# People who read Harry Potter and nothing else (kinda lame) **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [February 12, 2004, 9:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918 "2004-02-12T21:05:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Dunderman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecb155/32.png) [@Dunderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dunderman)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2004, 2:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918/61 "2004-02-13T14:08:03Z")
Oh, no-one. No-one special. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2004, 2:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918/62 "2004-02-13T14:21:43Z")
> [@](#): > > Fuck all of you and your shitty books and your potty mouths. Dante, right? > [@](#): > > I don’t need to be redressed by a bunch of pimple-popping nerds. What’s really funny to me (in addition to my clear skin) is that I don’t even like Harry Potter. I’ve read the first four books quickly and they were enjoyable, but my opinion of their originality went way downhill after that, and the hype just strikes me as ridiculous. And I’m a big Shakespeare buff. An ass is an ass no matter what degree he has. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2004, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918/63 "2004-02-13T14:24:22Z")
> [@lucwarm](#): > > Out of curiousity, what are the major pre-Harry Potter works with the concept of the wizard school? There’s a 1990 (pre-Potter) computer game by Steve Meretzky called “Spellcasting 101: Sorcerers Get All The Girls.” It’s sort of a cross between Harry Potterish, wizards’ school genre and the “Revenge of the Nerds” movies’ genre. ---
**Author:** ![Myrr21](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e495f1/32.png) [@Myrr21](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Myrr21)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2004, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918/64 "2004-02-13T14:26:14Z")
Man, I know some guys have trouble keeping it up, but that’s gotta be one of the fastest polite moron-to-drooling moron conversions I’ve seen in a long time. ---
**Author:** ![In\_Conceivable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/4bbf92/32.png) [@In\_Conceivable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/In_Conceivable)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2004, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918/65 "2004-02-13T14:31:37Z")
> [@Priceguy](#): > > Oh, no-one. No-one special. You are an ass. ---
**Author:** ![Merijeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f05b48/32.png) [@Merijeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merijeek)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2004, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918/66 "2004-02-13T14:32:58Z")
> [@skutir](#): > > Aha! But I merely said I was not an aesthetic relativist who SAYS “it’s **all** a matter of opinion.” There are other things, like test-of-time and influence and critical interest that raise the status/social importance of a text. One thing you will learn after you graduate from high school and enter college is that the world of evaluating art is not one confined to each person’s head, but it is actually a social and historical process. The question being, of course, if you backpedal hard enough will your flux capacitor kick in and take you far enough back where you never started sounding like an elitist prick in the first place? Anyways, now you’re bringing up historical perspective? Maybe all the Lit majors out there should think about how much of that social and historical process is simply all the Lit majors in the world simply engaged in an enormous game of eating the previous generation’s opinion just so you can regurgitate it to the next? So…do you work at a Barnes & Noble with other Lit majors or McDonald’s with the PolySci majors? -Joe, dislikes the pretentious ---
**Author:** ![Dunderman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecb155/32.png) [@Dunderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dunderman)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2004, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918/67 "2004-02-13T14:35:25Z")
I don’t know if this is widely known or not, but I didn’t know it until the other day, and right now I can’t think of a better place to post it. The hero in the 1986 movie [Troll](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0092115/), which has trolls and magic, is Harry Potter Jr. COINCIDENCE!!!1111 ---
**Author:** ![gobear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8dc957/32.png) [@gobear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gobear)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2004, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918/68 "2004-02-13T14:44:30Z")
While **Skutir** is being an ass, he does have a point in that many SF and F fans are not well-read outside of the genre. J. Michael Straczynski, the creator of _Babylon 5_ [commented](http://www.midwinter.com/lurk/countries/us/guide/068.html#JS) on the same phenomenon: > [@](#): > > This will probably get me in trouble, but…on the one hand, I am always delighted and impressed with the breadth and depth of analyses and thought of the larger group of SF fans, and the insightfulness with which they apply those perceptions. > > On the flip side of this discussion…for a certain percentage of them, that breadth and depth is only or primarily within SF and mainstream fantasy. The wellspring of material from which to draw when making comparisons is not often as broad as it should be in classical literature, mythology, medieval studies, and so on. They see a drop into a chasm, they think “Oh, Gandalf.” Not understanding that the root of this goes back way, way, way further…to Orpheus and his kindred spirits. > > I was copied a note from someone on another newsgroup who insisted that everything in the show had an elvish/Tolkein base, including and _especially_ the names of everyone, citing the Agamemnon as meaning something or other in LoTR elvish. The symbol is RIGHT THERE, in the name, Agamemnon, and the whole unfortunate history of that character and his wife, and the Cassandra character (which is at the center of G’Kar’s character)…and yet she says, “No, no, it’s all a clue, it means this thing over here.” ---
**Author:** ![Merijeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f05b48/32.png) [@Merijeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merijeek)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2004, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918/69 "2004-02-13T15:01:52Z")
> [@gobear](#): > > While **Skutir** is being an ass, he does have a point in that many SF and F fans are not well-read outside of the genre. J. Michael Straczynski, the creator of _Babylon 5_ [commented](http://www.midwinter.com/lurk/countries/us/guide/068.html#JS) on the same phenomenon: Sure, and JMS has a point. Now, you’re not actually going to claim that’s the point that **Skutir** was trying to get across, are you? -Joe ---
**Author:** ![Zebra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c0e974/32.png) [@Zebra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zebra)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2004, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918/70 "2004-02-13T15:08:48Z")
The thing I like most about HP is that down the road, the young readers of the series are going to have TONS of moments of realization of where stuff comes from. A three headed dog guarding the door to the underworld? But, but, but… However, untill they have those moments, they will be a little annoying. ---
**Author:** ![gobear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8dc957/32.png) [@gobear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gobear)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2004, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918/71 "2004-02-13T15:13:32Z")
> [@Merijeek](#): > > Sure, and JMS has a point. > > Now, you’re not actually going to claim that’s the point that **Skutir** was trying to get across, are you? > > -Joe Given that I’m quoting the author of my favorite science fiction TV show and that I am a fan of SF and fantasy who does not think it’s intrinisically “junk,” obviously, no, I’m not claiming that’s his point. However his posts, dim as they were, did make an interesting segue to JMS’s comments and are relevant to the OP. I love fantasy, but if that’s all one reads, one is missing something. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2004, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918/72 "2004-02-13T15:32:20Z")
> [@Zebra](#): > > The thing I like most about HP is that down the road, the young readers of the series are going to have TONS of moments of realization of where stuff comes from. > > A three headed dog guarding the door to the underworld? > > But, but, but… > However, untill they have those moments, they will be a little annoying. The really funny thing about this is, from the couple of interviews I’ve read with Ms. Rowling it seems she’s always been quite open about the fact that she _didn’t_ invent all of the fantastic creatures or strange names in her books. She’s said that virtually all of them come from mythology or literature, and she seemed proud of the extensive reading she has done in the field. So anyone who thought she invented hippogriffs must not have known very much about the author herself. ---
**Author:** ![Merijeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f05b48/32.png) [@Merijeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merijeek)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2004, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918/73 "2004-02-13T15:32:50Z")
> [@gobear](#): > > Given that I’m quoting the author of my favorite science fiction TV show and that I am a fan of SF and fantasy who does not think it’s intrinisically “junk,” obviously, no, I’m not claiming that’s his point. However his posts, dim as they were, did make an interesting segue to JMS’s comments and are relevant to the OP. > > I love fantasy, but if that’s all one reads, one is missing something. Well, sure, but that’s basically a truism, isn’t it? It can be said about pretty much everything in life. Tracing a fall down a chasm back to Gandalf is just mental masturbation, and really any different than tracing it back to Gilgamesh. It’s not any more impressive a conclusion to come up with one over the other. But according to our resident elitist prick, he’s super special for recognizing such things. That’s what makes him such a big brain, and the others in this thread pathetic pimple-popping geeks. -Joe ---
**Author:** ![gobear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8dc957/32.png) [@gobear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gobear)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2004, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918/74 "2004-02-13T15:34:34Z")
Crumbs. That last sentence of the first paragraph in my previous post should read, “However his posts, dim as they were, did make an interesting segue to JMS’s comments which are relevant to the OP.” ---
**Author:** ![Dung\_Beetle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dung_beetle/32/7945_2.png) [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2004, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918/75 "2004-02-13T15:39:39Z")
> [@](#): > > Quote: > Originally Posted by Dung Beetle > Hey! This is how I felt the day some girl told me Whitney Houston wrote that song “I Will Always Love You”! > > _Originally posted by jayjay_ > Aaaaaaaarghhhhh! > > That’s the one that always gets me. That and “Celine really wrote a great one with that ‘Drove All Night’, didn’t she?” The only thing that keeps me from smacking them is remembering when I thought Motley Crue wrote “Smoking in the Boy’s Room”. ---
**Author:** ![WernhamHogg](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a587f6/32.png) [@WernhamHogg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WernhamHogg)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2004, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918/76 "2004-02-13T15:53:39Z")
> [@gobear](#): > > Crumbs. > That last sentence of the first paragraph in my previous post should read, “However his posts, dim as they were, did make an interesting segue to JMS’s comments which are relevant to the OP.” Christ, even the people defending me are calling me “dim.” Look, my only point in the first place is that perfectly well read people don’t have a fucking clue what a “hippogriff” is. All the other shit came as a reaction to being immediately called a snob because I called most fantasy “junk.” It is. Many fantasy writers would agree with that position. As a writer, I have good friends from writing clubs who write fantasy and love it as a genre and are sick of all the junk. Christ, I make one casual comment and now everyone is all over me calling me a snob. That’s probably merited, but calling me a moron and fucker and everything else is not justified. Probably I shouldn’t have bothered with this whole “is it an opinion or isn’t it” before my first cup of coffee, but I refuse to lower everything to one plane and say it’s all the same and only snobs think one thing is better than another. It most assuredly is not. Just because you don’t know any better doesn’t mean it’s all the same. ---
**Author:** ![WernhamHogg](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a587f6/32.png) [@WernhamHogg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WernhamHogg)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2004, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918/77 "2004-02-13T16:00:54Z")
> [@Merijeek](#): > > Well, sure, but that’s basically a truism, isn’t it? It can be said about pretty much everything in life. > > Tracing a fall down a chasm back to Gandalf is just mental masturbation, and really any different than tracing it back to Gilgamesh. It’s not any more impressive a conclusion to come up with one over the other. > > But according to our resident elitist prick, he’s super special for recognizing such things. That’s what makes him such a big brain, and the others in this thread pathetic pimple-popping geeks. > > -Joe The decisions to call me “an elitist prick” and various other combinations of synonyms and profanity were very hasty. If you read back, you will see I had already been cursed up and down the thread for relatively mild posts before I used such harsh insults as “nerds”. The defensiveness and hostility I was met with was really quite baffling to me. For instance, find a post of mine that really says I’m better than anyone else… better educated, maybe, but flat-out better? I don’t think I said anything like that. ---
**Author:** ![Merijeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f05b48/32.png) [@Merijeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merijeek)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2004, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918/78 "2004-02-13T16:03:21Z")
> [@skutir](#): > > Christ, I make one casual comment and now everyone is all over me calling me a snob. That’s probably merited, but calling me a moron and fucker and everything else is not justified. Actually, claming your opinion as fact around here tends to lead to that happening. It’s called “cause and effect”. > [@skutir](#): > > Probably I shouldn’t have bothered with this whole “is it an opinion or isn’t it” before my first cup of coffee, but I refuse to lower everything to one plane and say it’s all the same and only snobs think one thing is better than another. It most assuredly is not. Just because you don’t know any better doesn’t mean it’s all the same. Prick-to-English Translation: I probably shouldn’t have said I was superior and all of you were ignorant fucks, but that doesn’t change the fact that I’m superior and you’re all ignorant fucks. For a Lit major, you sure are shitty with language and communication. -Joe ---
**Author:** ![WernhamHogg](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a587f6/32.png) [@WernhamHogg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WernhamHogg)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2004, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918/79 "2004-02-13T16:14:11Z")
Well, I tried to tone down whatever was arrogant, but apparently absolutely nothing will suffice to undamage this caricature of academic snob you decided to make up based on a couple of fly-by posts. It’s ironic that ones who hate “elitism” and “snobbishness” would be so judgmental and condescending. ---
**Author:** ![tdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2004, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918/80 "2004-02-13T16:47:04Z")
> [@lucwarm](#): > > Out of curiousity, what are the major pre-Harry Potter works with the concept of the wizard school? There is a FRPG called [Harn](http://www.columbiagames.com/cgi-bin/query/cfg/allharnitems.cfg) which kicks D&D’s ass, as well as all other fantasy worlds, including Middle Earth. This is not just my opinion. This is verifiable fact. NASA has developed an instrument to measure the kickassable quantities of fantasy worlds, and Harn has been measured consistantly to be 92.3726% more fucking excellent. It dates back to 1983. In Harn, there is the Guild of Arcane Lore. It has a subguild called the Shek-P’var. P’varic schools are called chantries. (And “muggles” are called “kvikir.”) That guild is further divided into 6 schools – Lyahvi (light and illusion), Peleahn (fire and heat), Jmorvi (metals), Fyvria (living tissue), Odivshe (coldness and water), and Savorya (the mind). Getting into a chantry is not easy – one must not only have innate talent, but grease the palms of enough Viran (masters), provided one can find them. (They’re not easy to spot, as they don’t wear silly pointed hats. In fact, chantries themselves appear to be nothing more than a wealthy person’s home, or a warehouse.) Applicants enter a chantry usually at the age of 14, as apprentices. They go out into the world hopefully around the age of 21, as journeymen. Most will never attain the rank of grandmaster. I include this level of detail because I know you were all about to beg me for it. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-read-harry-potter-and-nothing-else-kinda-lame/228918.md?page=5)