JK Rowling Hates You and Your OTP

Let's talk about J. K. Rowling spitting all over my happy little Potter world.

According to NPR Rowling confessed in a recent interview that she regretted pairing my beloved ginger-headed Ron Weasley with Hermione Granger.

Rowling is quoted as saying, "I wrote the Hermione/Ron relationship as a form of wish fulfillment.  That's how it was conceived, really.  For reasons that have very little to do with literature and far more to do with me clinging to the plot as I first imagined it, Hermione ended up with Ron."

Why?  Why would say that?  I think we can all agree that it would have been way too predictable if Harry and Hermione had ended up together.  That would have been boring.  The hero always gets the girl.  Let's face it there's nothing particularly charming or alluring about Harry.  He was the boy who lived and brave and cared for his friends.  The same could be said for Ron, except for the boy who lived part.  Ron was funny and a little klutzy.  Neither Ron nor Harry excelled in school. So realistically neither was a great match for Hermione but in the Potter world it works.

Let's face it Ron and Hermione were a compelling piece of drama unfolding.  It was a nice side story.  The fact that they were so different made it interesting.  Watching them grow up together and sort out all of those confusing dramatic angsty feelings was fun.  Ron getting jealous of Viktor, Hermione frustrated with his immature attitude.  Had it been harry it would have been boring.  They would have gotten along with little bumps in the road, except for the whole Voldemort deal.  It would have been cute watching them be shy at first but ultimately plain and uneventful.

Putting aside the typical hero gets the girl plot, why would an author speak ill about such beloved characters nearly seven years after the novels stopped?  Perhaps Rowling is trying to distance herself from the series that made her famous and wealthy.  If she wanted to anger and alienate fans then she may have succeeded.

From LA Times, "I know, I'm sorry," she said in the interview.  "I can hear the rage and fury it might cause some fans, but if I'm absolutely honest, distance has given me perspective on that.  It was a choice I made for very personal reasons, not for reasons of credibility.  Am I breaking people's hearts by saying this?  I hope not.”

Get your genitals out of my genre

Everyone knows men are way better at everything including writing.  The rough and tough male ego can’t fathom women writing the sort of things that would entertain them.  They want to read about manly exciting topics like spies, detectives, soldiers, and killers written by other men. 

It’s this accurate reasoning that leads many authors and their editors and marketing teams to the conclusion that female writers are better off using their initials or pseudonyms on their books so they don’t alienate potential readers.  J. K. Rowling was told having her real name, Joanna Rowling, on the book would make it hard to sell a book about a young boy to young boys.  So she borrowed the K from her grandmother and became J. K. She’s not the only one, E. L. James anyone?

But she showed them.  Even after people realized their beloved boy wizard was the product of a female brain they continued buying the series.  Some, myself included, loved them even more.

Unfortunately, she did such a good job with the Harry Potter series and made so much money she created an abundance of haters.  No one wanted to accept that she could do anything but Harry Potter.   How dare she even try!  When “The Casual Vacancy” was released reviews were overly critical and harsh as if for sport.  “…Willfully banal, so depressingly clichéd that “The Casual Vacancy” is not only disappointing — it’s dull,”wrote New York Times critic Michiko Kakutani.  It was called needless dark and violent among other things.  Kakutani also criticizes Rowling for a sex scene that wouldn’t count as foreplay to the 50 shades crew.  Needless to say it was not well received or fairly treated.  She could not escape her fame or gender.  But kudos to her for trying, instead of just kicking back and counting her millions.

So after the reception of her first post Potter book, it’s no wonder she chose to release “The Cuckoo’s Calling” under a completely different name.  The initial reviews were good and critics praised the author, whom they believed was a former security expert who previously worked with the Royal Military Police, for creating such a vivid an dark lead character.  But in an over crowded genre the public didn’t really take notice.  It was yet another crime tale.  Alas, sales were about 1,500 before the big reveal.   Of course once word leaked that it was Rowling’s work amazon sales of the book jumped 150,000%. 

“Rowling is reported as saying to the  Sunday Times of London, “I had hoped to keep this secret a little longer because being Robert Galbraith has been such a liberating experience. It has been wonderful to publish without hype or expectation and pure pleasure to get feedback under a different name.” 

She’s right of course.  It was the only way she would have gotten honest feedback and to not scare away the men folk.  It was also the only way her venture into the crime genre would have been taken seriously.  Sadly, she had little choice but to create not just the pseudonym, but also a new persona, Robert Galbraith.  Had the same book been released under Rowling’s name she surely would have faced unwarranted harsh criticism again.  "Presumably Rowling and her publishers decided to go that route because they assumed that acrime novel by a male author would sell better.”