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Original poster

to not understand why adults find harry potter so good?

162 replies

Mindexplode · 17/08/2015 11:28

I never really got into harry potter but people told me I was missing out so I have watched all 7 films in the name of research

I still can't understand why it made it so big when there are better fantasy films and books aimed at the children and teenager market?

I certainly don't understand the attraction to adults, I found them very dull and formulaic

if you are a fan - what is it I'm not getting? if you compare them to narnia, or his dark materials, or hitchhikers guide or Asimov then there is no comparison. I much prefer Pratchett or Iain m banks or gainman

am I the wrong age - I was about 18 when the first book came out

OP posts:
maybebabybee · 17/08/2015 15:46

Slightly off topic here but I've just finished an MA in creative writing and found that there was major snobbery around 'commercial' fiction in general (ie, stuff that actually sells). Everyone sneered at Gone Girl, Marian Keyes books etc etc.

Now, I don't particularly like Gone Girl, and I only like one or two MK books, but I recognise that at the end of the day they've sold thousands of copies, so they must be doing something right. As a (wannabe) writer, I would love it if a book I wrote sold thousands of copies. At the end of the day surely you write to please readers, not delight critics or professors of literature?

EBearhug · 17/08/2015 16:11

Not judging because they are choosing to read in general on the train but because they are opting to read a book aimed at people with a much lower IQ than themselves

Must I always read something where half the book is devoted to bibliography and endnotes? You don't know if it's the only book someone has read in a year (in which case, it's still better than nothing,) if it's light relief in between a ton of academic books, if they're studying children's literature, just want to see what the hype is, if they're trying to work out if it's suitable for their child or for someone they teach - it might not even be their first language. My German reading ability is about age 12, and I still need a dictionary to hand, so most books I've read have been children's books (Hamster Freddy is great!)

Adults don't have a monopoly on good reads. There are some really good children's and young adults' books out there.

(Diana Wynne Jones is also great.)

ThumbWitchesAbroad · 17/08/2015 16:11

Marian Keyes - now I like her books too. I like that she deals with dark subject matter under the cover of humour. I don't particularly like that she's lumped in with the other chick-lit stuff which is generally airhead fluff material (especially the shopaholic shit), I think that underrates her books.
I remember lending Rachel's Holiday to a friend who was doing a counselling course - she gave it back to me after she'd read 1 chapter, saying it wasn't her thing - so I told her to go away and read more of it, until she was at least halfway through. She did, she loved it. One of her favourite books now.
Having said that, I didn't much like The Brightest Star in the Sky, and I was quite disappointed in The Woman Who Stole My Life - but all the Walsh girl books are great, and so is This Charming Man.

For me, the books I like have to be readable - I don't much care if they are considered good or bad writing, so long as I enjoy reading them.
Terry Pratchett - his first 4 discworld books can be a bit of a trial in terms of quality of writing, but by the 5th book, he's into his stride and they're great; up until the point where he was producing too many at a time, and the quality (IMO) fell off a little, but I think he thought so too and slowed it down again. Jingo is my least favourite of his Discworld books.

Jane Austen might be a great writer, but I was reading some of Sense and Sensibility on line the other day and GOD it was hard going! (Although I love P&P, much easier to digest.)

HP - the books hold me, I'm transported into the HP world while reading them - and that's what makes them "good" for me. Same with Terry Pratchett; but there's another writer, Tom Holt, who is also comedy fantasy fiction and his books always seem just a bit too "try-hard" - the easy comedy just doesn't work so well, IMO. Yet to others he'd be just as good as TP.

Well that was too much of an essay! What I'm trying to say is: if I enjoy reading a book I consider it good; if I find it hard work to get into, or too easy to put down, then I haven't enjoyed it that much and I don't consider it that good. Isn't that generally what we all do?

SDTGisAnEvilWolefGenius · 17/08/2015 16:11

Mindexplode - like others on here, I don't understand why you are condemning a series of books without having read any of them.

I like them for a number of reasons - I enjoy the plots, like the characters and love the way that the wizarding world is hiding in the Muggle world. Plus, I have always liked boarding school fiction (another poster mentioned the Chalet school books - I have them all and enjoy rereading them), and Hogwarts is a well imagined school - the mundane details of life there are clearly depicted, and it seems very plausible.

I think well-written children's fiction often also appeals to adults - for one thing, if parents are going to have to read these books to their children, it is good if the adults will enjoy them too, on some level.

I never read the HP books to my boys - the older two were old enough to read them themselves, and ds3 was not a particularly keen reader, but enjoyed Stephen Fry reading them on cd - I read the first one because the premise appealed to me, and I was hooked by the story and the characters, so waited eagerly for the others when they came out.

5446 · 17/08/2015 16:16

I'm 25 and was 8 when the first book came out. It is so interlinked with my childhood that I remember certain holidays, events etc around which HP book I was reading.

I must have read each book around 30 times since each individual one came out.

That anticipation of the next book coming out was very special. I hope there's as big as a phenomenon when my DChildren are a similar age that they can experience.

helenahandbag · 17/08/2015 16:21

I'm 25 and the series started when I was 7. I grew up with them and was, frankly, obsessed, as a teenager. I wrote fanfiction and have a HP tattoo Blush

I still love them, I'm rereading the fourth book now.

windchime · 17/08/2015 16:21

I have never understood why adults read HP books, and make such a big deal of it too. Neither of my DCs were remotely interested in picking up one of the books or watching any of the films, so we haven't contributed to JK Rowling's fortune at all! There are a million other much better books out there.

maybebabybee · 17/08/2015 16:24

There are a million other much better books out there.

In your opinion.

hellsbellsmelons · 17/08/2015 16:28

There are a million other much better books out there
And how do you know if you haven't read them all?

MamaMary · 17/08/2015 16:30

Books are OK. Not that well written, but the plot keeps you reading.

Films were dire, partly because none of the three children could act - Daniel Radcliffe in particular was very wooden - and partly because they were too long and boring.

WilburIsSomePig · 17/08/2015 16:32

windchime why did you read them all if there are a million better books out there?

NarrativeArc · 17/08/2015 16:35

maybe I'm a novelist ( and a successful one to boot) plus I teach literature Grin.

Let me tell you. It is very easy to look at style and dismiss it as 'badly written,' and far far less easy to look at a novel ( as a whole baggy wonderful creature) and see it's craft in many layers on a macro level.

BoyScout · 17/08/2015 16:39

You're dismissing the books based on the films. They're two different things.

Coffeemarkone · 17/08/2015 16:39

" far far less easy to look at a novel ( as a whole baggy wonderful creature) and see it's craft in many layers on a macro level. "

With HP, 'baggy' is very apposite.
Do you really teach literature. I find that surprising. Adult ed is it?

HarrietVane99 · 17/08/2015 16:39

At the end of the day surely you write to please readers, not delight critics or professors of literature?
Yes. I'm a writer. Generally one has to strike a balance between writing to please oneself (because if the writer didn't enjoy writing it, people probably won't enjoy reading it) and writing what people want to read. Which generally means writing something that fits, however loosely, into one of the popular genres - crime, romance, fantasy etc. Then, likeable characters and a page turning plot are more important than beautiful literary prose.

Jane Austen did break what are now regarded as some of the 'rules' of fiction. But she was pretty much inventing her genre as she went along. And her characters and her wit make up for any supposed shortcomings, imo.

hackmum · 17/08/2015 16:43

I read the books as an adult - I was in my 30s when the first one came out. I've only seen a couple of the films and can't really be bothered with them, but I did enjoy the books. They work like very good detective stories (and I love a good detective story) but with added magic. There's a lot of humour in them, which I notice not everyone seems to get. What I particularly admire about them is the very clever way she has a single standalone mystery to solve in each book, but also maintains a quite complicated narrative arc stretching from the first book to the last.

I know that people say they're derivative (and I can see the influence of people like CS Lewis and Enid Blyton in there, among others) but to my mind she's created her own imaginative world that is quite different from any other children's book I can think of.

ShakesBootyFlabWobbles · 17/08/2015 16:52

I read the first three, struggled to get through the fourth, then sacked it. I found them fairly dull especially the quidditch world cup.
Some films were just ok but I fell asleep in some, particularly the part one of the last book.
HP studio tour is excellent though even for someone who is not a fan aka me. yanbu

NarrativeArc · 17/08/2015 16:55

coffee university. Oxbridge. You?

maybebabybee · 17/08/2015 17:10

Narrative I don't really understand what point you're making....are you agreeing or disagreeing with me :S

ShipwreckedAndComatose · 17/08/2015 17:14

I also admire her achievement in planning her storyline from the beginning and seeing it through to the end, unlike some other writers

YY to that. It was when I read the prisoner of Askaban and realised there was a throwaway reference in the first book to Hagrid being lent Sirus' flying motor bike to take the baby Harry away that I realised she really had planned it all carefully. Sirus was not brought in until book three but she already knew what she was going to write.

NarrativeArc · 17/08/2015 17:18

Ha maybe I'm agreeing Grin.

'Writing' involves a whole lot of invisible craft. The scaffolding that is removed once the house is built ( to shamelessly misquote Zadie Smith ).

I've had champagne. Apologies.

FuzzyWizard · 17/08/2015 17:18

Shipwrecked- Totally agree about that. People might assume that she mentioned the name without having yet planned out his place in the story but the name itself is such a huge clue to his identity in PoA that that isn't possible.

BerylStreep · 17/08/2015 17:18

I'm not entirely convinced that being a successful author and lecturer in literature necessarily means that their view is definitive.

I know a guy who is a successful author (first novels were good, subsequent ones dull and formulaic IMO), who also teaches literature. He also left his wife for another woman, got her pregnant, then skulked back to his wife with his tail between his legs. Personally I wouldn't give a shit what his opinion was on HP or any other book.

Narrative I'm not having a go at you - but I don't think your opinion trumps everyone else just because you are an author and lecturer in literature.

FuzzyWizard · 17/08/2015 17:21

Beryl- I don't think that's fair. Narrative hasn't claimed to be the final authority on anything. She was responding to a (fairly rude) question. Initially she very much underplayed her university teaching.

maybebabybee · 17/08/2015 17:22

Yes I agree, I don't think narrative claimed her opinion is definitive.