WARSAW, April 12 — It was witching hour on Thursday (April 9) night at the fairy-tale Czocha castle in Poland, as a Harry Potter-themed live-action role play (LARP) was set to cast its spell over more than a hundred would-be sorcerers.

In video released from a previous event, the 130 participants of the College of Wizardry resemble many normal graduation students, clad in capes and hats — except with added wands.

Their own four-day course is set to follow a purely ‘magical’ curriculum, with classes such as ‘Physical Defence and Geomancy’ designed to charm fans of the Harry Potter franchise.

Attendees take part as both actors and audience, playing students, teachers and ghosts at a school of sorcery heavily based on JK Rowling’s Hogwarts, where the hero of her wildly successful Harry Potter novels learns wizardry between bouts of fighting off the dark arts.

After news of the initial residential in November 2014 bewitched global fans, two more were organised for April 2015 and keen ‘students’ signed up from across the globe.

“When doing a game like this, we try to simulate a pretend magical college. So it means some people play professors, some play students, there are first year students, second year students, third year students, and so on, and we also have some rules for the game, because obviously none of us can do real magic, so we need to have some kind of rule to simulate it. And in this case it’s very simple. You point your wand at somebody, and say, “Silencio!”. And then if you think that’s cool then you become silent, and if you think that’s boring, then you think, “Oh, that spell didn’t work”. Or maybe you don’t understand what’s going on and you do something completely different,” the Danish organiser and game master of the ‘College of Wizardry’, Claus Raasted, said, during preparations ahead of the event, adding there were rules in place to simulate magic.

Raasted said that participants for the April 9-12 session come from over 17 countries and are aged between 18 and 60 years old.

“I think we can safely say that pretending to be a witch or wizard is something that appeals to everybody,” he added.

All students are provided with their own school books, carefully prepared in advance to preserve the game’s fantasy world.

But it’s not all toil and trouble. Students are free to try and tame the magical creatures in the forest, explore hidden basements, visit the local tavern and, above all, further their characters’ narratives.

“I play Hafnar Gudrinsson, an Icelandic wizard who went to the famous school of Durmstrang and now finally comes to the college. His father is a professor here and he doesn’t know about me and I’m going to tell him that he is my father and he left my mother and he will pay for what he did,” one participant, Andreas von Knoblosh, said.

Those new to the fictional college can seek out the ghostly Kalle Frolund for a bit of spiritual guidance.

“I am very much dead. My character died 150 years ago, and they actually celebrated my death-day party last time so... And, erm, my role is more of a guide and I guess it’s mainly a support role for the other players,” he told Reuters.

The set-up does diverge from Rowling’s fictional world at times — students are sorted into one of five houses, named Durentius, Faust, Libussa, Molin and Sendivogiuus — but has until now provided plenty of reference points for Harry Potter buffs.

“Creating this fantastic story in a place like this, it’s basically a childhood dream come true, so it feels really good to be here and after hearing a lot from friends and, you know, having lots of positive feedback when I was researching it, I decided that this is the place I need to go to, or else my 14 year old self will never forgive me,” participant Eva Wei, who plays a prefect, said.

Warners Bros, owners of the rights to the franchise’s film series, are allowing the explicitly Harry Potte- themed events starting on April 9 and on April 16 to go ahead, but to avoid potential jinxes the non-profit organisers, Poland’s Live from and Denmark’s Rollespilfabrikken, have agreed to omit overt references to the books or films for any future hocus-pocus — with plans and enthusiasm for new sessions already bubbling away.

“Sometimes people ask: ‘Why do you go to a LARP?’. And the answer is, why do you read a book? Why do you watch a movie? To escape from reality for a couple of hours or a couple of days. Or to learn something about yourself or about the world. It’s quite simple,” Raasted said.

Further College of Wizardry sessions are planned for November 2015 according to the group’s crowdfunding page — where they also hope to raise money to purchase a castle as a long-term home for the venture. Places start from 375 USD and participants are instructed to make their own way to Czocha — by broom, pumpkin or otherwise is not specified. — Reuters

Participants demonstrate for the media before the role-play event at Czocha Castle in Sucha, west southern Poland, April 9, 2015. — Reuters pic