Are you a Harry Potter child?

[Anadria]

I started reading Harry Potter when I was 7 or 8 and saw the last movie when I was 20 and then thought a very special period of my life came to an end. I know now that's not true. Those 13 years were most definitely very special, but that period has not come to an end. Harry Potter has and will always be a part of my life. It has influenced me in so many ways, small ones and bigger ones, and that just doesn't stop. I am a Harry Potter child and even though I'm adult now I will always be a Harry Potter child.

[deepprpl21]

I definitely am. I read the first book when I was around 9 years old, and I was 17 when DH came out and I read it that day. When I finished DH I felt like I lost a piece of my soul and I finally realized it was all over.

For one thing, Harry Potter got me interested in reading. I always hated reading when I was a kid (even though I grew up with my mom reading me bed time stories the second I was born), and my mom was constantly trying to get me to read. I'd read like 1/4 to 1/2 of a book and get bored and never read it again. Finally, my mom heard about Harry Potter and told me to read it. I picked it up, albeit grudgingly, and started reading it. I was immediately enthralled and felt like I had never experienced anything like it before.

When I was a kid I just read the series because I found it interesting and felt myself falling into the story, but I didn't really read it to interpret anything or take lessons from it. Now that I'm older I think about it all the time and feel as though it has significantly influenced my attitudes and how I go about my relationships with friends and family.

[Temery]

question for those of you who started reading the series BEFORE you turned 11 - when you turned 11 were you looking for/hoping for an owl from Hogwarts?

while not a HP child I am a huge fan and have been reading various series of books since I could read (Pern, Earth Children, LoTR and basically anything my mom brought home or I could find at a library).

[Badderworse]

Originally Posted by Temery

question for those of you who started reading the series BEFORE you turned 11 - when you turned 11 were you looking for/hoping for an owl from Hogwarts?

Haha, this is actually very funny. While I really did know the difference between fiction and non-fiction between ages nine to eleven years old (I even knew that flying broomsticks were 'far-fetched'), I was whole-heartedly convinced that I would receive my letter come my eleventh birthday. I was thoroughly disappointed! :T

[GrangerHermione]

I would definitely consider myself a Harry Potter child. I was introduced to Harry Potter in Kindergarden (age 5/6), and I read the first book in first grade (age 6/7). After eagerly licking up every scrap of HP awesomeness that was available at that time, I eagerly awaited every subsequent midnight book premiere and movie release, and finally, the last HP movie came out when I was 16.

Harry Potter had a huge influence on me when I was young. Without it, I don't think I'd be the same person. It's what shaped my imagination when I was young and made me eager to learn and create. It made me into the avid reader that I am today. I remember how spellbound I was by this magical world that I longed to be a part of. It's that sentimentality that makes me hold a special fondness for the first Harry Potter book--the most magical and innocent and awe-inspiring of the series. It makes me miss the old Harry Potter fandom, before the movies came out. You can't find that kind of stuff anymore. That was back when the book store sold Bertie Bott's beans in little velvet bags and T-shirts with characteristic Harry Potter artwork. Now everything is based on the movies, not the books. I recently registered on Pottermore, and I love it because it captures the old, pre-movie spirit of Harry Potter. It makes me feel like a kid again!

Through the years, I've watched the Harry Potter legacy rise and die out. The mounting tension right before a new book/movie release. The frustration through a particularly long gap of nothing. The anticipation for the final book! Film! And then it was all gone. I went through a mini depression after DH came out because it was like a very definite mark in my life--the end of childhood for all of us Harry Potter children. Same thing with the last movie. Now, I told myself, it is officially over. But then Pottermore came out! There's always something to extend the life of Harry Potter one last time. I'll probably feel the same sense of sadness when Pottermore is finished, too. But I will always be a lifelong fan of Harry Potter. It was my first love.

I am a Harry Potter child.

[RikuStark]

I would consider myself to be a Harry Potter child, as you call it. I was introduced to the series when the first movie came out in 2001, I was six.

Originally Posted by Temery

question for those of you who started reading the series BEFORE you turned 11 - when you turned 11 were you looking for/hoping for an owl from Hogwarts?

Yes. I remember before going to bed just praying that I'll wake up with a Hogwarts letter under my pillow. Ridiculous, I know. It just makes me think of how much we believe in things like Hogwarts when we we're younger. I also remember playing with sticks in my Grandparents back yard and pretending they were wands. It kind of makes me want to go back to those days and experience HP again.

[jbwarner86]

I guess I wasn't really a Harry Potter "child", per se - I didn't get introduced to the books until I was 12 years old, and that's kinda teetering on the edge of teenager-hood. I subscribed to Disney Adventures at the time (my favorite kids' magazine ever, by the way ) and the September 1999 issue had an exclusive excerpt from Prisoner of Azkaban, which hadn't even come out in America yet. It was the scene with Harry's first Divination lesson, and I'd never read anything quite like it before. Naturally, the idea of a school where kids learn how to do magic intrigued me, and I sought the rest of the books.

I got a box set of the first three books for Christmas 1999, and I was hooked. I got Goblet of Fire the week it came out in the summer of 2000, and read all 734 pages in one day. And then the movies came, and I thought they were so awesome. But when Order of the Phoenix arrived in the early summer of 2003, things started to change. It was such a dark story, with the injustice of Umbridge's reign of terror at Hogwarts and Harry's failed relationship with Cho and the death of Sirius and everything, that I found myself emotionally drained at the end of it. I cared so much about these characters, I found it hard to see all these horrible things happen to them. It was a beautifully constructed story, but it was just so hard to take.

I didn't actually buy the fifth book, I just borrowed it from a friend. It was the start of a period of waning Potter fandom in my life. It got worse when I saw the Prisoner of Azkaban movie in the summer of 2004, and found myself significantly underwhelmed compared to the first two movies. I read Half-Blood Prince in 2005 (again, borrowed from a friend), but it was more out of habit than anything, as I had a hard time hyping myself up for it. I didn't think I could take anything more happening to these characters that I'd grown so attached to. But for the first three quarters of the book, it was actually pretty lighthearted and even funny in a lot of ways. I was starting to get into it more. Then Malfoy gets Sectumsempra'd, Snape kills Dumbledore, and Harry breaks up with Ginny. I walked away from Harry Potter for a good five years after that. The books were getting too gut-wrenching for me. In 2007, when Deathly Hallows was published, I heard that approximately 30 characters died within it, and I thought "No way am I dealing with that." I couldn't bear to say goodbye. I wanted to preserve the series the way I'd remembered it from my preteen years.

By 2010, I had matured quite a bit more. I knew the movie version of Deathly Hallows was on the way, and I figured "What the hell, I'm so far behind, I might as well read it." And it hooked me all over again. I bought my own copies of the last three books, watched all the movies I'd missed, and became a full-fledged Potter fan again. I even saw Deathly Hallows Part 2 in theaters, in 3D, with a packed house full of fellow Potter fans. I love these books, and upon re-reading the fifth and sixth ones, I found them much easier to take. I still care about the characters, but I also have the maturity to comprehend the themes of the book better and understand what Jo is saying through them. It's a brilliant saga from beginning to end, and I'm glad I had the opportunity to read it.

[SnyderD]

Most definately not a HP child...however my son is. I read them to him and his sister when they were in elementary school.

[barrychenault]

Wow. I think that I am most definitely a Harry Potter child. I started the books in 3rd grade, I think. The first book I got was the third book from my aunt. Weird..I know..but that next Christmas, I got the first one and completely devoured it. I begged my mom to take me to Walmart to get the second book! Since then, I have been forever stuck on Harry. I remember watching the trailer for the first movie over and over, getting chills every time I saw it. I remember making a wand in my 7th grade wood shop class. I actually remember getting depressed when I didn't receive my Hogwarts letter after my 11th birthday!! I would write out the admission letter in green ink on parchment and just imagine what it would be like to go to Hogwarts! As I grew older, I began to notice the things in the book other than the magic and the heroes. I began to see some real life truths in the books. Death is real. It is irreversible. And there's nothing that we can really do to stop it. It helped me to deal with the big problems in my life, such as dealing with death and inadequacy (which is why I attached to Neville so strongly). And yes. I believe I am who I am today because of Harry Potter. He was alway there for me. I know that may sound weird to just about anyone else in this world, but I feel pretty comfortable saying it here among people like myself. Harry was the best part of my childhood. And I will always be grateful for him, and of course for Mrs. Rowling for giving him to me. He is the reason I read today.