The Role Of Fantasy In Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone
1103 Words5 Pages
This essay will explore the statement by looking at the different purposes that literature brings for children and young people, and the role of fantasy in fulfilling those purposes. It will also draw on Peter Hunt’s article, ‘Instruction and delight’ and the Harry Potter set text in general.
Most of the time in fiction, books that manage to have ‘elements’ of real life, helps the reader to gain a better understanding on what the characters they are reading about is going through. The idea here is that the story can be so good that it manages to make the reader forget its actually dealing with very real issues (AV1 no.3).
In the case of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, J.K Rowling sets a simple and straightforward tone, along with descriptive elements of Harry’s magical world, some playful irony and occasional uses of metaphors. The language overall is easy to grasp. And while the book does deal with some dark themes such as good vs.…show more content… p22), with only to some extent used as a means to ‘delight’. It wasn’t until the nineteenth century when ‘instruction’ moved towards entertainment purposes that gave way to religion then towards the genre of fantasy’ (Hunt,P. p22),. …This fact gives a better understanding and a realization that life has always been difficult for children. 200 years ago childhood was very different then what it is nowadays, as children had ‘fewer things to entertain them, and a different mindset’.
Thus authors need to be able to trust and respect young readers especially teenagers that they can understand and put things into context.
“There isn’t always a happy ending and people don’t always cope successfully with their problems” (AV1 no.3)
However happy endings are rarely seen in adult books compared to children literature it is a form of escapism for both children and