This is the one thing I really appreciated about the Discworld books on a recent re-read. The wizards are hilariously incapable of doing anything useful. Terry Pratchett doesn't give a super clear series of rules for the magic system but it's abundantly clear that the wizards are incapable of actually useful magic, and mostly just get too tired up in internal power struggles to ever do anything. And in the book Sourcery, the first sourcerer (one who can create new spells) to grace the disc takes over the world, realizes running the entire world is too stressful and tedious then creates his own pocket dimension to play with magic in instead (I'm oversimplifiing here, skipping over a bunch of interpersonal stuff related to a sentient wizard's staff run by a dead guy who tricked Death among other details but that's the general gist)

By making the wizards so useless it bypasses any of the logical problems posed by creating a world with magic in it. There's no "why no use this spell" "why not magic out of this problem" etc. all because the wizards are too useless to actually do anything

Eh, it's a good shower thought.

But I have to disagree overall. Both of them showed interest in various subjects; Harry more than Ron.

But, I think you're right that the magic system is boring. It's memorizing fiddly combinations of words and movements.

Rowling didn't really set out to write a magic series. She was writing a boarding school series with a magical background, so she never did any proper world building. What little there is came well after the movies exploded, and is largely cobbled together.

While not as well written, it has much closer ties to things like the Chronicle of Narnia than something like Sanderson's stuff. The magic is fluff, technobabble, not what the series is actually about.

If there had been sections set in muggle schools, Harry and Ron would have been roughly the same. Harry likely would have been interested in some subjects, but distracted by the real story, while Ron would have been kind of drifting along, getting by grade wise without being interested. Ron might have been semi into soccer, but have been whining about it not being as good as quiddich.

I would also argue that if Sanderson, or a similarly world building capable author, had taken on the story, there still would have been a gradation in the trio's academic focus. You take three kid characters and have them being exactly the same about something like that, it won't work; you'd end up having to completely hand wave it with references to them being great students because it's more boring to have them all be the same level of interest in any given thing.

Even among real world scholarly sorts, the levels of interest in a given subject aren't going to be exactly the same, and a lot of those kids tend to start their friendships because of the "nerd" factor. The HP trio became friends partially by accident, but stayed friends as they grew together and shared experiences, so the dynamics just aren't the same.

Even the last three books, where it seems like there's discovery of an underlying system to the magic, the deathly hallows are a mcguffin, not a genuine world building tool.

So, I get where you're coming from, and agree that she did a pretty crappy job of making a coherent magic system. But it didn't really need one, it just needed silly phrases for kids to geek out over, and that she did very well

Stories don’t have to have “hard” magic systems to be good. I’m a big fan of the magical realism popular in Latin American fiction - where the magic is ambiguous and never quite explained at all.

The problem is the way that Rowling uses magic.

Rowling was clearly writing mystery novels, while lifting a lot of ideas for her setting from like The Worst Witch series. She uses magic spells like a Checkhov’s gun kind of thing, usually establishing whatever magical principle will save the day earlier in the novel. With a relatively self contained story, it works really well. Prisoner of Azkaban is one of her stronger books - the way that she sets up the mystery with the time turner as well as the stuff with Sirius Black, etc - because it’s very “clean” in this way. She introduces a bunch of new elements to her world, but they are all tied around supporting her story. This is good writing.

The problem is that Harry Potter books don’t work as an overarching story. It is abundantly clear that the Horcruxes and Deathly Hallows were not planned from the beginning. Rowling got to the last two books, realized that she needed to write some kind of ending, and then completely drove her plot off the rails.

You could say because she didn’t have an established magic system, it made it easier to drive off the rails, but really, it’s more that she’s competent at writing stand alone mystery novels (which really, that’s what books 1-4 are and they’re the best in the series for it) and not larger narratives. She doesn’t know how to convey the scope of a war, she doesn’t know how to tie together an Epic fantasy.

It says a lot about Rowling that Hermionesl's one flaw was being an abolitionist

I love Brandon Sanderson, but his world building and complex magic systems aren't for most people. I've tried to get my wife to read his stuff for years and she just has never gotten into it.

The reason Harry Potter was so commercially successful is because the vast majority of the public doesn't want to learn about allomantic properties of 16 different metals and how they have internal/external, physical/mental, enhancement/temporal and pushing/pulling effects.

They don't want to learn about adhesion, gravitation, division, abrasion, progression, illumination, transformation, cohesion, and tension surges - and how bonding a spren through oathes increases your ability to surgebind. Their eyes glaze over when talking about the cognitive and physical realms.

Most people just want to hear "yeah some people are magic and can wave wands, say some magic words and poof magic happens." That's why it's one of the highest-grossing media franchises of all time.

But yeah, I've just learned to accept that while I love some Sanderson magic systems, it's not ever gonna be for everyone. And that's ok.

There's nothing wrong with the magic system because there's always a reasonable setup and payoff for what can be done with magic and solutions never come out of nowhere as some deus ex machina. The magic system the stories had worked perfectly fine for the stories that were being told. Not every magic system has to be some stupid overly explained BS that takes all of the actual wonder and "magic" out of it.

Rowling is a piece of shit terf but you Sanderson cultists are still so fucking annoying. There's more to magic in storytelling than just the exact, specific mechanics of how it works. Read Earthsea.

My issue is honestly just the inconsistency of when spells would work or wouldn't. That and the fact that many dangerous situations could have been ended immediately if they used a spell they knew. I watched the movies and was yelling at the screen to use a certain spell to solve the situation but they just run away scared and helpless.

is this not just affirming the premise of the sixth book? that's the whole reason why Potter found the Prince's spells so fascinating. school subjects are not meant to entertain. they are meant to teach.

also, as book five attests--as well as does the subject of history of magic--some syllabi and some subjects were way more boring than others.

my main gripe would be that nobody taught english or any other form of formal communication at hogwarts. i dunno how they all just didn't end up speaking like Hagrid.

She made Hermione after herself. She needed the boys to be bad at magic or Hermione couldn't save them. If they were bad because magic was that hard, that would make her a genius, which wasn't what she was going for. The magical system was lame and the boys were bad at it because they were just unobservant undriven "boys". It's likely a combination of her worldview she's painting and trying to set the stage that magic is everywhere and all around us and everybody can do it but they don't just know exactly how.

Just like all the worst real-world school subjects, her magic system isn’t something with a logic you can learn to understand, it’s something arbitrary you have to memorize. These poor kids are out here taking the equivalent of anatomy classes all day (why is that bone called the tibia? Don’t worry about it, just memorize it).

It's literally just memorizing bad latin, of course they were bored. There was no spiritual aspect to it at all

Edit: And don't think I forgot the time JK Rowling assumed a word meant "Friendly to thieves" because it was of African Origin when it actually meant "The Color Red in a spiritual context.", racist assclown

NECROMANCY!?

I'm a member of the College of Winterhold, In good stead.

It's also not surprising the conservative rat hates history even though it should be one of the most important subject when dealing with the setting's hitler.

Who sanderson

I'm currently going though the books and from what I can tell, Harry especially takes issues with some teachers. He hates history and doesn't understand divination but he's fine with charms, defense against the dark arts and even potions once Snape no longer teaches it.

It's just that during the lessons she describes, they usually have stuff like Quidditch or Voldemort stuff going on so they don't really pay attention. They also don't like doing homework so they let Hermione do it for them. And they still did pretty well on the OWLs so all in all, I think they were fine with class but by and large, she just doesn't really write about classes that went their regular course.

Magic systems are not about what is possible, but the limitations.

What's boring about the magic system in Harry Potter? Can you give specific examples?

I like how Patrick Rothfuss wrote about "magic" in his Kingkiller Chronicle... I think it was explicitly called something else (been years since I read the books), but it was pretty fucking cool.

It was like daoist in nature almost, if I remember correctly.