From: Linda Zame <zame>
Date: Mon, 29 Nov 1999 14:35:03 -0800

Have to put my two cents in on this one and say that children aren't taught a belief in magic and witchcraft. We are all born with a belief in magic and the 'occult' that stays with us throughout our lives and is only partially renounced as we grow older and wiser. Again it is part of the human condition to believe in magic and part of socialization of humans that makes us more or less renounce our belief in magic and it is never, ever a full renounciation.

If we are careful observers of children we can see their belief in magic and in particular their own magical rituals as they try and control the world around them. How about the old chant, step on a crack and break your mother's back. Haven't we all at one time or another engaged in that one with an intensity that belies it's nursery rhyme charm? (Not that any of us knowingly wished harm on our loving mothers) Or how about the child who watches a longed for event unfold and is sure the event has taken place purely out of his/her power of wishing.

My husband, an economist, who has been tarred by my psyhoanalytic brush, is currently doing reasearch on gambling. In part they take reasoned and reasonable undergraduates and show over and over again a deep rooted belief that dice have memory and can be controlled. The students don't call this magic or witchcraft but their behavior isn't governed by either reason, logic or the knowledge that they all possess that the roll of the die is always, always random.

Harry Potter and books like HP don't teach magic or witchcraft. They play with a preexisting human condition and their success or lack thereof is dependent on how close they come to reconciling every individuals sense of themselves as magic, with the reality of the human condition that we are are often hopeless in the face of some of the most painful human realities. So despite Harry's deepest wish to be reunited with his parent's his magic is not great enough to bring that about. And as Dumbledore reminds him at the end of all three books, Harry survives and perseveres not because of his magic but because of his human character and nature. In the first it is sacrificial mother love that protects him from evil, an experience that is a powerful protective force for many children and one that sets them on the path to reality testing. In the second, Harry learns that who and what we are is created by the choices we make in life, not just are natural propensities. Again a powerful message for all chidren as they struggle to make choices that move them more and more into the social world and further away from the magical world of wish fulfillment and fantasy. In the third book Harry learns how he exisits in the world held within the internalized relationships of those who love/d him and those he loves/d. That he is not a solitary boy, but one who possess the love of others that makes him a richer and more complex individual. Again he learns something about the state of human nature, in this case grief and love and moves forward towards the reality of his world and existence.

All in all I would say that Rowling, although she plays with magic has written throughly wonderful and insightful books whose ultimate orientation is to reality and the complexity and richness of bieng human.

Linda Goettina, D.M.H.
Received on Mon 29 Nov 1999 04:35:03 PM CST