Rereading Harry Potter as an adult and finding it difficult

[Dasisr]

Obsessed with Harry Potter as a teenager but finding it a difficult read as an adult. How badly he is treated by the Dursleys. How deprived of love he was and in later books how he was kept away from his friends/family. All the death of loved ones he had to witness. Honestly finding it tough to get through. AIBU or anyone else the same?

I find most children’s literature, all of the Disney catelogue of movies very difficult as an adult.

I think it’s a combination of life experience, but also the unprecedented rapid cultural changes over the last 150 years.

My dc were shocked at the start of Malory Towers and disinclined to continue reading about a school with so much nastiness and bullying in the opening chapter. As a child it didn’t occur to me to sympathise with Gwen because she, and her mother, were committing the terrible sin of failing to conform and socially mask. Those expectations have diminished drastically in the meantime.

One of the things I like about HP is that the series opens as a light hearted tale with cartoonish villains and abuse. But each subsequent book gets more difficult and nuanced. But JKR’s initial audience grew up between books too. It’s one of the reasons I didn’t let my dc read the whole lot. We did the first three. Waited a few years to test the waters with book 4. And then held off again until they were a bit more mature for the last three. I know it’s fashionable on MN to declare that little darling read the whole series at the age of 5 though.

I think that there is enormous value in emotionally challenging children’s literature (although I’d happily bin the nasty creepy Dahl stuff)

I read the first one as my daughter raved about all of them. I really struggled to finish it and couldn't bring myself to read any of the others. Far too long and just didn't hold my interest.

I'm the same with the Robert Galbraith books - tried and failed to read a couple of them yet FiL raves and says they're so well written. I enjoy the TV adaptations though.

‘People are entitled to their own opinions‘. Yes they are. And other people are entitled to say that those opinions are silly, ill-founded, nonsense, not worthy of notice.

There's huge tracts of it that are dull but the central story is good and she builds suspense at the end of each book.

On a slightly different note, does anyone miss the days of childhood where you were completely absorbed in a book’s magical world ?

I would read constantly and I just loved it - I loved the stories, I loved the ‘worlds’, the characters, the events and all the unusual things that existed but I think mostly it was the agency of the main characters - how they encountered a difficulty, knew they had to do something, felt fearful but did it anyway. I always felt those books were somehow instructional for the real world.

I also think that the focus on criticism here is a bit misaligned - there is no point looking for holes in a story about wizards and magic - the whole point is that it’s a fictitious world, but are the events plausible within that world, do the characters act consistently within the plot? This is literary criticism, to me

I do remember thinking at the time they were written for film, not reading - they are, imv, badly written and as someone else said, entirely forgettable once read (although the volume is huge)

and how has no-one picked up on this gem

nobody would have survived the underwater scene in the Tri-Wizard Tournament without his botanical knowledge.

like really, the poster honestly thinks the schools would have drowned teenage contestants and their loved ones!!! Harry just would have faced public embarrassment at being unprepared and unable to compete.

The Dursleys didn’t hate Harry because he was a Horcrux, else you’d have seen other references throughout the novels to those who mysteriously didn’t like Harry/his company.

Petunia hated magic because she hadn’t been able to go to Hogwarts but Lily did. As a PP said, not only did Lily get to be “special” by going to a magical school and learning to do magic, but her involvement with the wizarding world was what ultimately killed her. Then she and Vernon had to bring up Harry who was either a constant reminder and/or seen as an unreasonable burden. They tried to squash the magic out of him, either in the hope that it wouldn’t arrive on their doorstep and “out” them as weird to their (presumably) equally small-minded neighbours, or perhaps - if I’m being charitable - to try and keep Harry away from the wizarding world to protect him.

Dumbledore left Harry with the Dursleys so that he would be protected by his blood family and so that he didn’t grow up famous.

OP, how about a nice bit of Thomas Hardy?

I don't like the way OP has been mocked for being absorbed by the book. That's what a good book does surely? On a non PhD level? Surely no one should need a literature PhD to enjoy a book?

Also saying its a good reason to go work with deprived children? Come on, I work with very vulnerable children and it moves me does that mean they are not worthy of my emotions? Are they a stepping stone for something really worthy of provoking an emotion? Do I need to see deeper, more meaningful trauma? I think not.

Some people cry and get deeply upset at seeing kittens die, some people watch child porn for the criminal justice system. It's not a educational path to righteousness. Once you have seen and felt every horror of this world is your opinion valid. To truly reach the highest level surely you need to inflict and enjoy it? It's not like that though is it?

Yup! Him, Luna and Ginny are referred to as the 'silver trio' by the fandom and were running resistance at Hogwarts after it was taken over by Voldemort. He also went off to the Ministry of Magic without a second thought in Order of the Phoenix. He pulled the sword of Gryffindor out of the sorting hat during the final battle, only a true Gryffindor can do that.

Interesting to see this today - earlier I saw a tweet by a comedy writer who’d just rewatched Four Weddings and a Funeral and posted that the funeral scene when first watched as a young man seemed a good plot device, as an older man, hit hard. I guess having the experience of being the age of having been in long term relationships the loss was easier to emphasise with (esp as the gay couple who at the time were unable to marry)

j can see why as a parent, you would suddenly see this is a story with an abused child at the centre would be tough to read.

That "nasty creepy stuff" is life, and Dahl does it better than anyone.

Quote from American novelist Bret Easton Ellis on James and the Giant Peach:

"It changed my life. My aunt read it to me, my sisters and my three cousins in two sittings over vacation at a beach house when I was about six. The idea that the world was meaner, crueller, more absurd and fantastical than anything that picture books had previously showed me made a real impact. That was the moment I couldn’t go back [as a reader]".

JKR is a great writer in her own right, but being viewed as an heir to Dahl was a somewhat overblown claim.

Isn't all Ofsted make-believe?

What's wrong with liking Harry Potter? I still enjoy reading Heidi, The Little Princess, The Secret Garden and the Anne of Green Gables series. Is that disturbing too?

Or any of the fairy tales with their original meanings, Sleeping Beauty especially, it wasn't a kiss he woke her with! Many children's stories have their origins in some dark places which is why they're not fit for adult perusal!

I'm disturbed by anyone that judgemental.

Still, you do you and those of us with a wider perspective can get on enjoying books whoever they are aimed at

@OriginalBliss Yes I agree with that analysis. And actually, if you were reading it hoping for increasingly graphic misery porn, you'd probably end up disappointed because, apart from a brief section in the middle, there wasn't a huge amount of explicit content - so the author managed to overpromise and underdeliver in a really crass way.

I’ve reread and rewatched them many times over the years. They’re comforting and the way that love and strength of character triumphs evil is a beautiful and hopeful message. I think JK is absolutely amazing.

Is Neville overweight?

https://www.esquiremag.ph/culture/books-and-art/original-fairytale-endings-disney-didnt-tell-you-about-a2330-20190719-lfrm#:~:text=In%20Basile's%20original%20fairytale%20ending,returned%20to%20his%20wife%2C%20Maleficent.

Sorry it's from a ladsmag but it gives some interesting takes on 'fairy tales'.

Yes - he's described as chubby with a round face. He's also blonde in the books.

I always thought the Dolores Umbridge character was a piss take on Offsted and all it stood for...

I find this hard as well. When Dudley is out on a diet, and we as readers are meant to gleefully celebrate that he's only allowed grapefruit whereas skinny Harry is allowed to enjoy cake and sweets (in secret, from his friends).

I understand that Dudley is a nasty piece of work, but I hate the narrative that skinny people deserve treats (the students at Hogwarts are always merrily tucking into feasts) but useless, lazy fat people deserve nothing.

I don't think the books are brilliantly written. The first two don't flow as easily as I'd expect from a published author, and the fourth onwards suffer from not enough editing as they tried to get them out quickly not to lose the momentum.
The third is imo by far the best writing. I wish that she'd had the luxury of being able to take her time on the others, but I guess then probably none of us would have heard of her.

Her big talent is her imagination, much like Enid Blyton. The little bits she has, the side additions to the main plot are fantastic.

I agree with the comparisons to Dahl in a lot of ways. I'm not terribly keen on Dahl but the similarity to me is that they go OTT at times, taking it into the realms of silliness. Some children love that, I always found it too much. For example Dudley's school uniform in the first book. I can't remember the exact description, but it's so dreadful there's no way a school would have that. To my mind it would have been better if it had been dreadful but plausible. Perhaps I'd put it in the category of cheap laughs.

For me the child abuse comes across as too much. Fine have him under the stairs, unloved. But his aunt and uncle are all about the look. There is absolutely no way they'd have risked anyone saying they treated him badly. It would have been "oh my darling, poor nephew who we are so generous taking in for not a scrap of money, but we wouldn't take any money because we love him so much..." in front of others, and basking in how everyone thinks they're wonderful.
And it was so extreme that there's no way schools wouldn't have picked up on it by the time Harry was 10yo-especially the difference in the way Harry and Dudley are treated. I'm sure parents would have commented too.

I don't think this is meant to be about weight. It's about the fact that Dudley is described as greedy and unpleasant and we're meant to laugh at him suffering because he can't have the stuff he's used to (sweets, cake, unlimited food).

As has been said loads of times, lots of other characters are described as overweight and none of them are unpleasant or evil people. Molly, Neville, Professor Sprout and Hagrid are the obvious ones, though I'm sure there are others.

I read very widely, fiction and non-fiction on all sorts of themes and topics. I was intrigued by the premise of "A Little Life" and read lots of reviews. That helped me decide that it was possibly not for me. What are your thoughts? I do sometimes think I ought to attempt it