Sales Figures Beyond My Comprehension

While Harry Potter never says it in J. K. Rowling's books, Expecto Pecuniarius should be his most famous spell.

Harry, as we know, hasn't had to cast a money fetching spell, not since he learned he was a wizard, for he has stacks of gold coins in Gringotts Bank.

Jo, as we know, knows what it's like to need money. But not any more, having written deposit slips out this pas year for $300,000,000.* That's just this year. Numbers that high are beyond my comprehension, rather like hearing there are more stars in the sky than there are grains of dand on the beach.

The average American salary is purportedly $48,000 though, in my small town, very few people make that much. But if everyone in town made $48,000, my town's income would be about what Rowling made all by herself. Of course, if you're selling 625,000 copies of your last book every hour, you expect the dollars to add up without having to wave a wand or shout Expecto Pecuniarius.

Most authors would be happy to sell 625,000 copies of a book in their lifetime, so--suffice it to say--hearing that Rowling's "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" sells 15,000,000 copes per day brings us right back around to numbers so large they don't have any practical meaning to every day folks.

How many everyday authors does it take to reach 15,000,000 copies sold in one year, much less a day? I would like to sell that many copies of my next novel. Yet, I'm concerned about having to bank $300 million. I can't even imagine what it would be like to bank one million. Since I can't imagine that, I'll probably never find out.

And that's a good thing, for $300 million would change me in ways that are also beyond my comprehension.

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*These figures come from the Forbes Magazine article "The World's Best Paid Authors."

(Posted in my Writer's Notebook.)

Malcolm, are you considering contributing to the bank bailout?

I've never read a Potter book. Are they really that good?

I've read the first four Harry Potter books. They're good, but they're not that much better than other works of fiction. I think one of the major reasons why they sell so many copies is marketing. In my personal opinion, Harry Potter is good, but Lord of the Rings is better.

Abe F. March wrote:

Malcolm, are you considering contributing to the bank bailout?

Good post, Abe.
The $700bn bailout was probably itself a non-linear distortion on top of an already distorted economic framework. The numbers that Malcolm is referring to are literally *astronomical*. The same kind of baffling thoughts that one gets in gauging literature economics are also to be found in cosmology. Only difference is, in the case of the latter, it's intellectual and no wealth actually changes hands, just some egos get inflated above others. The universe is 15 billion years old (how old is that exactly? )

Abe, if I hadn't seen the Forbes article about the authors making the most money, I might have used that bailout as an example of a number beyond my comprehension.

I also could have used the age of the universe, though I think that age appears to be consistent with Rowling's earnings.

I liked the Potter books and think that their success--a true "Black Swan" kind of thing--can't really be view logically. The thing just took off. Marketing helped, but it was more of a viral event.

Malcolm

These figures are staggering, and giving me a headache just contemplating it!

I know I'm coming in late on this, but Dick, yes, the Harry Potter books are really that great! If you ever get the chance, you should sit back and start to read the first one. I did that years ago, just to see what all the hubbub was about, and I fell in love. They are smart and more imaginative than you can fathom. I have read book three-seven twice.

I got into them for about the same reason you did, Pol. People were talking about them, so I finally picked one up and read it during a weekend. Rowling has created another world in the manner of Tolkien. It has great depth and scope and, all things considered, is quite complex.

Malcolm

Are there many murders? I like to read and write murder and detective stories.

Dick there is plenty of sleuthing and treachery going on, a couple of murders...right up your alley!

Diagon?

I don't think Potter is my cup of tea. Hate fantasy, sci-fi, etc. Like straightforward, gritty street stories.

I have noticed some patterns in successfull products that target the younger agegroup. In many popular cartoons and fiction it seems that the main character is always a mediocre kid in the beginning, usualy getting bullied or has problems at home with parents or siblings. Then one day comes along someone that helps the kid discover he has something inside him that can make him the best of the best.

The children relate to these characters and trials with experiences of their own. With the hope that they too could awaken something inside themselves that would eventualy lead them to become as great as the heroes in these stories. I believe it is this hope, and the lack of it elsewhere, that is what inspires and encourages the children of this day.

Having just turned a teenager at the beggining of the Harry Potter craze, I picked up a copy of the book and started reading it one saturday morning. I can tell you that I read it front to back and skipped lunch in the process all in one day. Bear in mind that I had a hard time paying attention to a comic book, let alone a novel. I was consumed by the imagination of JK, I was empowered by what Harry had to go through, and I was really hungry by dinner time. I related soo well to Harry's life that I felt I had someone else out there that understood me and what I had to go through (I didn't really have it that bad, but having just turned 13 I felt the world was against me).

The numbers that Malcolm posted are indeed beyond comprehension for most people. I think they show not only the success of J.K. Rowling, but also the need for inspiration in youth and the power of suggesting such possibilities.

There is a reason and a season for many things. I think Harry Potter filled a need and the timing was right. Others try to jump on the bandwagon with copycat stories and it becomes overkill. Besides, to top Harry Potter would require something extraordinary. It's better to come up with something else with a new twist. However don't expect a windfall. The Lotto is about as elusive

True, Abe, you can't really engineer this from the minute you start typing the first chapter of your book.

So they call these phenomena "Black Swans," large events that could not have been predicted and that can't be duplicated once they are analysed from stem to stern.

Malcolm

Black Swans, eh? Never heard of that. Do White Swans mean anything?

White swans look celestial, but are quite nasty if you get too close.

You can find the Black Swan discussed here, for example:

http://appel.nasa.gov/academy/risk_management_bookshelf_black_swan

Malcolm

Black Swan being the "unlikely" event. A good metaphor.