Harry Potter is a big name in Britain. Recently, on a bookstore shopping trek along the popular Charing Cross Road in London, I saw him in all the bookstore windows with displays sometimes as big as life.
Harry Potter is not prime minister, nor is he running for Parliament. But he's just as well-known. To young readers, he is probably better known than any public figure.Harry Potter is the result of the Cinderella-like success of Scottish author J.K. Rowling, who leaped from being on public assistance to life as a celebrated author. Her book, "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone," was first published in Britain in 1997. The accolades were immediate, winning the 1997 British Book Award, the Smarties Prize and rave reviews.
The following year, Scholastic brought the book to this side of the Atlantic and published it as "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone," winning an equal amount of attention. Reprintings resulted in 275,000 copies being sold the first year.
Beginner's luck for this first-time writer was not a problem. The second book about Harry (and there will eventually be seven volumes in the series), "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets," was published in Britain in July 1998, becoming England's No. 1 best seller and receiving another British Book Award.
The fly-in-the-ointment was that the U.S. edition was not scheduled until 1999. This delay sent readers clambering to the online booksellers to obtain copies from Britain.
Web-savvy readers and bookstore owners found ways to get their hands on the much-adored Harry Potter without waiting for the U.S. edition. Scholastic, which owns the U.S. publication rights, was concerned about the violation of trade rights. Its sales representatives put a cease-and-desist request on these foreign-bought copies. Some booksellers obliged Scholastic's request, hoping that in the long run, publicity would be a good advertising gimmick. Other sellers merely made their order with British distributors, admitting they were "bending" some publishing-rights agreements.
While visiting the British bookstores, I saw the third in the series, "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban." Realizing that this wouldn't be available in the United States until the end of the year or perhaps even spring, I had no compunctions at all about buying a copy and bringing it home.
I am a Harry Potter fan, too, and I was curious about Harry's third year in the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. A cursory reading assures me that I won't be disappointed because there's much suspense: a mass murderer is found and the sinister prison guards of Azkaban are called in to guard the Hogwarts School.
The Harry Potter books continue to garner awards. In Britain alone, the first in the series has almost monopolized the medals for young fiction, including the Sheffield Children's Book Award and the Birmingham Cable Book Award besides the much-acclaimed Book Award and Smarties medal.
In the United States, the "Sorcerer's Stone" is appearing on many state children's choice lists, a sure sign of its across-all-ages popularity. The next two volumes will undoubtedly receive similar recognition. All three are well-written and, unlike many books in a series, each can stand alone, being skillfully written to make them independent reading.
What makes Harry Potter so popular? Adventure and magic. But maybe it is best found through the words of the author herself, "The idea that we could have a child who escapes from the confines of the adult world and goes somewhere where he has power, both literally and metaphorically, really appealed to me."
Many readers think so, too.