Blog Post #1 Response – My Brother, Harry Potter

            I had learned to read at the age of three, and was reading well above my grade level at the age of six – the year Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone was released in the United States. My mother and I read it together, and from the very first chapter I was completely hooked, despite my mother’s worries that the double-murder described in it was too dark for a child my age.

Over the next decade, Harry and I grew up together; while he was trying to prevent the remnants of Lord Voldemort from getting his servant’s hands on the Sorcerer’s Stone, I was losing my baby teeth, when he killed the Basilisk and destroyed Tom Riddle’s diary, I was joining my first basketball team, and, eight years later, when the story ended (no spoilers here!), I was dealing with high school bullies and the recent drug infestation in my hometown.

            Where would I be today if J.K. Rowling had not provided me with this wonderful hiding place of a world to which I could escape? Where would I have learned the lessons that no one was around to teach me? Resilience, courage, friendship… these things Harry taught me were not taught in my school; how would I have survived high school if Harry Potter had not taught me that, with courage, one can overcome anything?

            Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived, one of the greatest wizards of his age… most people would not guess that he happens to also be one of the most relatable literary characters in the past century (along with Katniss Everdeen, but that is another discussion altogether). Harry Potter has the power not only to kill Basilisks and speak Parseltongue, but also to help those who desperately need it, even if they happen to be ordinary Muggle children. The real magic of Harry Potter is this:  he gives us all the ability to transcend our own, ordinary lives and to live another, if only briefly.