Privilege of a lifetime

It is as though you step into another world. A world so complete and so rich in detail, that it appears as if you are in it. You are so immersed in it, and so mesmerized by its newfangled way of life, that you adore and relish every moment of it. It is like gliding like an adventurous cloud over a vast wonderland. No, I am not talking about the Aurthur Conan Doyle or about Tolkien. I’m taking about Joanne Kathleen Rowling’s world of magic. Yes, I’m talking about Harry Potter.

I was waiting for the release of the seventh book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows for a long time. I was in my fourth semester when the sixth book was released. From then on, I’ve been waiting patiently for the twenty first of July of this year. I was very excited about this date, and was looking forward to the excitement and awe that the book would bring. A wave of expectation, of palpable tension, and of pure fun. 🙂

And the book kept its promise. As customary, I had my eyes glued to the book from the first page to the last. Time and daily ablutions took a back seat, for I was not where I was. My mind had drifted – to chart the stunning journey of Harry, Ron and Hermione to thwart Voldemort, to witness what they discover about their own past, and to mourn the deaths of so many good people.

This book by far is the gravest among all the others that Rowling has written till date. It fills in the glaring gaps that were formed by the previous book and explains many of the things that were not so clear in the earlier books. We learn a lot about Harry’s past, especially about his mother and his aunt. I didn’t have the foggiest of dreams that Grizenwald was so relevant even fifty years after his death. The saddest part of the book is when one learns about the death of so many characters. I suppose this was inevitable, but it is still hard to read about the death of a character that one had really liked. I dont want this post to be spoiler, and will therefore not name these characters. But they have my tributes and my affection, for they died fighting for what was right.

I have grown reading the Harry Potter books, and I adore them immensely. This series is all about the power of love – of how it gives people protection, feeds them with hope and helps them to resist evil, even in the most testing of times. The books also highlight friendship, and tell us why friends should mean more to us than any other wordly treasure that we can have. They also remind us that whoever we are, and whatever our level of intelligence or wealth, we must never forget who we really are, what brought us to where we are, and who sent us here in the first place.

A friend of mine told me recently that last book had a very naive ending, much like the usual dross that bollywood produces. I was told the book was nothing more than the droppings of a bull. I suppose this view is shared by quite a few. I have nothing but scorn for these people, for they seem to be complaining about the fact that good will always triumph over evil. I pity them, for they are incapable of either appreciating or enjoying what is good. They’d rather finish off every character in the book, and end it with agony and with misery. Is there something that these people do enjoy in life? They might offer the teeniest of smiles if Bellatrix Lestrange was somehow alive. But nothing more. They are blinkered and fettered by the limitations of having a saddist outlook on life.

I am so glad that I have read the series. I have thoroughly enjoyed every single line of each of the seven books. The power of forming a mental image of a world not present and not previously known or experienced – the power and resourcefulness of imagination is great. Tributes to Rowlling for writing these books and my deepest affection for Dumbledore, Harry, Hermione and Ron.