Arts & Humanities >
British Authors
Get a Widget for this title
RSS FeedIs J.K. Rowling turning the Harry Potter series into dark literature rather than youth literature?
Results so far:
| Youth | 48% | 634 votes | Total: 1319 votes | |
| Dark | 52% | 685 votes |
Youth
Write now
Print
Invite a writer™
Add to FavoritesDo you remember what it was like to be 10 years old? What books you loved? What stories captured your imagination? Whether your answer involved Grimm's fairy-tales, The Lord of the Rings, or Narnia - chances are magic and a very graphic struggle between "good" and "evil" featured. And this is the only way it should be, because from a certain age children will simply stop reading, if all that is on offer is the happy, harmonious world of Thomas the Tank Engine.
Not a word against Thomas. He is aimed at children of up to five years old though. Parents of our decade seem to forget that at some point their beloved child has to learn to make judgments, face and cope with the real world. And just like the real world is not, child and youth literature must not turn a blind eye to the existence of good and evil, life and death.
In my mind one of the reasons why the Harry Potter books are so incredibly successful originates in the fact that JK Rowling can extract the beautiful and the brutal sides of ordinary life - love and friendship, death and evil - from ordinary life and put them into an amazing, magical background. This is the secret of Harry Potter - Harry is a wizard, a hero, a celebrity but above all he is an ordinary boy.
Now, why should a 10-year old child be exposed to all that cruelty? After all Harry's Parents didn't die from a road accident but were killed, killed by the most evil wizard who ever lived, Lord Voldemort. And mind you, all those scary creatures were-wolves, vampires, trolls and dementors will give the little ones nightmares. True, horrific things happen in the series. Message: people die in the real world and in books and sometimes very small children have to come to terms with the fact that a friend, a grandparent or even a parent dies.
And what about all those scary, magic creatures? Firstly a lot of the scary creatures are not so scary after you take a close look: Hagrid, the half-giant, is one of Harry's best friends. Remus Lupin, the were-wolf, is according to one of Harry's class mates "the best teacher we ever had". If nothing else, Hagrid and Lupin are valuable lessons for children to not judge a book by it's cover.
And the real really scary monsters? Bad magic, monsters have always featured in children's and youth story. The wicked witch from Hansel and Gretel keeps the two of them prisoner, keeps Hansel in a cage to cook and eat him and at the time she keeps Gretel a slave around the house. In "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" the Queen of Hearts threatens to chop everyone's head off. Harmless? Certainly not. But both stories are classics of children's literature.
Rowling, by the way, has made a brilliant reply to the advocates of "cuddly" youth literature in her book, "The Tales of Beedle The Bard": A revised version of the "gruesome" wizard's story "The Wizard and the Hopping Pot" closes as follows: "And Wee Willykins kissed and huggled the hoppitty pot and promised always to help the dollies and never to be an old grumpy-wumpkins again." Albus Dumbledore then comments that the tale "has met the same response from generations of wizarding children: uncontrollable retching, followed by an immediate demand to have the book taken from them and mashed into pulp."*
Morale of the story: We should put a lot more faith in our children's ability to cope with harsh reality; it will be for their own good in the long run.
Learn more about this author, Eva Maler.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.
Dark
J.K. Rowling created a series that was meant to be more of a children's novel, but instead the books made it into the hands of people of all ages, including adults. It sold millions of copies worldwide, and became one of the most cherished novels. Harry Potter: an orphaned child, living an ordinary life, but with incredibly mean relatives who happily take it upon themselves to make Harry's life a miserable one. That is, until he was taken to Hogwarts - a school where the students learn to use magic, thus capturing millions of readers around the world.
Part of the appeal of the Harry Potter series was its vivid characters, coming from different backgrounds, each loveable in their own way and its combinations of realism and fantasy mixed in. The other appeal of the series was its very dark tone that set it apart from other children's novels.
Harry found himself in a war against the most feared wizard: Voldemort. Throughout the series, Harry struggles between trying to live as an average wizard, and saving those around him. He not only struggles with himself, but his relationships with friends, classmates, and the adults he trusts. Throughout the war he loses many loved ones. That is what made Harry Potter so successful, its darkness. In a large-scale war, no one is spared from losing a loved one; Harry is no exception.
While the books deals with war and loss, the books also deal with topics such as discrimination. There are pure-bloods and Muggle-borns; a pure-blood would be someone born into a family with a heavy magical bloodline. While Muggle-borns are those that have non-magical members of the family, including the parents. There is much strife between the two groups, which spawned Voldemort's massacres in the first place: the hate for those born into Muggle families, and Muggles themselves. It is the equivalent of racism, homophobia, and other forms of intolerance.
The series needed to be dark in order to deliver these messages to its readers, despite the intended readers were intended to be children. Being dark does not mean that the books are "unsafe" for children, exposing to violence, death, and intolerance. Being dark is to also teach a lesson. If one takes a look at the older tales and nursery rhymes, they would find plenty of darkness behind them. Grimm's Fairy Tales are a shining example of children's tales being dark, to the point where it's hard to believe they were meant for children at all! If you thought Snow White was full of happiness, singing, and adorable animals prancing around with the main character; then you need to read the original version it greatly contrasts with the over-sugared Disney adaptation.
These stories are dark because they serve to teach a lesson and to warn about what would happen if you made very poor choices in life. Such as "The Boy Who Cried Wolf." The boy was eaten in the end as a result of his constant lying and pranks on the adults, so no one believed him when the real thing showed up. The story teaches that lying is not only morally wrong, but can also get you into very bad situations.
There is also another lesson to be learned in a dark story: triumph. Amongst the intolerance for Muggle-borns, also known as "mudbloods" (the equivalent to racial slurs) by the pure-bloods, there is also triumph. And that is in Hermione Granger, a shrewd, plain-looking, bookish girl, born to Muggle parents. She demonstrates that one does not have to be born into status, privilege, or be in certain groups to be the best. And she does it by being one of the smartest Hogwarts has ever had. And Ron Weasley, coming from a pure-blood family whose status is far from the wealth and status possessed by the Malfoys. Ron an his family show that though they are pure-bloods, it does not mean they show intolerance toward Hermione and Harry in fact, they treat them as part of the family. And Ron, in a way, possesses far more than his nemesis, Draco.
As for Harry, having gone through the amount of physical, mental, and emotional torture he still stood up and put up a fight when many others were overwhelmed in fear. The fight cost him so many lives, but in the end he triumphed. The dark tones in Harry Potter provide a wonderful opportunity to teach a lesson, it is all a good thing. It gets the characters to mature, and the readers along with them. And it brings hope when it was all thought to be lost. And it allowed characters to transcend the norm established by the societies. And provided realism to a fantasy world. What is the point of sugar-coating everything that is intended for young readers? Just what are we trying to protect them from? Reality? If a lesson is to be taught, the best way would be is through a dark story.
Learn more about this author, Karla Aguirre.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.
Difference of opinion? Debate now.
