On the "Save Harry Potter" campaign

[thatcrazycajun]

Having perused the reports of an international campaign to persuade author J. K. Rowling to abandon her decision to terminate her current highly successful series of Harry Potter novels with the seventh, due for release this Friday (they even have a website, fergossakes), I was thinking about what my reaction would be if I were in Jo's (undoubtedly very expensive and stylish) shoes and saw all this activity. I ended up having another attack of writer's diarrhea as a result; anyone who cares can read it beyond the cut and offer their reactions, if so moved.

A PUBLIC STATEMENT FROM J. K. ROWLING CONCERNING THE END OF THE HARRY POTTER NOVEL SERIES*

My dear readers,

Greetings and blessings to all of you. Before I say anything else, I wish to acknowledge and recognise that I would not be where I am today, enjoying a success and prosperity I could never possibly have imagined in my earliest years as an author, without the enormous support of the amazingly large numbers of fans who have taken my literary creation, Harry Potter, and his friends to their hearts for the past ten years. I am fully cognisant of the fact that all of you have made this possible, and my gratitude to you knows no bounds.

This being said, however, I must also say I am growing increasingly concerned at the reaction to my announcement that Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, the seventh volume in the series of novels I have written chronicling Harry's adventures, will be the last in the series...at least, for now. It has come to my attention that a growing number of fans are mounting a campaign whose intent is to persuade me to rescind this decision and continue writing more books in the series. The campaign appears to include Internet websites, letters by the millions pouring in to my publisher, Scholastic Books, petitions, faxes, telegrams, cards and public demonstrations.

With all of this occurring, I feel I must address the understandable disappointment I realise many of you feel at my decision, and the concomitant wish to alter it. It astounds and gratifies me to no end that so many people feel so attached to something I have created that they would go to so much trouble to forestall what they see—inaccurately, as I will shortly explain—as its demise. Toward this end, I would like to explain the several reasons behind my decision to end the current series, in hopes that acceptance of my choice may come more easily for these readers if I am able to increase their understanding of the logic behind it.

Firstly, it has, as I have noted, been over ten years now that I have been writing Harry's adventures. That is more than a full decade, and a very long time for any author to devote solely to any one character, or set of characters. While my enjoyment of writing them has by no means diminished, I nonetheless cannot help but feel a growing and undeniable yearning for change, as anyone would who has been doing the same thing for a long time. I feel that I have many more stories to tell, of other characters and other places, and I would hate to think that Harry and his friends, as dear as they are to me, might be all I had to offer the literary world. It may well be that I lack the ability to write other characters or stories as well as I have these; but I will certainly never know one way or the other if I am not given a chance to at least try.

A writer, as does an actor or a director in films or stage or television—or anyone in any field, for that matter—craves variety, versatility and diversity of experience. She or he wants to be able to show that they are not a 'one-trick pony,' as the saying goes, but can do a wide range of things with their talent. I would hope that my fans would not begrudge me the fulfillment of this desire simply for the sake of continuing to enjoy Harry's adventures. In fact, I would put it to you that, given a chance to produce new and different types of writing, I can come back later on to Harry and his friends, invigorated and improved and able to tell even better stories of their new exploits, bolstered by the things I have learned in writing the earlier stories and the new characters and stories I currently have planned. This can only redound to everyone's benefit, yours and mine; but more about this anon.

Secondly, from the moment I first began planning the Harry Potter stories, I have always intended this cycle to have a well-defined sequence, from beginning to middle to end, and not simply to run on endlessly as a vague, indefinite continuation. The individual novels in the series, taken as a whole, form a single overarching narrative of the struggle between Harry and Voldemort, as well as the larger struggle for Harry to deal with his own life experiences, the changes within him that every teenager must go through and the journey to adulthood. Both of these meta-narratives, if you will, conclude in the seventh volume, by long planning and design. This is by way of assuring you that my decision to end the series here is neither arbitrary nor ill-considered, but arrived at following careful and deep thought. I would ask all of my fans, as deeply as I appreciate their enthusiasm and devotion to these characters, to respect my wishes as their creator and allow their adventures to come to their natural concluding point.

Thirdly, I have witnessed far too often for my liking the sad spectacle of authors continuing to churn out endless books featuring a single popular cast of characters, long after his or her ability to offer anything new or fresh or different in writing them has been exhausted. This results in drearily formulaic, predictable writing, done all too obviously for no other real purpose than to keep a 'cash cow' alive and providing profit for the publisher, the author and their licensees. I have no wish to see the Potter books end up as such a franchise, pushed on into old age and mediocrity or worse, and I would hope you as readers would not settle for such, nor support such with your hard-earned money; I don't and won't, as a reader myself. I want more than anything for people to have only fond and pleasant memories of reading these books; I want Harry to 'go out on top,' as one might say, while I still can produce my best work for him. I want and will accept nothing less than my best work going out under my name; anything less would be unprofessional, in my view.

This also is with the hope, as I have mentioned, that I can keep the world of Harry Potter fresh and alive to return to later on, when and if I feel it is appropriate to do so, and keep you, my readers, ready to embrace Harry and his friends again as you have so gratifyingly done to date, when that day comes. As I have previously mentioned on this site, I have found a surprising mixture of relief and sadness at letting go of the series; it has been a very, very hard thing indeed, for a part of me would like nothing better than to give so many of you your wish and keep the series going past Book Seven. But I feel I must honour my original vision and not prolong the series past the point at which it has outlived its welcome, however painful it may be for me personally. I would hate to have the continued maintenance of income or popularity become a reason for writing, rather than having something genuinely worth writing about to produce.

Fourthly and finally, you should be made aware, if you are not at present, that I have already signed legally binding contractual commitments to produce new and different works for Scholastic and other publishers, which will be that much more difficult to honour if I am still forced to work on them in addition to continued work on the Harry Potter series. It is simply a logistical and legal necessity for me to lay the series to rest for now if I am to fulfill my obligations in this regard to the best of my ability; and again, I will not settle for anything less than my best work going out into the world, nor should you as readers settle for any less, from me or any other artist or author.

I hope that, reading this statement, those of you who have been campaigning to "Save Harry Potter" will better understand my motivation for making this decision, and realise that you are laboring under a rather unfortunate misconception. Please believe me when I tell you Harry and his world do not need saving; they are not being destroyed or ended forever, but merely put to rest for the time being. I will not and would not do such a thing; I could not bear to think of never again visiting this magical and wonderful world with you. All of the energy and time and money and enthusiasm you have put into this effort, as much as I appreciate it, could therefore be far better spent in other endeavours, for it cannot and will not change my decision. The current series absolutely, positively will and must end with Book Seven; and I ask you to accept that this is my final word on the subject.

In closing, I beg your indulgence, your patience and your understanding as I lay aside, not without a great deal of regret, this particular world of mine—again, only for now, not for ever—and move forward into new and unexplored territories. With time and the further development of my writing skills that new characters and settings and stories will allow (for I know full well that I have still a great deal to learn), your patience will, I promise, be rewarded manyfold with not only these new stories, which I hope you will enjoy as well, but eventually, one day, a return to Harry and his world filled with all the magic and wonder and excitement you have come to expect from his adventures...and that you so richly deserve for your steadfast support. I thank you once again for your kindness and that support; they have both meant more to me, professionally and personally, than I can ever possibly convey in mere words.

And please...keep reading!

Your friend always,
Jo

*This is a work of fiction. No actual impersonation of J. K. Rowling or infringement upon copyrights is intended or should be inferred.

Comments

[zsero.livejournal.com]

It's all so stupid. The series can't go on past #7, because it remains primarily a school story, in the long tradition of English school stories from Tom Brown through Billy Bunter and the Naughtiest Girl, and even Molesworth. And Hogwarts only has seven forms. By the end of book 7 Harry (if he's still alive) will leave Hogwarts and go on to whatever he does next. Any account of his further adventures would not be centred around Hogwarts, and could therefore not be in the same series. Perhaps such novels will eventually be forthcoming; or perhaps there will be other novels set at Hogwarts, with new lead characters. But this series must end either with Harry's death or his leaving school.

BTW, I don't think I've yet given my theory on his fate: I had long thought that the series had to build up to Harry's death, and yet for equally good reasons it couldn't. But from various hints in The Half Blood Prince I think I've worked out the resolution: to defeat Voldemort Harry will have to give up his magic. He will do this deliberately and willingly, though not without much agonising over the decision. And his scar will disappear. Harry Potter the wizard, the Boy Who Lived, will die; but Mr Potter the muggle with the unblemished forehead, will go on to do whatever muggle things lie in his future, retaining the friendship of the Weasleys and his other wizard friends.

[wolfette]

technically Harry ought to have left school by book 7 and be starting at whatever college or university equivilents the wizardly world has. One year per year of "secondary" education, which only goes up to Sixth Form.

Unless of course he gets held back a year.

[thatcrazycajun.livejournal.com]

Ms. R. has stated publicly that there is no wizarding university in the Potterverse, at least not in England; so this notion is unlikely to see print. (At least one interviewer has already suggested this possibility to her, and been shot down.)

[zsero.livejournal.com]

No. It's explicit canon that Hogwarts has seven forms, not the six that are usual at muggle schools.

[msminlr.livejournal.com]

I think you have a solid grasp of the GOOD reasons for keeping book series' finite.

Here's hoping that J.K. *does* have other tales to offer us, now that she's had time to catch her breath from Harry's story.

[hitchhiker.livejournal.com]

my jaw dropped when i realised you were right about the seventeen years (my immediate reaction was that had got to be a typo). time flies.

[hitchhiker.livejournal.com]

no, wait - you confused me too. it's but ten years.

[thatcrazycajun.livejournal.com]

I checked Wikipedia and they say the first book was released in 1997. Even assuming Jo began work on it as many as two years prior, that still only makes 12 at most; I sit corrected. I am not sure any longer where the figure of 17 years came from, other than some reference I Googled when first reading up on the series' background...or it may be that 17 years ago was when she first began writing, period, as opposed to when she began writing Harry. Or that she first conceived the bare bones of the idea in 1990, but didn't actually start writing it until later. (Anyone with more comprehensive knowledge can feel free to jump in any time now.)