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?
Well for an instance how there is a boy ‘chosen’ to do great things, to become a powerful wizard, whom just happens to be the main protagonist and both orphans. In the case of Harry Potter, Harry Potter himself, while on A Wizard of Earthsea, it happens to be Ged otherwise referred to as Sparrowhawk, while their personalities are different, similar to Ged, Harry also is filled with curiousity which leads him in to trouble. There is a similar mentor figure as well as for Harry Potter it would have to be Dumbledore while for Ged it would be Ogion the silent. In addition there is a school for wizards in both franchises, which is magically hidden from humans. According to Burn(2005) there is quite a wide variety of influences for Harry Potter but there was a suspicious similarity between Tolkien’s Hobbit’s dragon as well as Lord of the ring’s minor boss Shelob the spider and Harry Potter’s giant spider Aragog. The influences which he said range from The Princesss and the Goblin to The Phoenix and the Carpet.
Burn, A (2005). 'Potter-Literacy-from book to game and back again; literature, film, game and cross media literacy', in Papers: Explorations into Children's Literature Vol 14, No 3
Good points, I never realised how many similarities there woere between Harry Potter and A Wizard of Earthsea!
ReplyDeleteThe first sentence is a little long.
Yeah, when I am writing I tend to draw my sentences out a bit too much, thanks for the heads up though, also I too thought Harry Potter to be original. Perhaps it could be a coincidence, since there is no way for any story to be completely original. The whole theme around wizardry in stories was probably created before JR Tolken based on mythology from the middle ages when sorcery was said to have existed. Cheers for the feed back!
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