How Does Magic Work?

One thing that often frustrates people in the Potterverse is the way magic works--or doesn't work as the case may be. Adult fantasy, in my experience, is often very interested in how magic works, what sacrifices it entails, what the mechanisms for it are. In the Potterverse I think magic is based on something very different: a child-like, instinct. The Pensieve is probably one of the best examples of this. Logically, there are all sorts of questions that are never answered: Is the memory biased, since it belongs to one person? How can the viewer see things the original person does not remember? How far away can the viewer wander in someone else's memory-could he leave the country, for instance, and see what was going on in France at the time? Why does the memory end at a certain point?

The answer to this is, in my opinion, that there is no answer, because Pensieves have not been worked out logically. Instead they operate on the idea I, and probably many many other people, had as a kid: wouldn't it be great if you could just show someone your memory? And because memories are sort of like movies in your head, so one should be able to enter the movie and walk around. I recently was reminded of another example-the "binding magical contract" of the Tri-wizard Tournament. Once your name comes out of the Tournament you've "got to compete." An adult can think of any number of loopholes to this idea, but the story is based on a very simple idea a child could grasp: He's got to compete the way I say he does because the magic says so.

This can get very tricky when you think about what the magic means. Often I find it comes down to all the magic having two elements to it, with one element sometimes being more dominant. Those elements are what I would call the practical and the metaphorical.

Practical magic is just that, practical. It's what a certain spell does, what a Potion or magical object does. Accio calls something to you. Avada Kedavra kills the thing you point your wand at. Crucio causes pain.

Metaphorical magic is a little more slippery. It's what the spell symbolizes or means to the character. Sometimes it's a lesson, sometimes an emotional state, sometimes it has to do with growing up. This varies not only from spell to spell but from person to person or instance to instance. For instance, there was previously some question as to whether or not Snape could produce a Patronus, as he doesn't seem to have a lot of happy memories, and happy memories were imperative in Harry's learning the spell. In fact it appears Snape can cast one. I think in Snape's case the Patronus is practical: it's an advanced bit of magic that he, as a competent adult, can do. In Harry's case it's metaphorical: His Patronus shows that his love of his parents and friends conquers the despair of Dementors. The kids in the DA are in between: Their Patronus signifies their becoming independent and able to protect themselves without the need of an adult.

Because of this metaphorical aspect it is, I think, tricky to try to base anything on how anything magical operates or seems to operate. Snape's nasty disposition does not prevent him from producing a Patronus. Not all people have flashbacks when they see a Dementor. The Avada Kedavra does not follow rules. I do not think Dumbledore's rising up off the Tower means Snape did not throw an AK at him. He flies off the Tower because it's important metaphorically--the Lightning Struck Tower card usually shows someone falling off it. Nor does a lack of brains spattered on the ground below indicate any kind of counter-magic, in my opinion, or Harry's not being released from the spell at once. Basically, I'm very wary of ever relying on laws of magic for a theory of anything.

In GoF Crucio is built-up as one of the worst spells ever--it's a torture spell. At the end of OotP I was sure that Harry's attempt at this spell would be important--a bit like the way the AK seems to be described as "splitting the soul" in HBP. I didn't think it was a spell one could attempt to use (and be partially successful) without consequences. I no longer think that, because it seems Crucio means something very different to the younger characters than the older ones. When Bellatrix uses it, she is a torturer. Same with Crouch!Moody. Same with Umbridge, had she used it on Harry. Same with Voldemort. All these people use the spell on people weaker than they (a spider, a kid) or use it to such excess the person is reduced to a weaker state (the Longbottoms). They rarely have any personal anger towards the person. This is Crucio as Fake!Moody describes it, a spell of pure sadism.

However, I don't think that's what it means when Harry uses it. When Harry throws it at Bellatrix he isn't purely sadistic the way she is, wanting to enjoy her being tortured and have power over her. He is enraged and in pain and simply tries to throw that pain at her, make her hurt too. Not that this is in any way a good thing to do or could not lead eventually to the cold sadism described before, but as yet it is different. Bellatrix points out the difference (she describes Harry's motivation as righteous-anger but I don't think that's quite it). Crouch!Moody, too, talks about the correct "motivation" of spells, like when he says the whole DADA class could try to AK him and he wouldn't even get a nosebleed (obviously something else is at work in HBP when it's important Draco not try the AK). What Harry throws at Bellatrix knocks her back and is painful, but it's not born of the same impulse to torture.

In HBP we see that Harry's attempt at Crucio had absolutely no consequences for him. In fact he tries to throw it again. Draco also tries to throw it in the bathroom. In each of those attempts, both boys are in very similar emotional states: they are in pain themselves, and try to throw that pain at the other person. It's still violent, but not coldly sadistic. In my head I began to think of it as the "I hate you" spell when used by them, linked to a blind desire to obliterate the other person or make them hurt--not a detached pleasure derived from cruelty itself.

This is important in the bathroom scene, because the magic in that scene leans very much towards the metaphorical. Recent conversations on it I've seen have focused a lot on Harry being justified in using Sectumsempra because Malfoy was going to cast Crucio, and the fact that Harry didn't know what the spell did and just wanted to protect himself. These things are true in a literal sense, certainly, but I think they're exactly the opposite of what the scene is about. On a symbolic level the spell did do what Harry intended, which is what makes the scene powerful.

It's true Harry was responding to an aborted Crucio--I think that was very intentional on JKR's part. Not to justify Harry's own curse, but to make sure the stakes were high enough for Harry to use his unknown weapon. It's true that Harry had no idea what the spell would do, that it have done anything--it could have ripped Malfoy's clothes off or given him acne. But if that was a possibility in Harry's mind, why on earth did he use here to respond to Crucio? The seriousness of Draco's spell, the fact that Draco is trying to throw a whole lot of pain Harry's way, means that throwing an acne spell would probably be quite foolish. Why does Harry not throw something he knows will keep Malfoy from hexing him?

Because on some level, he does know. Not what the spell literally does, of course. But what it is for. He finds it in a book written by a character who has been Harry's personal Genii throughout the year. What Harry needs, the Prince provides, with double effectiveness. Sectumsempra is written in the book with one descriptor: For enemies. Those two words, in my opinion, put us firmly in the fairy tale world. It's not just an unknown spell, it's a promise. You have an enemy? Speak these words and the prince will take care of him for you.

Now, when I read the book I mistakenly thought we knew which spell this was already-the one I thought of as the "razor blade" spell. But even if I hadn't connected it to the Pensieve I still would have known it was dangerous--it just obviously had to be with that setting. Malfoy brings up one of the worst curses we've heard of so far and Harry...tops it. If this were rock, paper, scissors, Malfoy comes out with scissors and Harry pulls out rock (in a game where nobody even knew rock existed). If the Prince himself hadn't been there with the healing charm there would be no taking it back--sectum=to cut and sempra=semper=forever.

What's important about the way Harry uses the curse, in my opinion, is that although he doesn't know the details of the spell he does instinctively understand what it is, or he wouldn't have reached for it in that moment. It's very hard to explain what I mean and I worry that my phrasing it that way is going to get people off on the tangent that Harry literally didn't know what it was and was just as shocked as Malfoy. I don't dispute that. It's just that takes away a lot of the meaning of the scene. In the tradition of mysterious magical spells like this one, there's no way Harry could be hoping to grow Malfoy's toenails at a time like this. The spell pops into his head because in his moment of need he trusts the Prince knows what he needs and calls down the ominously cryptic spell from the character that has begun to attain mythical proportions for Harry (and with whom Harry shares an instinctual understanding). "For Enemies" encourages him to fill in the blanks himself. The risk is part of the lure of it. To focus on the mundane technicalities of Harry having no way to literally know what the spell did...it just seems like a denial of the actual scary experience Harry is having. Not the innocent experience of pressing a button when you don't know what it does, but a Faustian bargain. It takes away from what the scene is, in my opinion, saying about Harry and Malfoy, and also what it's saying about Harry and Snape.

It's important, in my opinion, that Harry used the spell for *exactly* the thing it was meant for and the power behind it was only partly accident. It's very hard for me to believe that the violence of the spell isn't also supposed to reflect the years of hatred here. More importantly, I don't think Harry believes that. I've heard it said that Harry doesn't feel that much remorse for Malfoy given their history, but I think in a way the opposite is true, that he feels more remorse because it was Malfoy. Not remorse in terms of feeling badly for Malfoy hurting, but a horror at the fact that on some level he did do it on purpose. This is the year Harry and Malfoy both get experience causing serious injury to others.

It's not that Harry's anger creates the spell, obviously. It's that Harry is simply unknowingly using a more sophisticated weapon than he thinks. Malfoy was no doubt putting just as much real hatred into his Crucio, but Crucio is cruder and absorb more anger. The same force and emotion put into Sectumsempra just works differently. As usual, the Prince came through for Harry, giving him *exactly* what he asked for: a better weapon than his enemy.

That, I think, is why it's not the best thing to get sidetracked thinking about Harry being justified or all the good things Sectumsempra might have been. Harry really isn't worried about being justified, nor does he say anything else he thought the spell would do. He feels betrayed by the Prince because he thought he would take care of an enemy without Harry feeling guilty, that whatever he came up with would be within limits Harry was comfortable with. I don't think he could, with a straight face, claim he only wanted to tickle Malfoy, given the history and the circumstances. He didn't go for the spell because he had nothing else at his disposal, he went to the spell because the Prince would take care of Malfoy. Iow, this is not something to be looked at as Practical Magic, that it's just about what happens when you say this word with your wand. It's important for the deeper meaning about adolescence and hate and rivalry and all those things that make the WW go round. The difference between what Harry wanted with the spell and what he got was just a matter of degree. There needs to be that niggling doubt for Harry--did I want that to happen? Is that what I do to my enemies?

I actually think that this scene is one that might be revisited in the last book. I feel like there's another shoe waiting to drop there, that the sight of Malfoy twitching in a pool of his own blood is too powerful to simply be there for Harry to have to hide the book and have the spell to use on the Inferi. Also, the last time the incident is brought up (when Ron says Malfoy healed up fine, didn't he) Harry still feels a twinge of conscience--it makes me think there's that's going to carry over. I'm wary of expecting it since many emotional arcs don't continue into the next book, but it may be intentional that JKR never had the two really meet again (do they ever?) after that confrontation, and Harry still has twinges of conscience. Are those twinges only there as an automatic response (sort of the HP opposite equivalent to "not that there's anything wrong with that"), or is it a hint that something's been left hanging (like the Montague storyline in OotP)? It feels like the latter to me. I hope it is, anyway. That and the Tower scene seem like definite set-ups for the future.