Harry Potter and the Millennial Generation
The Harry Potter saga officially comes to an end with the screening of the final part of the two-part series finale this week.
The final book, Harry Potter and the Deadly Hallows, came out four years ago.
It was either that book, or the sixth one, its predecessor that came out the day I was to fly to Israel. I received the book by courier about an hour before I had to go to the airport. I remember arriving in Israel and going through customs and the customs guards seeing my book on the conveyer belt going, “aaaah, Harry Pottar!”
Such was the success of this literary franchise that Harry Potter was internationally recognized.
I honestly can’t think of anything bigger than Harry Potter when it comes to such universal appeal across all age groups. People, snobby literary types, might dismiss it as junk, and I’ll be the first to agree that J.K. Rowling was no Dostoyevsky, but she knew what she was doing.
And she did it well.
Make no mistake, its cultural impact is phenomenal. At work, each summer, I deal with interns, young 20-somethings, mostly females, and it’s amazing to see how much a part of their lives Harry Potter has been. These young people, may have read Rowling’s first book in the series Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (dumbed down to Sorcerer’s Stone for American readers and Hollywood) when they were in Grades Two or Three. They would have been finishing high school by the time the last book came out and now are finishing university when the final movie comes out.
Talk about generational. I can’t think of anything that had such an impact in my generation.
And the beauty of J.K. Rowling’s creativity is that the characters aged as the book went along, along with its readers. The characters are children when the books start, are near-adults when they finish (not counting the flash forward epilogue). The books were certainly childrens’ book at the outset, nice magical children’s adventures with wands and wizadry.
The books take a turn towards the dark side as they progress and the book’s climax is nothing but a biblical battle between good and evil.
The magic of Rowling is that as the readers age, they grow with the characters of the books. The snogging of books five and six wouldn’t have interested them when they first started reading. But now as teenagers, they can understand.
I started reading them by chance. My nephew, then 10 or so, now a 21 year old and a dad himself, was reading them and I was intrigued. I read the first three books quickly, before the hype, at least over here, started with the release of the fourth book in the series. Or was it over the third book? I can't remember. Anyways, I started to read just before the hype.
I was hooked with the boarder school scenario, a school similar to the one I attended when I was growing up (except without the magic-or the girls). But I understood the mentality of cheering for your “house team” in soccer, if not in Quidditch.
I grew up reading a steady stream of such books as a kid. In particular the Jennings series must have interested me enough, that I still remember them today. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jennings_%28novels%29
My sisters also read similar girl books by Enid Blyton that I also enjoyed. But Rowlings added the magic, and the mystery and somehow or other she succeeded at something few others have. She got an entire generation of children to read.
I always argued at the time it didn’t matter what they read, as long as they did. And I stand by that. I’m hoping that as the millennial generation approaches adulthood they won’t forget the impact Potter had on their lives and share it with their own children.
The final book, Harry Potter and the Deadly Hallows, came out four years ago.
It was either that book, or the sixth one, its predecessor that came out the day I was to fly to Israel. I received the book by courier about an hour before I had to go to the airport. I remember arriving in Israel and going through customs and the customs guards seeing my book on the conveyer belt going, “aaaah, Harry Pottar!”
Such was the success of this literary franchise that Harry Potter was internationally recognized.
I honestly can’t think of anything bigger than Harry Potter when it comes to such universal appeal across all age groups. People, snobby literary types, might dismiss it as junk, and I’ll be the first to agree that J.K. Rowling was no Dostoyevsky, but she knew what she was doing.
And she did it well.
Make no mistake, its cultural impact is phenomenal. At work, each summer, I deal with interns, young 20-somethings, mostly females, and it’s amazing to see how much a part of their lives Harry Potter has been. These young people, may have read Rowling’s first book in the series Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (dumbed down to Sorcerer’s Stone for American readers and Hollywood) when they were in Grades Two or Three. They would have been finishing high school by the time the last book came out and now are finishing university when the final movie comes out.
Talk about generational. I can’t think of anything that had such an impact in my generation.
And the beauty of J.K. Rowling’s creativity is that the characters aged as the book went along, along with its readers. The characters are children when the books start, are near-adults when they finish (not counting the flash forward epilogue). The books were certainly childrens’ book at the outset, nice magical children’s adventures with wands and wizadry.
The books take a turn towards the dark side as they progress and the book’s climax is nothing but a biblical battle between good and evil.
The magic of Rowling is that as the readers age, they grow with the characters of the books. The snogging of books five and six wouldn’t have interested them when they first started reading. But now as teenagers, they can understand.
I started reading them by chance. My nephew, then 10 or so, now a 21 year old and a dad himself, was reading them and I was intrigued. I read the first three books quickly, before the hype, at least over here, started with the release of the fourth book in the series. Or was it over the third book? I can't remember. Anyways, I started to read just before the hype.
I was hooked with the boarder school scenario, a school similar to the one I attended when I was growing up (except without the magic-or the girls). But I understood the mentality of cheering for your “house team” in soccer, if not in Quidditch.
I grew up reading a steady stream of such books as a kid. In particular the Jennings series must have interested me enough, that I still remember them today. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jennings_%28novels%29
My sisters also read similar girl books by Enid Blyton that I also enjoyed. But Rowlings added the magic, and the mystery and somehow or other she succeeded at something few others have. She got an entire generation of children to read.
I always argued at the time it didn’t matter what they read, as long as they did. And I stand by that. I’m hoping that as the millennial generation approaches adulthood they won’t forget the impact Potter had on their lives and share it with their own children.