The Future Of The Harry Potter Franchise

I have made no secret of the fact that I am an avid Harry Potter fan. I consider the series a modern epic in the same sense that Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, Valmiki’s Ramayana, or Vyasa’s Mahabharata are epics. And, aided by modern rich media consumption channels, the Harry Potter films, merchandise, games, and websites have already built a $15 billion global franchise around this marvelous literary phenomenon that British author J. K. Rowling gave birth to. It has transformed children’s reading habits and their scope of imagination. And it has launched perfectly rational adults into flights of fancy that were perhaps inconceivable once upon a time.

But the books have all been written and the films have been released. As much as we may long for new adventures, the story told in the two dominating forces of the series has come to an end. There will no longer be the excitement of rushing to the bookstore or preordering books on Amazon. There will no longer be the queuing up in front of movie theaters for an opening-night viewing. Hence, this question: What is the future of the Harry Potter franchise?

J.K. Rowling is 46 and immensely wealthy. She also seems to have a rather solid moral compass. Over the years, her business sense has gotten better, and she has succeeded in maintaining tight control over her franchise and what happens to it. So, what does she see when she looks out into the future?

What I see, when I look out into her future, is an enormous opportunity to make an impact, but not in the traditional sense of donating large sums of money to various charities and trying to end poverty in the world. That method, I’m afraid, does not leverage her gifts, her unfair advantages, or her unique selling points.

No. J.K. Rowling should teach the world’s children to write.

Throughout the world, using the Internet as her primary platform, she should harness the tremendous passion her fiction inspires and will continue to inspire for generations to come – and teach children to use the language in beautiful, sophisticated, powerful, funny, inspiring, creative, and colorful ways. Weaving in the basics of grammar, vocabulary, and idiom, Rowling’s brand of magical edutainment should infiltrate every classroom from primary through secondary school, such that by the time children grow up to become young adults, each would have command over the English language and the ability to communicate their thoughts in writing, and concerns over literacy should forever become history. In the process, these children would have experienced the process of creating their own stories, characters, settings, and situations.

From the business angle, she needs to create a deeply thought-through set of online educational content, software, and games – collectively known as edutainment products – that students can access and engage with and teachers can teach with. Precisely what form those products take is up to Rowling to imagine. Perhaps co-imagine with other practitioners of the other creative forms – online gaming, software – such that in the domain of teaching children English, a definitive step forward can be taken.

You see, I have benefited tremendously from my ability to write, to bend language to do my bidding, and to influence a larger world through my ideas, which I have been able to communicate in powerful, persuasive ways. I thus have great respect for the ability to write well.

It is, however, a rare ability. And having a gift isn’t sufficient; writing is an ability that needs to be cultivated.

My hypothesis is that J.K. Rowling sits in a position from where she can encourage many generations of children to immerse themselves in that process of cultivation. She can create the excitement around the Potter phenomenon such that they may write new chapters in Harry’s history, or invent new schools of witchcraft and wizardry in places like China or Brazil. Some of their stories would be published on J.K. Rowling’s Pottermore website, and perhaps there would be prizes attached to such privilege. English teachers worldwide would use Rowling’s magical teaching aids, content, and software to infuse fun and joy into their classrooms.

And when they grow up, these children, nourished on magic, would weave their own magic on the world.