A lot of people point out that it doesn’t make any sense that Harry and Ron didn’t like their schoolwork. Well I figured out why:

It’s because the magic system is just as boring in-universe as out of universe. It doesn’t make any sense in universe either. Harry and Ron realised Rowling’s magic system kinda stinks way before we did, because they spent all day learning it.

If Sanderson had been writing Harry Potter, then Harry and Ron would have liked learning magic as much as Hermione did (Also, Sanderson actually DID write a book about a super-school, it’s called Skyward, it’s good)

  • Muad'dib@sopuli.xyzOPEnglish
    128·
    16 hours ago

    In Sanderson’s super school book, there are 10 kids and only one of them is uninterested in piloting spacefighters. But he is interested in engineering, so he’s still able to be a big nerd about the book’s subject matter. Everyone else is either a great pilot who likes piloting, or fucking dies in a tragic scheme emphasising the brutality and pointlessness of war.

    Sanderson doesn’t write characters who just drift along without an interest in anything, because Sanderson writes books about topics that he makes interesting.

    Rowling is only able to create characters who think Divination or History of Magic are boring, because she makes them boring. Sometimes on purpose!

    • TheresNodiee@lemm.eeEnglish
      1·
      49 minutes ago

      Rowling was writing about grade school kids going to school. Grade school kids get bored at school. If they live in a world where everyone uses magic and it’s not that special they’re going to get bored of learning about magic sometimes. It’s like if in grade school our teachers spent a bunch of time teaching us how to use computers, phones, and other technological devices. Sometimes it would be cool and interesting and a lot of the time it would be pretty damn boring.

      Plus Rowling wanted the grade school kids reading her books to relate to her characters, so she gave her characters a schooling experience they could relate to. And as much as I hate Rowling, there’s something inherently kind of comedic about a bunch of kids being bored silly learning about magic because it’s something that seems like it should be exciting to us, the reader.

      The boredom of the characters isn’t a failure of the writing or magic system, it works perfectly well for its intended effect.