Serious Thoughts: Harry Potter as a Reflection of the Millenial Generation

Before you say anything, I know I blog about Harry Potter a lot, you're all just going to have to get over it.

So, as I do with a lot of things, I came a little late to the Harry Potter fandom. I'm not saying I just started reading the book yesterday or anything (actually, I've been reading them since I was like five) but, because I was quite young when all the books were coming out and the fandom was really taking shape, I'm really only truly experiencing it now. I mean, it's not like I didn't play potions as a kid or have the fake HP glasses or the Harry Potter Levitating Challenge game ('Focus' 'Keep Steady!' 'Concentrate!!!!!', but seriously, that was a tough game). Anyway, the sort of things I'm thinking about now are like fan art, Wizard rock, and fan fiction.

Anyway, what brought this blog on was that I read this article ( http://thoughtcatalog.com/2013/were-not-a-lost-generation-just-an-exposed-one/ ) and started to think about things that, I felt, defined my generation, but seemed to be misunderstood by older generations. The Harry Potter phenomenon is one of those things. Now, I know that plenty of people my age don't like Harry Potter and plenty of people in older generations do, but, it's undeniable that the majority of the creative out pouring of Harry Potter fans comes from the millennial generation. Like, when was the last time you saw a wizard rock (I should probably write a whole separate blog about wizard rock because it's quickly becoming my favorite genre of music and I think I'm developing an unhealthy obsession with Draco and the Malfoys) band of fifty year olds?

http://harrypotterfandom.net/tag/dumbledore/

For the most part, it seems like members of the older generations seem to view the Harry Potter craze as something akin to the Twilight epidemic or the boy band pandemonium, and scholars of literature look on it as a series of children's books that have no bearing on literary canon, but it's not, it's not either of those things. I get really tired of people not taking Harry Potter seriously. I mean, I know it's not Shakespeare, but, I if Interview with the Vampire and Lord of the Rings (which, don't get me wrong, I quite like) count as classic literature, Harry Potter certainly does!

I mean, it has all the hallmarks of the culture surrounding great works of literature. I mean, people write spin offs of the Harry Potter books, people have formed bands for the sole purpose of writing songs about Harry Potter (much in the same way that Led Zeppelin wrote songs about the Lord of the Rings), and people paint and draw scenes from the books, that has to mean something!

Okay, let's take a minute to consider Harry Potter fan art. In paintings/drawings of Dumbledore, for example, I've noticed that there is almost an Arthurian, Merlin-ish quality to his depiction. The death of Dumbledore, especially, is a huge moment in the minds of the Millennial generation, with all the trauma and significance that King Arthur's death or the defeat of Achilles holds in literary thought and interpretation of, well, everyone who knows something about English literary canon.

Not to be belligerent, but Dumbledore's death is a watershed moment in the psychology of those who grew up reading the Harry Potter books. It symbolizes a loss of innocence and a sort of forced maturation. After Dumbledore's death, Hogwarts, the fantasy of many a millennial became a dark, almost frightening place. The lightning struck tower, where Dumbledore died is a place of extreme cultural significance, a modern Avalon. I found a few paintings depicting Dumbledore's death and funeral and, I have to say, they remind me of 18th and 19th century depictions of the death/funeral of King Arthur and the Lady of Shallot. The fact that so many people have felt the need to visualize this event, is proof of what a literary touchstone it is becoming.

Above, I have found two artistic representations of Dumbledore's funeral. I would like to compare

them to a painting called the Lamentation of King Arthur by William Bell Scott  (right). This painting depicts Arthur's body, surrounded by mourners, as it is borne away on his funeral barge to Avalon. We find similar imagery in the depictions of Dumbledore's funeral. If you look at both paintings side by side, you see that Dumbledore's body is in the exact, physical position of Arthur's and, if you laid the pictures on top of each other, you would find that many of the mourners are in the exact, same places, relative to the body. In fact, I would argue that the island of the white tomb (Dumbledore's tomb) is analogous to Avalon in Arthurian legend. I would argue that the physical mythology surrounding Dumbledore's death and funeral are actually, quite similar to Arthur's.  

The death of Dumbledore

(http://imgfave.com/view/981313)

In any case, Dumbledore's death was one of the moments that, to me, made the Harry Potter books a work of 'serious' literature. His death, and those of Cedric Diggory and Sirius Black,  create a darkness in the series that is very adult. This sort of violent, dramatic death is not the sort of death usually depicted in children's books. In most children's books, death is hidden - happening either before the start of the story or off screen from the main action. The Harry Potter books do not shy away from an honest depiction of the mental and psychological impact of death. The (fascinating) story of the Deathly Hallows is proof of this. The fact that Harry is an orphan forces the reader to confront death from the first page of the book; his scar is a physical representation of the power of death in the books. Yet, ironically, most of the books are spent in direct conflict with one person who cannot die: Voldemort. Voldemort's feverish determination to become an immortal is another very serious theme in the books. Voldemort's fear of death is a very human thing, yet, it has caused Voldemort to reject all things human and to do terrible things ("terrible, but great"). The psychology of Voldemort could be a whole blog post on it's own, but I still think it's something to consider here as something that has had a great impact on fan culture.

There is real darkness in the Harry Potter books, not only in themes like death and immortality but also, famously, in the tragic lives of Harry and his parents. Specifically, I want to talk about Lily. In the last book, fan's were thrown a serious curve ball when the childhood friendship and later, quasi-romantic attachment between Lily and Snape was revealed. I'm sure that there have been many fan fictions written about their relationship, but really, they are not needed to understand the nature of their relationship. It is summed up in Snape's answer to Dumbledore's question about Snapes patronus; "even after all this time?" Dumbledore asks when he sees that Snape's patronus is a doe (symbolic of Lily), "always", Snape answers. That 'always' is perhaps the most always of the 21st century, perhaps the most famous always of all time and, arguably, there is no single word in the entire series that contains the emotional punch of that "always".

Snape and Lily

The relationship between Snape and Lily, I would like to argue, is reminiscent of the forbidden love of Lancelot and Guinevere (still a better love story than Twilight). There's is one of the emblematic love stories of this century. I mean, after reading seven books designed to make you hate Snape, it's difficult to like him, but his love for Lily is truly his one redeeming quality. Even Harry seems to realize this, describing Snape as "the greatest man I ever knew" (I'm probably misquoting). Anyway, I don't want to get all poetic and mushy on you, but I just want to emphasize how much of an emotional impact Snape's story has on fans, especially after Snape's murder of Dumbledore. If you read my blog about Jaime Lannister from Game of Thrones, than you'll understand what I mean when I say that Snape sort of fits into the whole "Ill-Made Knight" complex. But, if you didn't, it suffices to say that Snape is one of the most maligned characters in English literature.

I didn't talk about this painting - I just think it's cool

Notice that I use the word "literature", because, personally, and I think the evidence supports this, I think that Harry Potter is literature. I think that, in the future, seventeen year olds in high school English classes will be writing essays about the symbolic nature of Quidditch (which people actually play in real life!!!!) and underlying ideas about the nature of racism and race relations in the Death Eater agenda.

I'm not going to define what Harry Potter is or what it means, though, because, in my opinion, it's pretty much undefinable. But, despite the sort of seriousness I've been trying to support, it's not a 'sacred' text for fans. It is not a static text, but rather a touchstone of modern, cultural mythology that is constantly being reinvented and re-imagined. These differing interpretations can be seen in the creative output of fans: paintings, songs, and fan fictions. It is treated as raw material that can be taken apart and put back together to create a canon for the millennial generation. I mean, the fact that being called a Hufflepuff is universally accepted as an insult says something about the cultural ideals of the millennial generation.

But seriously, don't be a Hufflepuff.

Just sayin'