What's the literary world's view of JK Rowling?

[Deeg]

@Melbourne

She didn’t win any literary prizes. And my personal view is, that’s fair: popularity is orthogonal to “literary” quality, or there wouldn’t be any point in having literary prizes.

Depending on what you mean by orthogonal I disagree. Popularity is by no means a guarantee of quality, nor does it indicate inferiority.

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@Deeg

Depending on what you mean by orthogonal I disagree. Popularity is by no means a guarantee of quality, nor does it indicate inferiority.

Given that “orthogonal” means “statistically independent,” I’m pretty sure you don’t disagree :).

[Derleth]

@Deeg

Depending on what you mean by orthogonal I disagree. Popularity is by no means a guarantee of quality, nor does it indicate inferiority.

Orthogonal: At right angles to. Independent of. Irrelevant to.

A wall is orthogonal to the floor, unless your walls slope. What shirt you wear is orthogonal to the wind speed on Venus.

So, yes, popularity is orthogonal to quality.