All Harry, All the Time

It's terribly quiet around here, just the sound of six-bean soup bubbling on the stove. Why is it so quiet? My daughter is out shopping with the grandparents, which means that the Harry Potter audiotapes are not blaring in the background.

D has to have background noise going--whether it's the sound of her voice or someone else's, or music. But it's a recent discovery that she likes audiobooks. Right now it's Harry Potter, all the time. Hey, it beats watching videos.

When I brought the first HP book home about six weeks ago, I planned to read it to her, figuring she was not ready to read it herself. That was accurate. She enjoyed it, but needed a lot of explanation. Apparently it was to her satisfaction because she's now reading books two and three on her own--while listening to the tapes. Over and over and over and over. The repetition is helping her understand a bit more each time, I guess. She asks me questions, too, especially about vocabulary. I'm pleased that she's gotten this far.

There are a lot of concepts in books like HP that third graders simply wouldn't know. I do a unit on mythological creatures with my fourth graders, to give them some of that background, and so they see how modern writers are inspired by ancient storytellers. It's not a knowledge I had as a child--other than reading Greek mythology--but then again there wasn't much fantasy literature then and I was not particularly into what was there. The Hobbit was sixth grade required reading, but I struggled with and never really got into the Lord of the Rings trilogy. I found Alice in Wonderland disturbing (also required sixth grade reading). I never read the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. I did not know about the work of Lloyd Alexander. I did enjoy a couple of the E. Nesbit books--Five Children and It and the Phoenix and the Carpet--I remember having these worn, out of print library copies in my hands. I did spend a lot of time on the classic fairy tales--I particularly liked the Russian and Nordic ones. I don't remember if I was exposed to any other children's fantasy lit.

Even as an adult I took no interest in it until I was in "library school" and had to read the contemporary canon. And then I got hooked. Not in the hardcore sense--I am told that REAL fantasy fans delve much deeper into the realm--my exposure is strictly children's or young adult. But what I've read, I loved. I cried when I finished the His Dark Materials Trilogy...I couldn't bear the thought of it ending. I love the Bartimaeus Trilogy.

But this is where I turn from reader response to teacher response--how could anyone even begin to understand the former without a basic knowledge of Catholic theology (the first book) or midrash (the third)? Or understand the Bartimaeus Trilogy without a background in Middle Eastern history and mythology, or in the story of the Golem?

The simple answer is, typically: "People read things at different levels," in other words, a child might read something they don't understand much of, but enough to get enjoyment out of it. I guess I am not satisfied with that answer: hence my fourth grade unit. We do all sorts of fun activities learning about mythical creatures and the cultures from which they came.

At home of course, I am trying to pass on what I know to D. It does matter; I hear it in the questions she asks. A few years ago we were having dinner at a friend's house, and their daughter, who was then nine, spent the meal peppering me with questions about HP. As advanced a reader as she was--more so than D--there was just too much in the book she did not understand. One of her friends is reading the entire series, and I have to wonder how much she gets since conceptually the last three books are much higher (although more power to her if she's doing it) And people are always surprised to hear that a child D's age is reading HP. For two reasons: a) the comprehension level and b) the length of the book. For question a, my answer is, if you give kids a little background knowledge, it will go a long way. For b, well, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone was THE book that proved all the publishers, teachers and parents wrong: It proved that reading is NOT dead among kids, that they WILL read something lengthy if it really hooks them. Harry Potter, already published over a decade ago, produced a collective sigh of relief among as many adults as it did a mass reading revival among children. It's old news at this point. But new for my delighted D, who now integrates HP into her playing with dolls and dollhouse. It has really, truly fired up her imagination, and curiousity about other forms of literature.



She has had a rough two days of it. She had recently come back from a deservedly self-congratulatory dental checkup--still no cavities--when bam, Wednesday she tripped and fell in gym and chipped one of her front teeth. All the dentists office were closed yesterday and today, but I finally got her to one here that was open, and they examined and bonded the tooth. The dentist said it was a good thing we had it taken care of immediately. I'm convinced that people are not evolved to keep their front teeth--how many kids do you know who've had theirs chipped or knocked out? (me twice).

But, the happy ending to the miserable day Wednesday was her Chanukah present at the end--she got a build-it-yourself model of Hogwarts.

And yes, I know that not everybody loves the series. We adults can forget that while its construction can seem overly simple at times, it IS a series for children. They start there and hopefully move on to His Dark Materials in their teen years...and so much more...And at the very least, some of us are enjoying Alan Rickman as Professor Snape...