It’s
funny how people always find something to be addicted to. In the Middle Ages
people were addicted to chess. After that, when the printing press was
invented, people were addicted to adventure stories. When television was
invented, no one could let go of great TV shows, and now, video games play a
big part. It seems that people go looking for addiction to release stress and forget
about their routine schedules.
What
is the modern addiction, then? There are so many addictions that people can
find today, and the most widely common one is the Internet as people can find “a
sea of information” about subjects they’re interested in. But here I’d like to
discuss a more unusual addiction which is nevertheless as strong. It’s the most
loved fantasy of the 21st century.
The
Harry Potter series is a collection of seven books written by Joanne K.
Rowling, about a young hero named Harry Potter who is a wizard and goes to wizarding
school. When the first book, Harry Potter
and the Philosopher’s Stone, received worldwide attention, Rowling moved on
to write six other sequels to the book, and the series earned a worldwide
fandom of millions. The series has been made into eight movies by Warner Brothers,
starring Daniel Radcliffe as Harry Potter. The series is creating an endless
row of new Harry Potter contents in the world, such as the Wizarding World of
Harry Potter theme park(WWoHP) in Orlando, Florida and an online Harry Potter
experience called Pottermore: by J. K.
Rowling.
Many
people who have read the Harry Potter books find the magical world of Harry
Potter in their everyday lives. What makes the series stick to your mind is not
the characters, not the plot, but the places. In the series, Harry goes to a
wizarding school called Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Fans find
Hogwarts to be warm and happy. They love the Great Hall, where they give out
extraordinary food in golden plates. They love the Quidditch field with its
fresh, green grass and flying balls. They love the Common Room with its
crackling fire and colorful tapestries. The magical places make people’s love
for Harry Potter even greater because if what you like is the character, then
all you can do is dressing up like the character. But if you like the places in
a novel, you visit there in your dreams. You want to decorate your surroundings
so that you could feel as if you’re living there. And because the setting is a
school – which Rowling has made so real with her beautiful details – fans can
enjoy an online experience in which they can become students of Hogwarts. Most
of all, they want to visit the WWoHP, where they can buy magical items from
wizarding shops and enter Hogwarts Castle. That’s why fans are showing so many
symptoms of Harry Potter addiction.
The
Harry Potter addiction is known to occur mainly with young children, but that’s
not true. Many students and even adults are immersed in the world of Harry
Potter. Having all seven books in your home and having read them more than two
times is a start. If you’re younger than eleven, you wait for your Hogwarts
admission letter. Once you get addicted to Harry Potter, you begin wanting to
buy lots of things in the Warner Brothers’ online shop, things like replica
broomsticks, collectible hero wands, school robes, house scarves, parchment, and
Hogwarts t-shirts. You download all eight movies in your laptop, and you
download all the Harry Potter movie soundtracks. You join Pottermore, and your
wish for your birthday is going to WWoHP. You go through Potter-related videos
on YouTube, and soon you reach the stage of listening to Harry Potter
soundtrack while you play Pottermore, reading a Potter book or watching a
Potter movie whenever you get tired from an array of continued dueling. If that
gets tiring (although it most certainly won’t), you scroll through the Warner
Brothers online shop and dream of all these items being delivered to you in a
huge Hogwarts trunk. You subscribe to a Pottermore-related blog to get some
tips on your potions and duels, or if you’re a bigger fan you might have a blog
yourself. You read all the comments, being ready to invest thirty minutes of
your living time on them, and post one of yours when you’re finished. You like
Facebook pages of all the Harry Potter characters, and join a Facebook group of
Pottermore players. After your busiest time of the year, such as final exams,
you spend an entire day devoted to Harry Potter. In the movie, Ron arrives to
Hogwarts Castle in a flying car with Harry and tells him “Welcome home,” and
you automatically respond by saying “Thank you.” You would like to have an owl
for your pet, and your nickname, or maybe your English name itself, is the name
of a character in Harry Potter.
And
I’m doing all of this. It is fun.
The
harms of Harry Potter addiction exists, of course. First of all, you lose a lot
of your time. Second, you will be teased by your friends for being so
unrealistic. They are simply amazed by how much you can love something that
doesn’t exist.
The
third harm, which is the most detrimental, is that the addiction pains you from
time to time because Hogwarts Castle and Harry’s magical world is part of a
fantasy and doesn’t exist in the real world. If you’re addicted to existing
things like an idol stars, at least you can go to their concert and see them,
although it might be from a long distance. Fans of Harry Potter are sometimes
hurt because deep down in their hearts, they know that it’s not real. They can’t
stop thinking that they’re nothing but a stupid muggle(a muggle is a word in
the series used to indicate a non-magical person).
As
Rowling tells us through Professor Dumbledore in Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, “It does not do to dwell
on dreams and forget to live.”
If you dream too much about nonexistent things, you might easily go crazy. But
if you moderate your fandom and try hard in real life to make it as happy as
your Hogwarts life, you can experience the saving grace of being a Potterhead: the
ability to return to your childhood, into the world of dreams and hope, where
the magical home of Hogwarts Castle awaits.
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