What's an Adult -- Censorship of Children's Reading Material

[catherine at cator-manor.demon.co.uk]

No: HPFGUIDX 25175

--- In HPforGrownups at y..., Penny & Bryce <pennylin at s...> wrote:
I just don't think that very many children will fully appreciate 
> the complexities of the later volumes ... or at least what I expect 
will 
> be the complexities of the later volumes given GoF.  <g>  I will 
> absolutely allow my kids to read HP at whatever age they can read 
the 
> words, but I don't imagine that they will fully appreciate it until 
they 
> are older.  I too read books as a child that I appreciate more 
*now* 
> when I re-read them.


I've been following this thread with interest,  (after I had got over 
the initial shock that the whole "Are they children's books or not?" 
argument had reared its head again <g>.)

I totally agree with the above.  I was, like Penny, one of those 
children who read whatever they wanted.  Whenever my mother tried to 
censor my reading, I was (almost) always able to convince her to let 
me go ahead.  This was, for me, a good thing.  I think that one thing 
that this thread has shown is that all children are different.  I 
have met children (admittedly, none under 11) who have a very good 
reading age, are very mature, and get almost as much out of the books 
as many of the adults I know who have read them.

Conversely, I have two small family members (8 and 10) who are 
reading their way through the books as we speak.  They do enjoy them 
and they do get very excited about what is going on in them - but I 
would say that they don't always understand what is going on, or at 
least are reading on a very superficial level and often need the 
complexities/subtleties of certain plotlines and relationships 
explained to them when it is obvious they have missed the point.  I 
wouldn't stop them from reading them now - I just know that they will 
get much more out of them in a few years time, as I did when I went 
back and read certain things when I was older.

The point is, though, that they are enjoying the books, and they 
don't realise that there is so much more to them than they currently 
perceive.  It is all about reading things on certain levels.  I am 
sure that in a few years time they will be amazed at the things they 
didn't pick up (like many of the adults on this list, including 
myself, who are constantly amazed what other people have noticed, 
which they have missed).

It is this very point which makes me think that the books are not 
specifically children's books though, and so I am agreeing with 
Penny.  There are many children's books which do operate on one 
level, when they are geared to a specific age group.  Then there are 
children's books which appeal to adults, for various reasons, one of 
which is probably nostalgia.  Then there are books which are not 
targetted at any particular audience, which appeal to adults and 
children alike.  It is into this category which I would put Harry 
Potter, along with Tolkein and Philip Pullman, and numerous others I 
could think of.

Question:  Is it the fact that the books are fantasy based which 
makes them more marketable as children's books?  Do the publishers 
aim them at children thinking that they are a larger target audience 
than those adults who like fantasy/sci-fi?  I was just wondering 
this, because I can think of very few writers who generate this kind 
of discussion, who aren't writing within this particular genre.  
(Perhaps LM Montgomery is one?)

Catherine