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Children's books

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Original poster

Am I alone in Harry Potter addiction?

48 replies

bambipie · 22/04/2009 16:26

I just keep reading them all the time. I haven't got the first two books but I read the whole lot, in order, and when I get to the end I just start again. Pretty much know them off by heart now. I read other books too, but always have an HP on the go.
Is anyone else a addict?

OP posts:

Dumbledoresgirl · 23/04/2009 09:54

Bucharest - me too! I was convinced of it. All that stuff from virtually the beginning about people changing their appearance and everyone saying to Harry "You look just like your father". I thought it was all a huge hint that somehow Snape had enchanted him to look like James to avoid the truth coming out.

Ah I could write a better plot than JK

Original poster

bambipie · 23/04/2009 10:43

I don't think it matters that afterwards things seem questionable. When I'm reading it I'm totally there!

OP posts:

Original poster

bambipie · 23/04/2009 10:44

Derek Jacobi as Dumblerdore? Needs some one more 'twinkly' IYKWIM.

OP posts:

Dumbledoresgirl · 23/04/2009 10:46

Derek Jacobi can do twinkly! (Not so secret DJ fan of old).

becstarlitsea · 23/04/2009 10:51

Love Harry Potter so much. I was really excited yesterday reading 'The Mayor of Casterbridge' for the first time, and found the word 'Dumbledore' - that must be where JK got it from (it's an archaic regional word for a bumblebee apparently). I'm always finding little things which must come from all her research and reading. I admire her so much for working so hard to create such a long, complex and carefully balanced plot. I've just finished my second novel (my first got rejected from lots and lots of agents and publishers), and I stand in awe of JK Rowling.

Bucharest · 23/04/2009 10:54

I think her use of individual words/the Latin-like but not-Latin phrases and stuff (stuff: there's a great word!) are genius at times...

differentID · 23/04/2009 11:37

I'm glad I'm not alone in my loathing of Michael Ganbon as Dumbledore. I've always felt he made him, well, a little pervy for lack of the right word. He reminds me of a bloke i was told to saty away from when I was a little girl because he was a bit pervy.

Bumperlicioso · 23/04/2009 14:49

'Agree re. Michael Gambon - he is wrong wrong wrong. That scene in GOF where he shouts at Harry after his name comes out of the goblet is so awful that I can't watch it.'

I sooo agree with that statement. Dumbledore was never aggressive, I hate that scene.

I am still curious as to what careers they had. And what did Lily and James do for a living, especially to have all that money? And I think JK treated the fact that HP had lost both his parents so perfunctorily, with little sympathy.

I do think JK must have done an incredible amount of research, there's a lot of folklore and archaic language that is less made up than it sounds IYKWIM.

I did enjoy all the films but none of them has the magic of the 1st one, it's so innocent and all new and lovely. They just get darker from then on, the don't revel in the magic so much.

Oh, I do love it so much though. But I am glad to have found a group of people geeky enough to share a critical analysis of it!

Juxal · 23/04/2009 15:06

My mum is an addict. She has all the books both in paper form and on cd, and spends half the night with the cds going while she's asleep.

I enjoyed the books, but was completely fed up with the last one which I thought was pretty crap. It reads as if she was bored with it and just wanted to finish it.

The films were all pretty awful, and the child actors were dreadful, though they got a bit better as the series went on. DH can't watch any of the films at all because the kids are so dreadful (sorry).

Peter O'Toole would have been a brilliant Dumbledore. Gambon was probably the worst choice possible.

becstarlitsea · 23/04/2009 16:18

I always assumed that the money came from James Potter's family - since they were an old pure-blood family, and he was the only descendant and died young. I don't think Lily and James had time to get jobs - they were only 21 when they died and were in the Order of the Phoenix, then had to go into hiding.

Did you see the interview with JKR where she explained about how the books get darker? She said that although the plot for the six books was all planned out before she started writing the first, the thing that changed was the death of her mother (I think she died while JKR was on first draft of ''Chamber of Secrets") - that made the main themes of love and death become much darker. I think that might also be why she doesn't dwell on the death of Harry's parents maybe?

I am such a nerd...

Flibbertyjibbet · 23/04/2009 18:16

I love Sirius.
But thats because I was completely blinded to the character he was playing - I just love Gary Oldman.
In fact prizoner of Azkaban with Gary Oldman AND Alan Rickman... heaven

I need to read them all again, I completely missed the gay dumbledore thing!

I always thought that girl was bad as Hermione, like someone in their school play not quite able to act properly and coming over all wooden.

MoominMymbleandMy · 23/04/2009 22:19

I enjoyed the first three but thought the later ones were very overwritten. However it would have been a very brave and mad publisher who told JKR her work needed tightening.

And I did get bored with Harry having permanent PMT in the later books.

Chrestomanci wins hands down in our household every time. Diana Wynne Jones is so much more adventurous. Even in the books where she doesn't quite pull it off you have to be impressed at the breadth of her imagination.

pointydog · 24/04/2009 23:23

bucharest, lickily dd2 reads her own books. I do not get involved in LOTR

psychomum5 · 24/04/2009 23:27

I have just finnished re-reading the series again. my brain has been much recently (too much RL stuff going on), so returned to my fave reading material.

am now in that limbo whereby I need to read, but cannot get out of the harry potter mindset...............

as for the films, they are what I return to time and time again whenever I am ill

janeite · 24/04/2009 23:35

I re-read 6 and 7 over the holiday, ready for the film coming out. I think there are many things that can be criticised, most notably the fact that they are far too long and some of the phrasing is either virtually repeated across the books (eg weather descriptions) or rather clumsy. They would have been better books with some fairly brutal editing.

However, their strengths are that she has created characters that you actually connect with and care about in an old-style plotbuster of good versus evil and that as this, and rather than as 'literature' they succeed enormously well. Her characterisation is excellent and some of the names are just pure Dickens - Professor Umbridge is just a genius example of naming, as is Dumbledore.

I liked the last one a lot, although agree that she seemed to forget about some things that earlier books seemed to hint were important.

FfreckleFface · 24/04/2009 23:39

Moomin, I thought that, especially with OTP. It's a very self-indulgent work, that, as an editor, I would have trimmed considerably.

I love them though. Can't help it. Even when you look at them in retrospect and the faults become apparent, the sheer magic more than makes up for them. My sister is staying at the moment, and is rereading DH, and I was thinking that I am due a reread of them all. (Have lots of new unread books though, so have to wait.)

Boydog is called Sirius, as POA was my favourite HP when we got him. I wanted to call him Dumbledore, but Bloke put his foot down firmly.

alicecrail · 25/04/2009 07:56

I was very against the whole Harry Potter thing to start with. I couldn't see the fascination with a childrens book. However, i ended up getting stuck at college when the rest of my course had an exam (i hadn't needed to do it) and nothing to do. My friend had The Philosophers Stone with her, so i sat down to read it. I was totally hooked!
I must admit that i enjoyed the first 4 the most, i think Harry is more likeable, and although the other 3 have more going on and are possibly aimed at the older audience, i was quite disappointed with how the characters had changed. I mean realistically i don't think Ron and Hermione would continue being Harry's friend because he is a moody, stroppy pain in the arse and a bit of a liability to be honest.

georgimama · 25/04/2009 08:36

I am so glad I'm not the only loon who would re-read all the other books before each one came out .

I have seen all the films but I am very anti "the film of the book" as a concept anyway, I've never seen a film adapted from a book which got it "right" in my view yet, and that's because you have a very set idea of the characters, locations, clothes, everything - or you do if the writer is any good at characterisation. The only screen adaptations I have ever seen which I thought actually enhanced my pleasure in the books I already loved were the 1980s ITV Brideshead Revisited and the mid 1990s BBC P&P.

monkeypinkmonkey · 25/04/2009 08:55

Not an addict but reading this thread i've decided i'm starting from the phil stone all the way through again. reaches to book case

Iseult40 · 03/05/2009 02:34

I love the HP books but wouldn't call myself an addict. It's wonderful though to have a series of books that can be enjoyed by both adults and children. I'm a huge fan of girls' literature but didn't really expect to find the HP books quite as fascinating as I did. I don't read them again and again, though, and I've only seen the films as they've come on tv.

SuperBunny · 03/05/2009 02:41

I have free tickets to this I can't wait!

bea · 05/05/2009 18:24

gawd! and i thought i was the only 'adult' who did this... at the moment am taking a break from them all and re-reading the twilightsaga... no way as good but has that epic.... long story drama feel to it...... once i'm done that may well start at the philosophers stone again and re read the whol blinking lot!!!!

AramintaCane · 06/05/2009 13:29

SuperBunny I am so envious of you. I am holding out for the Harry Potter theme park. We are so excited.

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