Who Fears Death, Harry Potter?

It is true that there are only a limited number of stories available to tell. Dress them up as you might, you are still basically telling the same stories that have been told over and over again in the past.


The story of the outcast who discovers that he/she/it is actually a hero/monarch/superstar in another world is one such archetypal story.


And it has been told and retold many times in western pop culture over the years:

• Peter Pan, where a young boy discovers he is a key figure in Neverland, destined to save the Lost Boys from the evil pirate Hook;
• The Narnia Series, where a group of young kids discovers that they are royalty in the land of Narnia, destined to lead it through a series of challenges;
• Star Wars, with orphan Luke Skywalker discovering that the "Force is strong" within him and that he is destined to battle Darth Vader (his father) and the evil Emperor;
• Harry Potter, with orphan Harry Potter discovering that he is a "wizard, and thumping good one" and that he is destined to battle Voldemort and his evil plans;
• The Hunger Games, with impoverished and practically orphaned (her father is dead, her mother emotionally absent) Katniss Everdeen volunteering to leave her family, fight in the ritual games and finally become the symbol of the revolution against the evil Capitol;
• Twilight, with lonely and depressed Bella Swan discovering that there is something special about her that attracts the interest of two mysterious and supernatural heroes and who finally becomes the key figure in their confrontation with the evil Volturi coven; and
• many more.

The popularity of this story seems, in my opinion at least, to be based on the fact that the main character escapes an unbearable life to discover that he/she is actually very powerful, very famous, very important. It is a wonderful dream for any of us who have ever been sad, or depressed, or unhappy with our lot in life. Maybe, just maybe, we really are special, if not here then in some other world.


The most stunning example that I've encountered recently is Nnedi Okorafor's 2010 novel, Who Fears Death (Daw). A powerful and gripping book, WFD shares a number of significant parallels with Harry Potter, both in its basic plot and in its detail.


Before I go on, however, I should warn you that Okorafor's book is NOT a children's novel. In the first 40 pages, she describes in graphic detail both a very violent sexual assault and a female circumcision. The violence and sexuality throughout the book is definitely for mature readers and the novel is written at a philosophical and emotional level that would be beyond most young people.


The story is told by the main character, Onyesonwu, a mixed-race outcast who is the child of rape. Onye's life in a small village is a miserable one, but for the love of her mother and her adoptive father, as she faces derisions, rejection and violence at almost every turn. As she approaches adulthood, however, she discovers that she possesses magical power that dwarfs even that of the local sorcerer. Further, she finds out that she is "The Chosen One", the mythic figure the arrival of whom has long been foretold and who is destined to end the subjugation and annihilation of the Okeke race.


In order to do so, however, she must face and defeat the most powerful and evil sorcerer in the known world: a man named Daib, who turns out to be her mother's rapist, Onye's own biological father.


It's a beautiful and powerful novel, one that tackles massive social issues in a spine-tinglingly exciting story.


And it also shares a number of points with the Harry Potter novels. A child with a violent beginning, outcast in his/her world, who begins to find strange "magical" things happening to him/her, things that frighten the people around him/her. A child who discovers both her/his power and her/his terrifying destiny, almost at the same time.


"The Chosen One" appellation was the similarity that struck me the most but there are other details that Who Fears Death and Harry Potter share: the often difficult relationship with the teacher figure; the early introduction of a powerful enemy and the suspense of whether or not the main character will be ready when the inevitable confrontation actually occurs; the creation of a group of friends and supporters through one or more dangerous experiences; the challenging journey undertaken by the hero that leads to the confrontation; and much much more.


I haven't finished Okorafor's novel yet but I'm anxious to do so, as much because I want to trace the ongoing parallels with Harry Potter as because the book is, itself, a riveting tale.

Strong female characters and the family decision

I went to see The Hunger Games the other day with a friend here in Halifax who is not only a literature professor at a local university but also a big fan of Young Adult (YA) fiction like I am.

Not surprisingly, over dinner after the movie, we enjoyed several hours of lively conversation that worked its way from the film through the original Suzanne Collins novels and finally, of course, to Harry Potter.

One of the things we noted about The Hunger Games, the movie, is that the screenplay attempts to incorporate some aspects of the second and third novels of the series into the film of the first book. Whereas that first novel focuses entirely on Katniss and her personal struggle to deal with the challenges she faces, with little thought until the end of the greater political impact of some of her decisions, the film version actually presents that potential political impact on-screen throughout, making politics a more important part of the story.

For example, in the film the people of District 12 salute Katniss for volunteering herself for the slaughter in place of her sister. This is an act of defiance that would never have been considered by the people of her district at the start of the first book. It is only when, in book two, Katniss visits Rue's district on her Victors Tour that such a salute takes place and it is greeted with cruel violence by the Capitol. Further, the film shows Rue's district move into an actual uprising when Katniss stands over Rue's flower-ornamented body and salutes her solemnly, an uprising that didn't start until late in the second and possibly early in the third book.

We discussed the implications of this on the entire story arc of the expected three-film Hunger Games series, comparing this compression of the story to the way the Harry Potter film-makers actually expanded the seven novels into eight films in order to J.K.'s story justice.

This led to a discussion of the epilogues included at the end of both series of novels: J.K.'s infamous 19-years-later section that brings The Deathly Hallows to a close and Collins' denouement wherein we find Katniss and Peeta married and taking care of their two children in the slowly recovering District 12, now that the revolution has been successfully completed.

And, as is quite natural for two people with such similar political viewpoints, our discussion of the two epilogues necessarily raised our discontent with the decisions made by these two strong women writers to use their epilogues to show their equally strong female characters (Hermione and Katniss) as having chosen to settle down and raise families, rather than continue to pursue a more public life.

We are not arguing that the decision to raise a family is an inappropriate one; we simply wish that the authors had at least left open the possibility that their characters could have pursued other opportunities in addition to, if not in place of, the more traditional route.

With regard to Katniss, we both agreed that this character was too badly damaged by her experiences (starting with the death of her father and the temporary "absence" of her mother, through her years of keeping her family alive by hunting and trapping and ending with the brutality of not one but two trips into the games, followed by leading a bloody revolution) to ever be able to settle into any kind of normal or stable life and was probably less capable than any literary character we could think of at the end of her trials to take on responsibility for raising children.

With regard to Hermione, on the other hand, we simply could not understand the message that Rowling is trying to send by showing Hermione as Ron's wife and the mother of his children at the end of the novel and mentioning nothing about her continuing to study, her taking on an academic career, pursuing advanced research or perhaps even taking over as Hogwarts Headmaster (or, for that matter, helping to establish the first wizarding university for advanced magical studies). Her intellectual curiosity and academic leanings are so pronounced in the seven novels that it is completely bewildering to us that they would not continue to form part of her life once Voldemort was vanquished. And, as so many people have proven, it would be completely believable if Hermione were to be shown to be accomplishing both: raising a family and continuing in a more public, academic role.

No, Rowling doesn't say anything in the epilogue that precludes the possibility that Hermione continued to develop herself in these areas but she certainly makes no effort to suggest that Hermione does so. Rowling states that Neville is a professor at Hogwarts by that point: why not Hermione?

Perhaps more problematic for us is the fact that both Rowling and Collins make a point of showing these strong female characters settling into more traditional female roles at the end of their narratives: what message are they trying to send to their readers by deliberately defining the decisions of these characters in this way?