I’m about 20 years behind the times, but I finally got round to reading Harry Potter. Sadly I’m not sure what all the fuss is about. I know, I know, the stats are mind blowing, Harry is immensely popular, so maybe my expectations were unnaturally high.
I saw the book as a very average story with nothing to inspire me to greatness or challenge me in anyway. It did stoke my imagination some what but I was not captured by the story. I found myself having to endure parts of it.
This book is the adventures of rude, selfish, sarcastic, disrespectful, disobedient kids. Harry does have courage however, i’ll give him that. Nietzsche shows up in Voldemort when he says there is no right, no wrong, only power. This belief was the justification for his evil actions and it felt like everyone in the story was stepping to that tune more or less, that is, until the end. In the end Voldemort was not able to defeat Harry because true love is much stronger then any Nietzschein’ will to power idea. Thank God! So of course I loved that part of the story because it reminded me of the greatest love story of all time.
If there was a story about Harry’s mom and dad I might be interested in reading that. Throughout the book we got little snippets of their life. We learned that Harry’s dad willingly risked his life for his enemy Snape, this selfless, counter intuitive, counter cultural act bound Snape, I think, to stay on the path of love (that’s being very generous) instead of descending into the Nietzschien’ pit. We learned in fragmented fashion that Harry’s father and mother regularly battled evil, ultimately giving up their lives so that the weak (their infant child) might survive. Redemptive themes are the language of my heart, so I definitely appreciated that. Upon conclusion of Harry Potter I read the great classic Treasure Island, now that is a story that I couldn’t put down. Harry is a mere sapling next to the towering Red Wood that is Treasure Island.
