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The Harry Potter curse

My spare hours these last few weeks have been spent re-reading the Harry Potter series, in anticipation of the July 21 release of its final volume, Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows, and the party we will hold at CoffeeTree Books, here in Morehead, leading up to its on-sale moment, one minute past midnight Friday night.

Lots of bookstores, big and small, will celebrate the release of J.K. Rowling's final Harry Potter volume with parties, and with a sigh, for the series has been a boon to young readers and to the book-selling business. (Sort of, but we'll come to that.) For the event I will once again don borrowed robes and a funny hat, wave around a wooden chopstick as if it were a wand, and conduct a trivia contest that will, by some miracle, resolve itself just before midnight.

That will seem an odd thing, for those who know or have met me. It is quite out of character. I was pressed into service three books back (when The Order Of The Phoenix first appeared, which I'm presently reading) with little warning and no preparation. I transformed in ways my wife and in-laws barely recognized and which I little understand. Apparently I have an extra gear in my personality that becomes outgoing and witty and plays well to crowds, though it is usually well-hidden. Either that or they were all sucking up to the guy giving out the prizes, which seems more likely in the cold light of morning. I do not know where it lives, that gear, and, when it came time to reprise that role for The Half-Blood Prince I was more than a little nervous that I might not be able to summon that persona again. But it emerged, more or less on cue. And so now I trust that it will show up one last time, and not be called upon again.

I wonder if I need spend a paragraph or three defending the reading of Harry Potter by a middle-aged man with better things to do? Perhaps.

Susan was teaching middle school when the first book came out, at a Catholic school in Nashville where there was some talk of banning the book because its emphasis on magic was heretical or whatever. That kind of chatter always frustrates me, and often leads me to read the offending book -- or, as in the case of The Satanic Verses, at least to buy it in sympathy. (I have read a little Rushdie, just not that one, which seemed impenetrable the first time I started it, and I suspect no small number of people bought it to leave on their coffeetable until the season changed. I actually meant to read it. Really.) Regardless, the lessons in Harry Potter are highly moral and resolute, and not condescending in the least.

Anyhow, I remembered fondly reading and re-reading Lloyd Alexander's Taran series, and John Christopher's post-conquest trilogy, and, of course, J.R.R. Tolkien. (It was something of a shock to run onto Tolkien again in college while studying medieval literature, but there he was, impressive as always.) Past which I don't read fantasy, and gave up on science fiction decades back. And so I read Harry Potter, which, for those first couple books is easily done because they're comparatively small and I read quickly; too quickly, sometimes. I have been entertained, and ensnared by Rowling's careful and intricate plotting; the books have stood up to being read each time a new installment arrives, though I suspect this may be my last time through the cycle. Rowling deserves particular credit for the difficult task of writing each book at the rough level of sophistication her lead characters might apprehend.

And so, this morning, rather than reading Seymour Hersh's piece in The New Yorker on Abu Graib, or the Faron Young biography atop my music stack, or Barbara Kingsolver or a political consultant's exit memo I haven't the interest in footnoting here, nor any of the other stacks of books I should be attending to, I will sneak in a couple more chapters of Harry Potter, looking for questions to ask my audience the evening of July 20 and for clues as to what might happen in that final book, and how it might fit together.

I am curious, for example, how the giants and house elves will tie in, and why Harry has been stripped of every strong male role model who might teach him how to survive this final altercation. And perhaps he won't survive, though I fear it's Ron who's marked for death as the hero's best friend.

None of which is precisely why I sat down this morning to write.

I sat down to contemplate price points and the economics of best-sellers. It is possible to buy Harry Potter online or at your local bookstore for 10 percent off, or 20 percent off, or, direct from the publisher for 30 percent off, and, from no small number of booksellers, for 50 percent off (or more), which means they are losing money on every volume they sell.

This is, in theory, the kind of competition which benefits consumers, but I think we put the cart before the horse, and it's time we began counting the real costs of such foolishness.

If I remember my high school economics correctly, the demand for this last Harry Potter book is relatively inelastic. People would buy it no matter the cost, most of them. It is one of the few books every bookseller in America (and abroad) can absolutely count on selling. Looking back at CoffeeTree's sales records we can see a pronounced spike every time a new Potter adventure came on sale, and a smaller spike around each movie debut, I suspect.

This is, as a friend here observed, every bit as idiotic as putting brown-n-serve rolls on sale the week before Thanksgiving.

Now, the sale price matters not to Scholastic Books, nor J.K. Rowling, nor to the various printers whose presses will, under stern security, no doubt, produce this new book. But it matters to booksellers. It doesn't matter to the big boxes -- Wal-Mart and Kroger and whomever else carry it and deeply discount it -- whether they make money selling this book, because they're trying to get you in the store to buy some dozen other things you may or may not need at prices which may or may not be to your advantage. And probably Amazon sells enough that their profit margin (with handling fees, I reckon) will bear up to the stress.

But this is brutal for independent bookstores. And idiotic all around. Publishing is like farming, and like the music industry. The hits pay for the misses; the good seasons mitigate the damage of years in which there is no rain (and Rowan County is in a drought right now, which may mean I spend the afternoon hauling water to our trees and beans). I realize there are anti-trust regulations which preclude price fixing, and in general I think that's a good thing. But there's also an arms race atmosphere to this: We all are obliged to compete with whomever will sell the book cheapest, no matter their motivation (and certainly some of Wal-Mart's motivation is to drive every shred of competition from their markets, including our family bookstore should it come to that).

At some point we as consumers are going to have to unlearn the lessons hammered into us by financial experts everywhere: That it is our right and our duty to seek out the lowest possible price when buying something. (I am hearing, right now, Margo Timmons singing "because cheap is how I feel.") Balderdash.

Where and how we spend our money in this consumer economy is the only real, functioning democratic choice we have left. Now, it behooves local and independent merchants to price things fairly, and to make sure their service is spotless. But where you spend, and on what, determines what is made, what is sold, and by whom. It impacts jobs and local communities and the international trade balance. And so, when buying your new copy of Harry Potter, or of the terrific new Mavis Staples album, or of Exile On Main Street (one of those records I still need to listen to, all these years gone), please consider the less visible costs of where you choose to spend your money. Will you support low wages; will you spend your money in ways which allow it to fly quickly from your community, never to return; will you contribute to the vibrancy and uniquity of the place you live; will you count in the not-so-hidden costs of conformity? Or will you save a buck?

Wal-Mart will sell Harry Potter for less than we pay for it. They have probably cut a deal with Scholastic Books so that they make a penny or two on the transaction, somehow, because that's what Wal-Mart does. It seems wrong to me that we have so tipped the scales of commerce in favor of the biggest of merchants that they have gained such an enormous pricing advantage over their smaller local competitors. If we are to have a fair and better world, I think consumer advocates should begin looking at national legislation which limits the ability of manufacturers to set quantity discounts which are so out of the reach of their smallest dealers. I realize that's socialism, and maybe bad economics, and that it is quite unlikely. But either we begin to realize the danger of the hegemony of the big box, or we risk losing every shred of regional identity, of individuality, and of choice.

Anyway, we're going to have a party, here in Morehead. I'll probably make a fool of myself, and there'll be no drink involved. C'mon down if you're in the neighborhood. And if not, spend a little time shopping in whatever neighborhood you call home, supporting whatever local and independent merchants remain.

Posted by grant on June 24, 2007 10:16 AM | Permalink