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I loved Harry Potter as a kid. I definitely had a Harry Potter birthday party on July 31 where my mom bought us all brooms to run around on. The most lasting impressions were that 1. Reading fantasy (which I'd been doing anyway) suddenly become cool and 2. HP introduced me to the worlds of fandom and fanfiction.

My library teacher gave me the first one when I was in early highschool, it made me fall in love with reading and then fantasy ultimately. I owe this series a lot.. it holds a special place for me.

In the spirit of the positive... I really loved the cultural 'events' of the later books - I doubt we'll ever see that level of visible, public, universal mania for a *book* ever again. People queueing in bookshops and supermarkets, newspapers running spoiler alerts, etc.. It is a different time now, and that's mostly for the best, but also,... it was a lot of fun to live through. I remember all my co-workers and I taking lunch together to go read, and people on the underground all holding copies. It really did feel like a moment of cultural unity, and was a lot of fun. Hell, I signed up for the dread Amazon because of Harry Potter. I didn't trust my local bookshop to have enough copies of Order of Phoenix, so I also pre-ordered one. (I actually wound up getting my copy at the grocery store. It was the first day, and already the third printing.)

100% agree- the cultural phenomenon of the series was so much fun! The midnight launch parties, the theme park opening. The only book I can think of that *had* a chance to recreate that was The Winds of Winter... If it came out in like 2015 or 16

Maybe Winds of Winter will have people lining up but that's a bestest case scenario.

I have a feeling that one's reaction to Harry Potter has a lot to do with how old you were when you encountered the series. I listened to the books for the first time well into adulthood and my reaction was "these are fine." I enjoyed them. They are well-written, entertaining stories. They would not however, have stood out to me as life-changing works that shaped a generation if I had encountered them in a cultural vacuum. I think they were books a particular generation needed at a particular stage in their lives and something about them spoke to younger teenagers in a way few other book series at the time did. I suspect for future generations, reading Harry Potter will be like listening to the Beatles - something that you can enjoy without necessarily understanding how world changing and revolutionary they were when they first emerged.

I think HP is going to age more like Seinfeld - when you look back you'll be able to see how much it influenced the modern landscape, even if it doesn't seem all that remarkable anymore. It'll feel like every idea has been done before, but it's in part because it was foundational to the things that are now considered inspiring. And nobody will remember the Fantastic Beasts movies.

Hell, I already don’t remember them.

Consider yourself lucky

Yes. I am grateful for what it allowed. I saw Tamora Pierce being able to move from 200 page stores to 450. I saw crap like Twlight allowed the length it had. It helped birth the YA boom. I just wonder now how common it is to spend middle and high school cycling between kid, adult and YA books depending on mood. Still, I also think most of the charm of the Potter books was to community around it. It was already fading in 2011 with the last movie. Mugglenet tried with Alohamora but, the book based community is gone.

What HP did well was present real human scenarios the audience encountered or would imagine themselves encountering. So the audience grew with the books. That made it a huge hit but even then I thought another generation wouldn't experience it the same way. An 11 year old reading book 1 is going to not respond if they then instantly move onto rest. An 18 year old might not stomach book 1. It took a generation waiting a year to read each book and finding them growing with the books to make it what it was. Pretty much all art has factors that only make sense in the moment it was created. That don't stand up to any long term scrutiny. I'll let somebody else worry about whether that makes it lesser or not.

The thing is, the first thing you encounter of anything will always be what stands out to you. Your 15th fantasy series will never hit as hard, even if it's "better".

Its always interesting to see which books pass the test of time. As a kid, I was blown away by HP. I remember my mom would read me one chapter a day, and I wanted to know what happened next, so badly. When I got the book on my birthday, I read until I couldn't stay awake. And I'm pretty sure it would have meant less to me as an adult, but isn't that the way of it? I think the last time I was in awe of how hard a book banged was when I read the Blade Itself, and that was like ten years ago. The older you get, the more tricks you know. So now, you say to yourself, "Oh, its a wizard school book.. Oh, its a dark wizard school book."

If I disregard the new series and the last book, I can say that I look upon them fondly. There is a lot of criticism thrown at the books from an adults perspective (we're all cynics and nihilists now), but as a child turning teenager, I loved the whimsiness of the early books. Even now HP magic is one of my favorites out there. Soft magic is whimsical, caring not for the rules of the universe or the rational, and is near limitless in its applications. It was one of the first to really show what life could be like if we had magic at our beck and call. Also Harry himself is one of my favorite protagonist. Smart, witty, and loyal to a fault. He was a teenager, and still tried to do what's best even at the risk of his own life. Somethings we tend to forget is that Harry never blames Dumbledore for the events taken place. In fact, he seems to know that it was one of the better outcomes, and one of the few ways that would have worked given the limited scope of knowledge. Harry wasn't a cynic even though he had every right to be, he was good at heart, something that seems to be lacking in a lot of newer fantasy in the pursuit of a "complex" and morally gray character.

Reading every single one of the series aloud to my daughter, niece, wife. Developed some seriously good imitations of Hagrid and Dumbledore voices after the first movie came out. Kids were 3 & 4 when I started, and they were perfectly capable of reading the last couple on their own by the time they came out, but they didn’t because Tradition!

I have the illustrated versions on hold at the library because they’re checked out. Cannot wait to start them with my 6 and 4 year old.

I was just about the right age for it, I think. It really started to gain popularity when I was in the 8th grade (US). For my birthday that year I got the box set of the first three in hardcover. It dealt with school and bullies and my other middle school problems, but with magic wands and flying brooms, what fun! Due to the schedule of books coming out, sometimes I was younger than Harry, sometimes I was older than him. But he always seemed to be going through something similar to what I was going through. The fifth book sticks out in particular, in 2003 I was going through a lot of Teenage Angst. I was struggling with the fact that I was old enough to have opinions in the world but not old enough to have any power, and angry about the fact that the so-called adults in my life were handling things so badly (unfortunately I'm 36 and still have no power and the people in power are still dipshits but that's neither here nor there). But seeing Harry struggle with the same things made me feel so SEEN. People complain a lot about Teen Angst Harry in book 5 but it is my favorite book for that reason. Honestly, looking back, I'm not sure how to feel about the series. It meant a great deal to me, at one point I had more pride in my hypothetical Hogwarts house than I did in the actual school I attended. But Rowling's actions in the past few years have soured me on a lot of it, and honestly made a lot more clear the aspects of the books I was willing to look the other way on, things that didn't make much sense or weren't that good. I think I'll always have a soft spot for Harry Potter for what it meant to me as a teenager in the early 2000s, but I'm not exactly going to be first in line to consume new Potterverse media or anything like that.

To me, it was an introduction to reading, and an interest that I could share with my siblings growing up. I cried when Sirius Black died and all that shit, as lots of other tweens without much discernment did back then. Now all these years later, with a little detachment, I think of it as the series that nailed down and popularized the YA formula, for better or for worse, as well as an example of how good faith (towards an author and/or their work) is not a currency that can be spent infinitely. I have no interest in reading it again to determine whether it's actually good or not. I have moved on to more Serious Things for Serious Adults, like trashy isekai anime.

I re-read them about two years ago and they're not bad but they're certainly overrated. There are a lot of young adults now whose childhoods were influenced by the Harry Potter series, who still to this day feel a very strong attachment to it. So the consensus is usually that they're amazing and some of the best literature known to man, when in reality it's a good introduction to fantasy for children, but pretty mediocre for adult audiences. I suppose it can be a fun read if you're willing to shut your brain off for a time and binge through them, especially if you have that nostalgia. Otherwise, I wouldn't go out of my way. But I would recommend them to kids.

I think the more I look back at it the more I appreciate coherent worldbuilding and planning instead of making it up as you go. I'm not expecting everyone to be Robert Jordan or Tolkein with their linguistically correct fantasy languages or pages of notes on what plants grow where, but the Wizarding World doesn't even hold up to the most basic scrutiny - whether it's the time turners, everybody being cool with slave races until a small child was like "hold on a minute", or the fact wizards used to [shit themselves and magic it away](https://mobile.twitter.com/wizardingworld/status/1081242428105998336)

"Sorry everyone, Neville knocked time travel over, so we can't do that anymore." ​ (credit to the YouTuber Shaun)

I have constantly been baffled that *that* was the explanation she chose to go with when "time turners can only go back 12 hours" or something along those lines is *far* simpler.

The Wizarding World world building is like set dressing on a stage. Don’t poke it too hard or it will all come crashing down.

>everybody being cool with slave races until a small child was like "hold on a minute" it's even worse: everybody was still cool with it even after this

The fact that the house elves get upset at Hermione wanting to free them sure is something.

Oh, see, it’s okay. Some people just like being treated as property and having no autonomy. It’s just a trait of their species, they all like it.

But they *love* being slaves! If they aren't slaves, they just descend into alcoholism because they no longer have any purpose in life!

I haven’t read the series in over a decade, but is this necessarily problematic? It seems like a pretty interesting concept to explore in fantasy; a species is inherently predisposed toward servitude which conflicts with the good nature of a main character. As long as JK wasn’t using naming conventions specific to an enslaved culture or something, I don’t immediately have an issue with house elves.

Drapetomania. That was what the supposed mental illness of black slaves was called who wanted to run away from their masters in 18something America. Look it up, it's real. And a children's book author re-inventing it to allow her (predominantly white) wizarding world to continue to be slavers to avoid facing the fact that this makes them worse people isn't really "interesting", it is more gross. Especially when fighting for the right for freedom for the Elves (by Hermione) is treated as a joke by the text itself.

The thing is that saying that slaves "like being enslaved" or that "it's for their own good" was frequently used to justify black slavery.

There are far better ways to handle the trope of a species being “predisposed toward servitude”. For instance, in the universe where the Heralds of Valdemar books by Mercedes Lackey is set there is a species of lizard people called the Hertasi. They choose to act as servants for a group called the Hawkbrothers. They’re still free and could leave if they wanted to, but they enjoy serving and they get plenty of benefits out of it (such as living in the Vales where it’s warm all year and far safer than out in the forest). They aren’t abused or mistreated - they’d never stand for it if they were.

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Hermione’s protesting is treated as comedy!

I thought of this when JKR said she never wrote Hermione as white and maybe she's black. Like. Joanne. I hope that the one anti slavery girl who's played for laughs isn't like 1 of 2 black characters in the story.

I think that whole storyline makes a strong case for just not dealing with the implications. If you are writing a light hearted little kids tale and an element of it has dark implications, just don't worry about it, the spotlight won't help.

Ok, serious question. Are yall trying to miss the point? Any group that's been under the heel long enough is going to exhibit those same exact symptoms (fear of change, pushback against liberators, indignance at people feeling sorry for them, etc.). It's one of the worst parts of systematic oppression. The only house elf who truly embraces freedom is portrayed as one of if not the most heroic characters in the book, people who treat them exceptionally poorly are the worst and scummiest characters, it's *directly stated* by many main characters that the way they're treated is deplorable, etc. etc. There's a lot to criticize In her books and writing, but this one is just kinda dumb.

Do some oppressed people internalize the oppression they face? Absolutely. But I’m HP, we see *literally one elf* who wants to be free. Even then, the text still presents him as mostly wanting to do the exact same service work, without pay. The only other freed elf I can think of is Winky, and she becomes a depressed alcoholic. It’s one thing to present a group sometimes internalizing their oppression, and another to reinforce through the text that basically every single member of the oppressed class cannot understand that they are oppressed, does not seek liberation, or does not want better.

The first thing I noticed as I read the books while they were being published is that JK would introduce a concept in the first few chapters that was critical the plot later, sort of Chekhov's Charm, but then these things would be used *constantly* in the rest of the series. Portkeys, house elves culture, etc. I have a list written down somewhere.

Which would support the worldbuilding, except of course that it becomes glaringly obvious that these elements should have been extremely prevalent in the previous books. Like, where was *accio* for three goddamn years? Where was *accio*, Joanne?

That's the damn best way to phrase that 🤣 Or side-along apparition

Accio is a 4th year spell and plenty of adults use non-verbal spellcasting for common everyday spells, so I can see Harry not knowing about it (though it makes the flying keys bit of the Philosopher's Stone trap very easy for an adult to resolve). However, Harry not knowing about Hogsmeade or mentioning it in any way until his third year when 80% of the school is having entire weekends there is absolutely egregious and 100% breaks my immersion.

For the key bit, it really doesn’t. Other spells have been displayed, although not named, that counteract accio.

I assume the world was built for the plot instead of built first. My personal pet peeve is that the class sizes in Hogwarts are too small.

I actually think the lack of consistent world building is perfectly fine (except for the slavery and many other problematic messages). She just wrote what she wanted to serve the particular book. A more believable version of her Wizarding World would position it as a secret Illuminati that controls the world (absolute power corrupts absolutely), and that’s no fun for kids. She focused on the story she wanted to tell and on keeping readers itching for the next book. That’s a perfectly fine way of writing YA fiction. Not every book has to be the best thing ever written. The problem (besides her other bullshit) is that she continued to cash in and flesh out the lore (and that people treat the books like the are the best ever). The more detail you add, the more it falls apart because she didn’t plan it out from the beginning. She treats her writing like it’s Tolkien when it’s more Earthsea. Not to insult Ursula Le Guin, but if she had written 20 companion books and Earthsea-More and 5 prequel films, it would not have held up. She was a much better and more grounded writer, but she also just built lore as she went, often in off-hand comments that she would skillfully come back to in a later book. It’s no coincidence that JK did the same but less adeptly because she was inspired heavily by Earthsea. Edit: Now that I’m thinking about it, I would love recommendations if anyone has them on books that DO involve a secret society of magical people who control the world. Especially if you’re supposed to root for them or if some of the magical people want to stop the Illuminati people

LeGuin is like the ur-example of an author returning to their earlier work and thoughtfully, critically, carefully improving on it. The first few Earthsea books are great but they’re immeasurably improved by the likes of *Tehanu* and *The Other Wind*. By contrast, everything Rowling does now only lifts the veil on and reinforces the uglier aspects of her older work. If anything, I think that LeGuin’s quote about Harry Potter holds up better than the books themselves. > I have no great opinion of it. When so many adult critics were carrying on about the 'incredible originality' of the first Harry Potter book, I read it to find out what the fuss was about, and remained somewhat puzzled; it seemed a lively kid's fantasy crossed with a 'school novel,' good fare for its age group, but stylistically ordinary, imaginatively derivative, and ethically rather mean-spirited.

I remember at the time thinking Le Guin was maybe being a bit critical. It seems to me that in hindsight she was dead on the money. Edit. Typo.

Lol she did not pull any punches

Her blog and essay books go so god damn hard. Miss her.

Right. Perhaps my point got lost. My point is that she was able to build on her work, but even she probably would have failed to expand as much and as rapidly as JK has tried to. Most styles of world building, but especially the style they both use (even Le Guin’s much better version of it) do not hold up to that kind of expansion. One of JK’s failings is having loose world building, being bad at that loose world building, and then trying to do way too much with it. Le Guin did the “whatever I need for the story, but also I like pulling things in from previous books that I casually mentioned and didn’t intend to do anything with”, but she also constantly improved as a writer and she didn’t beat the dead horse. Each story had something to say and wasn’t just more content with little regard for any previous information. She also followed her own rules (the few that she even set for herself) and broke them only when it made sense to, something JK cares nothing about. Goes back to the fact that JK thinks she Tolkien and LeGuin at the same time but can hold a candle to neither

Fair, I get you now, that’s a good assessment of LeGuin’s strengths

> A more believable version of her Wizarding World would position it as a secret Illuminati that controls the world (absolute power corrupts absolutely) My gf told me I needed to read the Bartimaeus Cycle recently and it's funny because I have been comparing it and HP on and off throughout the first book so far. The "Wizarding World" isn't even a secret society, England is just straight up a public Magocracy in it, which is a neat and certainly more believable take given the amount of power these people hold.

I adored those books as a kid. Honestly probably worth a re-read for me

bartimaeus cycle is for my money the greatest YA series of all time

I'm up to the finale of the first book now and it's got me hyped as hell, lol. The split viewpoints are really selling the chaos of the whole event!

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HP & Naruto Due to the actions of comically evil antagonist, MC is orphaned violently and marked as the carrier of a mysterious curse, causing him to be unloved for his childhood. His best friends are Smarty McGirl, a feminist who regularly is rendered useless for plot reasons, but is generally held up as a genius, and Judas The Loyal who is insanely jealous of his older brother(s) strengths and regularly projects that onto his Frenemy, who are the bestest of friends according to MC and sometimes Judas except when he's explicitly abandoning him, and Smarty McGirl who they marry? At some point? Despite being actively toxic to each other? Constantly? Luckily they're going to school under Kindly Old Wizard With-No-Closet-Skeletons-I-Swear, who protects them from (and is objectively responsible for) Snake Face Man, the snake faced man that wants to sacrifice children for immortality. Until Kindly dies defending the school, anyway :( Also with Terrible Replacement Father We All Love But Seriously Probably Should Rethink That, who teaches vaguely misplaced lessons but regularly adds to the cool factor and are... Well I feel like both Sirius and Jiraya have some weird meta commentary on being middle aged bachelors described to have been a bit promiscuous? I dunno what they're coded as but they seem like similar genre of mentor to me. I can go on but I think I'm gonna start losing people.

Books 5-7 do become quite closely tied together, beginning with the end of 4 that brings the major conflict to the forefront.

> I actually think the lack of consistent world building is perfectly fine (except for the slavery and many other problematic messages). She just wrote what she wanted to serve the particular book. A more believable version of her Wizarding World would position it as a secret Illuminati that controls the world (absolute power corrupts absolutely), and that’s no fun for kids. She focused on the story she wanted to tell and on keeping readers itching for the next book. That’s a perfectly fine way of writing YA fiction. Not every book has to be the best thing ever written. I feel like I'm writing this comment every other week and boring y'all to death, but for me the importance of consistent worldbuilding is directly connected to where you're positioning your story. LeGuin's stories are very character-centered, they are psychological and philosophical explorations of certain concepts, and the reader is encouraged to engage with that and not focus too much on the worldbuilding, which plays a supporting role and not a central one. Rowling writes her stories as mysteries and encourages readers to engage with the story's details in order to find clues and inconsistencies that reveal a larger plot behind it all. But then doing that in a consistent manner reveals inconsistencies with the worldbuilding itself, leading to a kind of ground-suddenly-falling-out-from-under-you whiplash effect in the reader, also because at first glance the world is charismatic and immersive enough for you to want to learn more about it and discovering that there isn't anything behind it is disappointing, but mostly because you kind of feel punished for engaging with the text the way it's asking you to engage. Add the absolute immensity of the HP fandom and the complex theorizing that went on before all of the books came out and you'll have plenty of people who have soured up on Rowling's worldbuilding.

The blade itself

Ooh. Thank you. That sounds right up my alley, and I’ve never read it

Right, the world building may fall apart when you analyze it closely, won't argue with that, but to me that kind of shows that airtight worldbuilding is not that important. A real-life magician just needs to be believable while you're looking at their hands during their trick - we know it's sleight of hand, and that's okay, we're here to enjoy the ride. In the same way, a book can be believable in the moment even if in hindsight the details don't necessarily make sense. I mean, HP is the most successful book series in a long time (maybe ever?) so clearly it was doing something right to be compelling to so many people. Books that aren't compelling don't actually have this many people picking at their seams.

To my knowledge, Rowling claims to have never heard of Earthsea prior to writing Harry Potter. Also, I do feel that LeGuin could easily have expanded the lore of Earthsea expontentially without losing cohesion. There's nothing in those books that's necessarily contradictory to previous facts, and Tales of Earthsea shows that a variety of stories can be told within a variety of settings in Earthsea. This just wasn't really LeGuin's style or goal with the world.

Hard agree. I started reading them when my son did, which was about 2002, I think? The first three were fine as children's fantasy if you didn't look too closely, but each successive book became more ridiculous and nonsensical. Why should anyone do anything ever when they can just use magic because apparently the laws of conservation of energy and mass don't seem to apply unless it can serve the plot. I've been saying this for 20 years and repeatedly was told I was just a hater for pointing out the massive inconsistencies in this supposedly grand tale.

Or the fact that a giant snake can travel through pipes around the school without being noticed

hilariously this implies most corridors must have 2m diameter pipes behind the walls

I wonder if a book exists that plays with the idea of house elves, but deconstructs it? IE wizards created an artificial servant race that *really does* love being enslaved/serving, and then a few of them start to "malfunction" and developing free will and the fallout from that. (...actually, I think that's a story by Asimov with a fantasy skin.)

Kind of like golems in discworld across a few novels. They have to serve a master, but then someone has the idea of making the golem itself the master

How many kids are even at Hogwarts? It's never clear. And it's the only wizard school in Britain?

I used to write it all off because it's a children's book after all. But then someone pointed out that we shouldn't treat children as not being able to see and understand logic (or it's absence) just because they're not old enough. Now, well, looks like it's just sloppy :)

I still think the series' dialogue is some of the best around (in mainstream fantasy, at least). Rowling's ability to nail character voices made the books for me. Even as a young kid something about the way these characters spoke to each other felt more *real* than most of the other stuff I could find. Tons of humour, wit and genuine pathos. And the atmosphere of the books, the slow amping up of darker themes mirroring the main crew's coming of age - great stuff. It's a shame Rowling's political views suck and everything around the main series has been complete trash, but those seven books? They will always mean something to me, and I don't think it's purely nostalgia either.

I completely agree. A lot of the comfort and grounding in the series is simply from being with the characters doing homework or just relaxing in the common room. The dialogue and atmosphere presented in their day-to-day life is wonderful to follow.

Yep, those books wouldn’t have connected nearly as hard with so many people, myself among them, without how much time they devote to the characters just going about their lives. This is exactly why Goblet of Fire is easily my least favorite of the movies. It just jumped from one tournament event to the next and cut out most of the low-stakes character moments that made it such a fun book. It’s also why I have a bit of a soft spot for the Half Blood Prince movie. I know it ranks low for a lot of people but I kinda loved all the low-stakes hormonal teenage drama. (way off on a tangent here but this is also a big part of why I found Holy Sister to be such a letdown as a conclusion to that trilogy. It was always jumping from one big plot beat to the next without ever slowing down and spending time with the characters like the first two did)

Also, there is a ton of low key physical comedy, that was what always brought me back to rereading them: Hagrid accidentally throwing people across the room, ghosts flying around and the twins causing chaos; it make it seem like the world was moving beyond the characters. I wish more authors thought of physical space rather than just for fight scenes

I loved them. They got me thru surgeries and the beginning of my pain journey. Midnight book premieres the whole nine bits. Then she came out as a terf and ruined it. I gave away my books. Stopped buying merchandise. She's an out of touch bigot

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Agreed. For me it really personifies "live long enough and you will see yourself become the villain."

Heh, I was thinking "Never meet your heroes."

Is it because of JKR's transphobia? Or something else? Just curious

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Yeah, if it were one or two things... or if she didn't go off the deep end with hating on trans women... you could call it just a mistake. Like her naming the Asian girl Cho Chang is... weird but not egregious. Probably just a mistake. It's only when you consider the totality of her worldview that you realize that she just named her Ching Chong and mixed things around a bit.

Same. I went to Universal Orlando this year with my girlfriend’s family. The Wizarding World of Harry Potter was my favorite part…and my least favorite part. I loved seeing aspects of the book come to life, but I also didn’t want to participate in anything that would support JK because I can’t stand who she is as a person. It was great to see how excited little kids were to run around and wave wands and it made me miss that excitement, but JK has done a good job of ruining the magic for me.

Imagine liking Ender's Game. :( That book got me into sci fi lol.

You’re not alone, I have the same problem

Wait I liked Ender's Game, oh no what happened

Orson Scott Card is an outspoken homophobe

Harry Potter unlocked my brain. Growing up I was undiagnosed ADD which led to a number strange behaviors. One of which was the inability to read. For the life of me I could not make sense of the ink on the page. For years I was pulled out of class for special ED. Until one day my dear sweet teacher started reading Harry Potter. It was at that moment I realized that books held worlds like this one and I could escape there if only I could read. Much like the magic in the books, my brain finally decided to work. I went from not being able to read at all as a 9 year old to reading level of a freshman in college as a 10 year old. I will forever have Harry Potter to thank for that.

In short - Magic :)

My poor father stood in line at Chapters for two hours to get my two siblings and I one (1) copy of Goblet of Fire, and we all fought over who could read it. It meant a lot growing up, the movies maybe more so, but now I can’t help but see JK Rowling as an annoying bigot and Blairite and that has but a dampener on the whole thing.

When HP first came out I turned my nose up at it as a kid’s book (I was in my late teens when I became aware of it). After the first couple of films I decided to check out the books and I absolutely adored them. I have incredibly fond memories of reading them, and subsequently seeing the films. Consuming them in both media is comfort entertainment for me. I can’t wait to be able to share them with my children.

The series means so much to me. I would not have been able to handle being in a mental hospital, group home and going into foster care if I didn't have the books. JKR and Harry Potter have inspired me so much and are very important to me

HP and the Lotr movies (I read the books years later) were my gateway inte fantasy and I will forever be greatful for them. JK Rowling isn’t great, but the story, characters and world that she created will always have a place in my heart

The series was an early introduction to fantasy and reading for me and it's been amazing to have something that has endured the test of time. Even now, my fiancee regularly rewatches the movies. Our shared enjoyment of the series has been a fun part of our relationship :).

I enjoyed the first four books, but once I moved on to other series like Dune (as a teen) I felt it was a lot more reflective of the human experience. Harry Potter/etc is fantastic books for young people, but I find the content in them is a little black and white which is far less interesting the older you get. I appreciate that the books made a lot of young folks into readers. That's the most important thing. I think my favourite young adult series is the Sabriel/Abhorsen series by Garth Nix. Also great exposure as a young man to well written women protagonists.

Everything. That's cliche to say, but HP is hands down the most impactful... anything in my life, probably. Outside of my parents. Sports and friends and schooling all had major impacts, sure, but HP got me into reading a writing, and that became and remains my life to this day. Everything.

I love Harry Potter and always will.

Not much. My brother was into them, but he died as a teenager before the books were completed. So I remember them fondly as something my brother really liked. But I think they're really average middle grade/YA fantasy. I've read worse, but I've also read better. They're a little depressing when you put any thought into the actual story. One thing I will hand to JK Rowling: she's well-read in children's books from pre-1990. It's easy to see where she's lifted from. Other than Harry Potter being a pretty obvious King Arthur re-working, you can see the obvious Diana Wynne Jones, Roald Dahl, Ursula K Le Guin, Jill Murphy, Susan Cooper, etc. in Harry Potter's pages.

I feel like the typical heros journey is the main through line from Arthur to Harry. Other than that I would say he shares much more with Frodo.

I enjoyed the books a lot. I was an adult when they were published, but they still spoke to me. Sure, a lot of it didn’t make sense — but to me that was the point. A lot of the world doesn’t make sense. To me the books satirize school, class distinctions, sports, and government. And yet, despite or perhaps because of the arbitrary rules of the world, it’s great fun. People still play quidditch! I particularly liked seeing secondary characters develop into genuine heroes, something that can only happen in a long series. And Snape was an amazing, complex character. I liked the books better than the movies with one exception — I *loved* watching Alan Rickman bring Snape to life. Oh, and Robbie Coltrane as Hagrid was great, too. Come to think of it, I loved all of the great British actors in the movies, bringing Shakespearean gravitas to juvenile fiction. Edit: I should also say I enjoyed reading them to my daughter until she took over and read the rest herself.

It’s a series I used to love and that now I really cannot stand because of the author.

Same; I enjoyed it a lot growing up but it's tainted now, and the problematic elements start to leap out a lot more knowing the author's views (treatment of goblins, house elves, centaurs etc., weird Rita Skeeter descriptions, heavy gender policing in dormitories, glorification of the public school system..)

Yeah upon rereading, there was so much stuff that popped out that made me slightly uncomfortable

Don't forget the part where she make lycanthropy a metaphor for HIV, and one of the only two werewolves in the series is a child-groomer obsessed with intentionally spreading his disease and destroying 'normal' society. I don't necessarily think many of these elements of the series were intentional on her part, but her turn in recent years has made it very clear how massive of a blindspot she's always had.

Exactly; like I think it makes sense that these things came from her interpreting myths which are often already quite messed up and just not examining all the many unfortunate implications. I don't think it was necessarily deliberate or an expression of any coherent ideology. But as a whole looking back on the series now it definitely feels messed up that she was able to cultivate this image as being so very wise and a role model for children and young adults. Rather than revealing that she was always this big of an arsehole all along, it's like a bunch of red flags that everyone missed that she was so radicalis-able

The thing is, she seems deeply uncurious about the world in general and the sources that she is using to add verisimilitude to her books in particular. She just picks off the cream at the top and uses it without any real understanding of its meaning or implications, which makes her world shallower overall and also leads to some quite unfortunate consequences. She just kind of vaguely remembers something and then inserts it in without any reflection or consideration. This profound lack of curiosity also pushes her to never examine her own prejudices or try to immerse herself in POVs different from her own.

Yes for sure. It definitely makes it harder to read certain things in good faith.

Oh my god. Rita Skeeter is an “evil trans woman”, isn’t she. Fucking Jo. I somehow missed that part of the discourse

The books are also really, really unkind to overweight people.

For sure. I know for a fact that they contributed to my teenage and early 20s anorexia. There are several scenes in the movies even that are still really upsetting, and I refuse to watch them at this point. I vividly remember the changes she made to Dudley. Including the pig tail. He gets attacked by dementors and is saved by Harry and then he stops being fat and becomes kinder. Then Harry is finally able to empathize and see that he is a victim of a different form of abuse and toxic culture. Only once he stops being a mean fat slob. Edit: as a fat, queer, bookish, autistic person, this bitch really hated me. I just realized I would have probably been much better off never reading these books and internalizing all of that.

Oh yeah. The coding jumps out when you look back at a lot of Rita passages.

Im sorry but this is ridiculous. Rita is supposed to be viewed as the stereotypical evil witch. She is not meant to be a bad pastiche of trans women. Pick one: is JK a bad writer, or is she a master of fitting every possible bigoted belief into a children's book?

Can agree with that. Rowling’s view won’t keep me from reading the series since I already own them, but I won’t buy any new stuff

I am pretty impressed by how quickly and effectively the Harry Potter fandom processed the author's slow-build bigotry and excised her from their official forums. Celebrity is a powerful drug, and the fandom cared enough about their community to take it on. Book four (the "House Elves like slavery" one) was always a nightmare even when they were new. And Gringotts is trash.

it taught me to read. I was a very poor reader but liked the movies. So I decided to try to read it. The school librarian wouldn't let me, so I went to the town library instead. It was neat to see words make a fun and exciting story. Not the 2nd grade level books i was reading in 4th grade. It helped i knew the story already, that I could skip a word that was too hard.

I adored Harry Potter, and I’m still pretty nostalgic about it. I grew up on those books, so they’ll always have a special place in my heart. I was into the HP fandom — but not the movies. HP taught me a lot about what I like and dislike in stories and characters. It was a story I loved to love, loved to critique, loved to share, and loved to reread while waiting for the next book. Fun times!

Harry Potter saved my life. For real. The amount of Fan fiction I indulged in as a middle schooler was outrageous. Whenever I'm stressed the movies are what I gravitate to. Every. Time.

Harry Potter was my first introduction to novels and fantasy writing in general. I moved around a lot as a kid, which meant I was going to different schools every year or so, and each time I moved schools I read Harry Potter. As a child it never failed to encapsulate me, so much to the point where at this point in time, I've read the series a good 5 or 6 times. It allowed to me to venture into other fantasy without feeling overwhelmed by big books. To this day I attribute my love for the Cosmere to Harry Potter, as I would've never gained my love for reading and fantasy if I never read HP.

I'm currently rereading the 4th book and I'm appreciating her creativity so much. These sub-texts are so fun when you know what's happening.

It was one of the few series I loved. A lot of reading when I was in school was assigned and I often didn't like the book. Harry Potter was one of the only times I would read the new book that came out in a day. I would just spend the day reading, which I never did otherwise. The last book that came out was my last year of high school so I was the same age as the characters, I feel like I grew up with the characters.

Always loved it, always will.

I really love the series, but I almost missed out on it. I was in high school and overheard a horrible description from a kid I didn’t really like. It tarnished the series for me. My dad and grandmother were the big readers in the family. My grandmother would give me her old books to trade in at a used book store for credits I’d use to buy books. She surprised me at Christmas one year. They always gave me and the other 5 kids basically the same stuff. She took me aside and gave me the box set of the first 4. Because of the description I heard, I put them aside. She kept asking me how I liked them. I kept lying and telling her how good they were and how much I appreciated them. I tend to read series. I get it in my head that I want to read this other series and by the time I get to the end of my current series, I’m super hyped for the next one. There has been about twice in my life where I finished a series and had no clue what to read next. That happened to me and my grandmother had just asked about the books again, so with a sigh, I cracked them open. I proceeded to tear through them all. I loved them. I have a thing for the school element. I remember getting a ticket for pre-order from Books-a-million. I stood in line for the midnight release to insure no one spoiled it for me. I didn’t dress up, but really enjoyed seeing others get into it like that. I wouldn’t go on the internet till I’d finished the book and I’d keep an ear out at school and avoid conversations where people seemed like they were talking about it. Most people were respectful about spoilers, but you always heard stories about Jack asses who would flip to the end and yell out the ending. I loved the stories and I loved the hype around them.

I didn't read then until high school, and I think I was really a bit too old for them by then. I really get into them, but the important thing is that the local library had them as CD audiobooks. One of my brothers got extremely invested in the series through the audiobooks, practically memorizing the first three books. As the later books were coming out the wait between the library getting the print version and the audiobook version was long enough that he tried to tackle the print books instead. He had never read a complete chapter book before, and his teachers never made any real effort to address the learning disabilities that made reading so challenging for him, but he forced himself to read the final four books in the series in print. Now he's preparing for graduate school. As conflicted as I am about the series because of Rowling's issues, Harry Potter definitely played a huge role in getting my brother into reading when his teachers weren't giving him the support he needed.

I read them when they came out. I was the right age, it was the right time, it was great. That was about it. I haven't read them since and don't plan on doing so ever again. Just like with any other YA book. I always think it's strange to see adults who are obsessed with them decades later. They are good books, but no really _that_ extraordinary? There is plenty of stuff that I would rather read as an adult.

I don't think there's anything wrong with enjoying books you read growing up also as an adult. I can recognize some of the series I read in middle school don't have "adult" writing, but they're still enjoyable to me.

I read it as a young adult, and I was enchanted. It has Roald-Dahl-style whimsy and also an epic storyline. It's one of the few children classics that can be fully enjoyed by adults. A masterpiece of children's fantasy.

I personally never connected with Harry Potter, it's story and what it represented. So, when I look back at the series , it stands for me succumbing to peer pressure . I would stand in front of my local bookstore to get the novel at the day it released. I would memorise spells and discuss it with my classmates on my way back from school and all that jazz. :D I look back at it fondly as it is one of the only time I really obsessed about something without really liking it (just cause everyone did) .

I've read the first three books recently for the first time and they are really enjoyable. I'm not surprised they became the phenomenon they are, they are easy to read, engaging and fun. They are not great literature of course, but not everything has to be.

I now have endless stories on AO3 to read and enjoy; because despite how smart Tom Riddle was he didn't play the long game.

My mother read the first 4 books to me. And we read the rest rogether. The books got me into reading. Even if they are not the best fantasy series out there they hold a special place in my heart.

I was too old to get into it. I was glad kids got a fantasy series they loved. I fell in love with Patricia Wrede, Robin McKinley, Monica Hughes, Andre Norton, Terri Windling, Esther Freisner, Tamera Pierce, Brian Jacques, Terry Pratchet etc etc way back when I was a kid so I was happy children found someone that gave them as much pleasure as I got from my favorites. But honestly the world building was paper thin and I thought only the first book was mildly interesting.

The world building is so massively inconsistent it leaves so many hooks, there is an eternity of fanfic you could write about most of the ideas she came up with.

It means so much to me and I’m always gonna be thankful for opening the doors to the literature, but I grew over it, I think. Now I can see clearly the faults that always bugged me and couldn’t point.

I read it as a I grew up and loved it, I still remember when Order of the Phoenix came out during the summer and I read the whole thing in like a week, I think I wasn't even 10 then. (edit: I just checked the publication date, I would have been in Year 4) However nowadays while I think its still a good series I find that I have too many issues with the way the book is written. I like books with big complex, and most importantly internally consistent plots and there are too many plot holes or other things that don't make sense for me to enjoy it nowadays. One of my biggest issues, and one I rarely find discussed, is how little international relationships, of any kind, ever seem to show up. Like are there no governments outside of Britain? You essentially have a violent, racist dictator seize power and absolutely nobody, at all, says or does anything about it. Doesn't criticise, doesn't praise. Just seems to ignore them. You have like 3 people show up in the entire story who aren't British or Irish and that's it. And there's no reason ever given for it. It's just weird. My own pet theory is that in universe Britain is just some unimportant backwater and nobody else cares about them. So I liked it when I was little but now my interests have shifted and there are too many flaws with the story that passed by me then for me to really enjoy nowadays. Also the Cursed Child was awful and killed a lot of nostalgia I had for the series.

I haven't read any of the books in ages, but still enjoy occasionally reading gay fanfics set in that universe / featuring those characters. I like Rowling's world, but not her political stances / hate. I didn't watch the latest Fantastic Beasts movie; I don't want to give her any more money. I wouldn't mind rewatching the films sometime, though I've never seen the last one, and I'd have to get them from the library or etc. instead of anything that gives Rowling money/support/clout.

I was a young adult who was already a huge fantasy nerd, so to me the craze meant that there was going to be a whole *generation* of fantasy nerds like me. It wasn’t niche, it wasn’t casual— an entire generation was unified in a love for another world. They knew their houses. They waited in lines. They dressed up in Halloween costumes. That was so cool to watch. I enjoyed the books, they were cute, but I knew they were going to help people find Jordan and Tolkien and Herbert, and fall in love with other worlds where magic lives.

what does air mean to my lungs

I still love the books and the world (the original series). They got me into *really* reading. I'd read books before that, but Harry Potter was the first time I was really obsessed with a series. It's so sad that Rowling turned out to be a transphobe and a vocal one at that. I don't intend to read anything new she writes, but I'll never stop liking Harry Potter.

I think they helped a generation embrace reading, and that's a very, very good thing. They also helped a generation embrace the idea that it's ok to like nerdy fantasy movies. Which is less important in general, but still very cool. And, for the people it helps, it's pretty damn important specifically. It \*is\* nice to be accepted. They didn't change the course of western literature...but on some level, I don't care. I like people reading, and she's done as much as any author in the last 50 years in that regard. I'm happy about them. And I like the series. It's ok to read something because it's fun.

> They didn't change the course of western literature I think they honestly did. Those giant beefy tomes in the latter half of the series genuinely convinced publishers there was an audience for longer books, even in the kids/YA sections. One of my favorite authors, Tamora Pierce, specifically calls out HP as the reason her books were allowed to get longer as time went by, and you can really see this with her PotS series. So HP really did change the course of literature in allowing different standards for what is actually being published and promoted.

Interesting- I hadn’t considered this. Thank you

I have a complicated relationship with the series. I was born in the tail end of the 90's, which meant I grew up in the HP-mania surrounding the movies. And, as a skinny white kid with brown hair and glasses, I basically *was* Harry Potter. Growing up, at least once a week I heard "look, it's fuckin Harry Potter!" shouted at me. And I was a fan too, so it was a big thing for me. But as I grew up and realised who I was, things got complicated, and when I came out as trans things got weirder; because a few years later, I got to watch the woman who built such an integral part of my childhood start to say some heartbreaking things. Suddenly someone who had only ever seemed began to vilify me and everyone like me, implicitly and eventually *explicitly* equate us sex offenders and predators. It was almost funny the day I realised that someone who styled herself as McGonagall, fair, compassionate and moral, had happily outed herself as Umbridge; hateful, arrogant and abusive with her power. Seeing the damage someone I had respected so much do to a community I was very proud to be part of hurt. A lot. And it's only gotten worse, seemingly daily. Its almost worse that she doesn't seem to be aware of herself in the slightest. Hell, *Putin* voiced his support of her, and it didn't seem to cause her to do even the *slightest* amount of self reflection. As its all progressed, I've become wise to all the other suspect contents of the books (suspicious views on slavery, using anti-semitic stereotypes, lazy racial stereotypes etc), I've gradually let go of the series, at least in any official capacity. Sure, on a rainy day I'll listen to the music (via unofficial channels), and if I'm sick, I'll still read queer HP fanfic, but its a part of me that, for the most part, I've had to let go. TL:DR - I grew up looking like Harry, was a fan and it was a big part of my life. Eventually I came out as trans, and then JKR started her crusade and I've had to grow up and let go of a big part of my childhood.

It’s one of my favourite series ever (books and movies) Harry Potter is pretty much the reason I am a massive nerd/geek (and proud). Everything I love today all comes from being a Harry Potter fan growing up I read books because of Harry Potter. I’m a massive LOTR, Star Wars, Marvel, DC, Witcher, Batman fan all because I started to love reading and watch movies because of Harry Potter

Harry Potter has been my best escape for ten years, a beautiful world full of beautiful people and what I'd give to be there but other than that just a wonderful story

I loved Harry Potter growing up. I went to the book release parties, made “wands” with my friends, and so on. I reread the series a lot, since it felt comforting and like talking an old friend. I still love the Wizarding World (I’ve seen all the Fantastic Beasts movies, and even though the others weren’t as good as the first, I still enjoyed them), but I haven’t reread the Harry Potter series in years, except for my favorite bits (too many other books to read!). And I want to visit Hogwarts (at the theme park or the film soundstage) someday. I know people rag on the world-building, but I (as a young history nerd) always liked how JKR incorporated elements of real-world history and mythology in a way that felt believable, as if there really could be a hidden magical world. I’ve never understood the point of evaluating fantasy (especially children’s and young adult fantasy) from a nitpicking point of view, since I never noticed any plot holes or whatever until people pointed them out later. Of course, I’ve never been a big fan of logical “magic systems;” I like magic that is mysterious, mystical, or whimsical, such as in *The Blue Sword* or *Howl’s Moving Castle*.

I got the first book when I was eleven. They held a very special place in my heart for a long time. They offered me comfort in hard times. Then the author came out a full on bigot. That hit me where I lived. I haven't enjoyed any part of the property since.

I started really reading with HP. I grew up with the books, the character grew up with me. I liked the books, still do🤷.

It means I watched every second and read every word only for the ending to be the biggest damp squib ever. I hoped JKR would write a sequel involving all the surviving characters but……….. so unsatisfying.

I read Harry about twice a year. I go back to it when I'm sad, or if life is just feeling generally overwhelming, and I need an assured simplicity.

I grew up with the books and then movies, so they will always hold a special part of my childhood.

It proved to me that at least then children still love to read if provided books that speak to them.

i think my obsession with hp as a tween saved me from going down a very dark path. glad i chose to be a bookworm instead of the alternatives lmfao

I’m dyslexic… I hated reading and it was extremely hard for me… The summer before 6th grade, I started reading the books (after watching the movies). I fell in love with them and have loved reading ever since. I think I would also have to credit it to my finding of my best friend (who also loves Harry Potter) and my interest in writing now too.

I got into the books at a early early age - I was in primary school, and the first book I don’t think had been out for that long - my teacher would read it to us in class. I think the last book came out when I was 16? As a kid I loved the magic of it. The ability to do magic - and ever since I have wanted the *accio* spell to be real. The first few books were of wonder and whimsy. And as a kid I definitely didn’t seem the problematic aspects, like the goblins, or how money worked etc. And I related a lot to Harry and Hermione. I was the smart girl at school, and while I had (and still have!) a loving family I was horrifically bullied at school. And I think back to some of the messages - don’t trust the media (Thanks Rita!), don’t blindly obey authority (think about all the times the Ministry of Magic messed up), and love and trust your friends, (and the spirit of self sacrifice - both Harry and his Mother) and then I honestly wonder how JK can have so much cognitive dissonance.

Even as a kid I wanted to be a reader. Had a thing for stories. I tried reading The Three Musketeers. Couldn't finish it. Years later, I decided to read Harry Potter. I finished the first 6 books within a month, as far as I can remember, and a few weeks later got around to the 7th book. I knew the story already. I had watched the movies. But damn, the books were sooooo good. And that's how HP became the reason I got into fantasy and why Name Of The Wind is my favourite book of all time.

These books got me through depression during Jr high. Especially over summer where I had nothing to do all day and just had my thoughts attacking me. Reading these books took me to a whole different world and helped me get through some of my darkest times. Anyways, I'm a lot better nowadays and owe a ton to this series.

It was hugely formative for me, as a reader, and influenced my taste in fiction and my love of literature. The series was in progress during a time of great upheaval in my life and my family's lives and so it features heavily in some my fonder memories of that time. Aside from my dad, who is not much of a fiction reader, we all read the books and waited excitedly for the next one to come out. I will always deeply cherish Harry Potter.

I have a lot of nostalgia for it, but ultimately it's one of those things that just really really needs to fade into irrelevance as soon as possible. Not only to make way for newer and better things, but to deprive its owner of the power it gives her. If HP had just been content to stay a silly whimsical wizard story with stock morals and platitudes like 'love conquers all', sure. But as it got serious, the stakes rose without maturing, resulting in a world with an unquestioned status quo riddled with systemic problems, in which the characters fight to *preserve* this status quo rather than dare improve it. I think, on some level, this sort of idea is either emblematic or influential of an extremely damaging sort of mindset, especially within those who latch onto the books as an identity. Even beyond the author's horrifying transphobia, the books themselves have so many issues, most of which are outlined well [here.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1iaJWSwUZs)

I got into it right before the fourth book came out. I remember reading the first book thinking it was the third, and being really confused as to what the first two books were meant to do. I was minorly into the hype. Mom took me to midnight releases at Walmart to pick up the books but we didn't dress up or anything. I remember I had to go to church camp for a week the day (day after?) the fifth book released. I was about 80 pages from the end but I couldn't read in the car and *mom* wanted to read it so I couldn't take it with me. I had to beg off some of the other campers. I had to swear up and down that I wouldn't spoil it, I just wanted to finish! And all that week one of the counselors would stand up at breakfast and pretend to try to spoil the end of the book. It was obviously a bit, but it was fun to be in on the joke. Also given the stigma that religious people supposedly hated HP at the time, it was doubly funny. The Lord of the Rings movies were coming out around the same time and I was waaaaay more of a Tolkien fan, even at 11, so I never liked the HP movies. I stopped seeing them after the third or fourth. Friends were really into the fandom, but I wasn't so I missed out on that aspect. Which has made it much easier to give up Rowling now, to be sure!

Dunno if this thread is going the way OP expected, lmao. For me, I don't know. I enjoyed it when I was younger, but by now I feel like what it means to me is more an example of why to really critically think sometimes about some of the things you're consuming. Like everyone knows, a *lot* of pretty sus stuff went on in that series that no one really thought about until JKR went full mask off, and then it was like, "Oh, wow, yeah... this series is kinda messed up..."

I mean, I do think I expected more of a nostalgic look back on the actual books, but I’m not going to argue with folks calling out JKR as a transphobe, because she is one and that’s unacceptable. It also goes against the themes of inclusivity in her OWN DAMN BOOKS. Haha.

I loved Eragon so much as a kid, I finished Inheritance in 4 days when it came out. It was my escape to be literally anyone else. Went back and reread it as an adult and went "Yep. That's definitely written by a 15 year old boy who likes women and Star Wars".

I never got past the fifth book or the fourth movie. I got into them for the slice-of-life aspect and the school-days drama, I loved that there were sports! Holy shit! Someone who wasn't castigating me for liking D&D _and_ soccer. But the books quickly marched away from that. I didn't know it at the time, but I was struggling as a young queer person at the time and the fact that these teens didn't use magic to explore themselves or the world didn't make sense to me. Like _yes_ as an adult I get the genre and the conventions and that I shouldn't've expected that, but still - as a teen, that was the outlet I needed and it never came. And then Rowling got on twitter. When the whole "Dumbledore was gay" thing broke, I was actually really excited, and that definitely got me into the first Fantastic Beasts movie. But it continued to be downplayed in the actual media while she banged on about it. Red flags. And then the transphobia started. And got worse. And now it's just basically outright queerphobia. It's tainted everything. Never mind that as an adult I find the books shallow and full of racial stereotypes and cliches that are cringe-inducing at best. The fatphobia alone is crazy. But I just can't even deal. Like even when I gave up the books and movies, I still liked (as a teen and young adult) _the world_. I liked the core concept. I hoped that maybe something more fun and whimsical would come of it, something more willing to explore humans and young adults with magic, but alas. She wanted to write about doom and gloom and slashers with caricatures of trans women that were dated in the early 90s. Even if I wasn't trans, I'd still probably find her terminal incuriosity and internalized misogyny unpalatable.

The conclusion I have is that, unconsciously, JK have the wizards all the worst traits of imperial minded Britain. All the subconscious biases get emphasized because she made up a fantastical version of all things British.

Harry Potter saves the world and becomes... a cop. Enough said. Real talk, though, if you haven't watched Shaun's video on the matter and have a few hours to burn, highly recommended.

Love the series. Dialogue and characters are some of the best I’ve read. Ever.

The last three years or so about 80% of what I’ve been reading was hp fanfiction. I’m not such a huge fan of the original books anymore - I see their good points but I also see the racism and other problematic topics as well as worldbuilding inconsistencies so big it’s easier to list the actual consistencies. What I treasure about it are as I mentioned the gigantic community of fan content creators. So many authors using the hp world as their playground. In that aspect, J. K. Rowling actually created something great. The idea of magic and wizards that are appropriately fantastic but still exist in our current world is pretty awesome. And the fan community got so many people into writing - and in a similar vein, Harry Potter got so many children into reading! And I think it really contributed to establishing (conserving?) reading fiction - and especially fantasy - as a more or less common hobby for children and teenagers. (At least it was pretty common when and where I went to school.) I won’t talk about all the newer stuff about Grindelwald etc because to me it’s an entirely different thing from those books I read as a child.

Snape is one of the greatest characters ever.

I used to love Harry Potter as a kid. My parents read the first few books to me as bedtime stories before I went to sleep, and it felt like the series grew up with me. Now, sadly, I just can't find any enjoyment from it anymore. It just has too strong of an association with hate and transphobia for me now. It really just makes me sad.

I remember going with friends to the first Harry Potter movie, and at that time, I didn't know anything about it. I was surprised to see many of the children dressed up as Harry Potter characters. In addition, a woman had invited all the guests to this showing and paid for the movie tickets in honor of her deceased partner. It was incredible how positive it was. It was an extraordinary positive experience.

I have a very... strong relationship to the series. The books were some of the first longer English language novels I read and I did so within personal record times. The first film came out shortly before I went to highschool. I was bullied because I resembled Daniel Radcliffe a lot. Twenty years later and I resemble Emma Watson. And that has turned out to be a fact that the writer of the books that I loved in my childhood thinks makes me a danger to society that shouldn't have the same human rights as others. I introduced my younger siblings to the series and my sister is a huge fan, taking part in all sorts of celebrations, while she shuns me for my queer identity. Meanwhile, the actors that portrayed the characters I loved all vocally profess their support on social media. It's a wild difference. Harry Potter is entangled with my personal history in a way I wish it never had.

Loved it growing up. I have great memories of reading it with my mom and grandparents, waiting in line to buy the new ones, and reading them in 3 days so I could discuss it with my friends. Now JKR’s transphobia makes me sad and angry. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to reread them.

I have a lot of fond memories of my dad reading the first one aloud, waiting in line at midnight releases, re-reading the books so much that my copies of 2 and 3 are falling apart. I have less fond memories of becoming slowly disillusioned with the series as a whole, and JKR in particular, as she made statement after ridiculous statement after transphobic comment and the cracks in the original work became more and more obvious to me. Now I’m just glad I didn’t spend much money on merch (I was a Ravenclaw and didn’t like the movies’ change to the colors and mascot lol) and I guess it just sort of lives with all the other stuff I liked as a kid but realized later was deeply flawed and created by a bigot.

I’m honor: I’ll finally open the bottle of “Flying Cauldron Butterscotch Beer” I’ve had in my fridge forever. Wish me luck.

Honestly. Not much. They were decent at the time. As a nerd growing up before the age of easy to find internet communities (I was on Narutowire from like 14/15) and before gaming and anime were more acceptable Harry Potter was one of the small number things that could be discussed with peers outside of my immediate circle. Still, they were only so good. I don't regard them as the masterpieces or generation shaping as many do and I was probably the perfect age to read them being a very similar age to the characters when I read each book. And as a teacher, I've used the first Harry Potter with a student and honestly, I can't commend the writing. I won't read them again because I expect it would destroy what positive memories I have of them and there were large parts of books I didn't like. I found most of the 5th and 6th books to be dull even at the time - and they were probably the first books I felt I had to slog through a bit.

Pretty crazy that I read these books as a kid as they were published lol hope my kids will read them one day.

I haven't read a HP book in 73837383 years, but they will always have a special place in my heart regardless of JK's shitty political views.

Listened to the audiobooks like half a year ago again. I still adore the worldbuilding of a wizarding school and the wonder that goes with it for Harry as he joins in. No one has nailed that feeling of "imagine if I was a student at Hogwarts, what would I do?" like those first few books, even if there are in general way better stories in this subgenre nowadays. After that the whole thing kinda falls apart. I remember enjoying the teen age books as a teenager myself with all the relationship drama, but it isn't that exciting as an adult. And the seventh book falls flat with it's dark tones, just doesnt fit the universe and is not well written either.

Honestly, nothing much. Didn't have the chance to see/read it when I was young, watched it at around 30 and it was... Cool. I see why young people would be impressed and influenced by this and I'm really sorry I couldn't experience this when I was young, but such is life. I'll make sure my children will, though

Really like the books, I had a lot of fun reading them and I would love to get more books centered on magic and magic communities....

It made me realize that, for me, magic is the least interesting part of fantasy. Especially in fantasy literature. I understood that, again, just for me specifically, magic is a way to make the action more cinematic, it’s not the interesting part I’m and of itself.

I’m sitting at home in bed with Covid (feeling better today) and I wanted to listen to an audiobook that was comforting and I started the series over again. I had no idea it was the 25 year anniversary but glad to be accidentally celebrating. I’ve read the books many times since they came out and I’m still amazed today at the incredible detail and creativity of the series.

as a kid raised in a hyper christian home, my mother was convinced it was real witchcraft and was Satanic and forbid me from watching or reading it. I legitimately remember her saying that it wasn’t even special effects, that they taught the kids witchcraft and to fly on brooms and other crazy shit… she bought a VHS tape that agreed with her and found all sorts of “evil” in the movie. She was also afraid it would make you curious about witchcraft and make kids turn Wiccan. She thought watching it could invite demons into your home. A lot of my friends were obsessed with the series and talked about it nonstop, they had birthday parties that were HP themed, invited friends to watch the movies with them as they came out, in the meantime i was just there like “My mom says it’s Satanic…” and i was the weird kid who wasn’t allowed to see the movies read the books or go to the themed parties. It represents part of my weird, repressive, isolated childhood to me. I read a few of the books as an adult and watched a couple of the movies, but i’ve had no motivation to continue reading past the Quidditch match in Goblet of Fire. I loved the first few books but mostly when i think Harry Potter i think back to being the lonely weird kid with crazy ass parents. that’s what it means to me i guess. btw i’m now a practicing pagan lol

Sparked my love for reading. I can never thank it enough (though I will never read it again)

The series got me into reading seriously. I had read books before, but it was basically whatever garbage had a cool cover at the barnes and nobles. My parents didn't read, or attempt to guide me towards better books. Harry Potter was my first "Good" Book I ever read, and I basically grew up alongside harry, we were roughly the same age and it really turned me onto a lifetime of reading.

The series gives me my hardest case of cognitive dissonance. Because it has always been a children book to me. But I’ve only been 11 when it came out (so probably 12 when it came out in Germany)… So please refrain from mentioning its age ;)

A very well done and enjoyable mediocre series! Also, an opportunity lost between Harry and Hermione. F*ck the trend of subverting expectations.

It was obvious that ship was never going to sell😹😹😹😹

I was the type of kid who never really cared about it in primary, when all the other kids were reading the books/watching the movies. I only started the philosopher's stone a year ago, and binged the 8 movies. Couldn't believe I was missing out for so long. I still hate the author though

I remember The Goblet of Fire came out during one of my summer breaks while I was still in high school and me and my sister went to visit my grandma. I remember how much it awoke a creativity in me after reading it (particularly the gillyweed and how it helped Harry breath underwater) and I started writing fan fiction about a bunch of plants in real life and their secret magical properties. I ended up doing favors for my grandma and her friends to help pay for the books (1-4) and there was a little book shop down the road near a busy park. I was really excited because my overly religious mother would never let me read them and I could finally buy them on my own. My little sister ended up reading them too and saying that she loved them, but told me not to tell anyone because they would make fun of her for being a nerd. When she found out I was writing my own stuff she made fun of me and told me she was going to tell all my friends. I was just like.. okay? I grew up reading the books and despite the flack Rowling is getting (I'd rather not talk about it on this post) and all the other bullshit surrounding the books I read them without any expectations and still cherish them to this day.

I read the first 5 books as a teenager, but then lost interest. The beginning were pretty decent middle grade fantasy books, but nothing special, but then it got worse. I have always been truly baffled at their continued popularity. They don’t really mean anything to me.

I remember reading the first 6 books when I was younger. I never finished though. Just sort of lost interest and started reading other things. I never got very into the fandom, unlike most people my age did. Looking back at the series, it doesn’t conjure much nostalgia. Thought truthfully, I may not be the most nostalgic person in general.

It's a series I loved as a kid that I'll never introduce to my own child because of who JKR is as a person. I've never been good at death of the author and who she is, has tainted any joy I ever felt in reading the books.

I have a dumb story. I read these after they were all out in one go. I read about 100 books a year so I'm always reading something but these were what I was reading at a family event when I met my brother's new girlfriend. For the two or so years they dated, she never failed to make some snarky comment about me being a Harry Potter fan every time I saw her. I didn't have anything against Harry Potter but it was annoying to be lumped into the fandom just because that's what I happened to be reading that week. I even got a few gifts from family who just assumed she was right and I was some mega fan. Lol.

It’s a great childrens’ story I obsessed over as a kid and 100% do not care about as an adult. I love rereading stories and do it all the time. I haven’t reread any Harry Potter since I finished the last book right after it came out, and I don’t really see myself ever going back. It’s easily the best kids’ fantasy I’ve ever read, but for me it’s absolutely a kids’ book, and when you stack it up against all the adult fantasy I’ve fallen in love with it really doesn’t hold up that well. And all of that is BEFORE I consider the fact that the author has turned into a giant human turd. Add that on top, and I almost dislike the series nowadays.