I came up with the idea for this post after someone mentioned "Harry Potter" in class on Monday. Since then, I have been thinking more and more about how "The Wizarding World of Harry Potter" should really be called "The Witchy World of Harry Potter." I will elaborate.
In contemporary times, when someone says Wizard, usually the first thing that pops into someones head is Harry Potter. However, when I think of a wizard, I think of Merlin or Gandalf, the more traditional image of a Wizard. That being said, Harry Potter lacks the traits that these older Wizards have because he is not a wizard at all, he is a witch.
Everyone will probably respond by saying "that cannot be true, Harry Potter is good and witches are evil (i.e. Wicked Witch from Wizard of Oz." If that is what you are thinking, then you are exactly right. In the traditional sense, witches are evil, but in the contemporary era, witches have taken on a more friendly and positive connotation to assimilate themselves into pop culture.
Harry Potter has all the physical stereotypes of a witch: he uses magic with a wand a flies around on a broom (if only he had the hat to match), but with a more human structure and skin in order to relate to the masses. However, he does not behave like a traditional witch, especially as described by Palmer. Palmer describes witches as these mean, ugly people associated with long noses, peasants, and the peasants' hallucinogenic bread. That is significantly different from flying around on a broom in a game of Quidditch, the modern interpretation.
Another significant difference is that traditional witches strike fear into people, as portrayed by old literature (i.e. Palmer gives examples). People are afraid of the Wicked Witch. In contrast, I have seen all of the Harry Potter movies in theater, and not once did someone cry out in horror over looking upon the face of Harry, and that is because he is the hero that destroys evil (i.e. Lord Voldemort), not a sinister being that wants to kill a little girl and her dog.
In conclusion, the modern portrayal of the witch has drastically changed from its roots, but just enough so that the image can still be seen as a witch but also as a good being, and Harry Potter is a perfect example of this.
~Ryan Lantz
Nice pick for a modern interpretation of a witch. My mind also jumped straight to Harry Potter. In terms of good witches, Harry potter is indeed good witch and in my mind follows an emotional path reminiscent to Glinda, the good witch of the south, as they both express a form of empathy towards the evil being [Voldemort/Elpheba] , which shows the softening of the image of the witch for modern interpretation and establishes the witch as an emotional being and thus more applicable for pop culture.
ReplyDeleteWoo! Another Harry Potter fan awesome. Love your post and how it compares and contrasts Harry to Palmer's traditional witches. On one side yeah he does use magic, but on the other he uses it for good and is definitely not gross looking. Really can't believe I forgot about the broom comparison when writing my post, I thought that was a really good observation. Another thing to add in my opinion is that Harry and friends are definitely deviant, maybe not sexually, but they do stray from the norm and are getting into quite a bit of trouble during the series from their curiosity!
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