Classics are those which survive the test of time. I'd say it is too early to tell, but I wouldn't be surprised.

 

Well, the Iliad and the Odyssey are by leaps and bounds ahead of the Harry Potter series in terms of writing. They also tackle a lot of very deep issues about humanity which is a bit lost now because we are so far removed from the type of society from which those poems were born.

My main point is, Harry Potter does not tackle any really deep human issues, does not have great characters and is not really groundbreaking in any way. But perhaps this is me being very selective on what constitutes great literature as there are classics that I don't really find that good...

 

I think there's a distinction between classics that are "well crafted" and classics that are "significant" (as in, very popular or had significant cultural impact).

Frankenstein (which was just mentioned haha) springs to mind as story which, to be honest, is not a very compelling read. But its cultural impact is extremely apparent, and you can't really talk about (English) horror without the story. I think a lot of Dickens falls into this category as well (not "amazing" books in a vacuum, but extremely culturally important and had a huge legacy).

I think Harry Potter is like this. Let's be honest - it's no "To Kill a Mockingbird". But that doesn't mean it won't have a significant cultural legacy. And that honestly depends. If my grandkids in 40+ years are reading it in school, it's passed the test of time. But we honestly can't tell at this time.

 

As far as I know there's no governing body who decides whether or not a story is worthy of the title of classic, it's more up to the forum of public opinion. That being said, I don't think that HP is any less deserving of the title than a series like LOTR, which I found to be quite over written - although I suppose it makes sense that classics become less accessible as time marches on.

I think that in the future HP will be spoken of in the same breath as book series like The Chronicles of Narnia and Mary Poppins - Children's classics in other words. It's too successful for it to fade into obscurity over the next few hundred years.

 

The Chronicles of Narnia is a good comparison actually - definitely on everyone's periphery, tons of younger kids read it in school/at home, analyzed a bit for themes, but still considered for children.

 

I mean, at the same time it’s not as though their is a dearth of material from the 1930’s, and yet The Great Gatsby is a classic, or even from Shakespearean times, where his works are classics because they stand head and shoulders above his contemporaries.

 

This misunderstands why we have little material from those ages. They aren't classics because they were the only stories around, they're the only stories we know about because they were considered classics and people cared to preserve them. Same reason people think the 80s had better music, people only remember the good ones.

On that note, I don't think there are any real criteria for being a classic besides being considered worth remembering and reading, and it's possible HP will, but it remains to be seen. I'm not sure the latter half in particular would pass an arbitrary quality check either, but that's meaningless.

 

Gradually it becomes a classic