Oh, Dear Sweet God

[abigailnus]

I (Abigail) wrote:
> > > I swear, there are days when I really wish these books weren't as 
> > > popular as they are.
> > > 
 
And Alshain queried:
> Which books, out of curiosity? Harry Potter or Left Behind?

Well, at the time I was referring to Harry Potter, because it gets rather 
tiring to see the series constantly trotted out whenever someone has a 
point to make about pop-culture, or when they want an easy target or 
a way to boost their ratings.  I also with the LB series weren't so popular, 
but for completely different reasons.

> 
> As I recall from reading the article a week or so ago, the writer 
> skewed the article rather neatly by only giving examples of 
> similarities instead of differences (and the similarities were very 
> trivial at that). He also plays it safe by being very vague, which is 
> 100 % failsafe, just like applying elements of The Hero's Journey, 
> but not very informative and very much open to interpretation. 

Yup, yup.  Slate doesn't take letters to the editor, but I had an 
overwhelming urge to write in and point out that there was a 
similarity the author had missed.  Both series are printed!  On paper!  
Also, some of his canon examples from HP were so off-base that it 
wasn't even funny.  Apparently, Harry and Cho's budding relationship 
didn't tank because she's emotionally damaged and he's immature.  
It was because Harry was too busy fighting Voldemort.  Whatever.

> 
> Oh well. Perhaps this article makes someone in the "Harry Potter is 
> the work of the devil" crowd come to see the light.

It didn't occur to me until long after I posted my original message that 
the author of the article might have thought he was giving HP props.  
Sort of a shout-out to LB readers - 'See?  This Potter series is just like 
this other series that you like!  It isn't evil!'  Of course, this is only 
flattering if you don't think LB is an awful series and actually want to 
court the fundamentalist, HP-burning demographic.  Admittedly, I 
haven't read the LB books, but from what I've heard about them and the 
excepts I've seen, I wouldn't like HP to be mentioned in the same 
sentence as them.

Abigail

P.S. Speaking of LB, there's a weblogger who for the last few months has 
been making a page-by-page review of the first book, primarily from a 
Christian viewpoint.  It's very interesting, especially to someone who 
doesn't know much about Christianity.  You can find the entire series 
here (start at the bottom):
http://slacktivist.typepad.com/slacktivist/left_behind/index.html