Regarding Harry, or Why Harry is Always in the News

Harry, A History: The True Story of a Boy Wizard, His Fans, and Life Inside the Harry Potter Phenomenon by Melissa Anelli


My concise but probably too-cryptic review of this book on goodreads.com is, "When the Harry Potter circus was in town, I worked as an usher. This book re-played for me the parts I had missed."


Here, where I have space to elaborate, is my story. I was too busy being the bookseller during the unfolding of the Harry Potter Phenomenon to enjoy the antics. There were many significant events which I only heard mentioned in passing, missing out on the full story. The metaphor of having worked as an usher really suits, because as an usher you are right there at the show, you even have backstage access; but you are fulfilling obligations which prevent you from having the complete (audience) experience.


In Ring #1 of the HP circus: The Big Bad Warner Wolf huffs and puffs! By which I refer to Warner Brothers' cease-and-desist letters sent to fan websites. Upon aquiring the movie rights to HP, WB flexed their muscle and told website founders (many of whom were minors!) that they must cease using terms from the HP books, because those terms were now the property of WB, even though the sites had been using those terms for years. Yes, I heard one solitary mention of that in the news at the time, but got no follow up. Melissa Anelli reports and concludes the story, including comments from website founders, J. K. Rowling, and WB staff.


In Ring #2, a tragedy in my own time: The splitting off of children's titles from the New York Times Fiction Bestseller List, specifically because Harry Potter was dominating it too much. Not only was HP chronically hogging three spots on the list, it had even begun to corrupt book buyers into buying Brian Jaques and Newbery honor books at such a rate that they crept onto the list, too. Someone needed to put kiddie lit in its rightful place, making room for "real" books like John Grisham thrillers and Danielle Steele romances. Charles McGrath, the NYT book review editor, said that this move would not "ghettoize" children's books; however, that's precisely the concept they furthered. It's hilarous to me that he used that exact word to deny it was taking place. (The June 2000 article announcing this move is at NYTimes.com. )


In Ring # 3, the Phenomenon--why Harry Potter had meteoric success:
A. Publication of HP coincided with rapid expansion of the internet into average homes. Prior to the late 1990's, fans were connected by message boards and listservs, but the world wide web created myriad places to meet fellow fans, discuss the books, and celebrate. Fan websites provided up-to-the-minute news about the books, movies, author, and publicity. Fan fiction exploded when publishing it became a click away rather than dependent on snail mail.


B. HP in the United States just happened to be published by the children's publishing house with the biggest pocketbook, able to publicize, support, and--most importantly--respond when HP took off. And, think back, what was it that made Scholastic's pocketbook so big? The Goosebumps/Fear Street craze! J K Rowling owes a debt of gratitude to R L Stine for her success-he paved the way both figuratively and financially for her.


C. Excellent ideas were tried and expanded upon. First Bloomsbury's after-school release date/time for book 3; second, the arranging of simultaneous UK and US releases for book 4; and lastly, the midnight release time.


D. A decent story, with an author who turned out to have long-term ability to develop and realize her magnum opus. Wait a minute, what?? I said, "a decent story"?? Didn't I mean to say amazingly stupendous? No, not really. Don't get me wrong--I really like HP; J K Rowling did a nice job. But starting off, the books were not particularly outstanding. Book 1 was pretty good--but most books I bother to read are pretty good. Based on the "pretty-good"ness of book 1, I did not get around to reading books 2-5 until 6 was about to come out. Taken as an entire series, though, HP is an above-average story, certainly deserving of success.


My point is that HP has #1 standing in the history of book publishing not because it is the "world's best children's book", or "world's best-written children's book". It is simply the children's book that went the farthest in sales. And of course it takes a good book to achieve that. It's just that being the most successful does not mean it has something intrinsically different that makes it number 1.

E. Speaking of money, I want to comment on the significance of the record-setting advance J K Rowling received from Arthur Levine Books for the US publication of book 1. Much is made of it because at that time Rowling was still unpublished. However, telling it that way is technically true, but misleading. At that point, there was already a long line of people, with clout, who saw merit in her book and potential for success--Bloomsbury, her UK publisher, which was just 4 weeks away from the book's UK release; Christopher Little and staff, her literary agent; and even the unknown awarder of the grant she received, which allowed her to write full time instead of having a day-job. Yes, Arthur Levine was taking a risk with giving her the biggest advance in juvenile book history, and that's what publishers do. They invest money at the beginning of the process in hopes that the investment will pay off. Levine was not a rookie in the business--he had an eponymous imprint to prove it. Furthermore, with this advance Levine started up the publicity machine vital to every publishing success. Harry Potter made headlines a month before its UK release via that advance. The HP Phenomenon is the story of how it managed to stay in the headlines for 10+ years.

Melissa Anelli's book looks into the HP Phenomenon from the perspective of a Big Name Fan. There are still niches available for other slants on the story, such as the business aspects that piqued my interest. I wonder if any are in the works. Maybe such a book is meant to be written by me.