When I was 8 years old,
I was a huge fan of Harry Potter.
I collected all the board games,
the scarves, and played
the characters with my friends
IRL all day long.

I asked my mother if I could learn english, which she was very happy to hear. Actually, my aim was to be able to write a letter to Daniel Radcliffe.

I remember that being a super fan is a sort of frustration of being just a spectator. When you’re a fan, you want to make something out of it.
You learn to play the guitar to sing a song of one of your favorite rock bands. You learn drawing by making precise portraits of the person. You make yourself T-shirts.

I remember that being a super fan is a sort of frustration of being just a spectator. When you’re a fan, you want to make something out of it.
You learn to play the guitar to sing a song of one of your favorite rock bands. You learn drawing by making precise portraits of the person. You make yourself T-shirts.

If i look back now, I wonder why I simply didn’t ask anyone to translate a letter I could have written in french.
Being a fan is usually not a secret. It’s something you want to share, and you become part of a community of fans. But actually, the love I wanted to share with him was probably very intimate.

I can’t remember what i wrote. And if i ever sent it. Because I was struggling finding his postal address.
I had a collection of different ones, because i couldn’t find out which was his personal one.
I had Warner Bros studios’ address which i found online. And the one of his american fan club. I had always imagined a fan club to be a closed space where people meet everyday talking about their passion about Harry Potter. Somewhere you would go on Wednesday afternoon when you don’t have class to make new friends.
But I didn’t dare sending them, I wanted to address Daniel directly. I didn’t want anyone else to open it. It would probably never have been opened anyway.

I saw a documentary about one of my favorite french actors who is just four years older than me. At the time he was 12, I was really impressed by him, he had huge success. He was explaining in the documentary that he wasn’t able to read all the letters he received. Maybe that’s when I decided not to send mine.

I hated seeing people of my age being as much a fan as I was. I was jealous or something. It felt awkward how sometimes things were getting sort of competitive.
I wanted it to be my thing and to keep it for myself.

thanks for reading,
clara