[HPforGrownups] Wand Thoughts

[Peggy Wilkins]

No: HPFGUIDX 153235

On 6/1/06, Kim <inspirit at ptd.net> wrote:

Kim wrote some questions about wands and wizards:

> "The wand chooses the wizard."  How?  Why this wizard instead of
> that one?  What this wand instead of one of the other 300?  What if
> this wand is broken, will another choose you?

Peggy W:
Many people seem to take "the wand chooses the wizard" quite
literally, and perhaps there is somehow some magic involved, but it
can also be understood in more general terms.  Let me give an example:
I am (more accurately, was) a violinist.  From my experience, the
instrument I play on makes a difference, and I might play a given
violin to produce sound that is better or worse than another violinist
of comparable skill level would produce playing on the same
instrument.  This makes sense to me because I have a physical
structure, and so does the violin, and to play the instrument I have
to physically contact the instrument.  Maybe a specific instrument
resonates particularly well with the conformation of my bones.  The
wood contacts my body which has a certain water content, bone density,
etc. that is peculiar to me; the wood that makes the violin will also
have physical characteristics of shape, density, water content, etc.
My body will conduct vibrations from some instruments better than from
others.  So to me, when choosing a violin it's a matter of trying out
a bunch of violins, and one of them will fit my body size and other
physical characteristics well, and I won't "fight" it in order to play
it, it will play easily.  In this sense, you can say that my ideal
violin "chooses" me because it is suited to me.

This doesn't mean someone else can't play my violin, or that I can't
play someone else's; just that a particular combination of person and
instrument naturally works well together.

I interpret "the wand chooses the wizard" in this way: that it's a
matchup between a specific wizard's physical and magical
characteristics with those of the wand such that they work well
together.  The only way the matchup can happen is if the wizard tries
a bunch of different wands.  The savvy wandmaker, like the savvy
violinmaker, will be able to tell when the two go together well.

Kim:
> If the wand chooses the wizard, and there are two wands with Fawkes
> feather in it, and one chose Voldy and the other chose Harry... Then I
> have some more questions:
>
> Why did a wand with Fawkes' feather choose Voldy?

Peggy W:
That is a very interesting question.  Fawkes as a phoenix effortlessly
passes from life to death and regenerates, passing through the cycle
again and again.  Voldemort, on the other hand, has gone to a great
deal of trouble to avoid the whole life/death cycle and is deathly
afraid of dying.  He seems to be completely blind to his own immortal
soul and is fighting against what is natural.  Is it ironic that he
focuses his great magic though a wand with a phoenix feather?
Perhaps...  In any case, the pairing is very interesting.

Kim:
>  And why does Olivander expect great things from the person chosen
> by the other wand with that feather?  Is that a common thing?

Peggy W:
To continue with the violin analogy, perhaps it was one of his finer
or potentially more powerful wands: carefully chosen fine wood,
carefully crafted.  Probably the core has something to do with it also
(though I couldn't say why this particular one would).   Don't forget
as well, that he also expected great things from Voldemort's wand--in
other words, he doesn't expect great things from Harry just because
Harry has Voldemort's wand brother; rather, he expected great things
from anyone who worked well with either of those wands.

The brother wands going to Voldemort/Harry can also be understood as
an indication of the magical connection between Harry and Voldemort.
Harry can open the Chamber of Secrets and is a Parselmouth--these
things show that he is somehow directly connected to Voldemort (he got
these powers from Voldemort via the failed killing curse).  The
affinity of LV's wand brother with Harry also is an indicator of this
connection between them.  It can be seen as indicating a similar
"magical signature" (characteristic) between them.

 That's about all the questions I have any idea how to answer...

-- 
Peggy Wilkins
enlil65 at gmail.com