(Sorry if this has already been touched on in the spoiler-laden threads. I haven't finished HBP yet, and will try to keep this one spoiler-free for the discussion.)
Something has been bugging me a bit in the last two Harry Potter books: They don't seem to be actually teaching the students anymore. It could be that Rowling doesn't want to get too redundant in describing lessons, but everytime there's new magic it goes something like "The goal of this spell is X. Try to do that. Nope, keep trying" instead of explaining how they're supposed to do that. It's a fairly minor thing, but I always thought the discussions on proper wand technique or pronounciation were interesting flavor.
Obviously they'd need to practice to get it right, but compare Snape's Occlumancy or Non-verbal Spells lessons to Lupin's Patronus lesson or any of the Charms lessons from the first two books. And is there any theory behind the spells being taught? Would any of these kids have the slightest idea how to develop new spells of their own? It seems that the focus on rote memorization and follow-the-recipe casting and brewing, without any focus on critical thinking or experimental development is preparing this generation of witches and wizards to be magical assembly-line workers and shutting them out from the more important and higher-paying sorcery jobs.
--Enigmatic
Posted by jebus202 (Member # 2524) on :
Yep, sounds like school.
Posted by JaimeBenlevy (Member # 6222) on :
I think you expect too much from JKR Posted by Enigmatic (Member # 7785) on :
Jebus: Good point.
Jaime: Okay, I pretty much threw in the theory/critical thinking part as a lark. But the rest is stuff that she was including earlier in the series and now just seems to be ignoring.
Obviously, the truth here is that these books are supposed to be teaching us all real magic spells to use against good christian families and they're just not cutting it! (And after all those years of playing D&D didn't work, either!)
--Enigmatic
Posted by firebird (Member # 1971) on :
I agree enigmatic ... it is a sad omission ... and one that I at least miss.
But I have resigned myself to the fact that as I was in that 10% of the population at school that liked to understand what was being taught maybe it is the same in the reading of her books. Perhaps only 10% of the audience enjoyed that extra colour and so to make her life a little easier she left it out.
Aside - The twins clearly still have the ability to develop new spells ... and yet didn't get great OWLs. Definately sounds like school.
Posted by aspectre (Member # 2222) on :
hrrrmmm...weird. Rawling's descriptions are more than adequate to successfully work the spells. You must be getting the versions censored for the muggle audience.
Posted by firebird (Member # 1971) on :
Posted by Nato (Member # 1448) on :
It's interesting that Harry doesn't even need to know what a certain spell is as long as he knows the magic word that he learns from the Prince's book.
And at the same time they claim that spells (especially powerful ones) take great force of mind to cast.
Oh well.
Posted by Enigmatic (Member # 7785) on :
Actually, I've got the audiobooks. Maybe they changed the pronounciation when Jim Dale read it, so your car stereo wasn't blasting magic spells out the speakers while you listened.
--Enigmatic
Posted by Tante Shvester (Member # 8202) on :
For more information on how to cast appropriate spells, see the Google Ads at the bottom of this page. Posted by jebus202 (Member # 2524) on :
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