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Unlocking Harry Potter: Five Keys for the Serious Reader

4.3 out of 5 stars 27 customer reviews
ISBN-13: 978-0972322126
ISBN-10: 0972322124
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Frequently Bought Together

  • Unlocking Harry Potter: Five Keys for the Serious Reader
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  • The Deathly Hallows Lectures: The Hogwarts Professor Explains the Final Harry Potter Adventure
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  • Harry Potter's Bookshelf: The Great Books behind the Hogwarts Adventures
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Product Details

  • Paperback: 312 pages
  • Publisher: Zossima Press (March 1, 2007)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0972322124
  • ISBN-13: 978-0972322126
  • Product Dimensions: 6 x 0.7 x 9 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (27 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #273,106 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Top Customer Reviews

By Sandra Miesel on June 14, 2007
Format: Paperback
Having read John Granger's excellent previous books including WHO KILLED ALBUS DUMBLEDORE? and LOOKING FOR GOD IN HARRY POTTER, the quality of UNLOCKING HARRY POTTER was no surprise. The erudite Mr. Granger has a great gift for presenting esoterica in accessible form: he makes alchemy and postmodernism downright transparent. Mr. Granger is well-attuned to J.K. Rowling's narrative patterns and shares his insights with infectious enthusiasm. This book will hold its relevance long after HP #7 is published.

Speaking as an experienced writer and critic of fantasy fiction, I highly recommend this book.
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Format: Paperback
I am still reading this book, but I have to say that I think it's brilliant. It posits things that I really never would have thought about otherwise, and it is prompting me to read some of the suggested reading it lists inside. One word of caution though; you really need to be in an academic frame of mind to read it because at times it is not an easy read. Other than that, really terrific book!! I highly recommend it.
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Format: Paperback Verified Purchase
This is not always an easy read and there's some hard thinking required to keep up with John Granger's fascinating views. Likewise, I'm sure there are simpler books which roll around in the Potter mythos more completely. On the other hand, I cannot imagine a more thoughtful and though provoking analysis of the bigger historical movements and context that informs, flows within and, sometimes, drives the Potter series.

If you are someone for who learning is a pleasure and discovering new areas of learning to explore is a delight, this book is for you. Buy it right now, it is a great joy.

One note: this book was written before HP7 was published so it is somewhat dated in that respect. I would be curious to see a newer edition which encompasses the last book. But, having said that, it was very interesting to read this book knowing what Granger did not, the contents of the last book. His views stand up quite well and the honesty of this 'blind test' is comforting and fascinating.
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I found Unlocking Harry Potter interesting, even useful, but fundamentally flawed and deeply irritating. John Granger gives us lenses (keys) through which to view aspects of the Harry Potter novels. Some of them are mysterious and new (alchemy), and some of them are just basic English 101. I'll start with the 101 material.

NARRITIVE MISDIRECTION

Granger spends a chapter on "narrative misdirection." He shows how the point of view of the novels is intended to keep us looking at all the action through Harry's limited view. He claims to have been caught by this narrative ruse in novel after novel. In this I can only assume he is being disingenuous. Any serious adult reader can follow the adult story going on around and behind Harry's erroneous view of the story. At the end of Sorcerer's Stone, we learn that Snape is working for Harry during the Quiddich match, not against him, and that Snape is completely trusted by Dumbeldore. Nothing in any of the following books would cause the serious adult reader to revert to Harry's teenage misunderstandings of the situation. Granger is not just a serious adult reader, he is an English and Latin professor. So the first truly annoying thing about this book is that early on, you recognize that the author is lying to you about his own experience.

In elaborating on narrative misdirection, Granger points out that Rowling's favorite author is Jane Austen, and that her favorite book is Emma, which is indeed full of the same device Rowling uses to keep her readers off-base; the central character is continuously clueless about the motivations of others. On page 186 of his book, Granger calls Austen, "this Edwardian spinster." Red alert, red alert! Austen is not an Edwardian author! Later he refers to her as a Georgian author.
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Format: Paperback
There is not much more I can say about this book that hasn't already been said. This book is definitely in my top ten books to recommend to anyone who wants to read and understand all the varying levels and depths of Harry Potter. There is definitely more there than meets the eye, which most readers get some sense of, but which can be teased out with careful examination and analysis. John Granger gives you the tools to do just that in this remarkable read!!
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Format: Paperback
Like all of John Granger's books on Harry Potter, this is a mixed bag. The stuff on narrative misdirection, Rowling's successful fusion of a variety of genres (fantasy, mystery, heroic quest, gothic, etc.), and religious subtexts in the books is very good. The weakest chapters are on postmodernism and literary alchemy.

Granger claims that the Potter books are (substantially) postmodernist because 1) they attack prejudice, intolerance and other "defining myths" of our culture, 2) teach that we shouldn't judge by surface appearances or assume that we know reality as it really is, 3) employ genre-blurring in order to shake up preconceived ideas.

The problem is that none of these are uniquely postmodernist themes. If condemning prejudice is postmodernist, then pretty much everybody is a postmodernist today. If cautioning people not to assume that they know what's really going on is postmodernist, then Socrates, Plato, and Buddha were early postmodernists. And if genre-blurring is postmodernist, then C.S. Lewis's Narnia tales fit the bill, because they blur genres like fantasy, coming-of-age novels, and religious allegory. The true hallmarks of postmodernism are attacks on ideas such as truth, objectivity, rationality, epistemic certainty, metanarratives, stable linguistic meanings, and authorial meaning. There is no deep or interesting sense in which the Potter books are postmodernist.

Granger also goes overboard on Rowling's alleged literary alchemy. There are two distinct issues here: a) Does Granger get alchemy right? and (b) Does he make a convincing case that the Potter books are infused with alchemical themes?

The answer is NO and No. Read any standard history of alchemy--say, F.
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