The Republic of Heaven

I have yet to meet a person who have read both Harry Potter and HDM and thought that Harry Potter was the better of the two sets of books. Why do you think HP has gained such massive popularity and HDM has ben mired in obscurity (relatively) do you think this will be aleviated with the upcoming HDM movies??

i think harry potter is as good as his dark materials... but they're pretty incomparable. you have to be a lot more mature to understand the trilogy, then you would have to be to understand harry potter. harry potter and his dark materials came out at the same time... pullman's even quoted as happy to hide behind it, hp blocking out some of the attacks for blasphemy. i think hdm's popularity will grow though, as the movie comes out. hopefully they'll do a better job on them than warner bros. did on harry potter. jk rowling's request to keep the movies faithful to the books didn't really benefit the story. i am somewhat glad about pullman's lack of involvement in the movie. hopefully new line cinema will chose good people for the cast and crew... now that the screenplay's apparently finished... hopefully stoppard did a good job too.

Yeah, I think jessia pretty much summed it up.

I think that HP has been more popular because it looks like it'd be a fun and interesting book for young readers. When I went to buy the HDM series, I found it in the section for children ages 9-12, and in the library, it was in the children's section, too. I think if it was in the teen sections, it'd be more popular. If I were a 9 year old, I don't think it would have looked very interesting to me.

they're both well told stories... it's just that you've got to be more mature to understand the trilogy, especially the second and especially especially the third book.

yep

I think HDM has been unwisely marketed as a children's book, when it would definitely have done better being sold as a teen or whatever they call it, 'young adult'. Trying to label it as purely a children's book does not really make much sense, given the mature content/subject matter and the level of comprehension needed. I definitely wouldn't have understood it properly at age 9, and I wouldn't give it to my 9 year old sister to read either (she's still on stuff like 'The Hodgeheg').

hell yeah hdm is the best set of books ever there aint no comparison with 2 more in the pipeline i say pullman rocks









i'm hell
i'm fire
i'm fury
i'm THE WHOLE F'N SHOW

I don't think Harry Potter is in anyway comparable to HDM! I love Harry Potter, they're fun books, but they're really nothing special, they've just cpatured everyone's attention. HDM, now, they are the best books I've ever read (and I've read at least eight).

But I can't understand why HP has got so much attention, and so much more than HDM. I think perhaps it's because it's been so long since a series of children's books has been even close to this popular; what was the last one? Postman Pat?

And because HDM is so controversial, people are afraid of it.

And if the films do for the books what Lord of the Rings did for... Lord of the Rings, then we're in for a treat!

the reason why hp is so popular is because they are easy reads.

say, welcome to the boards, willparry!

HP and HDM are totally different types of books. Harry Potter is a fun read, and it's interesting for the 9-12 audience (or younger), but it doesn't make an attempt at the deeper topics that HDM does (and rightly so, since it isn't that type of book). His Dark Materials (I agree) has been unwisely marketed as a children's book, but I think that's beginning to change. They don't hand out the Whitbread to books like Harry Potter... I think that's a sign that a lot of adults/teens have begun stumbling across HDM, and recognized its brilliance. It's almost due entirely to recommendations from friends/teachers/librarians etc... HP had a lot of advertising from the publishers, but HDM relied on word of mouth. Those fantasy fans who have already read through LotR and Narnia too many times are looking for something new that's just as good, and they're looking for the depth and strength of the writing, and HDM fulfills that. I've begun to see stands in bookstores advertising HDM, my local library went from only having 1 copy of TGC to having about ten copies of each book, and most of 'em are checked out constantly.

harry potter is an easy read and aside from the magic is non-controversial as far as religion goes. Children can read it and their parents do too. HDM is definitly a more difficult, "deeper" read, but so much more worth it. It doesn't contan all the old cliches that Harry Potter does and it's so creative... in my mind, completely different from any other book/series out there!

While Harry is fun to read about I think the reason it's doing so well is for two reasons:
1) It has a large audience appeal. Six year older learning how to read enjoy it, and grandparents adore it. Thats a helluva lot of buyers out there.
2) Hogwarts could very well be real (theoretically...I very much doubt the schools exist) and that very, very appealing to the kids.
Now, HDM doesn't have a huge audience appeal. You can't understand it unless you're like, twelve (or brilliant) and it's pretty controversial. What does Harry do thats controversial? Cast spells. Oooh, scary. What does Pullman do? Kill God.
But HDM is defintely getting more popular; my library too (which can't afford Speaker for the Dead or Children of the Mind but apparently can buy about thirty books of each Harry Potter) has about three copies of every book (One in the children's, and two sets in the YA) And the audio books, which make la a very happy bohemian

i'd say harry potter is special... considering it's sales. but that makes his dark materials especially special, since they beat the harry potter series. but i love both books, i'm constantly rereading the seven currently published.

but they're incomparable. his dark materials goes a lot deeper than harry potter does. but harry potter's a good read, and it's supposedly gotten a lot of kids that didn't used to read, reading more, other books too.

What does Pullman do? Kill God.

Good quote!

danke schön

I love both of the books and think each book series has its strengths and weakness, but that is what makes both of the books series so good. Personally I'm a little more wrapped up in the Ron /Hermione love story than Lyra and Will, because I feel it depicts the developement, not better but a little more realistically. However, I think in general HDM has a better grasp on human condition and I feel it allows the readerto make up their minds about who is bad and who is good. Everyone is falliable and everyone makes huge mistakes, kids and adults alike, and adults do worry about the actions, while in HP except for Snape, people aren't as gray and while adults are not perfect, their intents are always noble and they are really selfish. For example, we see Serafina wrestle with her choices and some of her actions don't always make things better ( when she and her witch clan try to heal Will's injuries and it doesn't work), while Dumbleodre (who I feel is closest in role in the books) who often appears as an all knowing and completely noble entity.

What romance between Hermione and Ron? I can defintely see one coming (and can't wait! I want them to hook up already!) but there seriously is not one at all yet. The hints are practically nonexistant. Lyra and Will on the other hand...we're still debating whether or not they had sex.

Please, don't even think about turning this into another debate about that again.

Yep, we got 13 pages or something of that already (Used to be a lot more before all the randomness/outright disgustingness got deleted).