Pratchett Angry at Potter

[Haydn C]

I've just seen this on the BBC website, do you think Terry has a point or is he talking twaddle?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertain...ts/4732385.stm


Are there other good childrens authors that are being overlooked? Personally I'd like to see a bit more recognition for peope such as Garth Nix but I'm not sure Rowling is holding anyone down.
I do think he has a point though regards Rowlings statement that she is trying to subvert the genre.

[Donald M.]

I think Terry's right about Rowling saying she didn't realize Harry Potter was fantasy is rubbish. The comments in the Time article are as well, as anyone that's actually read any fantasy can attest. Other than that . . .

I mean, of course she's going to get more attention in the press than other authors! Look how many books she's sold!

[Inkthinker]

Drat. Double post. >_<

[Inkthinker]

Yeah, but the point I think Pratchett's making is that many other, BETTER authors might sell well too, if they had the news media jumping out of their seats to kiss their asses for a month whenever they publish a new book. her success is partially derived from her books, but also owes a great deal of credit to the fact that you couldn't go ANYWHERE in early July without hearing about Harry Potter. I can't think of any other writer who gets this much free press for their premieres, but I can think of a lot more writers than Rowling who deserve it.

I'd take the writings of Pratchett (who was subverting the "Greensleeves" type of fantasy probably long before that Times writer learned to eat his peas without spilling on his bibby) over Rowling ANY DAY... he's simply a better, funnier, more heartfelt and skilled writer, and the continous success he's achieved is a testament to that. I'll put Tiffany Aching up against Hermoine Granger and place my bets with the Nee Mac Feegle, thanks.

Whereas Rowling... Rowling claims that she's going to take up a pen name to write her next series, but I wonder if she'll go through with that. Without the star power of Harry Potter and her own name, I have a suspiscion that she may not sell a fraction so many books.

I think Pratchett's also bothered (and rightfully so) by the idea that a veteran and master like himself may be pigeonholed by ignorant arses who think that he and others are copycats of Rowling, rather than the trailblazers that established a groundwork for her success.

I don't think Rowling is "holding anyone down", but I do worry about this "rewriting of literary history" in which people think that what she's written is in some way unique or even groundbreaking... her success is unique and groundbreaking, but I don't believe that the content of her books is.

[Roquefort Raider]

I think Pratchett's also bothered (and rightfully so) by the idea that a veteran and master like himself may be pigeonholed by ignorant arses who think that he and others are copycats of Rowling, rather than the trailblazers that established a groundwork for her success.

That is going to happen, too. It's the curse of our market-oriented society, where one product not particularly better than its competitors will reap all the glory, recognition and money just because of good marketing and herd mentality.

I don't think Rowling is "holding anyone down", but I do worry about this "rewriting of literary history" in which people think that what she's written is in some way unique or even groundbreaking... her success is unique and groundbreaking, but I don't believe that the content of her books is.

Hear, hear.

[Inkthinker]

Mind you, Pratchett's fans are legion... I doubt he's in TOO much danger of being mistagged as someone riding Rowling's coattails, and any accusation of such should be stomped pretty fast by those of us who know better.

It's sad, though, that a book reviewer for Time-freaking Magazine doesn't know more about the genre. The whole point of listening to a reviewer is that they're supposed to know MORE than you.

So write a nice angry letter to the editor at Time.

[Jasper]

I think it's been a long time since media has given any series proper attention. With Rowling they did go too far but I agree with her not holding anyone down. The only ground breaking thing she has done is got my brother and other kids like him to read. That's where her fame truly belongs. My brother has refused to read anything he would rather spend time playing video games and watching TV. Both of these are okay activities with me but he misses a lot of great things in this process. Harry Potter finally got him to read. I almost had a coronary when I learned that he was reading. We can only hope that now that this has been accomplished some of the kids who refuse to read might go on to other books. Sometimes the focus on great things misses the real miracles by miles.

[Samurai]

Pratchett is a far better writer than Rowling, and it's got to be galling to see someone with far less experience and talent being lauded as the greatest thing since sliced bread, and getting heaps of money, movie deals, etc, when he doesn't get anything like that. Pratchett deserves it more, IMO.

[Shellhead]

Pratchett should be angry at the major publishers. They spend 98% of their marketing dollars on less than 1% of the authors. By now, I'm pretty sure that everybody has heard of Stephen King, Tom Clancy, and J.K. Rowling. It's horrible and stupid business strategy, but it speaks to an underlying problem. The average American only reads 1 or 2 books per year, so they're going to tend to get books by those select few that the publishers are always pushing. Really, I suspect that a small percentage of the population is buying most of the books, so it would be smarter for the publishers to spread the marketing around more.

[Headhunter]

How often does the best talent end up on top?

Terry Prachett shouldn't be taking out his frustrations on J.K. Rowling; her only offense has been her enormous fortune and success at releasing her own books. It's not her fault if people prefer her relatively simple works to more sophisticated counterparts.

When I think hard science fiction, I think Neal Stephenson and William Gibson and the like. I can't blame other writers if their Star Trek books happen to be far more popular, as much as I personally dislike it.

[Haydn C]

You make a good point Headhunter but I do understand where he's coming from. Perhaps he is more angry at the article than Rowling herself? The reviewer clearly has no idea what they are talking about.
That said if she thinks she is subverting the genre she is clearly off her head. You will not find a bigger collection of fantasy cliches anywhere, oddly that's kind of why I like her stuff it does remind me of being a child, takes me back to when I discovered wizards and dragons etc for the first time.

[MarZom]

You make a good point Headhunter but I do understand where he's coming from. Perhaps he is more angry at the article than Rowling herself? The reviewer clearly has no idea what they are talking about.
That said if she thinks she is subverting the genre she is clearly off her head. You will not find a bigger collection of fantasy cliches anywhere, oddly that's kind of why I like her stuff it does remind me of being a child, takes me back to when I discovered wizards and dragons etc for the first time.

Well that's exactly what the article is saying isn't it? I mean he actually says "...the media ignores the achievements of other fantasy authors" which isn't taking frustration out at Rowling at all, and only brings attention to very questionable things said by Rowling herself like the fantasy remark, which is quite frankly extremely dense on Rowling's part. Nothing that Pratchet has said is wrong.

[Rachel Grey]

True, also JKR did say something particularly boneheaded there. I mean come on, "didn't realise HP was Fantasy untill it was released"?! If she thinks that shit is real then I want whatever she's on.

Love the books but she makes enough off them to hire a publicist canny enough to slap her every time she's about to make a fool herself like that.

Sigh.

[MKTerra]

Here's a new link to the Time article... hope it works. This is the most choice paragraph, I think:

It’s precisely Rowling’s lack of sentimentality, her earthy, salty realness, her refusal to buy into the basic clichés of fantasy, that make her such a great fantasy writer. The genre tends to be deeply conservative—politically, culturally, psychologically. It looks backward to an idealized, romanticized, pseudofeudal world, where knights and ladies morris-dance to Greensleeves. Rowling’s books aren’t like that. They take place in the 1990s—not in some never-never Narnia but in modern-day Mugglish England, with cars, telephones and PlayStations. Rowling adapts an inherently conservative genre for her own progressive purposes. Her Hogwarts is secular and sexual and multicultural and multiracial and even sort of multimedia, with all those talking ghosts. If Lewis showed up there, let’s face it, he’d probably wind up a Death Eater.

[Magneto_X]

Its clear from the paragrpah you just posted, MKTerra, that the reporter is just exaggerating the Harry Potter mythology to get a rise from HP readers, IMO.

HP *does* have most of the fantasy cliches. The only difference is that it takes place in the modern day, instead of in medieval times.

Saying that Lewis would be a "Death Eater" if he existed in the HP world is beyond rediculous. He's probly doing that to piss off the Christian fundmentalists who hate the series in the first place.