[HPforGrownups] HOMORPHUS CHARM AND WEREWOLVES

[Margaret Dean]

No: HPFGUIDX 69105

rayheuer3 at aol.com wrote:
> 
> atroposgryffin at yahoo.com writes:
> 
> > Although we know that Lockhart stole these stories and altered the
> > memories of the actual people who did the work-my question is:  If
> > the Homorphus Charm exists why can't it be performed on Lupin, so
> > that he can be transformed back into a man and end his monthly
> > transfigurations?
> 
> The discussions on this matter have fallen into two theories, each of
> which fits the established facts:
> 
> 1.  The Homorphus Charm is so "immensely complex" that only the wizard
> who performed it (and whose memory Lockhart stole) has ever been able
> to get it right.
> 
> 2.  (This actually covers three similar theories)  It's all a load of
> Dragon Dung.  Either Lockhart lied about it, or the wizard who told
> Lockhart about it lied about it, or Lockhart happened upon a town folk
> tale which had grown in the telling.

Or a third alternative, which I've also run across and which I
find more convincing:  The Homorphus Charm, while it exists, is
only temporary.  It will force a werewolf (or possibly another
shapechanged creature -- like an Animagus?) back into human form,
but it doesn't prevent subsequent changes.  (In that case, it may
be the same one Sirius and Lupin used on Scabbers in PoA.)  It
"saved the village," therefore, by identifying the werewolf, not
curing him.
 
> As with so many things about the Potterverse, "ya pays yer money, you takes
> yer cherce"

Indeed.


--Margaret Dean
  <margdean at erols.com>