When I heard there were plans to stage a Quidditch match at U of T, I leapt on the opportunity to write about it with the same childish curiosity that drives both young and old costumed Potter fans to camp overnight outside bookstores in barely contained anticipation for the latest addition to the Potter catalogue.
Though I’m pleased to say that I never belonged to this niche of Rowling connoisseurs, the idea of seeing a fictitious game involving magic broomsticks, sky-high hoops, and soaring balls called “quaffles” on the campus of a Muggle institution was too great to pass up. I had no idea what to expect, but vaguely imagined the game would be something of a novelty: Harry Potter fans dressed in costumes sporting the logos of Gryffindor or Slytherin playing at something that only worked because everyone pretended it did (kind of like the sci-fi fanatics who have mastered the art of speaking Klingon). This intuition was proven completely false.
Not only is the game very much a fun and playable sport, but many of its adherents hardly know a thing about Harry Potter. Keane Yarish, Captain of the McGill Quidditch team, told me he’d never read a Potter book or seen a Potter film in his life. Ariel Garneau, who organized last weekend’s match at U of T, was far more passionate about the sport than she was about the Harry Potter books, which didn’t even come up in our conversations before and after the event. Indeed the game is as intense as a football or rugby match and involves multiple lines of action occurring simultaneously as “chasers” (who are sort of like forwards) try to score and “beaters” (who are more like defencemen) try to slow them, and each other. Meanwhile each team’s “seekers” furiously pursue the Golden Snitch, a cross-country runner who is the only player without a broom and is free to move beyond the field of play. This last rule led to some amusing consequences this weekend at the Athletic Centre. All in all, these various lines of action make for an exciting, energetic, and entertaining game.
Yet the fact that players have to run with brooms between their legs, or with whatever approximation can be found, keeps things light-hearted. Like soccer, perhaps the greatest of grassroots sports, Quidditch is inclusive of everybody. For this reason, it has great potential to catch on in Canada, as it already has in the United States and Britain. Newly minted sports often fail to reach outside a niche market either because they appropriate existing sports or because they aren’t viable at the grassroots level and thus never find a wide enough audience to become popularized. Slamball, a game resembling basketball only with trampolines beneath each net, tried and failed several years ago. Quidditch, by contrast, requires only a few rudimentary items, which can be found or made easily. It’s also ideal for both the college and university settings given its basis in the fictional world of inter-house competition at Hogwarts. What is already a sleeper hit in the United States is poised to invade Canada. Grab your brooms and head to the pitch.
The next session of U of T Quidditch will be at the AC in the Field House on Saturday, Feb. 27 from 2-3 p.m. For more information, contact [email protected].
