Forbes Magazine announced its “Super Celebrity” list and, sure enough, Ms. Rowling is on it. She even made the top half of the list at #48 and, remember, this was in an “off year,” 2006, when she didn’t release a movie or publish a book. I think she has a very good shot at topping the poll next year, if she can make the $300 million it will take to displace Oprah Winfrey. 2007 promises to be very lucrative for our favorite blonde mother, author, and billionaire! Beat Oprah!
Even more fun is checking out where the Harry Potter writer finished compared to other authors. There are five on the list: Dan Brown, John Grisham, Rhonda Byrne, and Mitch Albom. Why Deepak Chopra wasn’t listed as an author, I don’t know, but he’s listed, too, at #82 (#2 on the “Self-Help/Pitchmen” list). [By the way, am I totally alone in not knowing who Ms. Byrne and Mr. Albom are?]
Even more mysterious, Rupert didn’t make the list but Daniel Radcliffe and Emma Watson did, at #79 and #97, respectively. Wassup with that? Maybe the Forbes folks are Harry/Hermione ‘shippers? How delusional is that? Look at how low they scaled other “kid stars.” Only Big Dan made the top 90.
But if you’re looking for injustice and wrongs that need to be righted, how about Ms. Rowling and all the Harry Potter stars being totally left off the OK! magazine’s list of “most influential” celebrities. There are six categories in which Ms. Rowling could have been chosen — beauty queens, style setters, entertainers, newsmakers, survivors and body shapers — but she didn’t make the cut in any. Being the best selling author of our times, I guess, just isn’t okay enough for OK! magazine.
Are you asking yourself, “Has John lost his mind? I don’t come to HogPro for this kind of trash; where is the ‘Harry and the Aeneid’ essay he promised?” If so, be calm, the more boring things like comparative literature notes are coming. I received a complaint yesterday that HogPro never had anything interesting on it about Ms. Rowling or the movies (and we don’t do enough fandom links). I figure this post should keep me on the plus side in those categories for a month. Just being responsive to positive criticism!
Tomorrow, though, more stupid stuff on Homer, Virgil, and Dante for you librarian types.
Mitch Abolm is the author of a very fiction book “Tuesday’s with Morrie” and “The Five People you meet in Heaven”. What a fake!!! He led everyone along like his first book was real, and it was fiction. How lame. Go Rowling!!!!!!!!!
If it’s any comfort, John, Alan Rickman made Entertainment Weekly’s July 6 issue, 100 Stars We Love Right Now. He was #4 (although the listings weren’t in order. He was termed Most Valuable Player, page 40, for his performance in OotP.
The text calls him “the icy, humorless magic instructor” and “Rickman may not be on screen long–but he owns every minute. He’s magnificently intimidating…turning a simple retort (“no idea”) into a mini-symphony of contempt.’
Oops, kitties in the catnip again, got to get them off the ceiling!
Rhonda Byrne is the author of “the Secret” DVD and book released last year. “the Secret” is a new age self-help quasi-religious genre-breaker in that it boasts that specific historical figures knew the Secret, which is basically the Law of Attraction: absolute belief in a “friendly universe” and maintaining postive thinking at all times will bring good things to the believer, including good health and great wealth.
The Secret is not unlike Ron Wealey’s belief that having drunk of Felix be became lucky (when in fact he had not drunk felix at all, Harry tricked him) it’s all about the attitude.
I don’t believe The Secret and Ron’s felix experience follow. Ron was deceived into believing he’d been given it. He didn’t choose to originate the idea he was lucky (positive thinking).
Whereas The Secret appears to be prosperity theology wrapped up for a secular audience, promising good if one “thinks right,” blaming those without “the correct attitude” for poor health and problems out of their control. Such Pharisaical thinking infuriated Jesus and is far from what he taught.
When Ron subsequently played Quidditch without the felix deception, he again had difficulties.
Oh dear! The kitties are trying to snag the chocolate truffles….
I remember hearing that J. Rowling “visualized instant fame and fortune” for her books; if so, she’s a poster child for The Secret. I haven’t read Byrne’s book, but lots of the teachers on her DVD are very cool and worth checking out. These all say that attitude alone doesn’t do it–you have to get in action and do the work, just as Jo planned and wrote these wonderful books.
This is my first post and I have to mention how much I enjoyed the Five Keys. Thanks John.
John,
Mitch Albom is one of my all time favorite writers. When I lived back in Michigan I wouldn’t miss reading one of his columns, even though I generally don’t make it a point to read the sports page.
That’s because his writing is so compelling.
From his online bio at the Detroit Free Press:
“Albom has won the Associated Press Sports Editors national column-writing contest 13 times. He is the only columnist to win the award, the highest in sports journalism, more than once.”
Albom is a workaholic.
He not only writes a regular column, he’s written nine books, several plays, and does a radio talk show for WJR.
And I must defend Mitch against the accusation made by “Rumor.” The book “Tuesdays with Morrie” was not fiction. It was his way to remember the life lessons that his favorite college professor taught him as he was dying of ALS.
Morrie Schwartz had been a guest on Ted Koppel’s “Nightline” and Mitch happened to come across that broadcast and was shocked to see his old professor. It was the trigger for Mitch to reconnect with Morrie.
Ted Koppel will never forget Morrie either, and on his last broadcast of “Nightline” he re-aired the interviews with Morrie. http://tinyurl.com/2gn3vv
I will read just about anything that Mitch Albom has written. The notable exception is his book about Bo Schembechler. Being a Michigan State partisan, I do not genuflect at the altar of Schembechler.
I would also say that the book “The Five People You Meet in Heaven” is probably the most elegant novel I have ever read. It has no extraneous anything. It is a short novel, only 224 pages, but it is exactly as long as it needs to be to tell the story.
Linda