As a child, I remember my granny telling my cousins and me tales of princes and princesses and forests and magical lakes and little children who were so brave. I grew up on fairy tales and happy endings and graduated to romance and mystery and so did most of my friends. Our books went from, to just name a few, Hans Christian Anderson to Enid Blyton to St. Clares, Mallory Towers, Batman, Superman, Three Investigators, Five Find Outers, Secret Seven, Asterix, Tintin, Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys to Sherlock Holmes, Jane Austen, Agatha Christie and then giving into adulthood with Earl Stanley Gardner, Jeffrey Archer, Eric Lustbader, Robert Ludlum, Calvin & Hobbes, Stephen King, Douglas Adams and Woody Allen. It was a ritual, a coming of age rite that was defined by which book we were reading then. Kids stuff was clearly demarcated from what grown-ups read.
Maybe Harry Potter changed all of that. Suddenly my friend's six year old daughter and I were reading the same book, with the same enthusiasm, madness and interest. And we were twenty years apart. JK Rowling, that magician of imagination brought us at par with each other, standing in the same queues, jostling, even fighting for a book. Many friends of mine are die-hard fans of the Potter series. Many, alas, are not.
The Harry Potter series is very simply written but carries so much within it. The characters are extremely well etched out, each having a destiny they play out no matter how unpleasant. All the characters in the book are flawed, even Harry. And the world Rowling creates is remarkable, for it is full of analogies and lessons without being preachy or moralistic. Like the Mirror of Irised which shows you the thing you want most. Or the set of horses called Thestrals that pull the carriages at Hogwarts (the school of magic) and are visible to only those who've seen death. Or the boggart - a creature who takes the form of your worst fear and can only be dismissed by imagining your fear in a funny situation while shouting the spell 'ridikulus'. Oh there are so many, and the books are truly an enjoyable read.
Children seem to respond to the real now. And embrace a flawed Harry or a book such a A series of Unfortunate Events, as much as Prince Caspian or Snowhite. They get that Spidey can be bad too or that Batman can be hurt and The Joker can steal the show. Unlike the fairy tales of the past which demarcated good and evil clearly, today's books and movies seems to be more realistic and the audience, be it children or adults, are able to enjoy them for what they are, rather than by what is right or wrong. Probably why all ages enjoy them.
But as children open up to flaws and gore and reality in their choice of movies, games and books, I find that many of my adult friends have moved back to romance and comedy and fun. As far away from reality as possible. A choice between 'Ghajini' and 'The president is coming' was to head for what would make us laugh and go home with a smile on our face. An experience we'd reserve for kids otherwise.
Fairy tales and Santa Claus were fiction while I grew up. With reality television and sensationalist news broadcasts, ironically, reality seems like fiction now. Only it doesn't have the charm that made a fairytale something to look forward to.
2 comments:
Fairy tales didn't always come with fairy tale endings - in fact, they almost always didn't. Happy fairy tale endings are a recent creation. More here : Top 10 Gruesome Fairy Tale Origins.
Fairy tales, romance, comedy, humour, light fun all of this is what I want NOW! Enough of scams, terror attacks, gore, rape, poverty, shrinking world, climate crisis etc etc- arent we surrounded enuff with negativity to want more of it. I want to see some positivity and so I will surround myself with that positivity so that I can be more constructive in my life.
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