Limelight:
Wild about Harry
By
Lubna Abdel Aziz
The global hysteria that surrounded the release of book 5, of the tale of a wizard boy named Harry Potter, has been nothing less than magical. The magnetic sense of anticipation has created a frenzy of such spectacular dimensions, leaving the world of muggles (non-magical folk in Potter language), deliriously volcanic. At exactly one minute after midnight on June 21 the start of the Summer Solstice, the hysteria reached a fever pitch as readers of all ages queued up for hours in Potter costumes outside bookstores around the whole of the English-speaking world. The clock struck midnight, their wait for the enchanted moment arrived. The doors opened and the crowd rushed to get their copies of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, and more adventures of an orphan wizard boy named Harry.
In just a few short years the story of Harry Potter and his friends at the Hogwarth's School of Witchcraft and Wizardry has created such a cultural sensation that standard favourites such as Cinderella and Pinocchio have been put aside for darker more mysterious lore. Who would have thought that Harry's Wonderland of witches and wizards, werewolves and vampires, would cast such a spell on the imagination of all who wander through it. The four previous Potter books have sold 200 million copies in 150 countries and 55 languages, figures heretofore unprecedented in the publishing community. Moreover the books are credited with getting children to rediscover the lost art of reading in this age of digital TV, netsurfing, and other endless electronic distractions. "Who would have thought that kids would line up after midnight to read a 900-page book!" mused a Manhattan bookstore owner. Who indeed! Even boys age 9-12, lowest on the reading scale, rush to buy books, CDs, tapes, games, toys, and any of the other 75 items of Potter memorabilia available to the public. Everyone is wild about the bespectacled unconventional orphan boy who answers to the conventional name of 'Harry'.
Security surrounding book 5 has been unprecedented. Retailers signed agreements not to offer the book for sale before the appointed hour. Intrepid muggles kept trying to get an early copy. In May, two copies were found dumped in a field in eastern England and were eventually returned to Bloomsbury, the British publisher. Last weekend 7,680 copies were stolen from a trading estate in Meyerside, leaving the English police puzzling over that mystery. In New York the Daily News purchased a copy from a Brooklyn store, mistakenly displayed by the owner before the official release date. The paper offered its readers a brief glimpse of the plot. Lawyers for author and publisher are suing The Daily for $100 million in damages, a drop in the bucket for a $5 billion/year enterprise.
Advance sales also made history selling over $1.5 million copies. The US publishers Scholastic were caught short 3 years ago when book 4, HP and the Goblet of Fire was released. Ninety six per cent of the printed copies were snatched over the first weekend amounting to 5.1 million books. This time 'Scholastic' is ready with 8.5 million copies in print, available for the US market alone. A massive run by hungry muggles has already gobbled up five million copies on its first day of sales. Even translators of 55 languages were not allowed access to the text prior to 21 June . Never before has there been such a strict embargo before the release of a book until the rise of the Phoenix. "We expect Phoenix to be the best-selling book in our history," said Carolyn Murphy, spokesperson for Barnes and Noble Bookstore chain. "It's unprecedented".
Critics, educators, psychologists and moralists, have tried to analyse those ingredients that make Harry Potter so irresistible. The author herself is just as mystified as everyone else is with the response to her books. "I just write the sort of story that I would like to read." She explores a world that has intrigued man and child since the beginning of time -- the powers of the supernatural, the mysteries of the underworld, the endless struggle between the forces of good and evil, a theme that lies at the base of every good yarn ever written. Without much hype or promotion children discovered the first book by themselves in September of 1997. By December it was on the best seller list and has never looked back since. The next three books all started as No.1 on every best seller list. Following the phenomenal success of her first book, Ms Rowling explains: "the book is really about the power of imagination. Wizardry is just the analogy I use." Therein lies her secret. She is very close to her characters and cried bitterly after killing off one of them in Phoenix.
The mystique that surrounds J K Rowling is no less bewitching than her creation. She feeds this mystique by fiercely guarding her private life appearing in public very briefly only when a film or book is being launched. So what has the most famous author in the world been doing during her three-year hiatus? Ms Rowling has remarried, had another child, a baby boy, David, and lives in one of three mansions she owns between England and Scotland. Accused of experiencing writers' block, Rowling disagrees: "I've been writing Harry through something like three changes of country, a marriage, a divorce, the birth of a daughter, unemployment, employment, I don't think getting some money is going to knock me off track now," she exclaimed to Katie Couric of NBC. The author, now richer than the Queen of England, has her net worth estimated at $470 million and will see her fortune grow to $1 billion by the time her seventh and last book in the series is published.
During that hiatus, all muggles around the globe had to be satisfied with the release of two blockbuster films based on books 1 and 2. HP and the Sorcerer's Stone, the first film became No.2 all-time grossing picture, second only to Titanic. The second HP and the Chamber of Secrets comes in at No.6. Between them they brought in $1.8 billion from ticket sales worldwide, and a total of $3.8 billion including tapes and DVDs. The third film, HP and the Prisoner of Azkaban, is currently in production and scheduled for a 2004 summer release.
Our modern Miss Mary Poppins possesses her own brand of magic, weaving together tales of the ordinary and extraordinary, of witchery and wizardry, of mysterious murders in silent corridors, of hounds from heaven and spirits from hell, and a boy who triumphs when he finds strength and inspiration in his friends, and learns new lessons about loyalty, integrity and sacrifice.
Thick runs the plot of the Phoenix, and readers will race through the pages with even more thrills than in previous books. According to the Associated Press: "It was well worth the wait, and then some." The adventure begins thus: The hottest day of the summer was drawing to a close and the drowsy silence lay over the large square houses of Privet Road. The only person left outside was a teenage boy lying flat on his back in a flower bed outside No.4. What child or adult can resist such a superb introduction which draws you within its enchanting walls, and once drawn there is no escape. It is the quintessential page-turner, stomach-churner, nail-eater and jaw-dropper. The book weighs one kilogramme, contains 225,000 words, 38 chapters, and 896 pages. Some children need help just to carry it!
The first thing young readers should learn, is to enjoy great works, greatly. It is only through regular reading that taste is developed and refined, discarding the vulgar and mundane, establishing the pure and the classic. What is undeniable is that no other work has so coloured young minds or cast such a potent spell as has the story of young Harry. Time will tell whether the Potter saga is truly grand, or simply grandiose.
