false 45922653 6896 862041 0545044251 9780545044257 1661 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1255571452m/862041.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/862041.Harry_Potter_Boxset_Books_1_7 4.67 13215
]]> 1077326 4.28 1698531 67856 0 1 false Sun Jul 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Tue Feb 10 07:02:01 -0800 2009 Tue Feb 10 07:02:01 -0800 2009 Deathly Hallows now behind me, my opinion remains steadfastly strong. Mostly, I appreciate the series because I believe that J. K. Rowling has done more for literacy around the world than any politician or legislature. She has inspired kids (and adults) to read, and little is more valuable in education than that.

But further, Rowling has created a body of work whose architecture withstands the kind of scrutiny that good English professors bring to university classrooms. She spent seven years fleshing out the details of the series before writing the first book, longer than John Milton spent writing Paradise Lost and Arundhati Roy spent writing The God of Small Things (five years each). She detailed personal features and histories for over 200 characters. She sculpted the plot of the entire seven book series before writing the first one. Actions in the first chapter of book one foreshadow dialog in book three. Events in book two anticipate events in book six. Smells, colors, and other details in scenes seem more often than not to serve as indicators to careful readers of what was or will be, and not just descriptors of the moment.

And then there is her wordplay. Character names find origins in history and mythology. Spell incantations derive from archaic languages--and not just Latin and Greek. Vocabulary increases as the series progresses so that by book five readers will find words like "mellifluous", "redolent", and "assiduously" scattered throughout the text. Children are no doubt sending parents to their dictionaries at bedtime.

And of course there are the characters. They are simple at first. Books one and two are like children's books. The good guys seem all good and the bad guys seem all bad. The stories hint at the complexity to come, but they remain straightforward. The children wander and flail their way around, surviving (and triumphing) mostly by mere accident. By book three, however, we begin to see the conflict in the children and the adults alike. Harry and his friends show signs of growing up. Teenage years bring with them romance and instability. Adult figures, at the same time, begin to reveal their own emotional conflicts. We realize that their ambiguities and insecurities had existed all along. Snape, in particular, emerges as a character caught between his adolescence and adulthood, his fear and his love, his history with Dark Magic and his loyalty to Dumbledore. By book six, his complexity rivals (surpasses?) Hamlet's. And in book seven, the connection between his fate and those of the hero, Harry; the villain, Voldemort; and the fallen sage, Dumbledore, come together in a play that asks us to reconsider our perceptions of all of them.

Rowling has not written fluff. Nor is she trying to teach witchcraft. (Are the people who believe this for real?) Instead, she has created an enthralling series that, ultimately, esteems its genre because of its emotional and narrative complexity and affirms the strength and value of the best possible ideals--love, friendship, trust, loyalty, hard work, and more.

So, if you haven't read the series because you've been busy, carve out the time. If you've been philosophically opposed to it for some reason, pull your head out of... the dirt.

Do I recommend it? To anyone with imagination. Or anyone who wants to do something about a lack of it. Really, everyone should read these stories. If you don't like them, you have no childhood left in you.
Would I teach it? For its structure and planning, I'd love to, even if some of the prose is dismal. Also, the books should be taught as a full series, and 4000+ pages are a bit long for most course calendars.
Lasting impression: So rich and detailed that Rowling should release an annotated edition.]]>