Spiritual Education

I reread the first book of the Harry Potter series, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone because it has been almost eight years since I read the series for the first time, and I’ve been wanting to reread the series for awhile. This book in particular feels the most geared towards a younger audience, and it’s not my favourite of the series for this reason. However, the novel does deal with fairly heavy and dark concepts like death, bullying, class differences, racism, and fear. Friendship, leadership, and strength are also really important issues that are addressed in the novel. The issues of bullying, class differences, and fear are presented in ways that a younger person would understand. Malloy and Harry clash a lot, but not in ways that would bring about harsh consequences. The turn towards consequences like death and injury come into play later in the series, however. The deaths of Harry’s parents hits harder for an older audience, in my opinion, because an older audience has more experiences that allow them to understand the loss and the terrible treatment of Harry by his relatives in all of its reality. The series is almost like a children’s show that has adult jokes and ideas that you only come to understand after you’ve rewatched the show as an adult. In terms of dealing with fear and standing up for yourself Rowling creates situations that kids can relate to, like clashing with a teacher, school yard bullies, and navigating differences between friends. This leaves the heavier stuff like death and oppression to be built up and confronted in later books. For me I think you’re meant to grow up as Harry and the rest of the kids grow up so that you really understand the issues that are important in the series. Then, as an adult you can reread the series and get a whole other layer of meaning out of the story that you didn’t get while you were reading the book as a younger person. This layering is probably what makes the series so successful, at least for me.