Q: Nicholas Lezard has written ‘Rowling can type,
but Le Guin can write.’ What do you make of this comment in the light of
the phenomenal success of the Potter books? I’d like to hear your
opinion of JK Rowling’s writing styleUKL: I have no great opinion of it. When so many
adult critics were carrying on about the “incredible originality” of the
first Harry Potter book, I read it to find out what the fuss was about,
and remained somewhat puzzled; it seemed a lively kid’s fantasy crossed
with a “school novel”, good fare for its age group, but stylistically
ordinary, imaginatively derivative, and ethically rather mean-spirited.