Potter-O-Pedia!

Harry Potter - the latest obsession of several readers, including me! Millions of the people across the world are suffering from this new "addiction."

What's so special about the series? What is actually behind the so-called "Harry Potter mania?" Have you ever wondered?

Is it an interesting plot? Is it because it has a good sequence of adventures or is it simple good quality writing? Is it the safe moral storyline of Good against Evil? I believe that there is something more. Readers get to explore a totally different world - an entirely different culture with people with "special powers".


The Harry Potter series talks about what each and every human being has secretly craved atleast once in his lifetime - a miracle/ a magical solution. It is not just magic talk but a combination of magic and a bit of LOGIC that made Harry Potter an instant success. A few people may want to debate about the "reality" of the core concept of the series - Wizarding, magic, dark arts, etc. They may call it a "mere fantasy." I agree wtih them. We may not have proof to the existence of Magic, wizards and witches. Yet, how many authors have been able to write about magic and wizards and successfully possess the minds of the readers?

According to me, Logic can be called as a study of inferences. The spells are not a mere babble of tongue twisters. An indepth analysis of the spells would reveal their inference from real words in languages like Latin, French and English. Having said this, can we deny the presence of Logic in JK Rowling's writing?

Still in doubt? Here's my analysis of a few names and spells used in the series:

Accio - A summoning Charm - in Latin the word means "I summon"

Mundungus Fletcher - A Shady character involved in stealing and illegal businesses and also a stinking alcoholic - derived from the word mundungus which is a kind of a stinking tobacco.

Anapneo - Apnea is the condition where the airways are blocked and the person struggles to breathe. An-apneo is the spell used to clear the airways.

Avis - the spell used to conjure birds from a wand - Avi in Latin means "bird."

Animagus - the term to describe a wizard who can transform into an animal - magus means a wizard or a magician and animagus means an animal wizard.

Engorgio - Makes things to swell or grow bigger - "engorge" means to stuff something to the point of congestion.

Levicorpus - to suspend a person in the air - "levi" as in levitate and corpus to denote a body hence "levicorpus" to make a body or a person float in the air. Means "raising a body" in Latin.

Liberacorpus - to release the floating person - "libera" means to free and in Latin Liberacorpus means releasing the body.

Beauxbatons - a wizarding school for women, located in France - beaux means beautiful and baton means a stick or a staff. Here beauxbtons may have been used to denote a wand.

Lumos - to emit light from a wand - Lumos may have been used to denote the english word "luminous" which means "illuminated" or from the Latin word "Lumen" which means light.

Ennervate - spell to revive unconscious people - means "to add strength"

Buckbeak - a creature that has the body of a horse and the head of a bird - beach is the mouth of a bird and buck could have been used to denote the bucking action of a horse.

Draco Malfoy - A wicked student, a person who believe in the Dark arts and one of the "bad guys" of the story - Draco may have been derived from the english word draconian which means "exceedingly harsh" and Malfoy may have been derived from the French word Mal Foi which means "malifide".

Crucio - A curse used to torture people - derived from the latin word Crucio which means "to torture"

Imperio - The imperius curse used to control people - derived from the latin word Imperio which means "to control"

Deletrius - a banishing spell - derived from the word "delete" which means to erase.

Nagini - Lord Voldemort's snake - refers to the word Naagin which means a snake.

Evanesco - to make an object disappear - From the latin word "evanesco (evanui)" which means "to disappear"

Finite Incantatem - to erase the effect of other spells - Finite is something that could end and Incantatem could denote the word Incantatem. Hence Finite Incantatem would mean something like "ending an incantation" or to make sense... cancelling the effect of an incantation.

Kreacher - a house elf - To denote a non human being: a creature.

Expecto Patronum - spell used to fight dementors - patronus is the latin word for protector and expecto could mean "to expect"

Wingardium Leviosa - to make objects fly - Could be derived from "wings" and "levitate" in English.

Sonorus - to amplify voice - derived from the Latin word "Sonorus" which means "loud"

Expelliarmus - to disarm an opponent - derived from the word "expel" and "arms (as in firearms or weapon").

Silencio - to silence a person - derived from the word "silence"

Protego - To nullify the effect of a curse/spell - Protego means "to protect"

Voldemort - A very evil wizard - Derived from the French words Vol de Mort which means "fighting death." Lord Voldemort fears death and goes to the extent of splitting and concealing his soul in order to escape death.

Incarcerous - to bind people with ropes - "incarcerate" means to "imprison or confine"

Confundus - the spell to confuse people - Confundo in Latin means "to confuse" could also denote the english word "confound"

Immobulus - to "immobilise" an object

Obliviate - to modify/erase a person's memory - Derived from "oblivious" which means "to forget or to be unaware of".

Reparo - To "repair" or mend broken objects.

Serpentsortia - The spell to conjure a snake from a wand - Serpent denotes a snake and the French verb "sortir" means to "draw out" or "come out with".

The above were a few spells and names that I have analyzed. If you are willing to contribute to this section please feel free to write to me.

Come back for more fun!!

All In The Name!

I have always been fascinated by cartoons and the "Asterix" series has been my all-time favorite. Renee Goscinny, the author, has very appropriately named the characters in the series. As I mentioned in my previous post, character analysis is one of my hobbies. Sometime back, roughly a year ago, I had a very strong urge to analyze cartoon characters. I wanted to start off with characters in the Asterix series. I was amazed when I found out that each and every character was named to describe the kind of role they played.

Sounds interesting?? Here are my observations about a few of the characters:

Asterix: An asterix, in normal english, is denoted by a star. The character "Asterix" is the star of the village. A tiny man with exceptional wit

Obelix: He is asterix's friend. A stout man, with little wisdom and amazing strength. I believe the name "obelix" was framed to denote "obesity." Obe-as in obesity and the suffix of lix gives us the name "Obelix".

Dogmatix - Obelix's dog.

Cacophonix - the village bard or singer. the word cacophony actually means "harsh, discordant or dissonant sound." The village bard has been portrayed as a very bad singer and hencce has been rightly named as "cacophonix"

Getafix - the village druid who brews magical potions for every ailment. Villagers "get-a-fix" for every problem from getafix!

Unhygenix - The fish vendor who sells stale and "unhygienic " fish.

Bacteria - She is unhygenix's wife.

Geriatrix - the oldest resident of the village. Geriatrics is the branch of medicine concerned with the diagnosis, treatment and prevention of disease in older people and the problems specific to aging.

Vitalstatistix - The village chief. I believe Goscinny wanted to imply that the chief had access to all the "vital statistics" of the village like population, births, property, etc and that is why he chose the name of "vitalstatistix." (this is just my guess.. if you know some other theory please feel free to mail it to me.)

Impedimenta: vitalstatix's wife. An impediment is an obstacle or a deterrant. Impedimenta believes that Vitalstatistix was not the right man for her and keeps coming up with wierd plans to irritate him.

Tremendelirious - A dipsomaniac. Dipsomania is an uncontrollable craving for alcoholic liquors. Does Goscinny mean to say that the charater becomes "extremely delirious" and hence the name "Tremendelirious?"

The above were just a few names that I could immediately think of. I intend to add more names and their possible origin shortly. Keep visiting this blog for more fun stuff!