Conversations
-
Shame...
Is anyone else ashamed to have Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows as the most read book on visual bookshelf? I get that some people find this kind of pap fantasy useful as a way to mindlessly de-stress, but the most read book?
Rowan Fortune Wood about 1 year ago
Advertisement
Take a look at the world we live in: What's most popular is rarely, if ever, what's best. There's no direct correlation between a work of literature being palatable to a large number of people and the quality of said work. Personally, I quite like the Harry Potter series, but I also realize that it's nothing that's dramatically shaped the course of human consciousness and dialogues of higher philosophy. Very few people desire to be constantly immersed in intense, existentially-challenging states of mind—humans simply lack the energy to endure that experience for protracted periods of time. Sometimes, it's okay to use literature as a means of unwinding. "Ashamed" is far too strong a word.
Mark about 1 year agoi read for pleasure. whats there to be ashamed of?
Heather about 1 year agoWell sure, but don’t you agree that there are a huge range of books in-between intense, existentially-challenging masterpieces like Malone Dies and Harry Potter?
Rowan Fortune Wood about 1 year agoFair enough.
Rowan Fortune Wood about 1 year agoI have mixed feelings about it. One of my main interests with Visual Bookshelf is to build something with 'mass appeal' to get folks who don't read or haven't read in a long time to start reading again. The best way to avoid this is to keep it fun/casual and less 'bibliographic' on its face.
I plan to solve the issue by introducing 'category' filters on the leaderboard eventually. Harry will still rule the overall leaderboard, but if you click down into 'classics', etc. the list will be a bit different.
Edward Frederick about 1 year agoi'm not ashamed or suprised at all. only certain groups of people read most books but harry potter spans every age and many many cultures. it doesn't make it the best book ever written, but it's not like harry potter is trash either.
Anonymous User about 1 year agoI think we should be proud, not ashamed. This is a fantastic piece of literature and I think most people just sort of shrug it off because it was intended for children from the start. We would do well not to dismiss something because of its intended audience. After all, children's literature is still literature!!
Christie Angleton about 1 year agoIt is true that we should be proud that this series of books is amazing, but not only for the reason that it may have inspired millions of readers to try newbooks but that this is one more reason that other countries around the world can prove they are better than the U.S.A. Our country says that we are best and why? Because we have a strong economy? Because of our cultural mixture? No, we are supposedly greatest because of our power, Foriegn literature is a way to show America that we need to become more cultured and less obssessed with celebrities and we should try to expand our literature. And as someone on this post said "Harry Potter wont influence philosophical talk" that is true, most of the books that do this are foreign, War and Peace, Crime and Punishment, and even great works of the political genre like The Republic are all foreign. This literature issue is a slap in the face to the U.S.A. so we might be seeing some more culture soon.
Mark about 1 year agoIt's a media-hyped serial, and the public loves serials. At least they're addicted to a written one as well as all those rotten ones on television.
Anonymous User about 1 year agoTo say that Harry Potter hasn't challenged people philosophically is ridiculous. Have you not been paying attention to all the ruckus HP caused with the religious right wing in this country? Do you think that this debate didn't cause some children to sit down with their parents and friends, some parents to sit down with THEIR friends, and discuss how Harry Potter is or is not heretical? What's more philosophical than religious debate?
And need I remind all you book lovers than many classics of today were considered popular garbage when first published? I'm sure Charles Dickens and Jane Austen would both love Harry Potter on principle.
No one should ever feel ashamed of reading anything. Even the most popular, entertaining book engages the brain far more actively than the most intelligent TV shows. The New Yorker just ran an article explaining this very thing.
And you're not going to get anyone to read supposedly more intelligent books by making them feel ashamed of what they already read. Instead, your criticism will shut their ears to you. Then they may never have encouragement to keep reading at all.
Facebook User about 1 year agoI really wonder if the critics of the Harry Potter series have ever read one themselves. I was a skeptic too, until I tried it (think green eggs & ham). The last entries are especially with an almost gothic darkness to them. I hope that one day you might put down your pretentions long enough to see that not everything popular is worthless.
Facebook User about 1 year agoRight on, Grant!
Christie Angleton about 1 year agoDo you realize that Harry Potter technically is foreign literature...JK Rowling is from the UK, NOT America........
Facebook User about 1 year agoI’m not saying that people who read Harry Potter ought to be ashamed, just that it’s a shame Harry Potter is the most read book on visual bookshelf. I’m certainly not a snob; I think the entire notion of the popular and canonical divide is ridiculous and artificial. I read and love manga, horror, SF and many other pop genres of literature. However, Harry Potter isn’t just pop, its pap; it relies on nostalgic stereotypes about British school life and is filled with one dimensional overused fantasy archetypes. Its unoriginality even borders on plagiarism when you look at the similarities with popular works like The Worst Witch and the much better A Wizard of Earthsea. As for philosophical content, I hardly think angering a bunch of right wing nuts who seriously don’t believe in evolution is that stunning – at least not from a UK perspective.
Rowan Fortune Wood about 1 year agoI have no problem with popular literature, just bad literature. Why do you assume that the only reason anyone might have for not liking Harry Potter is elitism? As for reading them, I tried. It was unendurably formulaic and stylistically like some kind of hideous crossbreed of Lord Dunsany and Roald Dahl.
Rowan Fortune Wood about 1 year agoSounds like a good idea. I certainly don’t want to come across as ungrateful for visual bookshelf. It’s one of the few reasons I stay on Facebook.
Rowan Fortune Wood about 1 year agoI think it's worse that in the ranking, after the HP series comes the Da Vinci Code... :S
Facebook User about 1 year agoThinking about it, I’m inclined to agree.
Rowan Fortune Wood about 1 year agoI agree -- there's more to life than Harry Potter.
Facebook User about 1 year ago