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The Bathroom Scene in Book Six

The Quote

… Harry slipped as Malfoy, his face contorted, cried, “Cruci —”

“SECTUMSEMPRA!” bellowed Harry from the floor, waving his wand wildly.

The Facts

  1. Harry had started to fall as Malfoy starts his curse.
  2. Harry is on the floor and thus has finished falling before
    1. Malfoy finishes casting
    2. Harry starts his curse.
  3. Malfoy’s pronunciation of the curse is interrupted. He does not miss, rather he never actually successfully casts.

Analysis

I am far from the first to note the problems in this passage.1 The problem is that “sectumsempra” is a much longer word than crucio and that [Malfoy][]’s aristocratic drawl must be exaggerated to ludicrous proportions for there to be any possibility of [Harry][] finishing the much longer word first after starting later. Take any two people with a normal speaking ability, and get them to try to say both words. If they start at anywhere near the same time, the one saying “crucio” will finish first.

This could have been resolved by making [Snape][]’s custom curse shorter, or by allowing [Malfoy][] to cast but miss (because [Harry][] was moving). It could also have been resolved if [Malfoy][] lacked the ability to make the curse fully effective, and thus [Harry][] was less than fully disabled by it.

However, as things stand, we have a time paradox. [Harry][] casts his curse while [Malfoy][] is frozen in time.

[Harry]: </Harrypedia/people/Potter/Harry James/>/ [Malfoy]: </Harrypedia/people/Malfoy/Draco Lucius/>/ [Snape]: /Harrypedia/people/Snape/Severus/

  1. Others include, but are not limited to:

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