It shouldn’t be a surprise that the Estevan Public Library has been a place for Harry Potter fans to gather for some time.
After all, the tales of the boy wizard and his friends – and their battles with the villain Voldemort – will go down as one of the most popular novel series of all time.
The library currently has a Teen Harry Potter Club, where teenagers can gather to discuss all things regarding the series while participating in crafts. Adults have been clamouring for their own Harry Potter Club for some time, and their wish will soon be granted.
“The generation of people who grew up with Harry Potter are now adults, so it’s fitting there would be an adult club and a teen club,” library adult program coordinator Victoria Utman told the Mercury.
Now the library is preparing to launch a Harry Potter Alliance, which will be for teens and adults in the community to come together. There will be an information session on Thursday, September 24, with details on the alliance, the existing teen club and the new adult club.
“The Harry Potter Alliance is an international club,” teen program coordinator Jolie Walliser told the Mercury. “It has a focus on activism, volunteering and literacy, all through fandom.”
It also teaches people why it’s important to stand up for their beliefs, and promotes such issues as gender equality, marriage equality and homelessness. The alliance will also incorporate Harry Potter into current affairs.
They will also delve into the literary value of the Harry Potter series, and the impact the novels and movies have had on society. It’s expected to be a lot of fun for the members.
Harry Potter Alliances have contributed to their community by purchasing books for those who can’t afford them.
“I think the older members will kind of act as mentors … for the younger kids,” said Walliser.
The first alliance meeting will also serve as the September meeting for the teen and adult clubs. From there, Utman said the teen and adult clubs will have separate meetings on the same day at the library, and then come together for the alliance session.
“We’re trying to organize it so that Harry Potter is happening one night a month,” said Utman.
It will be the first Harry Potter Alliance in Saskatchewan – a distinction that Walliser said they’re very proud of. There are a few alliances in Canada.
“They’re not all in libraries,” she said. “Some people do it as their own group of friends. Some people have it in classrooms. Some people have it in libraries. Some people have it as boys’ and girls’ groups in bigger cities, or as mentorship programs.”
They believe having the clubs and the alliance on the same night will make it more convenient for the members.
Walliser and Utman are both Harry Potter fans, so they’re excited to bring an alliance to Estevan.
“I was a kid when Harry Potter was published, so I grew up reading Harry Potter,” said Utman. “I waited every year for the next book to come out. So I’m a huge fan, and Harry Potter and I were the same age, so that was really cool for me.”
In an effort to promote the club, the library will be offering a quidditch tournament on Saturday, August 29 at the Dana Quewezance Memorial Field at Woodlawn Regional Park. Quidditch is the game that was created in and popularized through the book, and while participants in the library’s tournament won’t be flying, they will be running on the ground on brooms, and there will be unique takes on the game, which is now played at colleges and other venues across North America.
Quidditch is a combination of rugby, basketball and tag. Utman said participants will be asked to sign a waiver, but they’ll be discouraging tackling and other formers of contact to make the tournament as safe as possible. But Utman wouldn’t rule out the possibility of contact.
The object is to get the quidditch ball into a hoop.
“You have people protecting the hoops, you have defenders and forwards, and then there’s the snitch,” said Walliser. “If you catch the snitch, you win the game.”
The snitch runs around the field, and is allowed to run out of bounds to escape pursuers.
People will be registering as individuals, and then the library will form the teams, each of which will have eight people. Walliser said they already have some people signed up.
Walliser noted that it was during their research for prizes for the quidditch tournament that they found out about Harry Potter alliances.
“We read about it, and we contacted them, because we liked what we were seeing, all the good things they were doing, the difference they were making in the community, in the teens’ lives and the adults’ lives,” said Walliser. “We thought that would be a great thing to have here, since we already have such a huge Harry Potter fan base here.”
The tournament will also serve as a fundraiser, as half the proceeds will be directed towards helping the victims of the forest fires in northern Saskatchewan.
