Zoë Anderson, Blog Post 1: Responses to Generic Hybridity

            In thinking about my response to the first two volumes of the Harry Potter series, I must reach back several years: I was first introduced to the magical world at the age of seven. When visiting family, my aunt showed me the books and let me borrow her copies of The Sorcerer’s Stone and The Chamber of Secrets. That night, my dad began reading the first book to my brother and I, and I was immediately hooked.

            The reason I give this preface is to paint a picture of what that time was like for me: the day that my aunt gave me the Harry Potter books was roughly a week before my family and I moved to our new house—I was about to start second grade in a new city at a new school. I discovered the magical world as I discovered my new house and new life in Fairfield, Ohio.

            The idea of the portal-quest fantasy reminds me of my first responses to Harry Potter. I associate those first two books with my new beginning in my new house. As I reread, I am struck by the enchanting nature of the first few chapters of each book. Those resonate most strongly with me, particularly “The Boy Who Lived” and “The Keeper of the Keys.” Rowling opens with the portal-esque experience of Harry being dropped in his new life with the Dursleys, “…not knowing he was special, not knowing he was famous, not knowing that he would be woken in a few hours’ time by Mrs. Dursley’s scream…” (Rowling 17). We as readers also see Harry venture into the portal that takes him back to the wizarding world with Hagrid when he comes to tell him, “…yer a wizard” (Rowling 50). When Hagrid reveals Harry’s hidden past to him, I could sense that (even as a seven-year old) I was about to be plunged into a new world for an adventure along with Harry.

            Mystery is the other genre I feel most strongly when responding to the first two books. Being a young child, I didn’t pick up on the more subtle cues in each book, so I took everything at surface value. I was in awe when I discovered that Quirrell was the one in league with Voldemort, not Snape. Rowling’s careful misleading tone (making it seem as though Snape and Malfoy are the villains in each respective book) makes for a twisting, turning, mysterious tale that engulfs the reader (especially when the reader is a young child). When Rowling says, “Harry couldn’t take it in. This couldn’t be true, it couldn’t,” that’s exactly how I felt as my dad narrated the story (Rowling 288). I was also equally impressed when, in Chamber of Secrets, Rowling reveals that Tom Marvolo Riddle (a seemingly insignificant secondary character) is actually Lord Voldemort (or “I am Lord Voldemort,” to be precise). Each Harry Potter novel comes to an equally astounding climax, and Rowling’s writing in the genre of mystery is phenomenal to me now—just as much as it was when I was a child picking up the books for the first time.