On that Time magazine interview with JKR (may contain HBP spoilers)

[persephone_kore]

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1083935,00.html

I'm really puzzled by a few things here. I'm not the first to comment on what she says about Narnia, nor on the reporter's rather bizarre decision to slam C. S. Lewis further, nor for that matter on the rather perplexing idea that magic makes everything all better in most fantasy novels.

But look at this from page 1:

The most popular living fantasy writer in the world doesn't even especially like fantasy novels. It wasn't until after Sorcerer's Stone was published that it even occurred to her that she had written one. "That's the honest truth," she says. "You know, the unicorns were in there. There was the castle, God knows. But I really had not thought that that's what I was doing. And I think maybe the reason that it didn't occur to me is that I'm not a huge fan of fantasy."

And this from page 2:

Granted, Rowling's books begin like invitations to garden-variety escapism: Ooh, Harry isn't really a poor orphan; he's actually a wealthy wizard who rides a secret train to a castle, and so on. But as they go on, you realize that while the fun stuff is pure cotton candy, the problems are very real--embarrassment, prejudice, depression, anger, poverty, death. "I was trying to subvert the genre," Rowling explains bluntly. "Harry goes off into this magical world, and is it any better than the world he's left? Only because he meets nicer people. Magic does not make his world better significantly. The relationships make his world better. Magic in many ways complicates his life."

Er? Since these things are pretty clear right from the first book (and she's commented on this elsewhere, that the first book starts with a double murder and yet people act as if it isn't dark), I'm a little unsure how these statements fit together. Also on how much of a subversion this is. There are stories where magic ends up as the solution to problems, but right back to fairy tales there are also stories where it's more of a complication.

Also, while the article says she never finished all of the Chronicles of Narnia (and rather implies that she didn't like them at all), there are previous interviews where she mentioned enjoying things about them. She even told us her favorite character. (Nope, not the lion.)

Now, this is fair enough; there are plenty of stories I enjoy despite points of disagreement or outright irritation. There are series I've started and never gotten around to finishing, or where I like some books considerably more than others. There are authors with multiple books in separate storylines where I like some and find others deadly dull. For that matter, there's still the chance Rowling herself will turn out not to be writing some of the themes I thought she'd set up, things I thought I perceived that drew me deeper into the books than... oh, With a Single Spell by wossname. (Yes, fine, I sound like an H/Hr shipper. Whatever.) I'm more annoyed with the article author; JKR expressed distaste for one of Lewis's story developments, but I don't think she's the one who suggested he'd be a Death Eater!

But having seen RJA note that JKR had previously referred to liking Narnia, I went back to find some more information on this....

She said her favorite character was Eustace! Because he was "a very unlikeable character who turns good." And also funny.

Isn't that interesting.

Comments

[hannahmarder.livejournal.com]

I didn't like the tone of that article much either - one of those where it sounds like they picked and chose a very few things she said to present a highly coloured view. Which I suppose is the nature of journalism, but even so, I was surprised by the battering of the Narnia Chronicles. I know they have the whole Christian allegory element, which some don't like, but as a child reading them, you don't worry about that. They're still good stories. I also don't see how JKR can have been trying deliberately to subvert a genre that she never even realised she was writing! Not to mention that many childrens' fantasy writers had been there and done the whole 'bad side of magic' thing years before (like Diana Wynne Jones). JKR deserves loads of credit for writing great books, but not at the expense of other authors who've achieved just as good stories.

[persephone-kore.livejournal.com]

It does sound as if they were a bit, ah, choosy. I also got the impression that perhaps neither JKR nor the article author had actually read or paid attention to much decent fantasy. For heaven's sake... want to try telling Bilbo "adventure is so much more fun if it's happening to someone else and you're sitting by a fire hearing about it" Baggins that when you go out into the magical world it makes everything fine? (I'd recommend against telling it to Frodo, especially if Sam's around.)

Now, I could see it being possible that JKR didn't realize what she was doing at first and then continued the later books with the intention of being subversive. I'm not sure she actually managed it, given previous points about magic-solving-everything not really being that common, but I can see her having the expressed intention. It just doesn't make a lot of sense as presented.

Which also supports your contention about the article being deliberately slanted. They did seem to want to focus on how... modern, or something, JKR's fantasy was.