NPR: Would Rowling Really Kill Off Her Golden Goose?

Would Rowling Really Kill Off Her Golden Goose?

July looks like it's shaping up to be national Harry Potter Month.

USA Today gives a preview of the coming Potter onslaught. On July 11, the fifth film, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, will hit (and I do mean hit) theaters across America. Then 10 days later, at midnight, the last book, Harry Potter and the Deadly Hallows, will take over the country's bookstores.

Some Potter fans are calling it a cross-promotional nightmare. Emerson Spartz, who founded the Potter fan site MuggleNet.com eight years ago, when he was 12, says, "I would think that both Warner Bros. and Scholastic would want to spread the buzz out for a longer period of time."

Oh, nonsense, I say. Won't make a philosopher's stone worth of difference. Both the book and the film will generate millions, dare I say, a billion or more dollars, for these companies and for author J.K. Rowling.

And this leads us to the question that has dominated Potter talk ever since Rowling hinted she might kill Harry off. Allow me to offer an answer:

It won't happen. Because (as we saw above) it's all about the Benjamins.

Harry Potter is an economic engine of a ferocious nature. I know this because I have four children who have read the books, seen the movies, bought themed Lego sets, wands, costumes, computer games, etc. They LOVE Potter. But if Potter were not to survive the final book ... I'm not so sure their attention would either.

I can see young and old fans not going to the final two movies if they knew of such an outcome, regardless of how noble it might be. And future fans hesitating. (Would Star Wars be as popular if Luke died in the final episode?) And all the peripheral marketing bits would suffer as well.

Rowling may still risk all by killing Harry (Arthur Conan Doyle tried the same tactic with Sherlock Holmes and it didn't work), but I can't see her walking away from her Golden Goose.

2:48 PM ET | 06-21-2007 | permalink

Comments (Send a comment)

Going on the record in public with speculation that Harry will not be killed is not a bet I would take.

Sent by some dumb muggle | 3:33 PM ET | 06-21-2007

I am just about positive that Harry will not die in the last book. Although having Harry die would make it impossible for anyone else to write a sequel to Book 7, considering all that has happened in the books, I don't think Harry Potter will die in the final book.

Whatever the outcome, I know this is going to be an amazing book to read, and I cannot wait for it.

Sent by Rand al'Thor | 12:44 AM ET | 06-22-2007

throughout the series it is made clear that LOVE is the strongest magic of all!
voldemort has none and will perish!

Sent by jack armstrong | 10:03 AM ET | 06-23-2007

Killing off Sherlock Holmes did nothing to keep him from being a major cultural reference point, as you prove simply by mentioning the character.

While I don't personally think that Rowling is going to kill off Harry, it's perfectly within her right as the author to do so. To say that profit potential would influence that decision is really quite insulting. Certianly, the idea that fans might not like it hasn't kept beloved Potter characters from dying in the previous books.

Sent by Leslie | 10:37 AM ET | 06-23-2007

With magic, is it not possible to kill-off a character and still have the character? Case in point, Nearly Headless Nick and Moaning Myrtle - they're both dead already.

Sent by Sexy Rexy | 2:57 PM ET | 06-24-2007

When a major character dies in the realm of fantasy, does that necessarily mean that the person STAYS dead???

Sent by carolyn nord | 5:49 PM ET | 06-24-2007

Rowling won't kill Harry off - can you imagine the uproar? You can't have Harry die, and Voldemort live - that blows her whole premise. One of the themes of all the books has been good over evil - although Rexy's comment has merit.

Sent by Linda | 10:09 PM ET | 06-24-2007

I suspect that more money is not an incentive to Rowling...doesn't she already have more than a person can spend? However, the book, movie, and merchandise corporations can never get enough of the green. I'm sure they will do what they can to keep Harry alive.

Personally, I think Harry will die when he kills Voldemort to keep good/evil in balance.

Sent by Sandy | 8:34 AM ET | 06-25-2007

But ghosts choose that path and I doubt that Harry would choose that path. In an interview, Rowling once implied that ghosts are afraid of death. Harry is not a coward - he is a Gryffindor, after all! I doubt that Harry will die, but it won't be because Rowling is greedy. She seems to have integrity and the story is close to her heart. It will be because that was her plan all along - she claims to have had the last chapter written for some time.

Sent by Erin L | 9:37 AM ET | 06-25-2007

With any luck, Rowling will mercifully kill her bespectacled protagonist, and I won't have to listen to ADULTS utter the words 'Harry Potter' and 'Literature' in the same breath anymore.

Sent by Grouse | 9:56 AM ET | 06-25-2007

Sounds like there is a muggle in our midst! Grouse, just out of curiosity, what would motivate a Harry Potter critic to waste their time reading a Harry Potter blog?

Sent by Erin L. | 2:12 PM ET | 06-25-2007

and perhaps she may wait years longer than usual and come out with something to give us all more insight than the depth that the epilogue goes into-maybe a decade from now

Sent by Dalton | 3:24 AM ET | 07-27-2007

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