What parallels can you find between A Wizard of Earthsea and the Harry Potter franchise? What other influences does Burn (2005) suggest for Harry Potter?
I am a very big fan of 'The Harry Potter Series', I have been reading the books since 11 years old. When reading 'The Wizard of Earthsea' I noticed many parallels in the two aforementioned. For example in 'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows' Harry Potter finds out that in order to defeat Lord Voldemort he will have to surrender himself by allowing Lord Voldemort to kill him, in correspondence to 'The Harry Potter Series' there is 'The Wizard of Earthsea'. In the novel 'The Wizard of Earthsea' Ged embraces his inner shadow by finding out the shadows “true name” which is “Ged”, Ged grabs the concept that in order to defeat the shadow he must accept his own death and this is what frees him from his “shadowside”. There are many similarity’s in the two and this gives them parallel interests.
I think the one of the similarity’s of the two protagonists in the text are that they are both lonely. Harry Potter lost his parents when he was young and likewise, Ged lost his mother leaving the two characters to fend for themselves. Both texts being fantasy fiction gives the same sense of fictional and non-fictional setting, while giving the reader relatable characters. The texts also have the same archetypes as each other and the story lines tend to head in the same direction. Burn suggests in 'Potter-Literacy' that “The Potter phenomenon demands a cross-media literacy, attentive to both general principals and to media-specific features: but it also demands a historical and continuity.” Burn (2005).
Burn, A. (2005). Potter-Literacy – from book to game and back again; literature, film, game and cross-media literacy. Papers: Explorations into Children’s Literature Vol 14, No 3
Le Guinn, U. (1993; 1968). A Wizard of Earthsea. In The Earthsea Quartet (pp.13-167). London: Penguin.
Rowling, J. K. (2007). Harry Potter and the deathly hallows, Bloomsbury.
Hi Teu,
ReplyDeleteCongrats on doing 4 posts already! Well done and good time management :)
I'm glad we had a Harry Potter question in there to appeal to you.
Remember to add page reference to direct quotes.
What do you think about the 'high fantasy' and 'low fantasy' categories in relation to these texts?
Esther :)
Hi Teru,
ReplyDeleteGlad to know you're a Harry fan too. I just wanna ask a bit as I haven't read "The wizard of the Earthsea" yet so I just wondering if Ged have any help from friend later on in the second half? You know, Harry sure got a lot of reliable friend where Ged decided to go on his own..
As for "The wizard of the Earthsea" being 'high fantasy' and "Harry Potter" being 'low fantasy', I don't think it matter much as the deep structure of both fiction is similar and I think Eragon series standing somewhere between these too. After all, they all give us an interesting adventure along with the protagonist through many scopes with different style of writing.
Hi Esther,
ReplyDeleteI agree with Simon in relation to high and low fantasy. Both have the same core structure but with differences in setting and archetypes. I personally enjoy low fantasy as I find it is more realistic but still magical and exciting.
Simon answering your question on 'The wizard of Earthsea' yes Ged does have help from a school friend 'Vetch', so just like Harry Potter he does too eventually seek help from a reliable friend.
I forgot to write this in my last comment, my direct quotes from Burn don't have page numbers because the article doesn't have them. what should i do when this is the case?
ReplyDeleteThanks Teru ^^ I enjoy both of them though xD About the page number, just mention which paragraph it appear in the article is fine [eg. ..blah..blah..(Burn, year, para.xx)]^^
ReplyDelete