the fandom of a game like Starcraft and that of a novel like HP.
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On August 23 2014 08:12 iamho wrote:
What is the dystopian ending you're referring to?
...where do I start.
+ Show Spoiler +This is a society that made a pact with soul sucking demons to enforce their judgement system. You have no real expectation of a fair trial. Aurors have the freedom to torture and kill suspects at their own discretion. You can be put in prison for any number of spurious reasons, after which you'll be subjected to the mind-destroying powers of the dementors. Even people that are still in custody and have not yet been tried will stay in the presence of the dementors. After Voldemort's death they are supposedly gone, but the fear-based society that empowered them is still unchanged. Harry is a prolific torturer in the series and comes to lead the Auror office in later years.
The Slytherin house was almost completely disenfranchised by this society. That's 25% of the population. I'm sure that 'mudbloods' are still treated with disdain. Another 25% of the population. Giants are still killing themselves in reservations. Werewolves are still disenfranchised. I'm sure Harry's break-in of Gringotts and betrayal of Griphook also did not improve wizarding relations with goblins. House elves are still enslaved, and Harry now even owns one.
That's not even mentioning the casual racism against muggles that barely a single person in canon speaks out against, that's because oddly enough JKR has internalized the wizards > muggles mindset not realizing her audience actually consists of the latter. Then there is the constant use of the mind destroying obliviate to control the muggle population, the casual way in which even the heroes of the series use it, the fact that Hermione destroys the minds of her parents to remove all memories of her.
Then there's the rampant bullying that goes on in Hogwarts, also there is a lack of expectation of physical and mental safety. Hogwarts largely decides your future career just because the wizarding world is so small and everyone knows everyone from school. The wizarding society is based on patronage networks that are formed in school. Then there is the fact that McGonagall was made head mistress and then her first decision is to completely disenfranchise the Slytherin house by removing them from the Voldemort fight, which honestly mirrors the decision to lock up the Japanese population during WWII in the USA. Even the sorting hat disagrees with the house system, yet it's continuing in the epilogue and the same prejudices about the houses and the same tribal mindsets continue. Furthermore, the actual education at Hogwarts is a joke. There is no real study of history, arts, philosophy, language, politics, mathematics, science etc. and people don't come out better informed. Harry and Hermione were both better people at the start of the first book then at the end of the last book.
Voldemort is dead, but all the conditions that allowed him to come to life are still there.
& also, JKR writes that George Weasley (one of our heroes) is very successful as a business man in later years, when one of the products he sells is a date-rape drug.
On August 23 2014 08:16 zf wrote:
I can't say I had the same reaction to the series. I felt that the later books were overly moralizing and overly dramatic, but I wouldn't describe my experience reading them as traumatic.
I was unhappy as a 14 year old and the books were my primary way to escape reality. I think I read Order of the Phoenix like 10 times, so I was shocked when I realized I hated the sixth book.
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1001 YEARS KESPAJAIL22272 Posts
On August 23 2014 16:45 Grumbels wrote:
I was unhappy as a 14 year old
i guess that explains your username
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On August 23 2014 10:30 ZenithM wrote:
I personally grew too old by the time HP ended to care anymore. In the meantime I had gone on to read other stuff.
That being said, I have the same view as Hesmyrr on the matter. I believe you when you say that you can find litterary creativity and talent in fandom-derived works, Grumbels, but I've read my fair share of boys-love Twilight fanfics written by 12 year old girls to know that you're better off moving on and reading something else. I really can't believe that "80% of relevant HP fandom" are grads of anything :D. Or "relevant" is really restricted then. In the end, the fact that there is quality among the vast sea of mediocrity accounts for nothing more than statistics and luck.
Like I said, now I prefer moving on (onto other fictions, I mean) and go read something I'm sure I'll like rather than trying to desperately hang on to a fictional world I liked and in doing so, reading countless awful lines of fanfic and theories just to find the one interesting thing that'll keep my addiction sated.
I also don't know if you can compare the fandom of a game like Starcraft and that of a novel like HP.
I'll admit the "relevant" is cheating and I did restrict myself to a connected set of blogs and sites by people I like, but then the point is that this is a completely valid way of approaching the fandom, while with Starcraft you're kinda stuck with TL & Reddit and then you notice that this community does lack diversity and is restrictive.
Yes, fan fiction undoubtedly is largely mediocre, but you don't have to read everything.  I think there are a lot of gems, and while I've only read like a dozen stories I did like most of them and it made me think that fan fiction has potential. If you want to try one, look at the ones I recommended in the OP.
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On August 23 2014 16:48 lichter wrote:i guess that explains your username
I don't like my TL name, can I change it? :o
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1001 YEARS KESPAJAIL22272 Posts
not when you have 5k posts. :[
unless you become a progamer or an important staff member :o
something to aspire to
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On August 23 2014 16:45 Grumbels wrote:
This is a society that made a pact with soul sucking demons to enforce their judgement system. . . .
If that's dystopian, wait 'til you see the real world.
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United States15275 Posts
On August 23 2014 16:45 Grumbels wrote:Show nested quote +On August 23 2014 08:12 iamho wrote:
What is the dystopian ending you're referring to? ...where do I start. + Show Spoiler +This is a society that made a pact with soul sucking demons to enforce their judgement system. You have no real expectation of a fair trial. Aurors have the freedom to torture and kill suspects at their own discretion. You can be put in prison for any number of spurious reasons, after which you'll be subjected to the mind-destroying powers of the dementors. Even people that are still in custody and have not yet been tried will stay in the presence of the dementors. After Voldemort's death they are supposedly gone, but the fear-based society that empowered them is still unchanged. Harry is a prolific torturer in the series and comes to lead the Auror office in later years.
The Slytherin house was almost completely disenfranchised by this society. That's 25% of the population. I'm sure that 'mudbloods' are still treated with disdain. Another 25% of the population. Giants are still killing themselves in reservations. Werewolves are still disenfranchised. I'm sure Harry's break-in of Gringotts and betrayal of Griphook also did not improve wizarding relations with goblins. House elves are still enslaved, and Harry now even owns one.
That's not even mentioning the casual racism against muggles that barely a single person in canon speaks out against, that's because oddly enough JKR has internalized the wizards > muggles mindset not realizing her audience actually consists of the latter. Then there is the constant use of the mind destroying obliviate to control the muggle population, the casual way in which even the heroes of the series use it, the fact that Hermione destroys the minds of her parents to remove all memories of her.
Then there's the rampant bullying that goes on in Hogwarts, also there is a lack of expectation of physical and mental safety. Hogwarts largely decides your future career just because the wizarding world is so small and everyone knows everyone from school. The wizarding society is based on patronage networks that are formed in school. Then there is the fact that McGonagall was made head mistress and then her first decision is to completely disenfranchise the Slytherin house by removing them from the Voldemort fight, which honestly mirrors the decision to lock up the Japanese population during WWII in the USA. Even the sorting hat disagrees with the house system, yet it's continuing in the epilogue and the same prejudices about the houses and the same tribal mindsets continue. Furthermore, the actual education at Hogwarts is a joke. There is no real study of history, arts, philosophy, language, politics, mathematics, science etc. and people don't come out better informed. Harry and Hermione were both better people at the start of the first book then at the end of the last book.
Voldemort is dead, but all the conditions that allowed him to come to life are still there.
& also, JKR writes that George Weasley (one of our heroes) is very successful as a business man in later years, when one of the products he sells is a date-rape drug.
Sounds like a typical day in America.
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On August 24 2014 03:09 CosmicSpiral wrote:Show nested quote +On August 23 2014 16:45 Grumbels wrote:On August 23 2014 08:12 iamho wrote:
What is the dystopian ending you're referring to? ...where do I start. + Show Spoiler +This is a society that made a pact with soul sucking demons to enforce their judgement system. You have no real expectation of a fair trial. Aurors have the freedom to torture and kill suspects at their own discretion. You can be put in prison for any number of spurious reasons, after which you'll be subjected to the mind-destroying powers of the dementors. Even people that are still in custody and have not yet been tried will stay in the presence of the dementors. After Voldemort's death they are supposedly gone, but the fear-based society that empowered them is still unchanged. Harry is a prolific torturer in the series and comes to lead the Auror office in later years.
The Slytherin house was almost completely disenfranchised by this society. That's 25% of the population. I'm sure that 'mudbloods' are still treated with disdain. Another 25% of the population. Giants are still killing themselves in reservations. Werewolves are still disenfranchised. I'm sure Harry's break-in of Gringotts and betrayal of Griphook also did not improve wizarding relations with goblins. House elves are still enslaved, and Harry now even owns one.
That's not even mentioning the casual racism against muggles that barely a single person in canon speaks out against, that's because oddly enough JKR has internalized the wizards > muggles mindset not realizing her audience actually consists of the latter. Then there is the constant use of the mind destroying obliviate to control the muggle population, the casual way in which even the heroes of the series use it, the fact that Hermione destroys the minds of her parents to remove all memories of her.
Then there's the rampant bullying that goes on in Hogwarts, also there is a lack of expectation of physical and mental safety. Hogwarts largely decides your future career just because the wizarding world is so small and everyone knows everyone from school. The wizarding society is based on patronage networks that are formed in school. Then there is the fact that McGonagall was made head mistress and then her first decision is to completely disenfranchise the Slytherin house by removing them from the Voldemort fight, which honestly mirrors the decision to lock up the Japanese population during WWII in the USA. Even the sorting hat disagrees with the house system, yet it's continuing in the epilogue and the same prejudices about the houses and the same tribal mindsets continue. Furthermore, the actual education at Hogwarts is a joke. There is no real study of history, arts, philosophy, language, politics, mathematics, science etc. and people don't come out better informed. Harry and Hermione were both better people at the start of the first book then at the end of the last book.
Voldemort is dead, but all the conditions that allowed him to come to life are still there.
& also, JKR writes that George Weasley (one of our heroes) is very successful as a business man in later years, when one of the products he sells is a date-rape drug. Sounds like a typical day in America.
I want someone to draw a picture of Alexander de Tocqueville in the Neil De Grasse Tyson pose with "watch out, we got a political science badass over here" as the caption.
1. I think the first couple of books are excellently written, especially in their general structure. You couldn't ask for a better series to teach basic style. She definitely seems to have been a victim of her own excess in the latter half of the series. Writers, especially ones that are emotionally involved with their work so to speak, tend to become decadent in their literary old age.
2. I don't know if Rowling thought about this or intended this, but the horribleness of the wizarding society seems explainable to me. Everyone in the wizarding community has extreme power. Even the weakest among them is much more powerful than any non- magic person could hope to be. They prize power because the normal institutions and numerical advantage only counts for so much. In the last 50 years, there were no less than 3 wizards (Grindewald, Dumbledore and Voldemort) who could have easily dominated wizarding society if not for the intervention of each other (and Harry). They are essentially in a perpetual state of nature, unable to establish a robust social contract because the normal institutions are unavailable to them.
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On August 24 2014 03:54 Jerubaal wrote:Show nested quote +On August 24 2014 03:09 CosmicSpiral wrote:On August 23 2014 16:45 Grumbels wrote:On August 23 2014 08:12 iamho wrote:
What is the dystopian ending you're referring to? ...where do I start. + Show Spoiler +This is a society that made a pact with soul sucking demons to enforce their judgement system. You have no real expectation of a fair trial. Aurors have the freedom to torture and kill suspects at their own discretion. You can be put in prison for any number of spurious reasons, after which you'll be subjected to the mind-destroying powers of the dementors. Even people that are still in custody and have not yet been tried will stay in the presence of the dementors. After Voldemort's death they are supposedly gone, but the fear-based society that empowered them is still unchanged. Harry is a prolific torturer in the series and comes to lead the Auror office in later years.
The Slytherin house was almost completely disenfranchised by this society. That's 25% of the population. I'm sure that 'mudbloods' are still treated with disdain. Another 25% of the population. Giants are still killing themselves in reservations. Werewolves are still disenfranchised. I'm sure Harry's break-in of Gringotts and betrayal of Griphook also did not improve wizarding relations with goblins. House elves are still enslaved, and Harry now even owns one.
That's not even mentioning the casual racism against muggles that barely a single person in canon speaks out against, that's because oddly enough JKR has internalized the wizards > muggles mindset not realizing her audience actually consists of the latter. Then there is the constant use of the mind destroying obliviate to control the muggle population, the casual way in which even the heroes of the series use it, the fact that Hermione destroys the minds of her parents to remove all memories of her.
Then there's the rampant bullying that goes on in Hogwarts, also there is a lack of expectation of physical and mental safety. Hogwarts largely decides your future career just because the wizarding world is so small and everyone knows everyone from school. The wizarding society is based on patronage networks that are formed in school. Then there is the fact that McGonagall was made head mistress and then her first decision is to completely disenfranchise the Slytherin house by removing them from the Voldemort fight, which honestly mirrors the decision to lock up the Japanese population during WWII in the USA. Even the sorting hat disagrees with the house system, yet it's continuing in the epilogue and the same prejudices about the houses and the same tribal mindsets continue. Furthermore, the actual education at Hogwarts is a joke. There is no real study of history, arts, philosophy, language, politics, mathematics, science etc. and people don't come out better informed. Harry and Hermione were both better people at the start of the first book then at the end of the last book.
Voldemort is dead, but all the conditions that allowed him to come to life are still there.
& also, JKR writes that George Weasley (one of our heroes) is very successful as a business man in later years, when one of the products he sells is a date-rape drug. Sounds like a typical day in America. I want someone to draw a picture of Alexander de Tocqueville in the Neil De Grasse Tyson pose with "watch out, we got a political science badass over here" as the caption. 1. I think the first couple of books are excellently written, especially in their general structure. You couldn't ask for a better series to teach basic style. She definitely seems to have been a victim of her own excess in the latter half of the series. Writers, especially ones that are emotionally involved with their work so to speak, tend to become decadent in their literary old age.
There were a few things that happened:
- Rowling writes for effect and she's not good at logic. She's infamous for her awfulness at basic counting, actually. This means she's much better at setting up the plot than finishing it, and it's one reason that many fans were so disappointed. All the highly clever things they had read into all the inconsistencies in the story turned out to just be inconsistencies that made no sense.
- She had a burnout after the fourth novel.
- She started to write for the movies, putting all sorts of action sequences in the books that are only there because they're good movie fodder. She actually had a number of sequences or plot devices that are directly taken from the Lord of the Rings movie. (I can think of at least three: FiendFyre is based on the river horses of Rivendel, the cave at the end of the sixth book is based on the entrance to Moria, the corrupting effect of the locket horcrux is based on the ring).
- She was popular enough that the later books give the impression of not being edited at all. I think basic structure and pacing is something that an editor has a lot of influence on, but for instance the final book is horribly written in terms of pacing, grammar, style.
2. I don't know if Rowling thought about this or intended this, but the horribleness of the wizarding society seems explainable to me. Everyone in the wizarding community has extreme power. Even the weakest among them is much more powerful than any non- magic person could hope to be. They prize power because the normal institutions and numerical advantage only counts for so much. In the last 50 years, there were no less than 3 wizards (Grindelwald, Dumbledore and Voldemort) who could have easily dominated wizarding society if not for the intervention of each other (and Harry). They are essentially in a perpetual state of nature, unable to establish a robust social contract because the normal institutions are unavailable to them.
And Dumbledore is responsible for both of them: he guarded the knowledge of Riddle's personality disorder and background and gave him a magical education; he created the ideology Grindelwald used to justify his bid for power and he avoided dealing with Grindelwald for personal reasons while he ran rampant.
Actually, Voldemort's take-over of the wizarding world was almost trivially easy and it's hard to believe how this society could possibly hope to have any resilience in face of a future threat. Apparently all you need is a few strategically placed mind control spells and some high-ranking minions in the ministry. That's because the ministry doesn't take basic precautions of screening their staff for magical interference.
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United States15275 Posts
On August 24 2014 03:54 Jerubaal wrote:
I want someone to draw a picture of Alexander de Tocqueville in the Neil De Grasse Tyson pose with "watch out, we got a political science badass over here" as the caption.
You should. It was a pretty cheap joke.
On August 24 2014 03:54 Jerubaal wrote:1. I think the first couple of books are excellently written, especially in their general structure. You couldn't ask for a better series to teach basic style. She definitely seems to have been a victim of her own excess in the latter half of the series. Writers, especially ones that are emotionally involved with their work so to speak, tend to become decadent in their literary old age.
I would make the (somewhat weak) argument that Rowling misjudged her writing ability and tried to fundamentally change her approach to the universe post-Prisoner of Azkaban. Initially she created a world whose elements were subject to the whims of the story she wanted to tell. The first 3 books were a collective bildungsroman, so she never cared much about causal world-building. But then she tried to expand the consequences of wizard society besides its effects on Harry and his school. It didn't really work out.
For example, Slytherin House being disfranchised is pretty terrible if one compares it to other real-life events. But this was a somewhat natural response considering that Rowling set it up as devoid of any redeeming qualities. Only the meanest, most arrogant, petty and selfish people were selected by the Soaring Hat; of course these qualities were listed quite differently by Dumbledore. Even then Slytherin was the repository of all the rejects like Crabbe and Goyle. The house as a whole worked as a latent enemy to Harry throughout the books and the history of Slytherin set up the main conflict in Chamber of Secrets. But the very existence of Slytherin House, and why Hogwarts continued to tolerate it, was never explained. Rowling only tried to add nuance to its members and its overall philosophy afterwards, and that was mostly limited to older members like Slughorn and Tonks.
The same also applies to things like Time Turners (all conveniently put in one room and put out of commission during Order of the Phoenix).
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Rowling did misjudge her writing ability, hence the fan joke about how the series should be named: Harry Potter & The Adjectives From Hell. The deadly hollow livejournal focuses largely on her writing, in case you want to see many specific examples.
By the way, a nicer fan name for the series is: Harry Potter & The Seven Riddles.
You can make the argument that the first three or four books are mystery novels in a magical setting and that certainly the last two books are high fantasy, a genre with different requirements than mystery.
Rowling might honestly think that 25% of the population is beyond redemption by virtue of being sorted in the wrong house at age 11 and that It's Okay If A Gryffindor Does It -- like when Harry & co bully and torture people, but I think it's fairly dubious morality.
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United States15275 Posts
On August 24 2014 08:02 Grumbels wrote:
Rowling did misjudge her writing ability, hence the fan joke about how the series should be named: Harry Potter & The Adjectives From Hell. The deadly hollow livejournal focuses largely on her writing, in case you want to see many specific examples.
By the way, a nicer fan name for the series is: Harry Potter & The Seven Riddles.
You can make the argument that the first three or four books are mystery novels in a magical setting and that certainly the last two books are high fantasy, a genre with different requirements than mystery.
Rowling might honestly think that 25% of the population is beyond redemption by virtue of being sorted in the wrong house at age 11 and that It's Okay If A Gryffindor Does It -- like when Harry & co bully and torture people, but I think it's fairly dubious morality.
The argument that she tried to change her attitude towards the universe, I mean. I'm not especially well-versed on that series past The Goblet of Fire.
I think that's an argument with more backing.
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On August 24 2014 08:58 CosmicSpiral wrote:Show nested quote +On August 24 2014 08:02 Grumbels wrote:
Rowling did misjudge her writing ability, hence the fan joke about how the series should be named: Harry Potter & The Adjectives From Hell. The deadly hollow livejournal focuses largely on her writing, in case you want to see many specific examples.
By the way, a nicer fan name for the series is: Harry Potter & The Seven Riddles.
You can make the argument that the first three or four books are mystery novels in a magical setting and that certainly the last two books are high fantasy, a genre with different requirements than mystery.
Rowling might honestly think that 25% of the population is beyond redemption by virtue of being sorted in the wrong house at age 11 and that It's Okay If A Gryffindor Does It -- like when Harry & co bully and torture people, but I think it's fairly dubious morality. The argument that she tried to change her attitude towards the universe, I mean. I'm not especially well-versed on that series past The Goblet of Fire. I think that's an argument with more backing.
I don't think so, she always had the backstory more or less figured out and there was always going to be increasing moral complexity as the protagonists aged.
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EPT
