the impact of harry Potter

[beaulolais]

of course i must go see the half Blood Prince!

but i wonder, has the harry Potter phenomenon been good or bad in general for drawing attention and interest to English fantasy?

of course it gets a lot of attention, but it is such an empire, and so self-contained, i wonder whether it may even take interest away from other fantasies!

so how do you feel about it?  

[Sita Harker]

Well, I know that Harry Potter has drawn interest to reading, but fantasy? Mostly it started a whole wizard school genre, like Pirates of the Caribbean started a hash of pirate stories and Twilight started a bunch of teen vamp romances.

I don't think it has taken away from other genres of fantasy. For instance, PotC and Twilight. Especially now that it's over and the hubbub has died down.

 

[beaulolais]

i wonder now whether people care much, i mean in great numbers, about a book, no matter how good it is, until it has been made into a movie.

the sad thing is that some excellent books, like Strange and Norrell, would be very awkward to convert into cinema.  

[Lhia Dunwaith]

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone was the first full-length book I ever read by myself (I was four years old, not exaggerating), so I can sort of say I grew up reading it... and re-reading and re-reading it. ^_^

Harry Potter has done wonders for kids who otherwise would not have been interested in reading, and I'm sure it's led children to explore other fantasy books. The movies came out after books 1-3 got popular, and by that time there was already a significant following.

One thing I can't stand, though, is how Twilight was hailed as "the next Harry Potter." Are there ANY similarities that the two books share, besides having a massive fanbase? I can't think of any.  

[Altair Kingsfeather]

One thing about the Potter books is that there's a whole generation who grew up with them. My little sister right now is trying to read them, but the sixth and seventh are WAAAAY too adult for her (she's 8 ). I try to explain to her why it might not be a good idea to read/see the Half-Blood Prince, but she responds with "But you read them when you were my age". When I was her age, the third was out.

I think that the Potter books have definitely helped the fantasy book trade, but it seems like EVERYTHING is being compared to them. Which is annoying.  

[Sita Harker]

beaulolais

i wonder now whether people care much, i mean in great numbers, about a book, no matter how good it is, until it has been made into a movie.

I don't think so - especially since most of those movies stink. I mean, a fair amount of people like Inkheart and Artemas Fowl right?

Lhia_Dunwaith

One thing I can't stand, though, is how Twilight was hailed as "the next Harry Potter." Are there ANY similarities that the two books share, besides having a massive fanbase? I can't think of any.

I think that's what they meant - that it would be a sort of classic and part of pop culture... and it's not in the general talk as much as Harry Potter, (there's references to HP in Charmed, Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy, etc), but the idea of sparkly vampires in dangerously close to doing a Frindle, I think. Maybe.  

[beaulolais]

i believe there had not been a great deal of interest in magical themes on the part of publishing houses, except for juvenile lit, until Tolkein became a hit.

but after that, many authors joined in.

i realize it would be nearly impossible to make "another Potter", but maybe, i hope, others will attempt similarly elaborate magical creations.  

[greenphoenixrain]

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Harry Potter inspired me to learn to read. In the 5th grade, I was a slow reader and hated to read. My father started to read the books to me and I wanted to be able to read them for myself, which made me work on my reading skills. Harry Potter also introduced to fantasy. So case in point, I have become an avid read since then. (btw I was in the 6th grade before the movies)

I think the books themselves were good but the movies are bad. I think they are not getting people into reading but giving excuses for people not read. Or if people are reading, it is only the books that make it to movies that people read. This all started with LoTR because it became big with the movies.

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