Friday, October 26, 2007

Post Potter Propaganda


I am a huge Harry Potter fan. I first heard about the books on a radio interview. I bought the first book to read to my kids while we drove long distance on vacation. My kids weren't thrilled about me reading out loud, but when I insisted that I would just read out loud to the youngest, they all ended up getting in to it. They begged me not to stop, and if my voice got tired, they would ask me to drive so my husband could read to them instead. Since then, they have all read all of the books many times (I'm talking like 6 or 7 times each), and seen all the movies. They have gone to the midnight showings when each movie came out. They have stood in line at midnight to buy the next book. We are all huge fans. However, while I am a huge fan of Harry Potter, I am no longer a huge fan of J K Rowling.

Ever since the books were finished, J K Rowling has continued to "add on" information that she didn't include in the book. This has to be the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard. If it was important for us to know what each character in the book would do for their future profession in life, she should have included it in the book. Recently she announced that one of the most important characters of the book is in fact gay. I read an interesting article by a gay man who questioned her motives. In his opinion, there were no hints in the book, and nothing to make anyone think that this could be true. He questioned if she had political motives behind this announcement. I agree with him. If it was so important to announce at a news conference "post publication", why didn't she include the information in the book? Was it because she was afraid of backlash? She could just have easily said he was a rodeo cowboy...there were just as many hints about that in the book as there were that he was gay.

J K Rowling, if you really want to keep this story going, start another book. I don't want to read little snippets of information from news conferences. I would rather just read one more chapter. I think Mrs. Rowling suffers from "Post Potter Depression". She ended the series, but obviously wishes she could keep it going. It reminds me of when I was a child playing make believe. My friend says to me, "Pretend we are both hair dressers.", and I say, "And pretend we have boyfriends.". She says, "And pretend they are coming to get us for dinner.". And I say, "And pretend we are going to ride horses to dinner."...etc etc. It's much like when J K Rowling goes to an interview. They ask her, "How do you feel now that the books are finished?" and she says, "Pretend that I forgot to include that Dumbledore is gay. And pretend that there is another chapter where Harry becomes an Auror, and Ron goes to work at Weesley's Wizard Wheezes shop. And pretend that I meant to add......" Please, give us a break. You didn't write any of that...don't make it up off the top of your head to make your interviewers happy, or to pander to political groups.

5 comments:

Nene said...

This is really weird that you, Twist and I all wrote about Harry Potter. I hadn't read either yours or Twist's blog before I wrote mine. But I agree with you 100%.

Twist said...

What's weirder is that I used her phrase in the title of my blog. I hadn't read this yet either...unless...Life's blog was posted in a different time zone and mine was actually 2 hours earlier....

Baba Doodlius said...

You didn't see any clues about Dumbledore being gay? Oh, c'mon, you'll have to read more carefully! Don't you remember that scene in "Half Blood Prince" where he tells Ron Weasley to "bend over and take it like a muggle"?

Anonymous said...

from my understanding, she was done with the book series, but in some weird turn of event Harry didnt die as he was suppose to in the last book. I think she turned it into him living cause of the out cry of people if he did die, even though i thought his death would of made the previous story and events click more nicely togather.
After not killing him i dont think this is the last book, and as for dumble being gay, sure why not i always thought Snape was based on his actions (and the movie didnt help this out much)
So is it a publicity at work? Certainly writing is a business which makes money, Now you have a bunch of people rebuying books they might have loaned or traded off, to see if they can re-read and find the hints and clues.Might also bring those that only watched the movies into buying and reading the books.
Thats my impression.

Anonymous said...

I don't think it matters if they were all gay.
It's just fiction.
Either you liked reading the books or you don't...