My grade-school son committed a major gaffe the other night -- holding a dinner guest captive with a blow-by-blow plot synopsis of his favorite book. But because the matter at hand was urgent, I let him ramble on: Our adult visitor was wondering if she should read "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" before the movie comes out.
In a few days, she won't have that choice to make anymore. The movie opens wide, as they say in the industry, on Nov. 16. It will likely be greeted by many moviegoers as a welcome respite from these past weeks of sorrow and fear. But even as we herd to the theater for a much-needed escape from reality, let's pause for a moment and pay our respects to what Harry Potter was before it was a movie.
Just as much of the 1990s and 2000 now seem from our new perspective to be some sort of fever dream, it's hard to imagine that a few short months ago Harry Potter was nothing but a series of books. A staggeringly successful series, but still just books. Not DVDs, not shockwaves, not JPEGs; nonprogrammable, undownloadable, noninteractive.
Now we are on the edge of something different. Warner Brothers' huge marketing juggernaut has been cranking merchandise into the marketplace for more than a year, so you can already "get" Harry via coffee mug, sweatshirt, lightning-bolt scar stickers or mantelpiece figurine rather than getting him by reading. Thankfully, the stuff is in most cases so ugly that it helps even the youngest readers separate the wonderfully illustrated books from the movie hype.
But once the movie hits, there'll be no going back. Reading a book is an intensely private interaction between reader and writer, and even a chart-topping book like each of the Harry Potter installments has had to win over its converts one reader at a time. But going to the movies, especially a costly, much-anticipated would-be blockbuster, is about as public an act as you can commit. And so, even before the movie's release, our personal, intimate imaginings of quidditch, potions and chocolate frogs have been diluted by Harry on the Coke can, Hagrid in FAO Schwartz and wizards by the dozens on our Halloween doorsteps.
Film is simply too visual a medium not to worm its way into our consciousness. That the all-British cast seems reassuringly superb only exacerbates the problem. Once Dame Maggie Smith latches onto a role, who among us is strong enough to retain our own anemic vision of what Professor Minerva McGonagall is really like?
In a world as changed as ours is after Sept. 11, does any of this really matter, copies sold or box-office records broken? It might. Living in a culture that has in the past decade seemed bent on dividing the populace into ever smaller niche markets, we could do worse than to start looking at what unites us, even if it's just our shared amusements.
J.K. Rowling's books have connected hundreds of thousands of people all over the world, and in the process reminded at least some of them of the simple power of the paper-and-ink medium. As Americans start stockpiling bottled water and canned goods against the next unnamed catastrophe, it might be a comfort to remember that a book still works when the power is out; read aloud at bedtime, it can reassure an anxious child that all is well with the world even when that's not wholly the case; taken up at 3 a.m., it can distract the heartsick of any age.
If the Harry Potter movie opens up the books' shared experience to an even wider audience, then maybe it's all for the best. Unless director Chris Columbus has screwed up the story royally, then sure, let's all go. But let's also remember that there was a moment, way back in the mists of the late last century, when Harry Potter was a cool club you could join only by reading. You can still join, in fact -- they're taking applications at the bookstore and the library right now. But hurry, this offer expires at midnight on Nov. 15.
Salon reviews of Harry Potter films:
"Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone"
The long-awaited movie is faithful to J.K. Rowling's book, but the fantasy isn't very fantastic and the evil just isn't dark enough.
By Andrew O'Hehir, Salon
"Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets"
Despite terrific special effects and funnier gags, "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets" finds a way to make J.K. Rowling's marvelous series into a deadly bore.
By Stephanie Zacharek, Salon
"Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban"
Hippogriffs, Dementors and Harry, oh my! Director Alfonso Cuaron finally decants the essence of J.K. Rowling's work and brings us one of the greatest fantasy films of all time.
By Stephanie Zacharek, Salon
"Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire"
Harry and his friends are growing up, but this latest Potter film may leave you struggling with your own childhood demons.
By Stephanie Zacharek, Salon
"Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix"
Patches of magical beauty rescue this sprawling adaptation of the fifth book in J.K. Rowling's beloved series.
By Stephanie Zacharek, Salon
"Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince"
The sixth film in J.K. Rowling's series has beautiful special effects, and something even more rare: Magic.
By Stephanie Zacharek, Salon
Other Salon articles related to the films:
Harry Potter doesn't get "Blue Velvet"
The boy has no profound psychosexual life, which keeps the film from being dangerous -- and important.
By David Thomson, Salon
Harry Potter and the art of screenwriting
Michael Goldenberg talks about the pleasures and pitfalls of adapting "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix" for the big screen.
By Rebecca Traister, Salon
The sexual awakening of Hermione
How "Harry Potter" star Emma Watson is navigating the tricky transition from adorable child actor to mature adult.
By Joy Press, Salon
Salon reviews of Harry Potter books:
"Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone"
"Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone," like all great escapist reading, takes you happily back to where you already were.
By Charles Taylor, Salon
"Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire"
With her fourth Harry Potter book, J.K. Rowling takes her young hero to his darkest adventure yet.
By Charles Taylor, Salon
"Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix"
No, Hogwarts isn't a hotbed of drugs, smoking and sex (at least not yet). But J.K. Rowling's rich and huge new installment unmistakably brings our bespectacled hero into adolescence.
By Laura Miller, Salon
"Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince"
Harry learns more about his mysterious nemesis -- and the brutal reality of being 16 -- in J.K. Rowling's tricky, but ultimately satisfying, penultimate volume in the "Harry Potter" series.
By Laura Miller, Salon
"Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows"
Does J.K. Rowling's final installment, "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows," provide the magical ending to the beloved series her readers so desperately long for?
By Laura Miller, Salon
Other articles related to the books:
Dumbledore? Gay. J.K. Rowling? Chatty.
What happens when authors like J.K. Rowling can't stop telling their own stories?
By Rebecca Traister, Salon
A.S. Byatt and the goblet of bile
The author's recent New York Times Op-Ed shows that she doesn't understand why so many of us love Harry Potter. Maybe it's just too much fun.
By Charles Taylor, Salon
A list of their own
Has Harry Potter changed the course of the New York Times Book Review -- and the children's book market -- for good or for evil? It depends on whom you ask.
By Kera Bolonik, Salon
Of magic and single motherhood
Bestselling author J.K. Rowling is still trying to fathom the instant fame that came with her first children's novel.
By Margaret Weir, Salon
Harry Potter's girl troubles
The world of everyone's favorite kid wizard is a place where boys come first.
By Christine Schoefer, Salon
Can 35 million book buyers be wrong? Yes.
The cultural critics will, soon enough, introduce Harry Potter into their college curriculum, and The New York Times will go on celebrating another confirmation of the dumbing-down it leads and exemplifies.
By Harold Bloom, The Wall Street Journal
On the Potter lifestyle:
Potterpalooza
For the Quidditch players, wizard rockers and would-be witches who gathered at a New Orleans Harry Potter convention, this is the dawning of their summer of love -- and loss.
By Rebecca Traister, Salon
For Harry Potter fans about to rock, we salute you
A global network of Potter-influenced bands inspired kids like 8-year-old Darius to make their own wizard rock. Will fans keep the music alive?
By Elisabeth Donnelly, Salon
The end of the affair
For almost a decade, Harry Potter and Tony Soprano have been my intimate companions. Now it's time to disentangle myself from their lives and say goodbye.
By Rebecca Traister, Salon
Wizard people, dear reader
The first chapter in the famed unauthorized "re-telling" of the Harry Potter films.
Open Salon box office in review (10/18/09)
Weekend Wrap-Up Repost (I dunno what happened)
Is there enough of me left for a novel?
You Say Childless Like It's A Bad Thing
Some Summer Movie Box Office Results