Harry Potter

[iNow]

People who read Harry Potter should be lined up and shot. Whether it's because it's making them devil worshipers or because it's stopping them from reading superior literature isn't important. The important thing is that they're shot.

 

BTW, Harry Potter books burn at the same temperature as Proust books: 451 degrees Fahrenheit. No need for special fuel.

 

Wow dude. I'm not a big fan either, but I'd f*&k you up if you shot my girlfriend.

 

 

Perhaps extremism is a sickness unto death.

[Dak]

That's the real tragedy. I think everyone should make an effort to try to read Proust. Many (including myself) regard him as the greatest author of all time, and it's not as if his writing is horribly inaccessible, although not many are likely to finish his masterpiece.

 

see now this is why i was getting annoyed with you earlyer. why is it so hard, for a professed liberal, to accept that people have different tastes, and the fact that their tastes are not the same as yours does not make their tastes inferiour?

 

not everyone likes intelectual books and there is nothing wrong with that.

 

As someone who reads almost exclusively to better my own intellect, I just can't relate.

 

it is not required (by, presumably, your liberal philosophy) that you relate, just that you don't view their tastes (reading for fun as opposed to intelectual betterment) as inferior to yours because they are not yours.

 

Shakespeare is harder to read than Proust.

 

off topic, but shakespear wrote plays. anyone who suggests that they are good books should be shot (i mean you, english teachors).

 

If you're not prepared to read in order to develop complex ideas... the complex message ineffably expressed through written language, then I guess you should stick to Harry Potter. Just don't go around saying that Harry Potter had a profound impact upon your perception of reality the way an author like Proust can elicit.

 

I have never heard anyone claim that.

 

As far as I can tell, it's largely plot-driven yet episodic, there are few (two, from what I've heard, HP and Snape) characters of any real complexity, each of the books follows a recurring theme of a gradual buildup resulting in a confrontation between HP and Voldemort, and this approach is repeated throughout the series ad nauseam.

 

actually, i feel i should defend rowling here.

 

I like reading modern classics (1984 for example), modern but interesting books (i'd consider mcnab to belong in here) and more light-weight 'fun' books (HP and dahl for eg), but theres a difference between 'light-weight' and vacouse. the goose bump books that you mentioned earlyer are light-weight and vacouse (read some when i was a kid), but stuff from rowling and dahl are competently light-weight. it's like the difference between terminator and something with the rock in it: both are light-weight blow-shit-up films, but the terminator is a light-weight blow-shit-up film done well; stuff with the rock in is just wank.

 

so yeah, as has been said, not intelectually lah-de-dah != empty and vacuous.

[bascule]

not everyone likes intelectual books and there is nothing wrong with that.

 

it is not required (by, presumably, your liberal philosophy) that you relate, just that you don't view their tastes (reading for fun as opposed to intelectual betterment) as inferior to yours because they are not yours.

 

That seems to remain the point of contention. You seem to be saying "Let us have our crap, and by the way, don't call it crap"

 

I'm quite content to let you have your crap, but I'm going to call it crap, because that's my opinion of it.

[Dak]

That seems to remain the point of contention. You seem to be saying "Let us have our crap, and by the way, don't call it crap"

 

I'm quite content to let you have your crap, but I'm going to call it crap, because that's my opinion of it.

 

no, the point of contention is your implication that the fact that you don't like it (without even having bothered to read it) qualifies it as being crap.

 

your opinion is that it's crap, but you've been presenting it as a statement -- 'books that aren't to my taste are crap'. which is fundamentally bigoted.

 

what i'm actually saying is 'let us have our stuff that you don't enjoy, and don't presume to call it crap just because you don't like it'.

 

possibly with 'bitch' added to the end

 

I mean, I really can't stand shakespear, but i don't call it crap; rather, i recognise the fact that i, personally, don't enjoy reading screen-plays in outdated english, and so obviouly wont enjoy shakespear. I'm suggesting you should acknowledge that you just don't like non-'intelectual' books so obvioudly wont like HP, without HP neccesarily being shit.

 

out of interest, what's your oppinion of dahl?

[bascule]

out of interest, what's your oppinion of dahl?

 

Dahl was perhaps my favorite author as a child and I'm saddened by the travesty of a movie that was Matilda, a book which ranks among my favorite childhood reads. Dahl may perhaps have served as an impetus for my future jadedness, especially with such dark imagery as Mrs. Trunchbull's iron maiden-esque box lined with shards of broken glass where she placed problem students.

 

I also recall a cautionary tale told in poetry/song in Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator about a girl who consumed an entire bottle of chocolate coated laxatives from her grandmother's medicine cabinet, and subsequently suffered permanent diarrhea. Wow.

 

(And I'm guessing that sort of scatological humor isn't to be found in Harry Potter...)

[Dak]

Dahl was perhaps my favorite author as a child and I'm saddened by the travesty of a movie that was Matilda, a book which ranks among my favorite childhood reads. Dahl may perhaps have served as an impetus for my future jadedness, especially with such dark imagery as Mrs. Trunchbull's iron maiden-esque box lined with shards of broken glass where she placed problem students.

 

agreed. i asked because HP reminded me of dahl to varying degrees in places, tho i should point out i haven't read dahl in a very long time (might dig out some of his books and re-read them, thinking about it). the villians, tho, i think are definately dahlesque in their casual sadism.

 

(And I'm guessing that sort of scatological humor isn't to be found in Harry Potter...)

 

you'd be guessing wrong.

[bascule]

you'd be guessing wrong.

 

Oh really!

[Royston]

off topic, but shakespear wrote plays. anyone who suggests that they are good books should be shot (i mean you, english teachors.

Who said that ? Anyway I thought we were discussing literature which covers all categories of creative writing.

I'm sure this was mentioned before, (I can't be arsed to trawl back through this thread) whether JK Rowling can be accused of writing structurally formulaic novels...which they are, it's encouraged an entire generation to read, and will more than likely provoke an entire generation to read other books. That's clearly a good thing...and apologies to whoever already raised that point initially.

 

EDIT: Oh, it was ecoli...sterling point ecoli

[iNow]

So Bascule, your point about HP is that the books are crap, yet you've never read them?

[Pangloss]

That seems to remain the point of contention. You seem to be saying "Let us have our crap, and by the way, don't call it crap"

 

I'm quite content to let you have your crap, but I'm going to call it crap, because that's my opinion of it.

 

This seems to be different from what you were saying earlier in the thread, which was more along the lines that Harry Potter causes actual harm.

 

Teachers should be teaching children how to enjoy reading, and that includes how to find books they think they might be interested in. If they're only interested in Harry Potter, this skill is never developed, and then no wonder they don't read: they don't know how to figure out what to read.

 

I'm primarily arguing that there are better books for adults to be reading than Harry Potter. In regard to children my argument is that book selection skills aren't getting taught. After all, why would kids need to learn them when they're happily reading Harry Potter?

 

My contention is that you're wasting time better spent reading better books.

 

Because people who can't select books don't read

 

No, I'm saying teachers who depend on Harry Potter to turn kids into lifelong readers rather than teach kids how to become lifelong readers are causing children to lose out.

 

This is the quintessential "freedom-loving" liberal argument of "you can't decide what's best for yourself, so I will decide for you and instruct you on how to live your life." Which is why I'm comparing you to christian conservative nazis who see HP as witchcraft. It's a valid comparison. The only difference being you haven't asked for a law. (Not all of them do either, but that doesn't make them any less dangerous.)

 

But of course if you've changed your position then I'm glad to hear it.

[Skye]

There's nothing new under the sun. All the good narratives and allegory were already written down thousands of years ago. The allegory of the cave probably covers most allegories of perception in literature. Certainly Cervantes reveals his allegories in a different, more subtle, manner. But I don't see anything more there than what Plato was able to allude to. Really, if you read alot, it seems that the only interesting thing is seeing how new language and forms of writing interact with old stories and allegory. If you don't read much, then it's all new to you and you get that sense of a ride through the narrative, or the revelation of allegory, whatever you read.

[bascule]

There's nothing new under the sun. All the good narratives and allegory were already written down thousands of years ago. The allegory of the cave probably covers most allegories of perception in literature. Certainly Cervantes reveals his allegories in a different, more subtle, manner. But I don't see anything more there than what Plato was able to allude to. Really, if you read alot, it seems that the only interesting thing is seeing how new language and forms of writing interact with old stories and allegory. If you don't read much, then it's all new to you and you get that sense of a ride through the narrative, or the revelation of allegory, whatever you read.

 

So... can you suggest anything from the past that compares to A Remembrance of Things Past (or the more modern/comprehensive retranslation, In Search of Lost Time)

 

Note it's not really an allegory...

[iNow]

So... can you suggest anything from the past that compares to A Remembrance of Things Past (or the more modern/comprehensive retranslation, In Search of Lost Time)

Compares how?

 

By length?

By topic?

By setting?

By time period?

By some subjective property like readability or enjoyment?

[bascule]

Compares how?

 

You seem to be looking for some sort of quick categorical label to file it under. Rather bluntly it's "stream of consciousness", but used in a way I've never seen from other authors who write in the stream-of-consciousness form. Perhaps the most concisely I can describe it is "memory evocation-driven stream of consciousness"

 

I was using "compares" in the sense that RoTP/ISoLT is a unique work which, to my knowledge, there exists nothing that compares. If anything, it's a study of how the evocation of memory shapes our identity. Proust quite likely could've written about the same thing in the context of a non-fiction philosophical book, but it wouldn't have the same effect.

 

By doing it in narrative form, Proust builds up the memories he evokes through a bombardment of intense imagery. The reader is expected to take in this imagery, synthesize it into an internal picture, then allow it to be invoked at later parts of the story.

 

In order to do this, yes, the work had to be quite long, and it also depends on the reader to visualize and synthesize what's being expressed into a grander picture of the narrator's life, so that the process of memory evocation actually works.

 

Has anyone else done this? I'd sure like to know...

[iNow]

Has anyone else done this? I'd sure like to know...

I'm reluctant to think that you'll appreciate this answer, but I suggest Robert Pirsig did a fine job of it.

[bascule]

I'm reluctant to think that you'll appreciate this answer, but I suggest Robert Pirsig did a fine job of it.

 

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance is a great book and one which sort of kickstarted my love of philosophy, and yes, it's a semi-autobiographical first person narrative, but that's about where the similarities end.

[muchado]

Has anyone else done this? I'd sure like to know...

 

Our experience shapes our identity and how we react..this is specially true in context to how we relate/connect to a piece of literature...for me Virginia Woolf's Mrs Dalloway and Joyce' Portrait of a Young Man as artist are two of the best examples of Stream-of-cons.

 

About HP...it is a piece of literary work...how good? only time will answer that question...but i don't believe it will go down next to ulysses or such...she imitated too many previous authors in her books in trying to establish her own style...

Nonetheless, I have read each one of those books at least 5times, why? because I think its relaxing...she asks her readers to stress their imagination while still keeping feet with modern society..which is enjoyable...when I take few hours away from my work to let it loosely exercise..i find its refreshing to come back to critical thinking...but that just me

 

These kind of works should be read by adults because they raise important question that we should think about...the fact she was and still are able to captivate a generation for 10yrs is rather amazing...we should read the text to try to understand why it has such a tremendous social impact...understanding the culture/society we live in is always important..after all those of use who loves science loves it because we are so curious about ourselves..the nature.