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- Confronting reality by reading fantasy: How does reading Harry Potter make us confront the reality of our everyday existence?
Novels from C.S. Lewis’s classic Chronicles of Narnia series to J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series populate imaginary worlds with mythical beasts, power-seeking tyrants and more.
Characters adventure through worlds where the impossible is possible. Exploring the ‘impossible’ is another common element in fantasy. Magical wands may weave spells that defy the laws of physics as we know them.
The hero of the book is a wizard who attends a school, Hogwarts, where he is learning how to use his powers through studying and learning occult arts such as divination, casting spells, astrology, magical potions, and others. He is not a figure of contemporary pagan religions (such as Wicca), nor is he an imaginary wizard, but he is presented as a real boy who comes to the school to hone his innate magical abilities and develop into a practitioner of occult arts.
Many people today, influenced by television, movies, and fictional books, tend to think that magic is just made-up. There is fantasy magic such as a cartoon figure tapping a wand and turning a mushroom turns into a leopard, or something similar. Real magic is quite different, but does involve an attempt to use supernatural powers, or to connect with powers (sometimes seen as natural) through incantations, spirit contact, spells, reading hidden meanings, "powers" of the mind, and other forms of paranormal activity.
Fantasy highlights some illusions of reality, but the discussion of the above topics has led to the conclusion that while, like Potter, there may be inconsistencies in life, we find continuity and meaning from our memories, senses, mind, identity, etc., that allows us to believe in reality.
There are numerous theories about reality and whether we live in the only reality. While this topic might lead to an interesting discussion, it could also pose potentially unanswerable questions. Fantasy literature, such as Rowling’s Harry Potter series, is attempting to question some of our perceptions of reality. However, if we dwelt upon: dreams, the nature of death, our identity and whether our mind corrupts our perceptions of reality, then the outcome would be that we struggle with everyday existence and life generally, or perhaps end up like Cobb in Inception, no longer believing in only one reality. Soccio comments that philosopher Martin Heidegger (1889-1976), who studied the philosophy of literature and psychotherapy, suggested that people should accept facticity, namely: …facts about our unique way of Being. One of these is throwness, the brute fact that nothing explains our existence. We exist without any explanation, no 137 matter how hard we try to make it otherwise. When we acknowledge this aspect of our facticity, we understand […] that we have been thrown into the world without any explanation of why. We are in the world and then we are not. (Soccio, 2007, p.518) That is, we accept that we will never understand the purpose of our existence because that is the way it is intended. Just as Rowling invites her reader to accept certain concepts and information as truth, we must do the same with our existence and reality. It is unclear whether this is because of the continuity of reality that we experience in everyday life or whether it is easier to just believe in reality. Possibly, we accept this because it conforms to our understanding of a ‘three act’ structure.
We have been dealt a particular set of cards that we call life, and must live according to the rules. In a way, when we experience troubles it is as though we understand the limits of the rules of the game in which we are participants, sometimes unwillingly. It could be concluded that Harry Potter has brought to our attention the illusions of reality taking place around us. In a world where magic is normal the illusions presented to us by Rowling, such as the Mirror of Erised, appear strange only because they are unlike anything we have encountered in our reality. Rowling has shown us that wizards think the Muggle world is too simple69 and perhaps she is making a valid point.
The Wizarding world is undoubtedly complicated, and some wizards do not understand the jobs or beliefs of other witches and wizards70; the same can be said in our world. However, the main difference between the Muggle and Wizarding worlds is that things happen more quickly in the latter because of magic. Commenting on this as he picks a lock without the use of magic, Fred Weasley states: “A lot of wizards think it’s a waste of time, knowing this sort of Muggle trick, but we feel they’re skills worth learning, even if they are a bit slow.” (Rowling, 1998, p.25) Perhaps, like the Anne Fine quote above regarding the real world being solid around us, we like our lives to be simple and most people are content in the knowledge that many questions about life cannot be understood, reality being one of them.
For the further reading, you visit following link
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For the further reading, you visit following link
- References:-
- http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/11298/1/The_Illusions_of_Reality_-
- https://www.nownovel.com/blog/elements-of-fantasy/
- http://www.christiananswersforthenewage.org/Articles_HarryPotter.html
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