Sara Kloepfer
Managing Editor
One train ride, two homemade house elf ears, three hours waiting in a movie theater, and countless bathroom breaks later, I was finally ready to see Part One of the seventh Harry Potter movie. I clutched my friends’ hands and counted down in unison with the other moviegoers as the clock ticked closer to midnight.
You may wonder why a senior in high school would spend a school night dressing up as a fictional character to see a movie about wizards. To me it was a no-brainer. My 7-year-old self would never forgive me if I hadn’t. I am aware it is my teenage self that I answer to now, but after a decade of reading and re-reading the magical tales of Harry and his friends, I had to begin the final farewell to my fictional playmates.
I first picked up a Harry Potter book in elementary school, unaware of the love affair I was about to begin. My copies (the British version only, please) became worn after the 10-plus readings of each novel. I was entranced by the endlessly imaginative world J.K. Rowling wove, and cried bitterly when I did not receive my Hogwarts acceptance letter on my eleventh birthday.
It’s obsessed fans like me who drive the multi-billion dollar Harry Potter franchise. To follow a series for over a decade signifies much more than a fleeting trend. Unlike the “Twilight” series, released over just three years and aimed mainly at teenage girls, Harry Potter is beloved by children and adults of multiple generations. As of 2008, the book series has sold over 400 million copies and has been translated into 67 languages. The last four books have consecutively set records as the fastest-selling books in history, with bookstores opening at midnight to release the latest installment to hordes of anxious fans.
Rowling’s carefully crafted tale has unraveled perfectly ever since Harry “fell into her head” during a train ride from London in 1990. That same year she wrote the epilogue to the last book, knowing all along how the story would eventually end. This planning has allowed her to fill her 700-page tomes full of the brilliant magical details — play-by-plays of Quidditch games, intricate storefronts of Diagon Alley and secret passageways of Hogwarts castle — that make her stories such a rich escape. Amidst the spells and wizardry, the reader can also relate to the first crushes, difficult classes and those friends who always have your back.
It seems fitting that the final installments of the Potter movies are released during the fall and summer of my final year of high school. It’s time for Harry to grow up, and so will I. But I will never move on. There will always be a place in my heart for the boy with the lightning-bolt scar.
