Why did Harry Potter become so popular?

[KindergartenKop]

I'm not a huge fan personally, but I think they're quite well written. I'm not sure they deserve all the hype though. So why did they become so popular?

My dc were just the right age for them as they came out, the HP series transformed my book avoiding son into an avid reader which i will be forever grateful for. I am not a fan of fantasy but i really enjoyed them, the half blood prince being my favourite. (Big snape fan). JKL might not be a great writer, but she is a gifted storyteller, and as a pp said, she creates great characters. I thought the films were awful though, and the child actors horrendous.

They're not the best written children's books out there in terms of quality of prose but their success is demonstrably not just due to hype or the movies.

I'd put it down to an unprecedented combination of plot structure and attractive world building. JKR obviously adores the world she's built and it's a world that readers have an insatiable desire to spend time in.

Because 20 (plus) years ago kids (and adults) weren't slaves to their phones.
Imagine what you would be doing right now if you weren't on Mumsnet via a laptop/tablet/smartphone...

I think it's hard to imagine a book series blowing up now because of all the other distractions we have. At the time Harry Potter was the literary equivalent of Tiger King or Squid Game.

Personally I think she dumbed down and ripped off Terry Pratchett but that didn't stop me queuing at WH Smith's at midnight with my dad to get a book!

It’s the mix of the usual school stuff - homework, exams, dances, class bullies PLUS all of the magic that my children like. The funny parts, Ron struggling to ask a girl to the school ball, Hermione’s homework planner notebook that she gives to Harry and Ron for Christmas, “Don’t leave it for later you big second rater”, Harry having a vision during his History of Magic exam that was going badly anyway and the supervisor suggesting kindly that he had just enough time to “round his last answer off nicely” when he’d written nothing at all.

It’s relatable. She may not be a writer of literary prose but she has the ability to keep children transfixed by the story. This is no small feat and isn’t from marketing hype, no marketing hype can make a child read a book if they don’t want want to.

Because they are fun easy to read and people like me grew up with them and me and my friends used to go annually to the cinema to see the new films too.
Now I've given my dc the books to read and they love the books as well as the films too.
There really wasn't much out there like this at the time so it was refreshing and modern.

I'd imagine a new HP film franchise is in the works.

Parents read them to their kids and they both wanted to know what happened next. JKR is a terrific story teller with imagination and the level of detail is so amazing. The second and third times I read the books I noticed more things. She’s clever in Harry Potter and the Robert Galbraith books are also so subtly good. The gaslighting is almost more sinister than the murders. The woman knows how to engage the imagination of the reader using every sense.

Derivative is fine, especially for kids' books. What's old hat to adults is new to children, so can be recreated in a contemporary context for each fresh generation. And just as adults like to settle in with a familiar format (just look how very closely crime fiction authors will hew to very precise formats, with carefully-pitched levels of gore, sexual violence, complexity, human relationships, etc., depending exactly which sector of the crime fiction market they're going for), so do children. The HP books are easy familiar comfort reading with perfectly adequate prose. They have far more complex world-building and bigger stories than e.g. The Worst Witch, which I enjoyed as a kid before the HP books came out. They were set more or less in the present-day for readers at the time, unlike Enid Blyton era boarding school books which seemed very old-fashioned but which I'd also read plenty of. There's lots in there which feels profound to a young reader about human nature, good and evil, and all that stuff. Lots of wish-fulfillment stuff you can insert yourself into. Fairly rounded male and female characters. Sold stuff in there to make kids feel clever if they get the references. And a certain amount of luck obvs.

At the time I felt she ripped off The Worst Witch series and I loved those books!

I don't know that not having smart phones is really significant. Other books did exist but didn't become so hyped and popular.

The boarding school side of things is interesting. That would definitely be a hook for girls already into Malory Towers etc. I was put off by all the bloody magic though. I was a realist from a young age

@HowardNoir

They were great for all ages- particularly teen-20s as they were grown up enough to watch with friends but still had some childish magic. The books weren't great but are fine when you've watched the film. Shit author ruined it though

So they were simultaneously great and not great, this is a sort of doublethink you are pushing here. No, thank you. XX

@CareerConcerns1999

Because they got picked up and turned into a movie. The books were low key before the movie. Movie one dropped and boom suddenly everyone wanted to read the books.

There was a long long gap between book 4 and 5, and then subsequent ones. This also creates a hype.

Not true. People queued outside bookshops at midnight for the books, way before they were made into films.

Modern equivalent of Mallory Towers but for boys as well.
My DC were very young when HP came out so we were one of those families who had to buy two copies on publication day.
I can't see why adults read them though.

I only read them in my late twenties and they were just gripping and I got totally lost in them. I bloody love a book series where you can just BE there. I think they are just really appealing characters. Interesting stories. Perfect amount of suspense and humour. I think theyre brilliant. I didnt actually watch the films for years because sometimes the film ruins a story by leaving out too much but actually the films are really well done and I loved them too.
I think it deserves its hype

@Hellocatshome

The books were low key before the movie. that wasn't my experience at all but then I was the target audience and the books were absolutely huge amongst my peer group even before there was even talk of movies.

Agree this wasn't my experience at all. I queued at Waterstones to get them as a teenager and the buzz was amazing. I read them in a day.

I absolutely love Harry Potter and I've reread the books many times as an adult, like a comfort blanket.

If you haven't read them as a child or grown up with them I'm sure you don't have the same connection. Same with all kids books I think. You need the nostalgia.

I've often wondered if I could sum up my hp love so here I am to give it a try 🙂

The first one came out when I was 10 so I felt like I was pretty much reading them at the same point in my life as the main characters. It's such a rich fantasy world and the characters were so 'real' and I felt like I 'knew' them (as much as one can 'know' a fictional character!). I laughed, I cried, I felt tense during suspenseful passages etc. The way each book was set out was great and easy to read (number 5 was very hard going at times though!), and the way the story had so many moments of realisation, the foreshadowing. It was just beautiful. I'm nearly 32 and it's a world I still love to return to, and my love of reading is so connected to hp because they were the first books I ever loved and they were the start of myself as a reader. I've been reading them to dd (10) for maybe a year, we just started the last one. She hasn't loved them like I did at all, but she's enjoyed them and it's been lovely to share them with her all the same. Looking forward to reading them to my next dd (currently pregnant) in about 10 years time!

@Crackletranton

It doesn't matter that they're not Proust-esque levels of writing; they're engaging, good for escapism and, well, just a bit of fun really. It's OK to read books that aren't terribly cerebral (although I would argue Rowling has a nice touch when naming things) or are are considered derivative (usually said with a sneer).

They encouraged so many children to read - and still do. I have two children in my class who have just discovered Harry Potter and are so absorbed in them. I think Rowling kick-started a new wave of writing for children.

Well said @Crackletranton.

I remember hearing a journalist on the radio interviewing children and asking them why they liked Harry Potter. The general consensus was that the books were exciting.

I think they appealed to adults and children alike (maybe, not small children).

Some people are so snobby about Harry Potter.

The first few books were beautifully written.

If you haven't read them as a child or grown up with them I'm sure you don't have the same connection. Same with all kids books I think. You need the nostalgia.

I agree with this. Books that you adore as a child become a part of you (dramatic and cheesy as that sounds). And even though you can remain as avid a reader throughout your life, it's very unusual to experience that same level of emotional attachment to a book as an adult as you did when you were a child.

I was exactly the target group, late primary when the first one came out and it instantly became my favourite book. I was a big reader already but it captured my imagination like nothing before. I remember one summer after the 3rd book was out I read those 3 books on a loop over and over. I don't know exactly what it was about them but they are undoubtedly some of the best children's books of our lifetime.

I actually feel really lucky to have been part of the Harry Potter generation. It was a real phenomenon. Are there any books now that children are buzzing with excitement about, counting down the days to the next release date, devouring the new one as fast as they can?

On the other I thought the films were rubbish. I suppose they are OK for what they are, but the story, the world and the characters felt incredibly thin to me after the richness of the books. They are forced to leave out so much due to the nature of the medium, for me they were always just a pale shadow of the books. The wonder of those books is in the details. And I think she IS a great writer.

The first ones were out just as I started teaching and were massive way before the films. Reading them and being able to talk about them was a great way of engaging with children.

They're not the best prose - especially the middle ones where it seems obvious she was working to a deadline- but the story arc and the world she creates are incredible. The characters and school experience are so relatable alongside this magical world with elements of existing myths and legends alongside JRK's own imagination. They are amazing and inspired a whole generation back into reading. They were also books parents actually enjoyed reading to older children too so that contributed to their popularity as well

I remember hearing about them after at least two had been published, and deciding to give Philosopher's Stone a go because DS was still young enough to be read to at night. To my surprise, we both thoroughly enjoyed it, to the extent that I didn't want DS to go to sleep because I wanted to carry on reading to find out what happened next. We carried on with the next one in the series, and after that he began reading them for himself as they came out. I was one of those parents forever grateful to JKR for encouraging my children to discover the wonders of reading.

If you haven't read them as a child or grown up with them I'm sure you don't have the same connection

I was 42 when I read my first HP book. I enjoyed it as much as DD did when she started reading them.

Read the first one to see what the hype was all about. I’m still trying to understand the attraction. Same with Tolkien.

@Pyewackect

Read the first one to see what the hype was all about. I’m still trying to understand the attraction. Same with Tolkien.

Well they’re aimed at kids, not adults.

@Pyewackect

Read the first one to see what the hype was all about. I’m still trying to understand the attraction. Same with Tolkien.

I'll give you that Tolkien is an acquired taste (I love LoTR but not all the stoopid Tom Bombadil cavorting with his fair maiden for chapters, for example).