I was fine until you set that essay on Charms

Professor Wright

September 15, 2017 3:50 PM

Cheer up already, Intermediates! (III-V Years) by Professor Wright

In Gray’s old job, his job had mainly been to imagine things and write them down. Now, his job was to imagine things and then make them real. This was, he often thought ruefully, a less similar skill set than it initially sounded like. When he had started planning his new unit for the intermediates, he had envisioned elaborate light shows and decorations to set the mood beforehand, but in the end, he’d had two other classes, plus wrapping up the unit the intermediates were already in, then supervising flying lessons, then marking exams – something which, with the beginners in particular, made him think he might be qualified for a career as a government code-breaker should the government ever need one; he knew his handwriting was a bit…rubbishy at times and his use of mechanics perhaps looser than a professional writer’s probably should have been, but still. He was sure his teachers had never faced such problems – and other duties, and visiting his parents over the weekend, and penning a polite response to a friend who had admitted that sadly, he couldn’t get Gray anything with his network at the moment….Well, the time just went by, and now, the room had some posters depicting stone tablets with various etchings, all presumably indecipherable to his students, on them hanging directly over his desk.

“Hello, hello, everyone,” he said, coming in waving a sheet of parchment to dry it – he had just had an idea and written it down, using the wall to bear down on, quickly before class began and he forgot it. “Here – “ he put his portable document case on the desk, retrieved the intermediate exams, and handed them to the nearest student. “Hand those out, please, thank you. If anyone has any questions about the material or your grades, drop by after class, but right now, it’s time to start our new unit.”

He finally made it to the front of his desk and pointed to the posters hanging directly above his head. “The things hanging above my head,” he said, “are some of the earliest known spellbooks. One of them also mentions some of the rules of a primitive tax system, but that’s irrelevant to our discussion. Anyone have any idea where some of the earliest wizards started transcribing their spells?” He gave anyone who happened to know this tidbit a moment to speak up, then continued. “Mesopotamia, that’s correct. Very good. Now, a lot of these spells fall strictly more into Professor Nash’s class than mine, since they’re charms to protect houses and people from curses, but by the time these tablets were carved, people had already figured out how to make fire – “ Gray gave his wand a discreet flick and a large candle on his desk lit itself – “and pull water from the air – “ he picked up a goblet from the other side of his desk and filled it with water – “and had started work on spells to affect the human brain.”

A wave of his wand brought one poster down to the level where he could reach it and hold it out for the class’ closer inspection. “This spell, we think, is a charm that was meant to inspire courage in the person it was being cast on,” explained Gray. “It’s an ancestor of the Cheering Charm. You may notice, though, that it’s a lot longer than the incantation for a cheering charm.”

He handed a handout to the last student on the first row with instructions to take one and pass them along. “On one side of this paper, you’ll see the incantation for this charm,” he said. “Or a translation, anyway. It’s seven lines long, repeats certain keywords seven times, and requires some ritual items to complete – honey, cypress wood, and reeds, to be specific. These have to be placed in specific ways at specific times, and it’s a time consuming business that looks at the distinction we make between Charms and Potions and does a jig on it. On the other side of the page, you see a one-word incantation and a diagram showing you a pretty simple wand movement. One of these is a lot easier than the other.

“We’re going to start our unit on mood charms by exploring why that is,” explained Gray. “Fifth years, by the end of this unit – that’ll be in two weeks – you’ll all write me essays arguing whether mood charms or mood potions are more effective – and these are argumentative essays, with sources, not just opinion pieces,” he added, unusually sternly. “You don’t get to use sources in your CATS, but that just means the more you know now, the more you’ll have to work with when you do get to them. Fourth years, you’ll be writing about the ethics of using mood charms, citing at least three different charms in your final product. And finally, third years - development of mood charms between Mesopotamia and the founding of Rome, plus you’ll actually learn the spell and practice it on each other. At the end, each year will get together and plan a short presentation on your subject matter for the class; you can start working with others now if you want, but everyone has to write their own paper and I don’t want to see every single one identical, okay? Good. In class, you can start researching with someone in your own year, or you can help out your friends in others, but here’s a cart of books and there’s more in the library – have at it.”

OOC: As usual, posting rules, tag Gray if you need him, flag me down on the OOC or in Chatzy (mainly I’m ‘Tatiana Vorontsova’ there at the moment), and theorize away, as that would make me happy and earn your House points. Have fun!

Subthreads:

I was fine until you set that essay by Georgia Kirkly, Teppenpaw with Natalie Atwater, Pecari

I don't see that happening by Angelique Brockert, Crotalus

16 Professor Wright Cheer up already, Intermediates! (III-V Years) 113 Professor Wright 1 5

Georgia Kirkly, Teppenpaw

September 18, 2017 5:25 AM

I was fine until you set that essay by Georgia Kirkly, Teppenpaw

For the first time since starting Sonora, Georgia actually felt that her summer had been good, and not just something to be survived as she was shuttled between her parents, and all their stupid drama. It had started at the end of the previous term, when her dad had shown up to the end of year concert, in spite of her contribution being nothing more than baking some brownies, which she easily could have done for him at home. His presence had surprised her, because she’d been pretty convinced he hated everything to do with her school, her parents having split up over the whole fact of her going here and everything magic-related. Or at least, that had been what she’d thought. When she’d brought up his confusing presence at the concert, her dad had been pretty horrified at her interpretation of things. He’d actually cried (luckily she hadn’t brought it up at the concert, but later when they were at home), which was pretty weird cos she couldn’t remember her dad crying ever. It had been more to do with the fact that her mom had lied, or kept secrets, whichever you wanted to call it. Big ones, that were going to affect all their lives.

Georgia took her seat in Charms. She couldn’t say she was thrilled to be back. Summer had actually been kind of fun once they’d got through all the heart-to-heart stuff. It was the most relaxed she remembered feeling around her dad since she’d started school, and it was nice to get that back. Still, the theory of cheering charms beckoned. She tried not to sigh. Anything that involved ancient stone tablets didn’t sound like it would be very straightforward. She didn’t have much of an opinion on the spell Professor Gray gave out, except that it sounded pretty stupid. She was just glad that modern spells were more efficient, and that she didn’t have to a full round of grocery shopping and perform the hokey-cokey every time she wanted to do magic.

Luckily, the actual assignment given to the fourth years had very little to do with the lines of gibberish that Professor Gray had just given out. They had to write about ethics of mood spells instead, which was a lot more general. She also didn’t think he’d mentioned sources for them, so that just meant using common sense was an option.

She pulled a bit of parchment out, even though she was pretty sure that stage one was just giving everything a good think over. She guessed it wouldn’t hurt to make some notes, even though most of her early thoughts felt pretty obvious. At least that way it looked like she was doing something, and she was less likely to be accused of copying.

1) Messing with people’s feelings is wrong she wrote. She flicked back through the pages on cheering charms, trying to think of ways to make that point sound more like it was in an essay and less like it was a whiny teenage girl in a chick flick. She paused as she found a likely looking paragraph.

Whilst getting permission to perform magic on another human is considered good manners across all circumstances (even within a duel, both participants have agreed to be combatants), nowhere is this of more importance than with mood and mental magics. A person’s feelings make up the very essence of themselves, and to tamper with this is therefore highly personal.

That basically meant what she’d written, only fancier, and meant that she had a book agreeing with her, which was always a good start. The book continued in this vein for sometime, and so she stopped reading. She had enough for point one. The trouble was, to her it seemed that simple - don’t mess with people, it ain’t nice. And didn’t her parents’ divorce show that too? Even without magic involved, people just didn’t like being played around with. Could there be anything to say to counter that, to justify using them? But “discuss the ethics” and “find three spells” meant that she still had a way to go.

“Hey. Does ‘it’s just wrong and creepy’ break down into other things, or are there things beyond that that I’m just not seeing? I mean, do you think we’re supposed to find things in favour of cheering charms too?” she asked her neighbour.

13 Georgia Kirkly, Teppenpaw I was fine until you set that essay 346 Georgia Kirkly, Teppenpaw 0 5

Natalie Atwater, Pecari

October 07, 2017 5:00 PM

I feel your pain by Natalie Atwater, Pecari

Natalie's eyes glazed over as she listened to Professor Wright began to talk about ancient Charms. She never really liked when teachers went on and on about things like that. Did it matter where ancient charms were first written down? She had spent all summer listening to instructions that she felt were more than necessary and now she had to do it at school too.

She did tune back in though when the paper arrived on her desk. The incantation before her was mindboggling. It seemed so inefficient . Magic had sure improved since the days of Mesopotamia. For a brief horrified second, Natalie was afraid that this was actually going to be what they were doing today and if that was the case, she was dropping Charms after her CATS because if this was what was going to be inflicted on a class where the youngest students were thirteen, she couldn't imagine what Professor Wright was having the Advanced class do. This looked like it would be a challenge even for Kira! Then again, the sixth year generally had more patience than Natalie did.

So the Pecari was tremendously relieved to hear that they were, of course, using the much simpler spell. Said relief didn't last long though when Professor Wright assigned them an essay. Unlike her sister, Natalie had not mastered the art of an emotionless mask so she grimaced. A perfectly natural reaction to an essay for anyone not an Aladren.

Plus, her year seemed to have a really dull one that would involve research. She was about to get up and get a book when Georgia spoke to her.

"I...don't know. I mean, I don't have the same essay as you but I can definitely see arguments in favor of cheering charms. Like, if someone is sad and you use a charm on them to make them...not sad, but if it's a charm that makes someone feel something negative, it's not a good idea to do it." Natalie replied.

11 Natalie Atwater, Pecari I feel your pain 371 Natalie Atwater, Pecari 0 5

Georgia

October 08, 2017 7:18 AM

I'm not sure I want you to by Georgia

Oops. She’d asked a third year who, of course, was doing a different essay. Georgia hoped Natalie didn’t think she was thick for asking her about it. Not that Natalie couldn’t have an opinion of course, as she quickly demonstrated. Georgia wasn’t sure she really agreed with Natalie though. Which, she supposed was sort of helpful for her essay, although she found it difficult to know how to bring up the fact she disagreed. Natalie wasn’t someone she knew very well, although the one occasion they had met stuck out vividly in Georgia’s mind. She’d been doing some thinking in the water room, after her parents had asked her whose name she wanted to use… She wondered, if Natalie had been better at magic at that point, whether her solution would have just been to turn her wand on Georgia. Fix her up. Make her smile. Surely that was totally wrong though…

“But…” she began cautiously, “I mean, you should ask and stuff first, right? That’s what the book says,” she added, feeling like she should back up what she was saying, “I don’t think it’s quite that easy to fix people, and what they feel. Like, the thing that made them sad in the first place will still be a problem when the charm wears off. And other things that mess with people’s feelings, like love potions, are like… illegal, or restricted or something. It just doesn’t really seem like a nice thing to do to someone, to me anyway. You’d be ok with it being used on you?” she asked, as Natalie had seemed to be in favour of the idea, and well… the whole point of starting this conversation had been to get other viewpoints.

13 Georgia I'm not sure I want you to 346 Georgia 0 5

Natalie

October 19, 2017 4:44 PM

That's nice of you by Natalie

"Well of course you should ask first." Natalie replied. "But like, if you feel bad, don't you want to feel better? No, it isn't going to fix the root cause, but there are some issues someone can't fix. Some things don't change and all you can do is try to treat them." She tried to think of an example that was similar.

"Like say you have a medical condition that can't be cured but can be treated so you can deal with it and it's less debilitating. For example, one of my cousins has major allergies to the outdoors." The Pecari didn't normally think it was okay to discuss problems her relatives had especially with people she didn't know very well, but she figured that allergies were common enough and she hadn't specified which cousin. "If he doesn't take his potion for it, springtime is utter torture for him so any moment that he's not sneezing or sniffling is a relief . I've personally never been consumed by sadness or depression, but presumably, they aren't pleasant feelings any more than physical issues caused by allergies.

"Cheering charms are a temporary fix indeed but so are potions that help with chronic conditions. My cousin has to take his potion every day at least in the spring and summer."Natalie went on. "And in the example Professor Wright gave us of the long complicated spell for courage, there are times when you really need courage, such as if you're going into battle or have a dangerous job. It makes them easier to handle if you aren't coping with being terrified on top of it, especially if you're the sort who freezes up in these situations,though I suppose that kind of person wouldn't choose a dangerous job. Of course, the spell in the example was way too inefficient."

"Love potions, on the other hand, are different." The third year continued. "They don't produce real love, they produce obsession and basically take away the will of the drinker which is wrong. I very much doubt people want to be miserable and if I were miserable, truly miserable, I'd agree to have a cheering charm placed on me, so long as the caster was capable of not overdoing it."

11 Natalie That's nice of you 371 Natalie 0 5

Angelique Brockert, Crotalus

October 20, 2017 7:46 PM

I don't see that happening by Angelique Brockert, Crotalus

Angelique sat in Charms class, her prefect badge gleaming from her chest. She couldn't help but be proud of it. She had gotten it over Daniel Fintoc who was-or at least had been previously, she didn't think he'd signed up this year despite being promoted to captain- a Quidditch player . Even though she supposed she had nothing against him personally if she thought about it-Angelique had been taught that boys were supposed to play Quidditch, though naturally she didn't have really have a problem with those who didn't-it was still incredibly satisfying. Score one for the non-athletes.

Plus, being a fifth year meant she could see the end of her time at Sonora. Then the Crotalus would be out in society and no longer the odd one out. She would belong . Angelique fared quite well at parties, it was just that when she was at school, she was friendless and alone so naturally, she wished she was somewhere else.

Choir was the only outlet she had. It seemed to be going well. They even seemed to have picked up more people than they'd lost, including over a third of the first year class. Angelique considered this a success and owed it in part to last year's concert. Not to mention not enough of the first years were interested in Quidditch enough for anyone, even Pecari , a house full of rabidly sporty people, to get a full team.

Unfortunately, being a fifth year also meant CATS. True, there were advantages, such as not having to take classes she didn't like anymore and she supposed that she really only needed to continue Charms and Transfiguration as she only needed two RATS to graduate. Angelique had no intention of having a career and even if she did, she would be an opera singer which didn't require RATS level knowledge of any subject taught at Sonora. Still, it meant she had to study and just because she had little social life to speak of, it didn't mean she wanted to spend her time studying because quite frankly, she found theory completely boring.

When Professor Wright gave out the assignment, Angelique suppressed a groan. Not only did it involve an essay and research, she had to give a presentation with her yearmates. The Crotalus generally didn't have a problem getting up in front of people, but work with the other fifth years? Especially on something involving arguing a position. They were bound to disagree with her and it would be all of them against her. As usual.

11 Angelique Brockert, Crotalus I don't see that happening 332 Angelique Brockert, Crotalus 0 5