/lit/ - Literature

Going to a high school for wizards is an incredibly exciting idea for 90% of kids 10-13 who've been raised with some exposure to ideas and reading. It's really no surprise why it's popular. Plus the characters are great

>>15721840
Cringe.

>>15721952
>Noooo you can’t just have a differing opinion nooooo my heckin harry potter hate thread circlejerk!!!!!

>>15721830
Movies. That's it.

>>15721830
Yeah, it's nothing special when returning to it after a decade because you're probably matured, and moved on to better books. But what young children who are just starting to delve into literature? Do you honestly expect them to start with more complex material? Harry Potter isn't really that great, and it's probably still popular among older demographics because they can't move on, but the circlejerk that Harry Potter shouldn't be popular is retarded.

>>15721830
You can level the same charge at pretty much anything written for kids

>>15721830
The idea was an exciting and relatable escapism for kids, plus franchises tend to snowball regardless of quality and cultural infantilisation has given it great longevity despite a lack in substance

>>15721840
>>15721952
Surely you're not so emotionaly incongruent that you cringe at this.

Harry Potter is shit wrapped in glittering wrapping paper. Obviously people will gobble it up and pretend the inside is full of chocolate. You can feed people anything, so long as the outside is shiny and looks good. It's no surprise that HP is popular, despite it lacking any intellectual or philosophical rigor; H.P. has a beautiful world full of ~secrets~ and ~wizardry~, and that was genuinely enjoyable.

>>15722115
You'd have a difficult time leveling the same charge against The Hobbit.

>>15721830

>>15721830
It’s the ultimate narcissistic fantasy. Kids who read it vicariously get off on the idea of the ‘Letter from Hogwarts’—that in the most unpropitious circumstances and completely out of nowhere, a true world can be revealed in which you (through Harry) are exceptionally rich, famous, important, possess exceptional powers etc. I read it between ages 6 and 10 and convinced myself through some casuistry that I would get a letter from Hogwarts (or the American equivalent) on my 11th birthday. Lots of other kids did too. Each one of us was already convinced of our being fundamentally exceptional and significant and consequential, and we all yearned to see this fact reflected more fully in the world. This made Harry Potter a very appealing myth.

It's a power fantasy for poor kids to become chosen ones, and it feels very English which a lot of people like

>>15722182
Spot on.

>>15722182
>convinced myself through some casuistry that I would get a letter from Hogwarts

>>15721952
Wow so cringe that a mass produced children's book is assessed as such

>>15722294
I was like 8 kids believe all sorts of stupid shit.

>>15722294
Actually the brainlet isn’t inaccurate, just most 6-10 year olds are brainlets

>>15722294
If you’re curious, I figured that once you died and went to heaven, you got to plan out another life for yourself exactly how you wanted it. I have no idea why I thought this. But anyway I figured the best possible life would be the one I’d had up until that point, but where I went to Hogwarts at age 11. So I figured there was a decent chance I’d already died and had been reincarnated and that therefore I’d get my letter.

>>15721830
Are you kidding? It has the perfect formula to appeal to the worst in people.
>MC is the chosen one
>his family suck, outrageously suck, are actually out to get him
>but don't worry they're not his real family, his real family are magic, and awesome, and rich
>MC is now going to escapist awesome land, where he's famous
>where is this new reality? a fucking highschool of course, complete with color coded factions and drama which also serve as a fucking personality test horoscope type thing
>at the same time everyone knows MC and wants to befriend him he's misunderstood and persecuted, a super popular rich famous pariah of sorts
>but that's ok since he's innately virtuous, you can tell this because he's friends with poor people and nerds and stands up to the mean old rich types (who are evil)
>but remember he's still super rich and talented, captain of the magic football team, extra special powers too, so be sure not to confuse any of this for being uncool
>naturally life and death stakes follow MC as he combats the personification evil which is obsessed with him, like everyone else is
>in fact everyone in this new awesome world only seems to exist relative to him
>he defeats the personification of evil of course
>he does this by breaking the rules over and over, he's such a rebel
>but since he's virtuous and cool he gets rewarded for breaking the rules obviously, since reality itself is a playground for MC and everything even the most dangerous situations work out in his favor
I could go on.

>>15722351
This, and we're now reaping the consequences of a generation of mentally defective Harry Potter fans

The boomers who trashed those books were right

>>15722351
>>where is this new reality? a fucking highschool of course, complete with color coded factions and drama which also serve as a fucking personality test horoscope type thing
my fucking sides, it's true

>>15722351
This is a good point, but I hardly see the harm in it. Kids eventually grow up and face the reality that they aren’t the chosen one and that life isn’t an escapist magical fantasy land, etc., etc.

At least the little bastards are ENJOYING reading which, based on what I’ve seen, is more than most people can manage to instill in their little bastard children.

>>15722327
This is both insanely convoluted for an 8 year old and at the same time absolutely too fucking retarded even for that age.

>>15722351
my main problem with harry potter is that there are no MI(Magical Quotient) studies about Muggle-borns

how am I supposed to know they're actually on average the same as purebloods, they just assert it and say 'look at this smart one', that's not how averages work. Judging by the fact that everything in HP seems to be in decline maybe the Pureblood guys are right.

>>15722383
I don't know.

This idea that "reading something is better than reading nothing" is a pretty bad argument. Especially considering how young adult fiction currently dictates the market. The literacy rates in the US have gone down since the fever pitch of Potter. The kids who grew up reading Harry Potter are now either reading nothing or reading more YA crap.

I can't help but think what would have been if Harry Potter never existed. I'm sure some other YA crap would have become the defacto cult substitute, but there's a chance that maybe right now bookstores wouldn't be full of YA shit had Harry Potter never become so popular.

>>15722351
To be fair that's literally most fiction. Look at god damn Star Wars how much Anikin and then Luke get their dicks sucked. Matrix is even fucking worse. And I do not need mention video games. 90% of all rpgs and anime fulfill this trope. So yeah Harry Potter isn't unique in this, just that it appeals to a much younger audience but it would be more correct to stay our culture brings the worst out in appeal.

>>15722383
I don't think there's a respectable psychologist in the world who would agree with you, I don't want to get into it but I'd readily argue that the majority of Americans aged 15-35 are narcissistic schizotypals. Similarly I don't intend to let my kids read Harry Potter, at least not as children, as I firmly believe what we consume in our formative years has a very deep impact and informs our thought patterns later in life in ways we can't even begin to appreciate. And anyway it's not like there's any lack of good children's literature, even just from England, I'd happily have them read something like the Hobbit or the Wind in the Willows instead.

>>15722396
>>>/pol/

>>15722420
Everything you listed is garbage which has achieved fame purely due to generations of arrested development.

>>15722420
Your problem is bringing up modern american pop culture which is the most degenerate low brow trash in human history

>>15722419
someone post the god damn Harold Bloom pasta

>>15722419
>>15722424
>found Harry Potter to be boring when I was young
>read A Series of Unfortunate Events instead

Man, after reading some of y’all anons’ takes, it has occurred to me that these two series were on polar opposite sides of the YA spectrum.

It has been said in many ways before that have turned into copypastas: but essentially, it is a magical world that does nothing to challenge the reader's worldview. Therefore it allows the reader to read about adventures in a world that is superficially fantastic but essentially familiar.
No institution, practice or facet of life is fundamentally different in the Hogwarts world. People still drink at pubs, it's just a magical hidden pub, people still go to boarding schools, it's just a magical boarding school, people still send letters, it's just with owls, people still eat chocolate and collect merchandise, it's just magical moving picture cards, people still take trains, it's just a hidden train platform at the train station, people still have civil service jobs, it's just at a ministry of magic instead of the department of work and pensions, people still have exams, it's just magical wizardry exams, etc etc etc.
If you were a middle class British kid, it was like having your life exactly as it is with a superimposed magical world.
Compare this to something like the Hobbit or Earthsea, magical fantasy that requires at least some form of understanding about a life outside of the status-quo, even if a child still could be technically able to read it, it will never have the same effects because the world's and themes are beyond them.
Harry Potter is escapism; a magical reinforcement of the modern world.

>>15722396
For some reason the manchildren that makeup the left always invoke Harry Potter allegories for everything political so it's hilarious to use their beloved series in ways that revolt them. They go absolutely batshit insane, as though you've stolen something from them with the suggestion that they like the same sort of things that people who disagree with them like. I understand what you're doing and appreciate it, thank you.

>>15722458
They use it very similarly to how evangelical Christians invoke the Bible. Harry Potter has become a religion for leftist millennials.

>>15722452
I'm glad I came from a working class background and always found Harry Potter shite

>>15722056
peak retard
you must have been born in 2002 or something if you don't realize how popular the books were even BEFORE the movies

>>15722351
Very accurate assessment, however:
>complete with color coded factions
This is in the book because it is a common facet of British school life, particularly in private and boarding schools, it’s been present for centuries originally the houses were literally the buildings in which students lodged at boarding school, as students spent at least as much time in their houses as in their classes house ties became strong.
I went to a very old British private school growing up and they had 4 houses coloured red, blue, yellow, and green named after 4 men who heavily contributed to the school’s development over the decades and centuries, however the houses were not coded based on personality, it was random and had relatively little impact on our school life outside of sports day and other school wide competitions. Rowling lifted the 4 coloured houses from reality, though she embellished it a great deal

>>15722517
the books are in fact much more popular than the movies. They are among the very best selling books ever, whereas the movies are not on par with things like Titanic, Avatar, and Avengers apart from the last one, which is 13th

>>15722351
Please go on.

>>15722396
But the scientific method isn't used by Wizards, explaining most of their backwards ass ways of life and thoughtlessness

>>15721830
Media hyped it at the time.

>>15721830

Do we really need this thread every other day? Kids liked it, grew attached, grew up, didn't stop the HP nostalgia.
Now never make this thread again.

>>15722519
Intersteing, which school anon and how was school in general for you, would you or do you send your children to the same school?
I went to state-owned school and I used to defend/believe in education, school-systems, etc. until I realised about five years after leaving, that it was mostly wasted time that could have been used better. However I found many friends there, so I got a lot back.

>>15722519
nice larp fag

>>15722519
>however the houses were not coded based on personality,
That's nice for you, but they are so in the world of Harry Potter, which is what this thread is about.

>>15722182
tldr: You were a massive retard and put the fault for said retardation on a book series instead of yourself.

>>15722182
You just didn't got it bruh

>>15721830
book is actually pretty lousy

>>15722351
Well said

>>15721830
The idea behind Harry Potter was brilliant. It checked all the right boxes for the target audience, and because that target audience was younger children, the quality of her writing didn't really matter. The concept of a secret school for teenage wizards is compelling enough that her books didn't need to be literary art, they just needed to do the bare minimum of effectively communicating that idea. And she absolutely succeeded in that regard. The plot is easy to follow and understand.

When we look back on the books as adults though, the plot/gimmick isn't nearly as compelling because most of us have matured past our narcissistic "I need to be quirky and individual" phase. We look at the writing as think "wow this is entirely mediocre." This maturation never happens for the die hard harry potter fans, they never grow past their quirky stage.

>>15724352
>The concept of a secret school for teenage wizards is compelling
but also entirely derivative...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scholomance for example

>>15721952
It's cringe. But he's right. Kids love an epic sense of being thrown into world they feel like they could also be thrown into. Harry Potter is trash as a whole, but it's the perfect young fantasy. The school concept is relatable, the way normal kids turn out to be wizards and get invitations to the school. It's like a good dream to a young reader. The way the petty issues of the characters when they are younger evolve into a bigger and darker story as the books go on and they grow too. The formula is like heroin for a kid looking for an immersive story that grows with them. It just lacks any substance after that.

>>15721830
The better question is, why is this shit so popular among young women?

>>15722294
To my nine-year-old mind, the books were a cover so that no one would suspect that Hogwarts really existed, since anyone who revealed it would just be describing things from Harry Potter.

>>15721830

>>15725357
nooo what do you mean most ideas are not completely original and unheard of

There's tons of kids' and young adult books that are always being written. I haven't read anything HP related (though I did watch a few of the movies) but at some point there's going to be something that gets popular out of all the shit that comes out of that. The problem is that HP is so popular with adults, to the point of obsession and some people use it as a comparison to things in real life because they can't express themselves otherwise. Kids read all kinds of stupid bullshit but at a point they usually grow out of it. HP is something that people never grew out of though and became a cultural landmark somehow.

>>15725357
That's pretty cool. She was homeless when she wrote it though, so not sure if this was what inspired the books.

>>15722396
>Despite being 13% of the wizarding population...

>>15721830
>Dont you just hate harry potter, I know I do guys and I bet you do too, so lets vibe and chill, lets chill and vibe, together. Harry Potter, so cringe hahaha. When I made this thread I totally wasnt expecting to find so many others who hate Harry Potter just like me! It's not a /lit/ dogma to hate harry potter after all, I guess I have finally found my crowd of people! The cool people, who assess childrens books through the lens of avant garde art.

>>15726776
If a children's book gets so extremely popular with adults and becomes a cultural phenomenon among them I think it's fine to start judging it against other books and not just other kids books.

>>15725989
That post is literally by a libtard complaining about muh class conflict

>>15726866
>If a children's book gets so extremely popular with adults and becomes a cultural phenomenon among them I think it's fine to start judging it against other books and not just other kids book

>>15722294
jealous cope

>>15727011
Not that anon, but it seems that it'd be very difficult for Rowling to write an entire book series without bleeding in some of her own real life ideologies into it, which unto itself could be worth analysing. Not that she's ever said much worth analysing, she's a mediocre writer that caught the winds of a great (profitable) idea.