Week 7: The Tale of Spiritual Education

For this weeks reading I chose to read about the feature film  before class, Harry Potter. Now quick life story but I was never allowed to read let alone watch a Harry Potter film growing up. Not once did I get close to doing either seeing as my mother was a firm and stubborn Christian woman who detested the concept of witchcraft of any nature. So by my knowledge all I knew about Harry Potter came from friend's who had seen the films and memes from the internet. This week I got the chance to finally get through the first few chapters of the first book and in all honesty I wasn't the most interested in it. I believe this probably had a lot to do with the fact that I couldn't heavily relate to these adolescent characters as I would have in elementary or middle school. The tone of the series here is light and fun which I can appreciate in a children's book considering where the series seems to lead later on. What I personally found fascinating was the great lengths were met when it came to world building. As a Game Art major here at Ringling I believe world building to be most important when it comes to creating an immersive story. Since so much meticulous care was put into creating this story it managed to capture the hearts of several fans which kept them following along with a heavy dose of nostalgia. Everything in the world is thought out carefully in order to suit the characters residing in it and so much creative detail was thought out from the hallways in Hogwarts to the name of spells and origin of creatures. I find it inspiring that Rowling created all this from a simple jotted down after thought on a delayed train.