Magical Talent/Glasses (was Re: Harry's innate abilities)
GulPlum
hpfgu at plum.cream.org
Thu Oct 10 02:26:29 UTC 2002
No: HPFGUIDX 45154
At 14:09 08/10/02 -0400, jodel at aol.com wrote:
>Interesting thread, but we've gotten off into a fruitless comparison between
>sports and music. No one seems to be carrying the observation back a step to
>a point where it makes somewhat better sense.
>
>Quidditch skills, per se, are probably not inheritible. But those Quidditch
>skills are the finished product. You don't start with the finished product,
>you start with the ingredients, and those very well might be inherited
>tendencies. For example;
<snip>
As the person who started off this train of thought, I've also been very
surprised by the turn the discussion has taken. :-)
When I said that Harry had "inherited" his flying skills from his father, I
had of course meant to imply, as you suggest, that he had inherited certain
physical attributes which gave him a head-start in the right direction,
rather than the fact that his skill was inherited lock, stock and barrel
from James.
Besides, every time HP discussions start talking about genetics (usually
WRT Magic Ability AKA the Magic Gene), I get very worried. JKR has said
that she has never had much of a head for science and so I would never
expect any kind of consistent genetic explanation for magical ability in
her world. She has a quasi- folkloristic attitude towards inherited traits
(allegiances, good/evil, physical attributes, etc) which aren't always
borne out by genetics as we understand them.
One of the similies used in this thread, apart from sport, has been musical
ability. Some of the arguments have considered musical *fame* or musical
prodigiousness which I agree are beside the point. However, I myself have
always explained JKR's "Magical Ability" and the way it appears as a
parallel to basic musical talent. I don't mean the ability to produce
million-selling records, I mean something much more basic, such as a
musical "imagination" (i.e. the way some people tend to think in terms of
sounds, the way others do in terms of visuals or words), perfect pitch, the
"natural" ability to play any instrument or the like. Scientists have been
unable to determine beyond doubt where these things come from, but it is
usual (but by no means universal) for a "musical" parent to have a
"musical" child of the same gender. Of course, children who grow up around
people who appreciate music tend to appreciate music themselves.
An anecdotal example. My own musical tastes are mainly in classical chamber
music, and particularly classical guitar (the playing of which is
completely beyond my own inherited skill-set!). :-) One of my big musical
heroes is John Williams (the guitarist, as opposed to the HP music
composer!). He is famous for coming from a musical background and creating
musical progeny (a jazz pianist daughter and a violinist son). There are
other examples of musical families, such as the Mozarts, the Bachs or the
Strausses.
Now I'm not saying this is normal. On the contrary, such prodigious talent
is quite rare. But having musical parents increases the chances of being
musical oneself, even if one doesn't perform professionally. Furthermore,
the nature -v- nurture debate is never quite as fierce as it is with
musical talent. Nevertheless, even the most skeptical "nurturists" admit
that there's something in it. A lot of that is about purely physical
attributes (development of the inner ear, bone and muscular structure,
etc), huge elements of which are definitely inheritable.
At the same time, some musically talented kids crop up in families with no
apparent musical skills at all. There is a current example of a 12 year-old
clarinet prodigy (whose name temporarily escapes me) who was born to a
family of motorcycle mechanics. He was discovered to have perfect pitch
when, at the age of six, he insisted to his dad that certain engines didn't
"sound right".
In the same way, I believe that basic magical talent, although almost
guaranteed in the case of magical parents ("Squibs are extremely rare", I
think the quote was), can easily, if rarely, crop up in otherwise
completely Muggle families. Just as musical talent has, on some levels, a
connection with having a specific kind of imagination, an "inner openness"
to the world of sound, I believe that magical talent in the
Potterverse depends to a certain degree on an "inner openness" to the
existence of the magical world, whether one is conscious of it or not.
(sorry, I'm rambling. I'll shut up on that topic now.)
>A good sense of timing, good hand and eye
>coordination probably are. (Not necessarily vision. Both Harry and his father
>seem to have had to wear glasses -- or are James's glasses fanon?)
James did indeed wear glasses (Mirror of Erised scene). Thank you for
reminding me of yet another physical attribute Harry has inherited. Why am
I so sure that he inherited it? Anecdotally, "spectacle wearers beget
spectacle wearers". More scientifically, the problem for over 80% of UK
children who are prescribed glasses is myopia. In the case of boys only, it
is well over 90%. The rest are mainly cases of damage to the eyes, optic
nerve or brain, at or before birth. Almost universally, myopia is genetic,
and especially in the male line (a myopic man's son is 98% likely to be
myopic, his daughter is 70% likely). As a personal illustration, in all
photos of my immediate 9-person family (parents and me & my siblings),
everyone is wearing specs or contacts except for my mum and one of my sisters.
I therefore propose that it is safe to assume that Harry is myopic, and he
got it from his father. In terms of Quidditch, this gives them an advantage
in that they are pretty much guaranteed 20/20 vision, which might not be
the case with everyone else on the field (spectacle wearers are much more
likely to have their sight examined and corrected than non-wearers).
In terms of what Harry inherited from which parent, it is perhaps
interesting that whilst he inherited his mother's eye colour, he inherited
his father's condition. This may or may not be important. :-) Furthermore,
is Harry's physical myopia symbolic of his more general short-sightedness? :-)
On the subject of glasses, something else which may or may not prove
important is that Percy Weasley wears them (a change in the MTSNBN which I
deplore; I understand that Chris Rankin is himself a "four-eyes"!) whilst
nobody else in his family does. I've been unable to build a theory around
this to date (other than the usual stereotype of "glasses=brainy") but I
can't help feeling that they're there for a reason...
--
GulPlum AKA Richard, who's written far too much, and most of it is probably
too close for OT status for comfort...
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