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Masterarbeit / Master's Thesis MASTERARBEIT / MASTER’S THESIS Titel der Masterarbeit / Title of the Master‘s Thesis „Apparating from anonymity to fame: the celebrity and in- fluence of J.K.Rowling“ verfasst von / submitted by Julia Ribiczey, BA angestrebter akademischer Grad / in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts (MA) Wien, 2020 / Vienna 2020 Studienkennzahl lt. Studienblatt / UA 066 844 degree programme code as it appears on the student record sheet: Studienrichtung lt. Studienblatt / Master’s degree programme Anglophone Literatures and degree programme as it appears on Cultures the student record sheet: Univ.-Prof. Mag. Dr. phil. habil. Nadja Gernalczik Betreut von / Supervisor: Table of Contents I. Introduction ............................................................................................................................................... 4 II. Literature overview .................................................................................................................................. 9 III. Theory and method ............................................................................................................................... 12 1. Actor-Network Theory .................................................................................................................... 12 2. Concerning apparatus ...................................................................................................................... 14 3. Celebrity studies .............................................................................................................................. 16 3.1. Defining contemporary celebrity ............................................................................................ 17 3.2. To be seen: importance of origin and media ........................................................................... 21 3.3. Audience and the celebrity ...................................................................................................... 25 3.4. The parasocial relationship ..................................................................................................... 28 3.5. Literary celebrity in the twenty-first century .......................................................................... 35 IV. Not a waste of space: Rowling, the celebrity ........................................................................................ 40 1. Introducing J.K. Rowling ............................................................................................................ 40 1.1. From Rags to Riches: Background ......................................................................................... 40 1.2. Rise to fame ............................................................................................................................ 42 1.3. An inescapable audience: fandom ........................................................................................... 51 1.4. Sacred, unparalleled, but ultimately disappointing: life and status after Harry Potter ........... 54 2. Media (re)presentation .................................................................................................................... 58 2.1. Interviews with the author ....................................................................................................... 59 2.2. The battleground of Twitter .................................................................................................... 65 3. Closer but distanced: relationship with the audience ...................................................................... 77 4. Celebrity apparatus ......................................................................................................................... 82 4.1. Emotional apparatus ................................................................................................................ 83 4.2. Celebrity capital ...................................................................................................................... 85 5. The Network of J.K. Rowling ......................................................................................................... 87 V. Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................. 89 VI. References............................................................................................................................................. 92 Index ......................................................................................................................................................... 101 Abstrakt ..................................................................................................................................................... 102 2 3 I. Introduction J. K. Rowling captured many hearts and minds with her stories. She unleashed a worldwide mania-turned-phenomenon when Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone was first published, in 1997. From that time onwards, J.K. Rowling rapidly acquired a unique, celebrity-status: she became a trans-medial celebrity initially due to the success of her series which was then followed by her control over her brands, and to an extensive, consciously controlled presence in the media. Throughout the years the established celebrity persona began to be attributed with notoriety which resulted in a reformation of her status as celebrity. There are few people in Western communities who have not heard of J.K. Rowling. Even if the author's persona remains a mystery to them, there is probably a vague connection between the name and the enormous success of the Harry Potter series – which, because it has been translated to more than 60 languages, also acquired a fame of worldwide notice. Since the release of the books and especially since the release of the movie adaptations, she and her fame began to be talked about almost simultaneously. As Daniel Boorstin noted in 1961, a celebrity is someone who is famous for being famous. Rowling's rapid rise to fame is such a well-known fact that it also increased this fame to an extent. Gradually, the talk began to focus on her astonishingly quick rise to fame, and later on her statements that did not concern the wizarding world of her successful series anymore. But who is J.K. Rowling? There is no annotated and authorized biography of hers so far, thus we, the public, may only know as much as there is on her website's About page – although there is an abundance of unauthorized biographies. The curious may find a not unusual type of biography on her website that tells them only a bit more of her background, than any sleeve: The English-born Joanne Rowling was always fond of reading and writing. While attempting to give 4 a scientific account of her success, McGreevy says in his article that there was a definite, though not deliberate preparation in the early stages of her life towards a creative career she follows now. (McGreevy, 35) After seven books, eight movies, and an uncountable amount of paraphernalia, the series that launched her career had been drawing to a close. Nevertheless, the fame of Rowling did not seem to falter. One would attribute this possibly solely to the quality and influence of the Harry Potter series; however, there is more to the status than meets the eye. In the first part of the thesis, I offer an overview of the definition for what makes someone a celebrity today, and explain how and why the definition should be updated to be applicable to contemporary celebrities. Celebrity studies is a relatively new field or research, and as far as I can assess, an ever-changing one, providing new viewpoints and techniques to examine the phenomenon of the celebrity and the culture surrounding it. Thus I do not seek to contrive a brand new definition, but rather to explain the differences between already existing ones. The aim is to amend them several viewpoints that are valid in contemporary celebrity culture, and by applying slight changes, define what celebrity means in the case of J.K. Rowling. Rowling became a layered, and trans medial celebrity, in several senses. On one hand, she started out as a literary celebrity but quickly became a media celebrity as well. Especially after the publication of the final part of the series, the amount of articles, interviews and appearances have increased. On the other hand, she herself remained very active in her celebrity status. She is an active Twitter user, never denying her opinionated nature on current affairs. There is probably an even more curious phenomenon to be explored: she refuses to let go of her authority over the world she created, and in Pamela Ingleton's words, she “refuses to die” (Ingleton 177) possibly partially because of a worry that if she were to let go, the world built 5 with ardent work would fade too. She always finds something else to reveal about it, something consumable to create, intending to keep the interest alive around her first famous work and also around her fame, while also aiming to gain more profit. Based on her method of continuous revelations, Rowling believes herself as the author to be the sole source of canonical information, and thusly fans need to turn to her for information. However, as it is going to be discussed, audience, and especially fandom, is not to be ignored. With the application of Actor-Network theory, the following chapters will map out the connections between aspects that constitute the mechanism that
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