Defend OOTP against my horribly Muggle mind!

[subrosax99]

No: HPFGUIDX 76375

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "feetmadeofclay" 
<feetmadeofclay at y...> wrote:
> Dear Grownups... 
> I have consistently felt that while I like Harry Potter's universe, 
> OOTP is not a great or even good novel. (Trust me when I say I 
didn't 
> want to think this.) It is (in my opinion) dully written and filled 
> with hackneyed phrases.  This hampers my ability to see beyond its 
> surface. It is undenyably repetative - harping on the same points 
> like Umbridge looking like a toad and clearing her throat.  I don't 
> have my book here... (it was so expensive that it is making the 
> rounds with friends) but "hot on his heels" is hardly a phrase I 
> expect during one of the most dramatic scenes in the novel.  And 
> Hensher of the Spectator was right "feathery cannonball" is truely 
> lamentable writing.  Neither really funny nor terribly vivid.  Also 
> she used a similar allusion with Errol before anyway. 


> 
> Do books have to do all this?  Well IMO good books do!  That is 
what 
> it means to be a good book. Otherwise why read? Reading is meant to 
> to add to our stock of experience by entertaining us.  Even light 
> parody does this by teaching us to challange what we know and read. 
> Is OOTP just brain candy or is it literature? It can't be both.  
This 
> of course doesn't mean literature (and OOTP, if it is litertature) 
> can't be fun too. (though I didn't find OOTP to be so).  I don't 
> subscribe to the school that say "no pain no gain".  But I enjoy 
the 
> classics and many of the newer books I read.  Some I like more than 
> others but I think overall I rarely read bad novels.  And I like 
> children's books so that is not it... Michael Bedard's stunning 
> Redwork is one of my favourite novels.  
> Golly

Oh, Please! Not to be snarky, but this post strikes me as being 
awfully pretentious.
Why does it pain you to say that OoP is neither a good or great novel?
It certainly doesn't pain me. I don't feel any compulsion to justify 
my love of the books by claiming they are great literature. They 
aren't, in my opinion.
The last book I read before OoP came out was "The Magic Mountain" by 
Thomas Mann. No question in my mind which was the better book, but 
you wouldn't catch me on some public forum discussing the particulars 
of that 700 page sleeping pill.
The Harry Potter fans in my circle of friends are all persons with 
advanced degrees and plenty of fancy book lernin'. (One of them, a 
professor of philosophy, actually read the first book because he 
thought it was a kid's book that had something to do with..well, 
philosophy!)I haven't heard anyone complain about JKR's somewhat 
clunky writing style, because no one cares, frankly. 
I, for one, will not rise to the challenge of defending OoP. I 
shouldn't have to and neither should anyone else. If you prefer not 
to read "bad" books, then by all means don't. I'm sure I'm not alone 
when I say that I eagarly await JKR's next hackneyed and dully 
written book.

 
Allyson