She creates empathy for Harry before Harry utters one word because we now know he's an orphan and will be mistreated in this muggle family.
How will Harry respond to the bad treatment he will surely receive? We're curious to find out. We also want to know who these people who morph into cats or disappear are. We don't know that they are wizards yet.
Indeed! Rowling does a great job not only with generating readers' empathy with Harry, but also with keeping readers curious. We explore this throughout the rest of our Substack posts in more depth.
I really enjoyed this! I've never been one to consciously break down stories and analyze them, any analysis tends to happen in the background and come to me in flashes (I usually get too caught up in the story itself). It's helpful to see the things you look for and highlight in your analysis.
Thank you for your kind comment! I'm having a blast deep-reading this one so far. I wasn't sure that a middle-grade book like Harry Potter could sustain a critical read like this, but I'm finding that there's a lot we can learn from it even as adult readers/writers.
Yes, they are rather terrible. I think when we find out in later books that their hatred of magic is driven largelt by Petunia's jealousy, it humanizes them a bit. Just a bit though.
She creates empathy for Harry before Harry utters one word because we now know he's an orphan and will be mistreated in this muggle family.
How will Harry respond to the bad treatment he will surely receive? We're curious to find out. We also want to know who these people who morph into cats or disappear are. We don't know that they are wizards yet.
Indeed! Rowling does a great job not only with generating readers' empathy with Harry, but also with keeping readers curious. We explore this throughout the rest of our Substack posts in more depth.
I really enjoyed this! I've never been one to consciously break down stories and analyze them, any analysis tends to happen in the background and come to me in flashes (I usually get too caught up in the story itself). It's helpful to see the things you look for and highlight in your analysis.
Thank you for your kind comment! I'm having a blast deep-reading this one so far. I wasn't sure that a middle-grade book like Harry Potter could sustain a critical read like this, but I'm finding that there's a lot we can learn from it even as adult readers/writers.
Excellent read, thank you for bringing the Harry Potter series back to the top of my next reads..
Man you brought back memories on how much I dislike all of the Dursleys.
Yes, they are rather terrible. I think when we find out in later books that their hatred of magic is driven largelt by Petunia's jealousy, it humanizes them a bit. Just a bit though.