A Case for Harry Potter

I'm more well read than you. With some confidence I can say that I've made it further and more skillfully through the canon of our cultures than you might hope to claim. I'm no student of the art but I am comfortably established in the upper echelon of the lay and with few exceptions can hold my own in basic literary conversation.

That being said I feel the need to tell any gainsayers that Harry Potter is not "A children's book". In fact the plot is more subtle and complex and dark than most things I have read. Rowling has worked on this immense cast of characters for 15 years and it shows in their development. Themes of betrayal, war, familial hatred, loss, murder, loyalty, racism, sacrifice and emotional abuse cannot be cast off as child's play merely because they are mixed with the themes associated with coming of age.

Well, clearly they can since they are, if only by the unfortunate ignorant.

I'll grant that at least now it seems like a classic Hero device. Harry will win and we will all be happy, but that device has been proven for thousands of years and is absolutely not without value. Though the series is not without it's tragic deaths and many more are to come if the author is to be believed. My point is that the books is only "formula" in a very broad way.

I only mention all this because if you are ignoring this important series because of those kind of prejudices, because you are in your "Umberto Eco" phase, you are depriving yourself of an extraordinarily compelling story. You don't have to be stoically detached all the time to be and adult.


So...who wants to go to Edinburg with me?