第二名
姓  名 繆詠璿 學  校 台北市立中山女子高級中學 年  級 三 年 孝 班

 

 

The Magic That Stretches Beyond the Wizarding World

With an ugly, lightning-shaped scar slashed across his forehead, Harry Potter stepped into the world in which he and his scar were famous--- the wizarding world, on his eleventh birthday. As he entered Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, a place where wonders, secrets and adventures were laid before him, he encountered his two great and loyal friends---Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger. Again and again, the trio traveled together on their way to thwart Lord Voldemort, the notorious man who brought about the death of Harry’s parents. It is a story about the immense power of love, friendship and bravery. Ever since I started reading the series, I felt as if I were actually traveling along with Harry, Ron and Hermione as they smashed down the obstacles laid out for them and launched themselves across Voldemort’s path to victory repeatedly. There were even times that I was tricked into believing that the magical world actually existed.

Others may merely be awed by the fascinating plot. However, what intrigued me most was much more than that. There are several messages I have interpreted beyond the mere story, the boundaries of magic and the imaginary world JK Rowling constructed. I believe that under the fantastic imaginary creatures and magical skills lay the reflection of the true world and Rowling’s own beliefs. As I dug deeper, I realized that the enslaved house-elves were no different from the hundreds upon thousands of people enslaved, discriminated and tortured only because of their races or identities. The goblin rebellion bears a strong resemblance to the conflicts that occurred as those who still had strength remained in them stood up to fight for equality and rights. The offensive term, ‘mudblood’(a word used to insult witches or wizards born in muggle families), was no different than the biased labels placed upon the certain types of people. Above all, Lord Voldemort was just the same as the power-hungry, blood-thirsty and cold-blooded tyrants, made up of nothing but greed and secretly fearing the consequences of their acts of evil. Always they were on the lookout for the figure who would rise up to fight back, and never had they learned that without the power of goodness, they would most certainly be brought down and overthrown in the end.

“It matters not what someone is born, but who they grow to be.” Comprehension dawned on me as these wise words spoken by Albus Dumbledore struck me. It shone like a beacon of hope and flooded every recess in the labyrinthine passages of life with lights. It was then that I realized that only when we truly lay down the differences between people and embrace each other with that same loving caress would all hatred and contempt melt away. What we should value above all should not be a person’s race, backgrounds or titles, but the love, loyalty, courage and all the other goodness they possess. It is those that give us the ability to “live beyond death”, because we would understand that even though death takes our bodies away, our love and spirits live on. Reading between the lines, I gathered Lord Voldemort is possibly the only soul in the Harry Potter series that knew nothing about love and goodness, and had never been able to grasp the knowledge of the precise and immense power of them. He, I believe, is the symbol of extreme cruelty and evil, who stands no chance to Harry. Harry, a boy protected by layers of love and also set out to protect others with that extraordinary power, was the sole person to vanquish the Dark Lord for the power was beyond the reach of any deadly magical skills and the protection was so strong that no other magic could penetrate it.

In the end, I realized that the imaginary world JK Rowling constructed might not be imaginary after all. As a matter of fact, it might even have spoken more truth than that held in the true world we live in. Love is the most powerful magic beyond anything else in the world, and by embracing and respecting the miraculous uniqueness we all possess, we can build a truly magical world of our own.