Where’s JK Tolkien with The Lord of the Rings? Where’s JK Rowling with Harry Potter† The lack of ‘the king and queen of the fantasy genre’ on the Queen Elizabeth’s platinum jubilee book list has caused amazement. Rowling’s absence, in particular, came as a shock because she has made many children—and adults—read with Harry Potter.
For The Big Jubilee Read citizens from all corners of the Commonwealth were given the opportunity to suggest books. The resulting long list of 152 books has been reduced to 70, the number of years Elizabeth reigns, by a committee of librarians, booksellers and literature experts. Ultimately, 27 countries are represented on the list, including Great Britain with 14 books. The organization is in the hands of the BBC and The Reading Agency.
There are classics on it, such as The God of Small Things from Arundhati Roy, A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess, Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel, The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro, The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje, disgrace by JM Coetzee and Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie. According to Debbie Hicks of The Reading Agency, whose mission is to get young people to read more, these are audience favorites.
That makes the lack of Rowling’s sorcerer’s apprentice even more curious. Opposite The Guardian Susheila Nasta, professor of modern literature, acknowledged that there has been considerable discussion within the committee about Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. Ultimately, the verdict was that it is mainly a children’s book and that better books were written in the 1990s, such as The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields.
Nasta stressed that the accusation that Rowling is transphobic has not played a part. Since she said two years ago that “people who menstruate” can also simply be called women, the 56-year-old author has been the target of protests. Her comment would suggest that she does not consider trans women to be women. Recently, a transgender author even wrote a fantasy book in which Rowling dies by fire.
In The Daily Telegraph columnist Allison Pearson, a former English teacher, suggested sending an alternative list to the palace “for people who prefer fantasy books to sermons on postcolonial guilt.” By the way, Rowling is in good company. Evelyn Waugh, Graham Greene, Martin Amis, Julian Barnes, Jonathan Coe, Philip Larkin, Jim Ballard, CS Lewis, Ian McEwan and Arthur C. Clarke have also been passed.
It will be a disappointment to the jubilee queen that Dick Francis is not on it. This former jockey’s ‘horse books’ are well stocked in Buckingham Palace.