Friday, July 20, 2007

The countdown...!!!

In exactly nine hours from now, I shall be extremely busy. Busy reading the long-awaited last installment of the Harry Potter books.

I started reading these books when I was in Class X. The first four books had come out, my brother and father had been borrowing them from friends and were obsessed with them, and I was exasperated at the amount of time they spent discussing someone called "You-know-who", a term they used mainly to irritate me, I might add. That year, we gifted my brother all the four books for his birthday, soon after which my half-yearly exams got over and I vowed not to study for the next one week. Having nothing else to do, I started reading the books. And I was hooked.

In the seven years since, my kid brother has "completely outgrown" the books, as he puts it, but I've remained an ardent fan. For the first time ever, I have not read any spoilers (and those who know me will know what an achievement that is for me), I have stayed away from all potentially spoiling places, and like with the last book, tomorrow, starting 9 A.M. IST, I shall be reading the book non-stop till I finish it thank you very much.

As is usual with Harry Potter, the advent of the release has caused every freaking newspaper and news channel to go into a spin. One enterprising channel, Headlines Today, decided to have a different take on the hype: it decided to interview all those people who hate Potter on what they have to say about the books.

You know, something I really don't get is how people can pass judgment on things they've never been exposed to (OK, smoking doesn't count; that's just dumb). I mean, I can't stand SRK. I think the man just can't act. However, I have every right to pass such a statement, because I have sat through plenty of movies starring him, and have formed this opinion
based on those movies. And that is something I am entitled to.

But when you freely admit you've never read the Harry Potter books, don't make an ass of yourself on national television comparing the Harry Potter books to Cinderella "where someone comes and waves a magic wand and everything will be fine". That's just embarrassing yourself. Or, for that matter, say that you would rather see a Govinda movie than the HP movies because when you go for a movie, you want "entertainment". What're the HP movies doing? Lecturing you on global warming?

Yes, the books' success has a lot to do with hype and sheer marketing genius. Yes, there are a lot of kids out there who pretend to read these books or maybe do read these books simply because their friends do - I know one such kid personally. But you can
not deny the fact that there are also a lot of people out there (of all ages I might add) who adore these books and will continue to do so for quite some time to come.

If you've read the books and haven't liked them, fine, that's your right. If you've chosen not to read the books because you think you won't enjoy such a genre, again, that's your right. But don't pass judgment on something you know nothing about while pretending to sound like an expert. Because all you do is sound like an idiot.

PS: Ten points to whoever figures out why the colour of this post is what it is.

2 comments:

R said...

They were really really good in the beginning. My favourites are the 3rd and 4th. I don't much care for the 2nd and the 5th is terrible. The 6th isn't much good either so I hope this last one makes up for it. The much awaited ones have been disappoinments so far. Only the 4th one was a fat one that was any good.

R said...

Ra... mon amie, why do you concern yourself with the general population? it is stupid. it thrives on embarassing itself and giving us people to laugh at. if it wasn't for them, you wouldn't have an entry and blogging itself wouldn't exist. Thank the low(er than ours) IQ of the human race and adopt a puppy.