J.K. Rowling’s first adult novel, The Casual Vacancy, is being released this week. Ian Parker, in the New Yorker, discusses the writer of “Mugglemarch“:
… In the spring, nearly five years after the appearance of the seventh, and final, Harry Potter novel, Little, Brown, Rowling’s publisher, announced “The Casual Vacancy,” and offered a glimpse of the plot: an idyllic English town named Pagford; the death of a man named Barry; a parish-council election. In response, a British publisher announced “The Vacant Casualty,” billed as a parody, if one can parody something whose contents are unknown. Commenters on the Guardian’s Web site guessed at Rowling’s likely models, with reference to Robertson Davies and “Desperate Housewives.” One reader, playing on Rowling’s word for non-wizard society, suggested an alternate title: “Mugglemarch.” And the hosts of Pottercast, a popular American fan podcast, picked over the press release, registering both delight at fresh data—Rowling has written ten tweets in three years—and a hint of worry that an extraordinary global bond between an author and her readers, and between two generations, was about to be severed. They were opening an invitation to a party where they might not be quite welcome. During the podcast, they looked up “parish council” on Wikipedia, and established that the term refers to the lowest rung of English local government. One of the hosts, Melissa Anelli—a thirty-two-year-old who runs a Potter Web site, stages an annual Potter convention, and has published a sharp-witted book about Potter enthusiasts—pondered the title, asking, “What’s casual, ever, about a vacancy?” She and her co-hosts wondered whether they’d go to a midnight party to celebrate the book’s launch, as many fans had for the later Potter novels….
“I have drawn a map of Pagford,” Rowling told me when we met, in late August. “It’s one of the first things I did.” We were not speaking in her Edinburgh house, or at her country place—which stands in grassland, overlooking a fast-running river in a valley north of the city—or in her home in an expensive part of west London. We were at her office, which occupies an unmarked Georgian building on a handsome street in central Edinburgh, not too far from a café that, in mockery of competitors, has hung a sign that reads “J. K. ROWLING NEVER WROTE HERE.” The office has high ceilings, Turkish rugs over wooden floors, figurative oil paintings by modern Scottish artists, and the air of a small but very well-funded embassy. According to the London Sunday Times, Rowling is worth nine hundred million dollars….
At the Guardian, Decca Aitkinhead has an excellent interview, complete with video (political junkies, don’t miss the “starstruck” quote at 7:20!):
… “How many of us are able to expand our minds beyond our own personal experience? So many people, certainly people who sit around the cabinet table, say, ‘Well, it worked for me’ or, ‘This is how my father managed it’ – these trite catchphrases – and the idea that other people might have had such a different life experience that their choices and beliefs and behaviours would be completely different from your own seems to escape a lot of otherwise intelligent people. The poor are discussed as this homogeneous mash, like porridge. The idea that they might be individuals, and be where they are for very different, diverse reasons, again seems to escape some people.
“They talk about feckless teenage mothers looking for a council flat. Well, how tragic is it that that’s what someone regards as the height of security or safety? What would your life be like if that’s the only possible path you can see for yourself? But I don’t know if that’s a question some people ask themselves. There has been a horribly familiar change of atmosphere [since the 2010 election], it feels to me a lot like it did in the early 90s, where there’s been a bit of redistribution of benefits and suddenly lone-parent families are that little bit worse off. But it’s not a ‘little bit’ when you’re in that situation. Even a tenner a week can make such a vast, vast difference. So, yeah, it does feel familiar. Though I started writing this five years ago when we didn’t have a coalition government, so it’s become maybe more relevant as I’ve written.”
Like so many British novels, The Casual Vacancy is inescapably about class. “We’re a phenomenally snobby society,” Rowling nods, “and it’s such a rich seam. The middle class is so funny, it’s the class I know best, and it’s the class where you find the most pretension, so that’s what makes the middle classes so funny.” The book is so funny I was halfway through before noticing that every character is, to a varying degree, monstrous…
I will confess that I’m in the middlebrow minority that’s never read any of the Harry Potter books, or even seen the films (no prejudice, just haven’t gotten the round tuit, yet). But I’m quite looking forward to Casual Vacancy — it sounds less like Dorothy Sayers than Ruth Rendell or Minette Waters, both of whom I adore.
? Martin
The HP books really are quite enjoyable. I was surprised.
ShadeTail
The Harry Potter novels are rather inconsistent. They’re good, don’t get me wrong, but the quality tends to swing up and down. And even at their best, they’re pretty formulaic.
All that said, I definitely enjoyed them.
Alison
I’m looking forward to it, too, since I loved the HP books and also am something of an Anglophile who adores stories about the Brits and their classes and their tea carts and their snobbery and their willingness to talk about their snobbery.
I definitely suggest at least seeing the HP movies, AL – I mean, they’re not like, the greatest cinematic achievements ever or anything, but overall they’re very good adaptations and fun and for the vast majority the casts are excellent.
ETA: The books are certainly worth reading too, IMO. You can blaze through them fairly quickly, even though each one has lots more to it than its film counterpart, of course.
Shana
While I often read your posts I don’t remember whether you have mentioned whether or not you have kids. I’m guessing you don’t because you could not have NOT read the Potter books if you have kids. Mine, now in and out of college, loved them and hubby and I did too. You should read them when you have the time.
That said, I’m kind of looking forward to the new non-Potter book because she’s a pretty good plotter.
cathyx
I think the first 3 Harry Potter books were really good. By the fourth, Rowling got popular and remarried and started a new family, and the rest of the books weren’t as good.
Davis X. Machina
I just hope The Casual Vacancy is better than The Rural Juror.
Wumpus
She could buy Mitt Romney and use him as a coffee table.
Linda Featheringill
Anne! How could you be such a muggle?
I highly recommend the first one. It will give you a taste of the flavor, it’s one of the best ones of the bunch, and you’ll learn why you’re a muggle.
:-)
DougJ
Rowling in the deep would have been a good title here.
suzanne
Love the HP books. The sixth, which I won’t discuss in order to not spoil it for those that haven’t read it yet, is my favorite. Definitely will read this book. Rowling is a very compassionate person and it comes through in her writing, not in a treacly way, but in a way that feels very humane and genuine to me.
SatanicPanic
@cathyx: I liked the last two as much as the first two. The middle ones were boring.
jwb
@ShadeTail: I think she writes excellent characters and had a great setting in Hogwarts. I found the plotting, however, pedestrian. Overall, I still prefer them to Tolkien.
AHH onna Droid
The first book was good, if very, very derivative. I can see why they are appealing to kids, Goosebumps plus fantasy of escaping your parents. Rowling just goes overboard books 4, 5 and I had to quit. The movies are good though. Even had a nice slash pairing that JKR didn’t intend and passive aggressively had to kill. (Pissing off more than the slash fans bc of who she used as the beard.)
PeakVT
I probably won’t read her non-Potter books, but I am curious to see if she can write a decent real-world novel. The Potter books were entertaining, but I think a lot the series followed fairly naturally from the (very clever) premise of a secret, parallel, magical Britain. A clever premise will only take her so far in a non-genre work.
geg6
Well, I don’t care what any snobs have to say about Harry Potter or JK Rowling. I loved, loved, loved the Harry Potter books and I have loved Rowling based on every interview with her that I’ve seen or read and based on the messages and skill in writing in Harry Potter. I don’t have kids and I can’t imagine not reading these books. I’ve probably read them as many times as kids and people decades younger than me. I send my niece to a week long Harry Potter summer camp every year on my campus and it’s as much fun for me to see what she’s written for the Daily Howler or kicking ass as a seeker in the Quiddich Tournament or what she’s made in Potions class as she does participating. Harry Potter is a liberal hero, as is Ron and Hermione and pretty much every one of the good guys in the books. Read them. They’re a ripping good time.
I don’t read much fiction any more because I find so much of it awful and formulaic. I can be a bit of a snob about current fiction. The most interesting and entertaining fiction I’ve read in the last decade or so have almost all been by YA authors. The state of contemporary literary fiction for adults is awful. Just really bad stuff. Give me a great writer and I don’t give a shit what supposed niche audience he or she is supposedly targeting. A great story and characters, with some well integrated political or philosophical ideas, is so rare that we should all treasure it wherever it appears.
I look forward to the new book and a new path for Rowling. I hope she’s as good at this as she was with young adult novels. If she is, it will be a great read.
Bubblegum Tate
@Davis X. Machina:
I’m holding out for Urban Fervor.
jwb
@PeakVT: I really do think she writes excellent characters. I think the new book will depend on whether she forms another ensemble of good characters and can find a good situation to put them in. It’s unlikely to be great fiction, but I believe it will make for clever, enjoyable reading.
Face
And here I thought Harry Potter was an Italian florist.
Davis X. Machina
Because she now has more money than God, and studied the classics at Exeter, Ms. Rowling paid for translations of Philosopher’s Stone into Latin, and what is truly remarkable, ancient Greek.
The linguistic gymnastics required to get Privet Drive into the Greek of the Second Sophistic are truly breathtaking.
Steeplejack
This upcoming novel sounds like it could be in the Barbara Pym zone, which is not a bad thing at all.
Henry Bayer
I’ve always loved a reference to the lack of “tuits”, especially the circular ones, that keep us from our tertiary priorities. The Potter audio books are good.
suzanne
@geg6:
True dat, as, of course, is Rowling herself. She was on public assistance as a single mom while she wrote the first book. The rest, as they say, is history. And the fact that she very pointedly didn’t move her fortune out of the country after she made more money than God because she felt a sense of responsibility and gratitude to her society makes me wish that one of the current jackasses running for President had one iota of her character and compassion.
wrb
I liked the odd girl who wore a lion hat.
Harry shoulda got with her.
RedKitten
Good for Rowling. It’s nice to see that she still “gets it” when it comes to people who aren’t at the top. Plus, the HP books really WERE some ripping good yarns, and she did a fantastic job of creating characters and settings.
And if nothing else, I’ll forever adore her for creating Hermione, the bookish, independent, heroic character who should be required reading for every Twi-hard out there who thinks that Bella is worth anything other than derisive laughter.
SiubhanDuinne
I like Minette Walters very much, adore Ruth Rendell (also too, Robertson Davies), and pretty much worship Dorothy L. Sayers. Having said that, I’m struck by the setting:
Those who know Sayers’ Lord Peter Wimsey novels will recall that his honeymoon home/ country house, Talboys, is located near the town of Great Pagford.
Looking forward to reading the new Rowling. I hope pixels don’t weigh much, because I’m building up an e-book To Be Read stack that rivals the various dead-tree TBR piles cluttering my apartment.
wrb
Good, but nothing on The Wee Free Men.
Crivens
Tehanu
@SiubhanDuinne:
Yes, you beat me to this. I have been wondering if there’s any connection or if Rowling just picked the name out at random.
martha
@DougJ: Ah, Adele…another British woman who singlehandedly saved an industry…good one Mr. J…oh, and AL, love, love Minette Walters. Have you discovered Tana French?
geg6
That said (in #15), there are two contemporary novelists who are4 as good as anyone has ever been and who make all the rest of their contemporaries look like amateurs: Michael Chabon and Jeffrey Eugenides. I’d read them if they wrote the phone book.
Fun fact of my life…I had a linguistics class with Chabon when he was a student at Pitt. He was very quiet, was already writing, and the smartest guy in the class. Oh, and I was a pedestrian waaaaaaaaaaaay in the background in the scenes in Wonder Boys that were filmed in Beaver (Frances McDormand’s house).
Yutsano
@RedKitten: Not to mention Hermione’s “class” is considered lower in the wizarding world. Yet she excels and thrives at her craft despite that supposed setback.
SiubhanDuinne
@Tehanu:
I kind of vaguely remember hearing or reading somewhere that JKR is quite a fan of DLS. So it might be deliberate tribute, it might be unconscious mimicry, it might be sheerest coincidence. I must say, “Pagford” (and “Great Pagford,” “Paggleham,” the “River Pag,” etc.) all sound so quintessentially British that it’s kind of surprising they don’t actually exist!
Chris
@geg6:
Pro civil rights, feminist, anti racist, anti elitist, anti torture… I could go on at some length. Yeah, definitely a liberal hero. I appreciated that a lot.
pseudonymous in nc
I must admit that a) I’ve never read any Harry Potter; b) someone I know in the publishing business did (deservedly) very well out of the books, having decided to take on Rowling as a client with the first book, when nobody really knew what might happen next.
Mary G
I think you’d love the HP books, Anne Laurie. There is a bit of political (the idiots at the Ministry of Magic are always doing the exact wrong thing)and journalistic satire in them that I found hilarious.
geg6
@SiubhanDuinne:
Yes, she’s a fan. I would think the name Pagford is a tribute, IMHO.
Joy
I haven’t read/seen any either, so I am of the minority also. I am looking forward to this book simply because it wasn’t initially designed for a child. Not saying anything about the HP novels – both my daughter-in-law and granddaughter love them. I just haven’t had any interest…….
Hal
I bought the first Harry Potter on a whim, and loved it, so I went back and read through the rest of them, up to I think book 4 or 5, and then the rest when they came out.
I’m not a huge fan of the films, I just don’t think they captured the magic, no pun intended, of the books.
geg6
@Joy:
A prejudice you should overcome easily if you’d read the books.
? Martin
Yay! CA gets same-day voter registration starting Jan 2013. Suck it GOP. This won’t get overturned in the courts.
SiubhanDuinne
@geg6:
That’s nice. A little Easter egg for some of us :-)
Original Lee
@Wumpus: Where would you like your internet delivered?
geg6
@SiubhanDuinne:
Heh. Good luck finding me. I still can’t pick myself out because we’re so far in the background.
dogwood
As a retired teacher I can attest to the fact that Rowling created a generation of students who read more than the previous ones. I called the students I taught the last ten years of my career the Harry Potter Generation. Rowling did a good thing and should be admired.
jenn
I’m psyched! I loved the Potter books, even the long and wordy ones. And I too am a big Sayers fan. But I’m curious about the kiboshed slash pairing that Anna Droid mentioned…can you put enormous spoiler bars on it and spill?!
I loved most of the characters (tho not an enormous Ron fan), and adored Luna and Neville.
Mnemosyne
@Alison:
The adults in the films really are impeccably cast. I’m not sure if she had Alan Rickman in mind when she was writing Snape in the first book, but there’s a scene between Snape and Dumbledore in Half-Blood Prince with an important revelation that I’m absolutely convinced she wrote just so she could see Rickman play it on screen.
Also, I have to go against the majority and say that I actually think the books got better as the series went on and became more interesting and morally complex, especially Order of the Phoenix and Half-Blood Prince. I have a feeling Rowling kind of wished she could go back and retcon some of the ideas she came up with later in the series and insert them into the earlier books.
Scamp Dog
I loved the first few Harry Potter books, but the affection dropped off as they got longer and longer. I made myself read the last one, but (as others have noted), Rowling could have used an editor to tighten the last two or three up. That said, I’m looking forward to giving the new book a try.
I may take another run at studying Latin, now that I know there’s a Latin version of (at least) the first book.
ArchTeryx
@Mary G: It’s a really great illustration of how a cloistered bureaucracy is utterly, totally unable to deal with massive existential threats.
Fudge was the way he was because Voldemort’s return meant the end of his safe, cushy, feather-bedded existence. In that way, he’s not at all unlike most any other politician, British or American.
geg6
@Mnemosyne:
Agreed. Half-Blood Prince and Order of the Phoenix are my two favorites in the series, too. And I also agree that the books got better as it went on. I don’t understand, at all, why anyone would think the earlier ones are the best ones. They are the setups for the rest, meant to draw you in and establish the characters before all of the darker, more complex underlying themes of the later books come along. You understand why people act as they do and some are all the more heroic because you understand their motivations, their personal failures and character.
Culture of Truth
I read a lot of contemporary fiction and am usually disappointed, but I must say I was pleasantly surprised by the books when I finally got around to reading them, at the urging of a young person and an adult who was a fan.
I also think they got better later, and more complex.
Violet
@geg6:
Oh, my gosh. I love “Wonder Boys”. I got the soundtrack and was thrilled when Dylan won the Oscar for “Things Have Changed.” Still love that song.
geg6
@Violet:
FTR, Frodo is pretty much how I remember Chabon. Not the suicidal stuff (didn’t really know him, so who knows?), but the intense quiet very smart guy.
Cacti
@Alison:
My familiarity with the Potter franchise is strictly through the films. I’ve never cracked any of the books.
As cincematic works I found them decidedly “meh” and lost interest about halfway through the series.
gnomedad
@Henry Bayer:
Yes! If you’ve read the books and seen the movies, you’ll still want to listen to these. Jim Dale is amazing.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@geg6:
Me, too. The last book dragged a bit. And the film version of OOTP I found a little disappointing– the battle scenes could have been a little more dramatic and truer to the book, I thought, but I thought they handled them pretty well in the last movie. I think Maggie Smith went in to a meeting at some point and said, fuck this, I’ve been a good soldier, Minerva gets a fight scene in this last one (not a spoiler). I think as the series went on, Rowling sold MacGonagal and Ron a little short.
Brachiator
@Mnemosyne:
There was a cartoon somewhere that showed the characters from the book vs the characters from the movies. Harry, Hermione and Ron all looked more scraggly than their Hollywood glam counterparts.
The book and Hollywood versions of Snape both looked like Alan Rickman.
ETA: I also liked how the Potter books were discovered and championed by kids before adults shoehorned in on the action. I also liked how the books, and the Internet, changed the old publishing model. Originally, the US versions were to be published after the UK versions. But kids are impatient and parents started ordering online directly from the UK vendors. Ultimately, the publishers moved to simultaneous US and UK release schedules. Muggles rock.
The Dangerman
OT: So, it was Green Bay, a team without a traditional owner, that got massively fucked by the replacements.
Wow.
ETA: There will be regular refs by the weekend.
Alison
@Cacti: Well, sure, no movie is going to appeal to everyone. I often can’t stand the movies that most people rave about. To each their own, and all that :P
Brachiator
@DougJ:
Ha! Good one.
The Dangerman
If I’m reading the line right, GB was -3.5, so Vegas just went ballistic.
Spaghetti Lee
@The Dangerman:
How do those numbers work anyway? (I lead a sheltered life.) If a team is ‘-3.5’ does that mean they’re favored to win by more than 3.5 points?
Also, while I’m rooting for anything that gets the real refs back, I can’t bring myself to feel sorry for the Packers.
suzanne
Irony: JC loses his shit when a football thread gets derailed, but is OK when threads on other topics get derailed….to football.
Origuy
The BBC genealogy show Who Do You Think You Are did an episode on Rowling. You can find it on Youtube. She explored her mother’s French ancestry.
peggy
I’m curious as to how Rowling will deal with adult sexual emotions. In the last HP- Deathly Hallows- Ron and Hermione are on the run in a tent (with Harry) for months without sex.
Perhaps Rowling’s publishers prevented her from depicting standard teenage behavior, but it leaves one with a safe for under 13 flavor. It will be interesting to see if her characters can grow up.
PurpleGirl
I’ve read the whole Potter series and liked it. I’ve seen most of the movies and liked them. I like Rowling and how she has maintained her liberal views — I’ve read an essay or two by her about class and politics, being poor, etc. I love her for those words. I’ll look for the new book.
Nick
@Mnemosyne: I still think they didn’t get it quite right with either of the Dumbledores. And I think Richard E Grant would’ve been a better Lupin.
Amir Khalid
Damn. FYWP eated two of my comments.
piratedan
from what I understand, Rowling indicated that the books are written in the “voice” of the age range of the characters. More simplistic at the beginning and they grow with the characters into more complex entities as they discover that life isn’t simple and not everything is as it seems.
BenA
I read the first couple because my daughter did… I think the setting is pretty good. The constant reliance on “deus ex machina” just drove me up a wall… I know it’s a weakness of the genre.. but there’s always some sort of random intervention out of now where that saves everyone… that and the fact that Quidditch makes no fucking sense.
Don’t get me wrong I’m not being snobby.. I read zombie books for christ sakes… I think there’s some extraordinarily clever things going on and I think the setting is great.. and I love Rowling’s politics.
Cassidy
Personally, I haven’t read them and haven’t had interest. I love fantasy, but this isn’t the kind of fantasy that really grabs my attention; I don’t like magic-centric fantasy. My oldest read them and loves them and I’m glad they were there for her to read.