Fan art by Zaionczyk at DeviantArt.com
As a
kid in the 80’s, I loved watching the made-for-TV movie The Worst Witch, starring Fairuza Balk, Charlotte Rae and Tim Curry
on HBO. It was a Halloween classic. I had some of the songs replaying in my
head all the way into my adulthood (especially Tim Curry’s epic Halloween song)—so
much so that I watched some of the movie on You Tube the other day and never
realized until then just how similar Harry Potter was to it. I can’t believe I
didn’t realize it before. The similarities are too close not to be noticed.
Now,
to those of you who may not be familiar with the The Worst Witch series of books by British author Jill Murphy, the
first book was published in 1974, with sequels following in the 80’s, 90’s and
early 2000’s. So, obviously, The Worst
Witch was published way before J.K. Rowling ever conceived the idea of
Harry Potter. Besides the film that was released in 1986, there was a British
television series that ran from 1998 to 2001.
I
knew I couldn’t have been the only one to notice the similarities between Harry Potter and The Worst Witch, so I “googled” it and found some links that go
into more detail on the similarities (see them below). Now, a lot of people use
words like “rip-off” and “plagiarism”, but I don’t know if I would go that far.
I love the Harry Potter series and
there are things in the series that are crazy similar to the The Worst Witch, but J.K. Rowling
still made Harry Potter a story and world in and of itself, despite the
similarities. The only thing that kind of bothers me is that Rowling never
mentioned any inspiration from Jill Murphy’s books or the The Worst Witch film in any interview. She had to have been
influenced by Murphy’s creation. Either she just doesn’t want to admit it, or
she just forgot, or it’s just a coincidence. You be the judge.
Below
are some thoughts on this topic throughout the web:
Many critics have noted that Jill
Murphy's The Worst Witch series
(first published in 1974 by Allison
& Busby), is set in a school for girls,
"Miss Cackle's Academy for Witches", reminiscent of Hogwarts. The story concerns an awkward pupil at
a boarding-school for witches, who faces a scheming rival student. Her
professors include a kindly and elderly headmistress and a bullying,
raven-haired potions teacher. Murphy
has commented on her frustration at constant comparisons between her work and Harry
Potter: "It's irritating … everyone asks the same
question and I even get children writing to ask me whether I mind about the
Hogwarts school of witchcraft and pointing out similarities. Even worse are
reviewers who come across my books, or see the TV series, and, without taking
the trouble to find out that it's now over quarter of a century since I wrote
my first book, make pointed remarks about 'clever timing' – or say things like
'the Worst Witch stories are not a million miles from J K Rowling's books'. The
implications are really quite insulting!"
* Charles Webb at MTV.com states:
“If you squint a little, you can see a little bit of The Worst Witch making its way into J.K. Rowling's work, with the same emphasis on a parallel world of magical whimsy with its own rules of reality. I'm not saying there any kind of lift here between the two authors' work--in fact, Rowling was more concerned about her characters growing up and maturing in school than Murphy was in her own work. Not better, not worse--just different focuses.”
“If you squint a little, you can see a little bit of The Worst Witch making its way into J.K. Rowling's work, with the same emphasis on a parallel world of magical whimsy with its own rules of reality. I'm not saying there any kind of lift here between the two authors' work--in fact, Rowling was more concerned about her characters growing up and maturing in school than Murphy was in her own work. Not better, not worse--just different focuses.”
In
this precursor to the Potter books, a young girl from a Mugg – uh – non-magical
family attends a boarding school for witches. Which is in an ancient castle
surrounded by an enchanted forest. While Mildred Hubble is enrolled at Miss
Cackle's Academy for Witches, where she attends Potions, Broomstick Flying,
Chants and Charms classes, she must deal with conflicts with her classmates, a
cursed broom, and an attempt to overthrow the school. Also, Mildred and her
friends make an invisibility potion. Here's an old Geocities page listing more similarities, including
the fact that there's a mean teacher who hates the main character, and a
popular blond kid who gets off on the wrong foot with the hero on the very
first day.
* From a forum at MythicScribes.com:
Is
there a Case? The
series of Worst Witch books skews younger and tends to the lighter side of
magic than the Harry Potter books. Many of the similarities are of the
superficial, non-copyrightable type, though Murphy got there first.
I am sure that Jill
Murphy's The Worst Witch is actually the roots of Harry Potter, even though J.K. Rowling has never admitted
that. There are simply too many similarities between both worlds for it to be a
coincidence, and if Murphy never sued I guess that it's because she did not
want to suffer all the hassle.
Just consider these unusual coincidences:
1- Miss Cackle's Academy for Witches is a lonely castle, surrounded by forest.
2- The castle is invisible to non-magical people.
3- There is a village nearby the castle.
4- The forest is forbidden to the students.
5- Mildred Hubble comes from a non-magical background.
6- Mildred has two best friends, Maud and Enid.
7- Mildred has a cat.
8- Miss Hardbroom (scary potions teacher) hates Mildred.
9- Elitist fellow student from an elitist family of Witches hates Mildred.
10- Benevolent, warm-hearted Headmistress loves and helps Mildred.
11- The first year students take special lessons to learn to fly with broomsticks.
12- Miss Cackle's Academy was founded by a witch called Hermione Cackle.
All of these sound familiar, right? There are other similarities, these are just a few!!
Now, if Harry Potter had come first then everyone would scream that The Worst Witch is a Harry Potter rip-off, but in fact the first Mildred Hubble book was written back in 1974... J.K. Rowling is a wonderful writer and a superb storyteller and there are also many differences between WW and HP, but I think that all HP fans (myself included) should accept that WW is actually the roots.
* The
fan art by Zaionczyk on DeviantArt.com is a fun comparison which illustrates the
similarities. A portion of the artwork is shown above for this post, but you
can see the whole thing here.
* Lastly,
below is a video that someone posted on a Worst Witch fan channel on You Tube…
Just consider these unusual coincidences:
1- Miss Cackle's Academy for Witches is a lonely castle, surrounded by forest.
2- The castle is invisible to non-magical people.
3- There is a village nearby the castle.
4- The forest is forbidden to the students.
5- Mildred Hubble comes from a non-magical background.
6- Mildred has two best friends, Maud and Enid.
7- Mildred has a cat.
8- Miss Hardbroom (scary potions teacher) hates Mildred.
9- Elitist fellow student from an elitist family of Witches hates Mildred.
10- Benevolent, warm-hearted Headmistress loves and helps Mildred.
11- The first year students take special lessons to learn to fly with broomsticks.
12- Miss Cackle's Academy was founded by a witch called Hermione Cackle.
All of these sound familiar, right? There are other similarities, these are just a few!!
Now, if Harry Potter had come first then everyone would scream that The Worst Witch is a Harry Potter rip-off, but in fact the first Mildred Hubble book was written back in 1974... J.K. Rowling is a wonderful writer and a superb storyteller and there are also many differences between WW and HP, but I think that all HP fans (myself included) should accept that WW is actually the roots.
