Have you ever wondered how Harry Potter Influenced modern storytelling and changed its format drastically? If you see the stories that were introduced to us after Harry Potter their storytelling is affected by the series one way or another. The huge success of the Harry Potter book series has shown new ways of creativity to the writers. Readers of the Harry Potter book have given it a massive affection which made it a milestone. It has combined a child story with complex endings which made it appealing for every age.
J.K. Rowling has done brilliant work by blending Harry Potter’s story with mythology, magic, and realism. These themes have helped it to attract the readers and connect with it. It has a new style of expressing the story with some old mythology and reality in it. Many critics were amazed at how these methods worked for Harry Potter books. And the way it’s manipulating other writer’s works. I am guessing this method will last for a long time.
The Blend of Magic and Realism in Storytelling
In the Harry Potter book series, J.K. Rowling has narrated the story in a present timeline blending with magic. Harry Potter was set in a modern timeline where the characters use telephones to communicate, watch TV, play video games, use cars as vehicles, and many more. In the traditional wizarding stories we always saw the stories were set in an old timeline when the world was not modernized yet. They use horses as their transport and people wear clothes that fit the time of the 10th century or before. That timeline was perfect for the magical set, as doing the magical performances without getting noticed by the commoners was easy at that time. So, no writer before Rowling tried to break the traditional way. But Rowling took a brave step and created a world where the magical world is growing in parallel with the real world of modern times, and she was successful in blending the magic and modern timeline. As an example, it was so brilliant of her to create a path from the real modern world to the magical world by creating platform 9¾ to catch the train of Hogwarts, the school of magic. Another big example is how a telephone booth or a public toilet can be a connected path where they need to flash themselves to get into the Ministry of Magic. She even created the school as the boarding school London which gave the story a realistic vibe as people can connect themselves with the story and feel as if maybe the magical world is real and they are living side by side among us, but we just simply can’t differentiate them. We know how much strict they are on account of revealing their identity as a part of the magical world.
Rowling’s brave step changed fantasy storytelling style. Later many writers have written wrote in a modern timeline with the characters being a part of the worlds of mythology or mythical creatures or a survival game that gets involved in human’s regular life such as Suzanne Collins’ The HCollins’smes trilogy,Stephenie Meye r’s Twilight series, Rick Riordan’s Percy Jackson & the Olympians series etc.
Hunger Games:
In this novel the story is about the future society where North America becomes an oppressive nation. They each year hold the Hunger Games event where every district sends one girl and one boy for the game where they fight to the death. In this book Suzanne gave the reality check of having too much that power can make you blind and turn you into a monster.
Twilight:
In the Twilight novel the writer Stephenie has narrated how vampires and wolves live alongside humans in the same community without getting noticed by them. And the amusing part is this book was also accepted wholeheartedly by the readers as they could connect themselves with the characters’ regular lifestyle.
Percy Jackson & the Olympians:
Percy Jackson & the Olympians is a novel that portrays the life of mythology and Greek Gods in modern life. This novel was written in a modern setting where the characters are from Greek mythology though they use modern devices and vehicles, they also disguised themselves like no humans.
Revitalizing Myths and Archetypes
In the Harry Potter series Rowling has blended her characters with the mythical archetypes. The characters of her series have features like a hero’s journey, wise mentor and villains etc. Let’s search for, similarities of Harry Potter with the mythical archetypes:
Hero’s Journey:
The hero of the Harry Potter series Harry Potter has a rough journey throughout his childhood to teenage. He had to face many struggles and dangers though he fought all of them with bravery. He is always ready to protect his close ones even if he has to sacrifice his life. Harry never gets frightened by the threats from the dangers he always faces them with courage. He is brave, courageous and mentally strong, these features represent the heroes of the mythological characters.
A Wise Mentor:
The Harry Potter character has many mentors throughout his journey; the professors of Hogwarts, his father’s friend Sirius Black and many more. They were all a great help for him to go on in the novel. His most reliable and wise mentor was Professor Albus Dumbledor. He helped Harry from childhood and guided him on the right path. Whenever Harry needed advice he went to search for Dumbledor and he was never disappointed.
Villain:
The presence of a wise and powerful villain is the theme of mythical archetypes. There’s many reasons behind Harry Potter being a masterpiece, one of them is its villain. Voldemort the one “who must not be named” the most feared character of Harry Potter. Other people are so afraid of the villain that they don’t even mention the name out loud. This shows the fears among the wizards for the Dark Lord.
These symbols show how Rowling has slightly followed the mythical archetypes and mixed it wisely with modern literature. Readers of all over the world love the themes and magical appearances that the Harry Potter series gave along with the realism of the characters.
Legacy of Storytelling Depth and Moral Complexity
The Harry Potter series is not only a children’s story based on a magical theme. This series belongs to all categories. It has dark themes, mature themes, adventure, thrill, comedy, romance, bravery, personal growth and last but not least moral complexity. This series can be read by any reader and they will enjoy each and every corner of the story arcs. Not a single chapter passes with boredom, every chapter has different surprises that are disclosed to the readers.
Moral Complexity:
In the series the protagonist has shown many leading by his morality. The main theme of the Harry Potter series can be said to be the morality of humans. No man is fully good or evil. There is always good and evil inside human nature. It depends on you how you will lead your life. Harry was struggling through his journey whether he is a part of the villain or not but he always believed that it is him who decides what he wants to be, not the inner dark desires that are controlled by the Dark Lord.
Bravery:
Through the novel almost all the characters have shown courage and bravery. They in the end fought the Dark Lord and their fear with bravery to save their loved ones. Though Harry Potter was the main reason why they were able to fight evil. Harry was brave from his childhood; he was never intimidated by the Dark Lord‘s power and never ran away like a coward. Sometimes it may seem like foolishness but his bravery makes him unique and a leader of the wizards battalion.
Personal Growth:
We saw the Harry Potter character from his childhood till adulthood. The character has faced many changes throughout the series. At the beginning he was just an 11 years old orphanage boy whose parents were wizards of Hogwarts. But as the story continues Harry becomes the chosen one who can destroy the Dark Lord Voldemort. In this journey Harry Potter has learned many things, lost many friends and in the battle fields moreover has found a great bond with his best friends Hermione and Ron. This whole journey shows how Harry became someone who is the most important person of the wizarding world from a boy who lives in the cupboards. The personal growth of Harry Potter is such an important part of the series.
Many writers have followed these themes to create characters that are similar to these features. At some points they were all successed. Such stories are Divergent, The Hunger Games and Percy Jackson & the Olympians.
Harry Potter has always been an influencing work for all. The unique style of storytelling has attracted many readers and writers. The writers were very much interested to follow the path Rowling has taken. She enhanced the fantasy genre stories to a different level that the future of fantasy genre has become a popular genre. The Harry Potter series has broken many records that were set by the other books series’ such as the most popular thriller action detective series James Bond and set a new record to break. The book series even broke its own record by releasing new parts of the series. Isn’t it really amusing how much power the Harry Potter series holds! Realizing how much Harry Potter has been dominating the modern storytelling makes me a proud fan of the series.
