harry potter and adulthood (mine, yours, his)
Every few months I tend to post something long and rambling that deals with how depressed I am. I suppose it's that time again. I just read an article in The New York Times titled "Harry Potter is their Peter Pan," and the bulk of the article deals with the general sense of nostalgia that is apparently felt by generation Y. "They're twenty-something and already nostalgic," the byline reads. The article also tells us that 45% of Halfblood Prince audience members surveyed were in their twenties. I don't find this too surprising, because of all the books that I have read, Harry Potter fills me with the most intense nostalgia. I just re-read Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows after seeing HBP, and when I finished the book I felt like I had been punched in the gut. This may sound melodramatic, but I did experience an intense feeling of loss, and I'm not sure I experienced that upon my first reading.
For some reason, this time around, it became abundantly clear how much Harry Potter, and his world, mean to me. I realized today that I first read a Harry Potter book 9 years ago, when I was a freshman in high school. The seventh book came out the summer before my senior year of college. When the sixth book came out, I had just finished my first year, and I sent my copy to Carl, who was still living in Cleveland. I dressed up for the fifth book with yeats, and the boy she was seeing then, and Erica. I read the fourth book on the plane to London with my high school choir when I was just 14. At first I thought the very idea was nonsense, but I guess I (like many others) have grown up with Harry.
I think the epilogue of Deathly Hallows is surprisingly heartbreaking, not because of its cardboard feeling, but because it places us in the thick of the Trio's adulthood happiness -- they are married, they have children, they are probably successful. In many ways, the reader is left in the lurch -- still young, unsure, digging him or herself out of the dust of childhood. I honestly felt left-behind, not relieved, when I finished Deathly Hallows this second time. I am struggling as I try to figure out my post-college life. I really am. But the Trio and their friends, they go through a world of trauma in young adulthood, they grow up in ways that we are still trying to. I think that Voldemort's death, and the journey up to it, is quite obviously about the rite of passage into adulthood, about the importance of family, community, selflessness, and love. These ideals are woven throughout the entire HP series, and yes, it is fiction, but I believe that the affects of literature on the reader are very real. Looking at my life as it is right now, I wish there were a single, unbearable task that would force me to find my adult self, perhaps a Dark Lord to vanquish, or a daring quest to fulfill. The trials of my unextraordinary life are not as interesting, or rife with lesson-learning experiences as Harry Potter's trials are.
....and so I stumble. Often, the smallest of tasks seem unmanageable. But more than the day-to-day troubles, I am lonely. I have friends in this city, lovely good friends, and I have a boyfriend who loves me, but I miss the easy comfort of being in college or even high school. I miss the pleasure of knowing my friends were just down the hall, working on papers, checking facebook, knitting, or carrying on. Before the epilogue of Deathly Hallows, when the battle is done, Harry's parting thought is of his bed in Gryffindor Tower. After fulfilling his destiny, all Harry wants is the comfort and familiarity of his dorm room. Harry, I feel you. When I have a hard day I long for Tyler House with an intensity that I cannot explain. I want the messy living room, the poorly tuned piano, the Greek above the fireplace, I want my room above the dumpster and the funny bathroom wallpaper. I want to crawl out onto the roof and look at Paradise Pond. More than anything else, I miss the way Tyler smelled.
I find that very few people understand the closeness I felt with my Alma Mater. I had no intention of making this post about Smith, but when I encounter Harry's love of Hogwarts, I feel an immediate kinship. I, too, have felt more at home somewhere than at 'home'. I understand what it feels like to suddenly belong in a way you never thought was possible. I know these things, I know them so well. It continues to break my heart now that I cannot go back to that world. And I hate to think that college was the best four years of my life.
When I see Harry in the epilogue of Deathly Hallows, I want to know so much more. How did he get over Hogwarts? What was it like while he waited for Ginny to graduate from school? Did Ron and Hermione get together straight away? How did they all manage to stay friends? Wasn't it hard dealing with the aftermath? Didn't everything have to change? I need to know these things because I am dealing with them right now. I have watched much loved friendships fall apart in my life since college ended, I have seen my mental state diminish, and I know that I have changed. So I feel a little bit betrayed, Harry Potter. You've been there for the last nine years. Why can't you be here for me now? Now is hard too.
For some reason, this time around, it became abundantly clear how much Harry Potter, and his world, mean to me. I realized today that I first read a Harry Potter book 9 years ago, when I was a freshman in high school. The seventh book came out the summer before my senior year of college. When the sixth book came out, I had just finished my first year, and I sent my copy to Carl, who was still living in Cleveland. I dressed up for the fifth book with yeats, and the boy she was seeing then, and Erica. I read the fourth book on the plane to London with my high school choir when I was just 14. At first I thought the very idea was nonsense, but I guess I (like many others) have grown up with Harry.
I think the epilogue of Deathly Hallows is surprisingly heartbreaking, not because of its cardboard feeling, but because it places us in the thick of the Trio's adulthood happiness -- they are married, they have children, they are probably successful. In many ways, the reader is left in the lurch -- still young, unsure, digging him or herself out of the dust of childhood. I honestly felt left-behind, not relieved, when I finished Deathly Hallows this second time. I am struggling as I try to figure out my post-college life. I really am. But the Trio and their friends, they go through a world of trauma in young adulthood, they grow up in ways that we are still trying to. I think that Voldemort's death, and the journey up to it, is quite obviously about the rite of passage into adulthood, about the importance of family, community, selflessness, and love. These ideals are woven throughout the entire HP series, and yes, it is fiction, but I believe that the affects of literature on the reader are very real. Looking at my life as it is right now, I wish there were a single, unbearable task that would force me to find my adult self, perhaps a Dark Lord to vanquish, or a daring quest to fulfill. The trials of my unextraordinary life are not as interesting, or rife with lesson-learning experiences as Harry Potter's trials are.
....and so I stumble. Often, the smallest of tasks seem unmanageable. But more than the day-to-day troubles, I am lonely. I have friends in this city, lovely good friends, and I have a boyfriend who loves me, but I miss the easy comfort of being in college or even high school. I miss the pleasure of knowing my friends were just down the hall, working on papers, checking facebook, knitting, or carrying on. Before the epilogue of Deathly Hallows, when the battle is done, Harry's parting thought is of his bed in Gryffindor Tower. After fulfilling his destiny, all Harry wants is the comfort and familiarity of his dorm room. Harry, I feel you. When I have a hard day I long for Tyler House with an intensity that I cannot explain. I want the messy living room, the poorly tuned piano, the Greek above the fireplace, I want my room above the dumpster and the funny bathroom wallpaper. I want to crawl out onto the roof and look at Paradise Pond. More than anything else, I miss the way Tyler smelled.
I find that very few people understand the closeness I felt with my Alma Mater. I had no intention of making this post about Smith, but when I encounter Harry's love of Hogwarts, I feel an immediate kinship. I, too, have felt more at home somewhere than at 'home'. I understand what it feels like to suddenly belong in a way you never thought was possible. I know these things, I know them so well. It continues to break my heart now that I cannot go back to that world. And I hate to think that college was the best four years of my life.
When I see Harry in the epilogue of Deathly Hallows, I want to know so much more. How did he get over Hogwarts? What was it like while he waited for Ginny to graduate from school? Did Ron and Hermione get together straight away? How did they all manage to stay friends? Wasn't it hard dealing with the aftermath? Didn't everything have to change? I need to know these things because I am dealing with them right now. I have watched much loved friendships fall apart in my life since college ended, I have seen my mental state diminish, and I know that I have changed. So I feel a little bit betrayed, Harry Potter. You've been there for the last nine years. Why can't you be here for me now? Now is hard too.