Red Rock News
Date: July 27, 2007
He’s here! After much ballyhoo and waiting, the final volume of the Harry Potter series, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling is here. There has been endles speculation about its outcome, about the quality of the writing, and on and on and on. With so much media attention about what is ostensibly a children’s book, its may be hard to remember that readers of all ages actually do love the books. What is it about this series of tales depicting a young boy wizard growing up and battling evil that has so captured the imagination and hearts of people? I have some suspicions, at least as far as this culture goes. Allow me…
If one goes back to Joseph Campbell and his book The Hero with a Thousand Faces, as well as his fascinating video interviews conducted by Bill Moyers, our culture is bereft of myths. For many reasons that would take more than this column to list, we have tended to see them as artifacts of less advanced societies and in so doing we have abandoned them. But, the myths and stories told around the fire served important functions in all societies that created them. They explained how the universe worked and the role each person had to play in that mystery. They offered instructions as to the manner in which to live and the choices each person faces in life. They were guides to life, essentially.
That our culture has abandoned them has lead, in the opinions of greater minds than mine, to many problems in our society - crime, the dissolution of the family, eternally adolescent behaviors, lack of responsibility and more. The Harry Potter series are, for all intents and purposes, myths similar to those told around the campfires of ages past. The stories tell of mysterious forces in conflict in the world and the need by the young protagonists to choose what path they will take as they face that uncertain world.
What has been most rewarding for many of the youngest readers is they can easily identify with the characters, allowing the reader to see him- or herself faced with the same choices between good and evil. Certainly, the spectacle of wizards, magic and sharply defined darkness and light have allowed the series to be more than morality tales. They are rollicking fun and exciting, to boot! But, in the main, they are one of the few guides about the decisions we all make in life for children from all walks of life, for a wide array of beliefs to envision themselves within.
Certainly, some will say that books like the Bible and other religious books do the same thing. Some churches feel that to read these tales is bad for young minds for their being about witches, wizards and magic. But, there are few stories in any of the variety of faith texts that I have read that so fully flesh out the characters in their pages. There are few stories with which children can so easily identify. There are few stories that are so much fun to read.
For many readers, young and old alike, there is an easy sense of personal identification with the challenges and choices Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, and Hermione Granger must face. That all of them are pouting teenagers only makes them more realistic to the teens who read the books. Their distrust of the adult world and their fears of what the wide world holds for them are no different than the distrust and fear that all children address as they grow up.
For many, the television has replaced the campfire as the focal point of family evenings. The many questionable messages told at that “campfire” have done much to confuse and alienate our children. There is no consistent, positive message at that fire that guides our children as they grow. In fact, the skill of telling the stories that guide us has been all but lost.
The Harry Potter series offers its readers of all ages with well drawn moral choices, made both correctly and incorrectly by the actors, but easily recognized as such. The Potter stories capture the imaginations of readers just as those fireside tales did in ages past and their resolution is such that readers can clearly find a higher sense of purpose for the characters and themselves. There should be, in my opinion, more stories of a similar nature to guide us all. Whether the stories come from the popular press, from religious corners or, (and wouldn’t this be nice) from one’s elders around a campfire under a night’s starry sky, those lessons are needed and sought.
