Ten Day Hiatus…

from Newbery, Harry, New York, and this blog.

You see, I’m off to Iceland to see glaciers, geysers, waterfalls, hot springs, puffins, little horses, and volcanoes.

Remembering Harry: Harry Potter as Global Folklore

Daniel H. Nexon, a professor of government at Georgetown University, has some extremely interesting things to say about Harry Potter in the world. Thanks to a post at Hogwartsprofessor I found his notes for the keynote he gave recently at the Prophecy 2007 conference. Among other things Nexon sees Harry Potter, “… not merely a reinterpretation of folklore, it is a, functionally speaking, contemporary folklore. And more than that, it is folklore on a global scale. Or, as I’ve argued in various settings, Harry Potter is cultural globalization: it is part of the creation of transnational common currency of narratives, personages, themes, and other circulating commonplaces.” I also found this very interesting article of his, “How Harry Potter Explains the World.”