Harry Potter’s wizarding world resembles Adolf Hitler’s Nazi Germany, says boff
A German boffin has claimed the Harry Potter books and films bear a disturbing resemblance to the Third Reich.
Jannina Schäffer argued that the wizarding world’s political and legal systems are uncannily similar to those under Adolf Hitler even before evil lord Voldermort seizes control. Her mammoth 549-page thesis has sparked debate but also been dismissed as lightweight tosh.
Critics said it makes light of the Fuhrer’s Nazi regime by comparing it to a fictional world of animated chocolate frogs and talking paintings. But legal tutor Schäffer, 32, has penned a doctoral study entitled Harry Potter and the Laws of Power and said she is serious about her theory.
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Defending it, she explained: “I think it’s unbelievably important to recognise that we in Germany might be better secured against this kind of seizure of power today, but we are not completely safe either.
“The rise of the AfD [Alternative for Germany] party is really scary. We are very worried that another Nazi party could come to power. “I think the Harry Potter books are a wonderful warning.”
Schäffer said she is a diehard Harry Potter fan from southern Germany who was casting around for a PhD subject at Cologne University and hit upon JK Rowling’s novels. When she began studying law she became interested in the more sinister and adult side of the series.
(Image: The LIFE Picture Collection via)
She continued: “The beautiful thing about Harry Potter is that as the books go on the subject matter keeps developing and growing darker. “They contain an incredible number of legal issues.”
Schäffer reckons that rather than English law, the books had more in common with Germany between 1933 and 1945.
She added: “Lord Voldemort found the political structures for his regime of terror were already present with the bundling of powers in the hands of the minister for magic, whereas Hitler had to create this structure for himself.”
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