Why Avada kedavra is a bad spell WAS: Re: I HAD A DREAM OR HOW I REALIZED

dumbledore11214 dumbledore11214 at yahoo.com
Thu Apr 5 15:16:52 UTC 2007


No: HPFGUIDX 167111


> Magpie:
> The distinction I'm making is that I think for JKR it's always the 
> thing that she's symbolizing that has the real power--she doesn't 
> transfer that power to the spell.
> 
> That makes even less sense.
> 
> Like, with the AK, I think what's terrible about it is that it is 
> the intent to kill, distilled into two words. What I think is bad 
> about it is that the person killed someone. That, imo, is what 
> causes the soul to tear.

Alla:

Well, I guess I disagree? Sort of? As I told Zara I believe that AK 
is the strongest metaphor of intent to kill in action, that does not 
mean to me that the soul would not split from the murder by other 
means.

I think JKR does transfer the the power of the thing which is 
symbolised to that metaphor. Let me go back to the Dementors, which 
symbolise depression. Their effects **are** terrible, but Dementors 
are horrible by themselves, are they not? NOT just as symbols, but as 
species as well ( among the foulest creatures, etc).

Dumbledore is angry that Dementors themselves, NOT metaphors for 
depression are in Hogwarts. He warns students to stay away from 
Dementors, not symbols. Does it make sense? To me they bad because of 
what they symbolise, but things themselves are powerful too.

So, by the same token I believe that AK  as metaphor for intent to 
kill and bad in itself as spell.


Magpie: 
> What I think isn't JKR's style is to focus on the mechanics of 
> magic, so that, for instance, the AK is bad because using that 
> particular spell causes some sort of magical reaction akin to if 
you 
> killed someone using a nuclear device and you got radiation 
> poisoning yourself. Because I don't think the mechanics of magic 
> really interest JKR--they seem more like they're interesting 
because 
> of the situation they represent.  That's why I don't often think 
> it's profitable to focus on the mechanics of how spells are 
supposed 
> to work to figure out what's going on, be they Life Debts or 
> Unbreakable Vows or TriWizard Tournament Contracts. I think they 
> seem to usually be best understood in the most general sense: it's 
> like you feel really indebted to the person, you've promised to do 
> something and if you don't you die, you have to compete in the 
> Tournament even though you don't want to.
>

Alla:

But I agree that mechanics of magic is not what interests JKR. I do 
not believe that AK is bad because this is this particular spell. I 
believe it is bad because author chose it to symbolise something 
which is horrible and **because of that** this particular spell is so 
bad.

Like Life Debt too, it is powerful because of what it symbolises, but 
because of that it can be powerful in itself IMO.





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