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Is there some in-Universe (or somewhat canonical) explanation for why Harry wears glasses - either 100% of the time, or at least, when playing Quiddich?
Surely, given assorted spells, there should be one to repair either the issues with his near-sightedness, or, more likely, to act as lenses (being how magic is used to replace ANY technology, it ought to be able to replace lense-making).
P.S. I seem to recall a spell to make someone see better from afar, but not sure of the details.
Poor eyesight simply appears to be a non-reversible ailment among wizards.
We have ample evidence that this is so, by the 19 other mentioned wizard and witches who also wear them.
Amelia Bones (monocle), Borgin (pince-nez), Aberforth Dumbledore, Mafalda Hopkirk
Albus Dumbledore (half-moon)
‘Exactly,’ said Dumbledore, looking very seriously over the top of his half-moon glasses.
Minerva McGonagall (square)
Instead he was smiling at a rather severe-looking woman who was wearing square glasses exactly the shape of the markings the cat had had around its eyes.
Myrtle Warren (thick lenses), Bob Ogden (thick lenses), Harry Potter (round)
James Potter (round)
The tall, thin, black-haired man standing next to her put his arm around her. He wore glasses, and his hair was very untidy. It stuck up at the back, just like Harry’s did.
Rufus Scrimgeour (wire-rimmed), Rita Skeeter (rhinestone), Tofty (pince-nez)
Sybill Trelawney (thick lenses), Arthur Weasley (horn-rimmed)
Percy Weasley (horn-rimmed)
‘I – don’t – want –’ said Percy thickly, as the twins forced the jumper over his head, knocking his glasses askew.
Wilhelmina Grubbly-Plank (monocle), Eldred Worple
As to Harry's particular case, as Syltherincess states he appears to simply be genetically predisposed to poor eyesight like his father.
With the large base of people wearing glasses in world it leads to a pretty solid assumption that it cant be fixed magically. Not really a plot hole when you look at the vast list of individuals, simply something Rowling planed magic to have no answer to.
Harry wears his glasses during Quidditch because he cannot see without them. Why he cannot see without glasses, I think, has to be one of three reasons.
Harry's poor eyesight is collateral damage from Avada Kedavra, the darkest of evil curses. Body parts that are damaged, destroyed, or severed due to dark curses don't seem to be repairable in Potterverse:
Mrs Weasley looked round and said, ‘I can’t make it grow back, not when it’s been removed by Dark Magic. But it could have been so much worse ... he’s alive.’
Deathly Hallows - Page 66 - UK Hardcover
Harry's eyesight is poor because the author wanted her hero to wear glasses.
When a fan asked J.K. Rowling why Harry Potter wears glasses, Rowling answered: "Because I had glasses all though my childhood and I was sick and tired of the person in the books who wore the glasses was always the brainy one and it really irritated me and I wanted to read about a hero wearing glasses. It also has a symbolic function, Harry is the eyes onto the books in the sense that is always Harry's point of view, so there was also that, you know, facet of him wearing glasses".
JK Rowling - BBC INTERVIEW 07.18.05
Harry inherited his poor eyesight from his father James Potter, and values other qualities in himself (much like the reason Snape doesn't attend to his hygiene, per JKR) and doesn't feel that he needs to "fix" his eyesight.
Regarding spells, Hermione uses Impervius to protect Harry's glasses during Quidditch in PoA. There is a spell called Obscuro, which blindfolds a person (Hermione uses it on Phineas Nigellus). the Supersensory Spell lets a person see objects that are out of their line of vision (Ron uses this to pass his Muggle driving test). The Conjunctivitis Curse affects the vision of anyone hit with it (Sirius suggested it to Harry as a possible Curse for the first task of the Tri-Wizard Tournament; Madame Maxime uses it against the giants when they acted up when she and Hagrid went to meet with them). As an aside, Oculus Reparo does not appear in the books; it's a movie-only spell.
ETA: Just adding confirmation that James Potter did indeed wear glasses: This was in contrast to the only wizarding photograph on the walls, which was a picture of four Hogwarts students standing arm in arm, laughing at the camera. With a leap of pleasure, Harry recognised his father; his untidy, black hair stuck up at the back like Harry’s and he, too, wore glasses. (Deathly Hallows - Kreacher's Tale)
There's a difference between healing an injury, i.e. returning someone to their natural state, and attempting to override one's natural physical characteristics.
There are several healing spells mentioned in the books, such as repairing a broken nose, removing/regrowing bones and healing cuts. These are not trivial spells and they can go disastrously wrong if cast improperly. Even these spells only speed up the body's natural healing process; some injuries are so traumatic that they can't even be healed by magic.
IIRC the only magic powerful enough to physically alter someone's appearance (and eyesight) is polyjuice potion, and that wears off fairly quickly.
Plus, I can't help feeling it would be considered a fairly gross thing to do, to use magic on your own body... kind of like plastic surgery when used for vanity's sake. It feels like more of a dark wizard thing... like splitting one's soul.
Eyesight may not be viewed as a deformity by the magical world.
Speaking for someone who's worn glasses since they were in primary school, I'm not sure they'll want corrective surgery if and when such surgery that would correct all their vision faults becomes available. Viewing the world through glasses and viewing the world without glasses will mean a huge shift in perspective and having to relearn all sorts of things.
Maybe the spell is available, but not everyone makes use of it. Harry couldn't when he was younger (imagine the Dursley's response) and may just not care one way or another at current time.
Percy Weasley, Dumbledore and Prof. McGonagall too wear glasses.
McGonagall and Dumbledore may like the way they look with glasses. (Being able to look over the tops of your glasses at students when you need to intimidate is widely regarded as a good thing by some teachers.)
Well, we know that his vision wasn't perfect, and so he needed them in the Muggle world. It seems like wizards don't use any modern muggle technology, and contact lenses would definitely fit into that (Plus how could he afford them, he didn't exactly have muggle money...)
One not as well known thing about Lasik surgery is that people should be 18 to do it. Why, might you ask? Well, it's because eyes are still changing significantly until one reaches about that age. So, even if he did want to ditch the glasses, he wouldn't be old enough for Lasik. I'm going to assume that the same thing would be true of any wizard treatment that might exist.
Also, in order to fix vision, one has to know a fair amount of optics and human biology. Things have to be done exactly correctly, or else one will mess things up even further. With some of the other things we see fixed, it's more of a matter of getting things to an appropriate size, and approximately the right location, but for eyes, they must be very precise, to the micron level.
Finally, the glasses to a large degree represent many things which Harry often represented, intelligence, respect, little money (Especially with the broken glasses to begin with), and not particularly physically strong.
It could be a combination of several reasons:
He really doesn't mind his glasses. After some time, glasses start feeling like a part of you. Plus, AFAIR, he isn't teased about his glasses in the wizarding world. (I suspect that glasses are not considered uncool. Plus, Dumbledore and Lupin both wear glasses).
He doesn't realize that magic can be used to cure everyday maladies (like tooth, pimples) etc. He views the hospital as something you go when you have misplaced every bone in your body or maybe poisoned yourself.
They may not even have the good technology magic for it. Certainly they can do some wonderful stuff, but it may not be very safe, convenient or inexpensive. If there's an instantaneous cure for bad sight, I will take it. But if I have to wait three weeks in the hospital for it, nah.
I have no idea whether there's a canonical answer to that, but if I had to draw up a theory I'd say his sight was damaged by the same spell that gave him that famous and apparently also incurable scar.
(On a side-note worthy of Captain Obvious I'd say having problems with his vision is quite symbolic: He's constantly looking back into memories or looking forward to his impending confrontation with his nemesis: focusing on the present is a kind of a struggle for him in itself.)
We know that technology in the magical world follows Muggle technology with a long delay. Wizards use candles for lighting, fireplaces for heating, and a steam locomotive for traveling.
Both contact lenses and laser eye surgery are new technology, have improved a great deal in the last decade, and are still improving. I would thus expect that contact lenses or laser eye surgery were not yet readily available in the wizarding world at the time the story of Harry Potter happened (eg. in 1997).
I don't have any canon for this, just my opinion. Harry wore glasses because it was the only physical way to tie him to James (other than his unruly hair which a lot of people have). Everyone commented on his eyes - his mother's eyes, but the glasses were the only thing that visually tie him to his father and made them look alike. If there were no glasses he would have been any ordinary boy with dark hair.
Remember when Hagrid first saw Dudley in the ocean shack? He was under the impression that Dudley was Harry until Harry stepped out and Hagrid saw the (James') glasses.
Perhaps he could have had his eyes fixed but it is a complex spell which needs a specialist in eye healing/surgery magic and they are hard to get appointments or Harry had not found out about the specialist yet. Or perhaps one must be a certain age before the repair can be made by magic so that the eye continues to grow with the individual. Plus, it may be very expensive/dangerous.
