Creating spells

[becks3uk]

No: HPFGUIDX 186077

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Geoff Bannister" <gbannister10 at ...> wrote:
>
> Geoff:
> This post has been prompted by the fact that there 
> has been some recent discussion on spells and hexes 
> and it opens a topic which I have felt I wanted to 
> see aired for a very long time and just haven't got 
> round to launching and I do not recall it having been 
> touched on previously.
> 
> To kickstart the thread, in HBP for example, Harry
> used the Sectumsempra spell which we learn was 
> invented by Snape. This for a long time has posed 
> the question for me "How do you invent a spell?"
> 
<snip>

Becks3uk:

I think it has less to do with the word and more to do with focusing the wizard on a certain thought. Wizards can do magic when they are young and have not yet learned that they are wizards. Some wizards  can do non verbal and even wandless magic. Wizards use their wands as a focus for their magical energy (for want of a better word) and though they could do wandless magic before they went to school (e.g. setting a snake on Dudley), they later find it difficult to do magic without a wand. I think the incantations work the same way, it is about finding a word and a way to express what they want to do to themselves and to their wands and that enables them to do it. Then when they have learned it a certain way they can only do it if they repeat it exactly because that is how they focus on that one narrow thought. I mean, even patronuses require the wizard to find their own thoughts within themselves that enable them to produce one. If the incantation was so important how could they do non verbal spells?