Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling

Bookshops everywhere RRP £17.99

This book is the predictable, yet gripping finale to a series of seven books, that have increasingly held much of the world enthralled. As would be expected in a story about a boy wizard, and a lot of dark magic, there have been some bad reactions to it from strongly religious communities, but despite that, Harry Potter is number nine on the list of bestselling books of all time.

Surprisingly, if you consider how some religions have reacted to it, the book opens with two quotes, one of which jumped out at me as a William Penn quote. None other than our very own Quaker William Penn.

This led me to considering how early Quakers would have reacted to Harry Potter, my theory being that they wouldn't have joined the death-eaters, negative characters with strong 'racist' influence, but would instead have tried to minimize the violence by attempting to protect Harry and his friends.

The book can in fact be drawn parallel with the times of earlier Quakers, with slavery, witch-hunts and outright murder. Quakers did their best to protect from these torrents of evil. In fact with a stretch of imagination, we could become the persecuted, as many religious groups can claim. So how would we, as Quakers, react to these situations today? Would we be strong enough as a group to try and protect the remnants of good, or would we fall by the wayside?

I ask myself.

Eye is grateful to Miranda Chadkirk for this review.

Labels: harry potter, william penn