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Remus Lupin

Index ID: PMRL — Publication date: July 31st, 2013

New from J.K. Rowling

Trait Description
Birthday 10th March
Wand 10 and a quarter inches, Cypress, Unicorn Hair
Hogwarts House Gryffindor
Special abilities Exceptionally gifted in Defense Against the Dark Arts; werewolf
Parentage Wizard father, muggle mother
Family Wife Nymphadora Tonks, son Edward Remus (Teddy) Lupin

Parents

Remus Lupin was the only child of the wizard Lyall Lupin and his Muggle wife Hope Howell.

Lyall Lupin was a very clever, rather shy young man who, by the time he was thirty, had become a world-renowned authority on Non-Human Spiritous Apparitions. These include poltergeists, Boggarts and other strange creatures that, while sometimes ghostlike in appearance and behaviour, have never been truly alive and remain something of a mystery even to the wizarding world.

On an investigative trip into a dense Welsh forest in which a particularly vicious Boggart was supposed to be lurking, Lyall ran across his future wife. Hope Howell, a beautiful Muggle girl who worked in an insurance office in Cardiff, had taken an ill-advised walk through what she believed to be innocent woodland. Boggarts and poltergeists may be sensed by Muggles, and Hope, a particularly imaginative and sensitive person, had become convinced that something was watching her from between the dark trees. Eventually, her imagination became so overactive that the Boggart assumed a form: that of a large, evil-looking man, bearing down on her with a snarl and outstretched hands in the gloom. Hearing her scream, young Lyall came sprinting through the trees, causing the apparition to shrink into a field mushroom with one wave of his wand. The terrified Hope thought, in her confusion, that he had driven her would-be attacker away, and his first words to her – ‘it’s all right, it was only a Boggart’ made no impression on her. Noticing how very beautiful she was, Lyall made the wise decision not to talk about Boggarts any more, but instead agreed that the man had been very big and scary, and that the only sensible thing to do was for him to accompany Hope home to protect her.

The young couple fell in love, and not even Lyall’s shamefaced admission, some months later, that Hope had never really been in danger, dented her enthusiasm for him. To Lyall’s delight, Hope accepted his proposal of marriage and threw herself enthusiastically into preparations for the wedding, complete with a Boggart-topped cake.

Lyall and Hope’s first and only child, Remus John, was born after a year of marriage. A happy, healthy little boy, he showed early signs of magic and both parents imagined that he would follow in his father’s footsteps, attending Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry in due course.

Bitten

By the time that Remus was four years old, the amount of Dark magical activity across the country was increasing steadily. While few yet knew what lay behind the mounting attacks and sightings, Lord Voldemort’s first ascent to power was in progress and Death Eaters were recruiting all kinds of Dark creatures to join them in their quest to overthrow the Ministry of Magic. The Ministry called in the services of authorities on Dark creatures – even those as minor as Boggarts and poltergeists – to help it understand and contain the threat. Lyall Lupin was among those asked to join the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, which he did gladly. It was here that Lyall came face-to-face with a werewolf called Fenrir Greyback, who had been brought in for questioning about the death of two Muggle children.

The Werewolf Registry was badly maintained. Werewolves were so shunned by wizarding society that they generally avoided contact with other people; they lived in self-described ‘packs’ and did all they could to avoid being registered. Greyback, whom the Ministry did not know to be a werewolf, claimed to be nothing more than a Muggle tramp who was utterly amazed at finding himself in a room full of wizards, and horrified by the talk about the poor, dead children.

Greyback’s filthy clothing and lack of wand were sufficient to persuade two overworked and ignorant members of the questioning committee that he was telling the truth, but Lyall Lupin was not so easily fooled. He recognised certain telltale signs in Greyback’s appearance and behaviour and told the committee that Greyback ought to be kept in detention until the next full moon, a mere twenty-four hours later.

Greyback sat in silence while Lyall was laughed at by his fellow committee members (‘Lyall, you just stick to Welsh Boggarts, that’s what you’re good at’). Lyall, generally a mild-mannered man, grew angry. He described werewolves as ‘soulless, evil, deserving nothing but death’. The committee ordered Lyall out of the room, the head of the committee apologised to the Muggle tramp and Greyback was released.

The wizard who escorted Greyback out of the inquiry was intending to place a Memory Charm upon him, so that he would forget having been inside the Ministry. Before he had a chance to do so, he was overpowered by Greyback and two accomplices who had been lurking at the entrance, and the three werewolves fled.

Greyback lost no time in sharing with his friends how Lyall Lupin had just described them. Their revenge on the wizard who thought that werewolves deserved nothing but death would be swift and terrible.

Shortly before Remus Lupin’s fifth birthday, as he slept peacefully in his bed, Fenrir Greyback forced open the boy’s window and attacked him. Lyall reached the bedroom in time to save his son’s life, driving Greyback out of the house with a number of powerful curses. However, henceforth, Remus would be a full-fledged werewolf.

Lyall Lupin never forgave himself for the words he had spoken in front of Greyback at the inquiry: ‘soulless, evil, deserving nothing but death’. He had parroted what was the common view of werewolves in his community, but his son was what he had always been – loveable and clever – except for that terrible period at the full moon when he suffered an excruciating transformation and became a danger to everyone around him. For many years, Lyall kept the truth about the attack, including the identity of the attacker, from his son, fearing Remus’s recriminations.

Childhood

Lyall did all he could to find a cure, but neither potions nor spells could help his son. From this time onwards, the family’s lives were dominated by the need to hide Remus’s condition. They uprooted themselves from village to town, leaving the instant that rumours of the boy’s odd behaviour started. Fellow witches and wizards noticed how peaky Remus became as new moon approached, not to mention his monthly disappearances. Remus was not allowed to play with other children, in case he let slip the truth of his condition. In consequence, and in spite of his loving parents, he was a very lonely boy.

While Remus was small, his containment during his transformation was not difficult; a locked room and plenty of silencing spells usually sufficed. However, as he grew, so did his wolfish self, and by the time he was ten years old, he was capable of pounding down doors and smashing windows. Ever more powerful spells were needed to contain him and both Hope and Lyall grew thin with worry and fear. They adored their son, but they knew that their community – already beset with fears at the mounting Dark activity around them – would not be lenient on an uncontrolled werewolf. The hopes that they had once had for their son seemed in ruins, and Lyall educated Remus at home, certain that he would never be able to set foot in school.

Shortly before Remus’s eleventh birthday, no less a person than Albus Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts, arrived uninvited on the Lupins’ doorstep. Flustered and frightened, Lyall and Hope tried to block his entrance, but somehow, five minutes later, Dumbledore was sitting at the fireside, eating crumpets and playing Gobstones with Remus.

Dumbledore explained to the Lupins that he knew what had happened to their son. Greyback had boasted of what he had done and Dumbledore had spies among Dark creatures. However, Dumbledore told the Lupins that he saw no reason why Remus should not come to school, and described the arrangements that he had made to give the boy a safe and secure place for his transformations. Due to the widespread prejudice around werewolves, Dumbledore agreed that for Remus’s own sake his condition should not be broadcast. Once a month, he would leave for a secure and comfortable house in the village of Hogsmeade, guarded by many spells and reached only by an underground passage from the Hogwarts grounds, where he could transform in peace. Remus’s excitement was beyond anything he had known before. It was the dream of his life to meet other children and have, for the first time, friends and playmates.

School

Sorted into Gryffindor house, Remus Lupin was swiftly befriended by two cheerful, confident and rebellious boys, James Potter and Sirius Black. They were attracted by Remus’s quiet sense of humour and a kindness that they valued, even if they did not always possess it themselves. Remus, always the underdog’s friend, was kind to short and rather slow Peter Pettigrew, a fellow Gryffindor, whom James and Sirius might not have thought worthy of their attention without Remus’s persuasion. Soon, these four became inseparable.

Remus functioned as the conscience of this group, but it was an occasionally faulty conscience. He did not approve of their relentless bullying of Severus Snape, but he loved James and Sirius so much, and was so grateful for their acceptance, that he did not always stand up to them as much as he knew he should.

Inevitably, his three best friends soon became curious as to why Remus had to vanish once a month. Convinced by his lonely childhood that his friends would desert him if they knew that he was a werewolf, Remus made up ever more elaborate lies to account for his absences. James and Sirius guessed the truth in their second year. To Remus’s astonished gratitude, they not only remained his friends but thought up an ingenious method of easing his monthly isolation. They also gave him a nickname that would follow him all through school: ‘Moony’. Remus finished his school career as a Prefect.

The Order of the Phoenix

By the time the four friends left school, Lord Voldemort’s ascendancy was almost complete. True resistance to him was concentrated in the underground organisation called the Order of the Phoenix, which all four young men joined.

The death of James Potter, along with his wife Lily, at the hands of Lord Voldemort, was one of the most traumatic events of Remus’s already troubled life. His friends meant even more to him than to other people, because he had long since accepted the fact that most people would treat him as untouchable, and that there could be no possibility of marrying and having children. Even worse, within twenty- four hours he had also lost his two other best friends. Remus was in the north of the country on Order of the Phoenix business when he heard the horrible news that one of them had murdered the other, and was now in Azkaban, a traitor to the Order and to Lily and James themselves.

The downfall of Voldemort, such a source of jubilation to the rest of the wizarding community, marked the beginning of a long stretch of loneliness and unhappiness for Remus. He had lost his three close friends and, with the Order disbanded, his previous comrades returned to busy lives with families. His mother was now dead, and while Lyall, his father, was always delighted to see his son, Remus refused to endanger his father’s peaceful existence by returning to live with him.

Remus now lived a hand-to-mouth existence, taking jobs that were far below his level of ability, always knowing that he would have to leave them before his pattern of growing sick once a month at the full moon was noticed by his workmates.

The Wolfsbane Potion

One development in the wizarding community gave Remus hope: the discovery of the Wolfsbane Potion. While this did not prevent a werewolf losing his human form once a month, it restricted his transformation to that of an ordinary and sleepy wolf. It had always been Remus’s worst fear that he would kill while out of his right mind. However, the Wolfsbane Potion was complex and the ingredients very expensive. Remus had no chance to sample it without admitting what he was and so he continued his lonely, itinerant existence.

Return to Hogwarts

Once again, Albus Dumbledore changed the course of Remus Lupin’s life when he tracked him down to a tumbledown, semi-derelict cottage in Yorkshire. Delighted to see the Headmaster, Remus was amazed when Dumbledore offered him the post of Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher. He was only persuaded to accept when Dumbledore explained that there would be a limitless supply of Wolfsbane Potion, courtesy of the Potions master, Severus Snape.

At Hogwarts, Remus revealed himself to be a gifted teacher, with a rare flair for his own subject and a profound understanding of his pupils. He was, as ever, particularly drawn to the underdog, and both Neville Longbottom and Harry Potter benefited from his wisdom and kindness.

However, Remus’s old flaw was at work. He had grave suspicions about one of his old friends, a known fugitive, but did not share them with anyone at Hogwarts. His desperate desire to belong and to be liked meant that he was neither as brave nor as honest as he ought to have been.

An unfortunate combination of circumstances arose that resulted in Remus undergoing a true werewolf’s transformation on the grounds of the school. Severus Snape’s resentment, never abated by Remus’s subsequent respectful politeness, made sure that it was widely known what the Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher was. Remus felt obliged to resign and departed Hogwarts once more.

Marriage

As Lord Voldemort once again gained ascendancy, the old resistance regrouped and Remus found himself once more part of the Order of the Phoenix.

This time, the group included an Auror who had been too young to belong to the Order during its first incarnation. Clever, brave and funny, pink-haired Nymphadora Tonks was a protégée of Alastor ‘Mad-Eye’ Moody, the toughest and most grizzled Auror of them all.

Remus, so often melancholy and lonely, was first amused, then impressed, then seriously smitten by the young witch. He had never fallen in love before. If it had happened in peacetime, Remus would have simply taken himself off to a new place and a new job, so that he did not have to endure the pain of watching Tonks fall in love with a handsome, young wizard in the Auror office, which was what he expected to happen. However, this was war; they were both needed in the Order of the Phoenix, and nobody knew what the next day would bring. Remus felt justified in remaining exactly where he was, keeping his feelings to himself but secretly rejoicing every time somebody paired him with Tonks on some overnight mission.

It had never occurred to Remus that Tonks could return his feelings because he had become so used to considering himself unclean and unworthy. One night when they lay in hiding outside a known Death Eater’s house, after a year of increasingly warm friendship, Tonks made an idle remark about one of their fellow Order members (‘He’s still handsome, isn’t he, even after Azkaban?’). Before he could stop himself, Remus had replied bitterly that he supposed she had fallen for his old friend (‘He always got the women.’). At this, Tonks became suddenly angry. ‘You’d know perfectly well who I’ve fallen for, if you weren’t too busy feeling sorry for yourself to notice.’

Remus’s immediate response was a happiness he had never experienced in his life, but this was extinguished almost at once by a sense of crushing duty. He had always known that he could not marry and run the risk of passing on his painful, shameful condition. He therefore pretended not to understand Tonks, which did not fool her at all. Wiser than Remus, she was sure that he loved her, but that he was refusing to admit it out of mistaken nobility. However, he avoided any further excursions with her, barely talked to her, and started volunteering for the most dangerous missions. Tonks became desperately unhappy, convinced not only that the man she loved would never willingly spend time with her again, but also that he might walk to his death rather than admit his feelings.

Remus and Tonks both fought Lord Voldemort and his Death Eaters in the Department of Mysteries, a battle that resulted in the public exposure of Voldemort’s return. The loss of the last of his school friends during this battle did nothing to soften Remus’s increasingly self-destructive attitude. Tonks could only watch in despair as he volunteered to spy for the Order, leaving to live among fellow werewolves to try to persuade them to Dumbledore’s side. In doing this, he was exposing himself to the possible reprisals of the werewolf who had changed his life forever, Fenrir Greyback.

Remus came face-to-face with both Greyback and Tonks at Hogwarts barely a year later, when the Order clashed with Death Eaters within the castle. During this battle, Remus lost yet another person he had loved: Albus Dumbledore. Dumbledore had been adored by every member of the Order of the Phoenix, but to Remus, he had represented the sort of kindness, tolerance and understanding that he had received from nobody in the world outside his parents and his three best friends, and had been the only man ever to offer him a position within normal wizarding society.

In the aftermath of the bloody fight, inspired by Fleur Delacour’s protestation of enduring love for Bill Weasley, who had been savaged by Greyback, Tonks made a brave, public declaration of her feelings for Remus, who was forced to admit the strength of his love for her. In spite of continuing misgivings that he was acting selfishly, Remus married Tonks quietly in the north of Scotland, with witnesses taken from the local wizarding tavern. He continued to fear that the stigma attached to him would infect his wife and wished for no fanfare around their union; he swung constantly between elation that he was married to the woman of his dreams and terror of what he might have brought upon them both.

Parenthood

Within a few weeks of their marriage, Remus realised that Tonks was pregnant and every fear he had ever had surfaced. He was convinced that he had passed on his condition to an innocent child and that he had condemned Tonks to the same life as his mother, forever moving around, unable to settle, having to hide her increasingly violent child from sight. Full of remorse and self-recrimination, Remus fled, leaving the pregnant Tonks, seeking out Harry and offering to accompany him on whatever death-defying adventure awaited.

To Remus’s shock and displeasure, the seventeen-year-old Harry not only declined his offer but became angry and insulting. He told his ex-teacher that he was acting selfishly and irresponsibly. Remus responded with uncharacteristic violence and stormed out of the house, taking refuge in a corner of the Leaky Cauldron, where he sat drinking and fuming.

However, after a few hours’ reflection, Remus was forced to accept that his ex-pupil had just taught him a valuable lesson. James and Lily, Remus reflected, had stuck with Harry even unto their own deaths. His own parents, Lyall and Hope, had sacrificed their peace and security to keep the family together. Bitterly ashamed, Remus left the inn and returned to his wife, where he begged her forgiveness and assured her that, come what may, he would never leave her again. For the rest of Tonks’s pregnancy, Remus eschewed missions for the Order of the Phoenix and made it his first priority to protect his wife and unborn child.

The Lupins’ son, Edward Remus (‘Teddy’), was named for Remus’s recently deceased father-in-law. To both parents’ relief and delight, he showed no sign of lycanthropy when born, but inherited his mother’s ability to change his appearance at will. On the night of Teddy’s birth, Remus briefly left Tonks and his son in the charge of his mother-in-law, so that he could go and find Harry for the first time since their angry confrontation. Here, he asked Harry to be Teddy’s godfather, feeling nothing but forgiveness and gratitude towards the person who had sent him home to the family that gave him his greatest happiness.

Death

Both Remus and Tonks returned to Hogwarts for the final battle against Voldemort, leaving their tiny son in the care of his grandmother. The couple knew that if Voldemort won this battle, their family was sure to be eliminated: both were notorious members of the Order of the Phoenix, Tonks was a marked woman in the eyes of her Death Eater aunt, Bellatrix Lestrange, and their son was the very antithesis of a pure-blood, having many Muggle relatives and a dash of werewolf.

Having survived numerous encounters with Death Eaters and fought his way skillfully and bravely out of many tight corners, Remus Lupin met his end at the hands of Antonin Dolohov, one of the longest-serving, most devoted and sadistic of all Voldemort’s Death Eaters. Remus was no longer in prime fighting condition when he rushed to join the fight. Months of inactivity, using mostly spells of concealment and protection, had blunted his duelling capabilities, and when he ran up against a dueller of Dolohov’s skill, now battle-hardened after months of killing and maiming, his reactions were too slow.

Remus Lupin was posthumously awarded the Order of Merlin, First Class, the first werewolf ever to be accorded this honour. The example of his life and death did much to lift the stigma on werewolves. He was never forgotten by anyone who knew him: a brave, kind man who did the best he could in very difficult circumstances and who helped many more than he ever realised.

J.K. Rowling’s thoughts

Remus Lupin was one of my favourite characters in the entire Potter series. I made myself cry all over again while writing this entry, because I hated killing him.

Lupin’s condition of lycanthropy (being a werewolf) was a metaphor for those illnesses that carry a stigma, like HIV and AIDs. All kinds of superstitions seem to surround blood-borne conditions, probably due to taboos surrounding blood itself. The wizarding community is as prone to hysteria and prejudice as the Muggle one, and the character of Lupin gave me a chance to examine those attitudes.

Remus’s Patronus is never revealed in the Potter books, even though it is he who teaches Harry the difficult and unusual art of producing one. It is, in fact, a wolf – an ordinary wolf, not a werewolf. Wolves are family-orientated and non-aggressive, but Remus dislikes the form of his Patronus, which is a constant reminder of his affliction. Everything wolfish disgusts him, and he often produces a non-corporeal Patronus deliberately, especially when others are watching.


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The Marauder’s Map

Index ID: PMMMAP — Publication date: April 10th, 2013

New from J.K. Rowling

Perhaps no students (even including Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, Hermione Granger and Tom Riddle) have ever explored the castle and grounds of Hogwarts as thoroughly and illicitly as the four creators and contributors to the Marauder’s Map: James Potter, Sirius Black, Remus Lupin and Peter Pettigrew.

James, Sirius and Peter were not initially impelled to explore the school grounds by night out of devilment alone (though that played its part), but by their desire to help their dear friend Remus Lupin to bear his lycanthropy. Prior to the invention of the Wolfsbane Potion, Lupin was compelled to undergo an excruciating transformation every full moon. Once his condition was discovered by his three best friends, they sought a way to render his transformations less solitary and painful, which led to them learning to become (unregistered) Animagi, so that they could keep him company without harm to themselves. The ability of Sirius Black, Peter Pettigrew and James Potter to become, respectively, a dog, a rat and a stag, enabled them to explore the castle grounds by night undetected. The interior of the castle, meanwhile, was mapped over time with the help of James Potter’s Invisibility Cloak.

The Marauder’s Map is lasting testimony to the advanced magical ability of the four friends who included Harry Potter’s father, godfather and favourite teacher. The map they created during their time at Hogwarts appears to be a blank piece of parchment unless activated by the phrase: I solemnly swear that I am up to no good, a phrase that, in the case of three of the four makers, should be understood as a joke. The ‘no good’ of which they wrote never denoted Dark magic, but school rule-breaking; similar bravado is evinced by their use of their own nicknames on the map (‘Messrs Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs’).

The magic used in the map’s creation is advanced and impressive; it includes the Homonculous Charm, enabling the possessor of the map to track the movements of every person in the castle, and it was also enchanted to forever repel (as insultingly as possible) the curiosity of their nemesis, Severus Snape.

Although the precise circumstances surrounding the makers’ loss of their map are not given in the Harry Potter novels, it is easy to conclude that they eventually over-reached themselves and were cornered by Argus Filch, probably on a tip-off from Snape, whose obsession it had become to expose his arch-rival, James Potter, in wrongdoing. The masterpiece of a map was confiscated in Sirius, James, Remus and Peter’s final year and none of them were able to steal it back from a well-prepared and suspicious Filch. In any case, their priorities changed in their final months at school, becoming far more serious and focused on the world beyond Hogwarts, where Lord Voldemort was successfully rising to power. All four of the map’s creators would shortly be inducted into the renegade organisation headed by Albus Dumbledore, the Order of the Phoenix, and a map of their old school – no matter how ingenious – would no longer be of use to them except as a piece of nostalgia.

The Marauder’s Map was, however, of immense use to the young Weasley twins. The story of Fred and George’s acquisition of the map is told in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. It was a mark of their high esteem for Harry Potter, and their belief that he stood in need of assistance with a destiny none of them yet fully understood, that they later gifted the map to him, unwittingly passing it on to the child of one of the creators.

The map was subsequently confiscated from Harry Potter by a Death Eater in disguise at the school, who recognised it as a likely source of his own discovery.”

J.K. Rowling’s Thoughts

The Marauder’s Map subsequently became something of a bane to its true originator (me), because it allowed Harry a little too much freedom of information. I never showed Harry taking the map back from the empty office of (the supposed) Mad-Eye Moody, and I sometimes regretted that I had not capitalised on this mistake to leave it there. However, I like the moment when Harry watches Ginny’s dot moving around the school in Deathly Hallows, so on balance I am glad I let Harry reclaim his rightful property.


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Sir Cadogan

Index ID: PMSIRC — Publication date: December 20th, 2012

Trait Description
Birthday Unknown
Wand (according to legend)Blackthorn and troll whisker, nine inches, combustible
Hogwarts House Gryffindor
Special abilities Insane bravery
Parentage Wizard father, witch mother
Family Three wives are believed to have left him, rumoured to have had seventeen known children

Before the wizarding community was forced into hiding, it was not unusual for a wizard to live in the Muggle community and hold down what we would now think of as a Muggle job.

It is widely believed in wizarding circles that Sir Cadogan was one of the famous Knights of the Round Table, albeit a little-known one, and that he achieved this position through his friendship with Merlin. He has certainly been excised from all Muggle volumes of King Arthur’s story, but wizarding versions of the tales include Sir Cadogan alongside Sir Lancelot, Sir Bedivere and Sir Percivale. These tales reveal him to be hot-headed and peppery, and brave to the point of foolhardiness, but a good man in a corner.

Sir Cadogan’s most famous encounter was with the Wyvern of Wye, a dragonish creature that was terrorizing the West Country. At their first encounter, the beast ate Sir Cadogan’s handsome steed, bit his wand in half and melted his sword and visor. Unable to see through the steam rising from his melting helmet, Sir Cadogan barely escaped with his life. However, rather than running away, he staggered into a nearby meadow, grabbed a small, fat pony grazing there, leapt upon it and galloped back towards the wyvern with nothing but his broken wand in his hand, prepared to meet a valiant death. The creature lowered its fearsome head to swallow Sir Cadogan and the pony whole, but the splintered and misfiring wand pierced its tongue, igniting the gassy fumes rising from its stomach and causing the wyvern to explode.

Elderly witches and wizards still use the saying ‘I’ll take Cadogan’s pony’ to mean, ‘I’ll salvage the best I can from a tricky situation’.

Sir Cadogan’s portrait, which hangs on the seventh floor of Hogwarts Castle, shows him with the pony he rode forever more (which, understandably perhaps, never much liked him) and accurately depicts his hot temper, his love of a foolhardy challenge and his determination to beat the enemy, come what may.


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Marge Dursley

Index ID: PMMD — Publication date: December 20th, 2012

New from J.K. Rowling

Marjorie Eileen Dursley is the older sister of Vernon Dursley. Although no blood relation of Harry Potter, he has been taught to call her ‘Aunt Marge’.

Marge is a large and unpleasant woman whose main interest in life is breeding bulldogs. She believes in corporal punishment and plain speaking, which is what she calls being offensive. Marge is secretly in love with a neighbour called Colonel Fubster, who looks after her dogs when she is away. He will never marry her, due to her truly horrible personality. This unrequited passion fuels a lot of her nasty behaviour to other people.

Marge dotes on Dudley, her only nephew. She does not know that Harry Potter , who lives with her relatives, is a wizard. She believes him to be the offspring of two unemployed layabouts who dumped their son on their hardworking relatives, Vernon and Petunia . The latter, who are terrified of the prejudiced and outspoken Marge finding out the truth, have fostered this impression over many years.

When Harry becomes angry with Aunt Marge, who has been insulting his parents, and loses control over his magical abilities, she is blown up like a barrage balloon. Two members of the Accidental Magic Reversal Squad must be dispatched from the Ministry of Magic to deal with this incident and modify Aunt Marge’s memory. From that time forward, the Dursleys do not invite Marge to stay while Harry is in residence and he never sees her again.

J.K. Rowling’s thoughts

I regret making Aunt Marge a breeder of bulldogs, as I now know them to be a non-aggressive breed. My sister owns one and he’s the most loveable, affectionate dog you could hope to meet. On the other hand, they do look grumpy, and on appearance alone seemed to suit Aunt Marge.


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Professor Kettleburn

Index ID: PMPROFK — Publication date: December 20th, 2012

Trait Description
Birthday 22nd November
Wand Chestnut and phoenix feather, eleven and a half inches, whippy
Hogwarts House Hufflepuff
Special abilities Encyclopedic knowledge of magical creatures, fearlessness
Parentage agical father, magical mother
Family No wife, no children
Hobbies Dangerous creatures are both his work and his hobby

Silvanus Kettleburn was the Care of Magical Creatures teacher at Hogwarts until Harry’s third year, when he was replaced by Rubeus Hagrid.

Kettleburn was an enthusiastic and occasionally reckless man whose great love of the often dangerous creatures he studied and looked after led to serious injuries to himself and, occasionally, others. This fact led to no fewer than sixty-two periods of probation during his time of employment at the school (a record that still stands). Like Hagrid after him, he was prone to underestimating the risks involved in caring for creatures such as Occamys, Grindylows and Fire Crabs, and once famously caused the Great Hall to catch fire after enchanting an Ashwinder to play the Worm in a play of ‘The Fountain of Fair Fortune’.

Kettleburn was a loveable if eccentric man and his continuing employment at the school was evidence of the great affection in which staff and students held him. He finished his career with only one arm and half a leg. Albus Dumbledore presented him with a full set of enchanted wooden limbs on his retirement, a gift that had to be replaced regularly since, because Kettleburn’s habit of visiting dragon sanctuaries in his spare time meant that his prosthetics were frequently set on fire.


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Hogwarts Ghosts

Index ID: PMHGH — Publication date: October 18th, 2012

New from J. K. Rowling

Hogwarts is the most heavily haunted dwelling place in Britain (and this is against stiff competition, as there are more reported ghost sightings/sensings on these damp islands than anywhere else in the world). The castle is a congenial place for ghosts, because the living inhabitants treat their dead friends with tolerance and even affection, no matter how many times they have heard the same old reminiscences.

Each of the four Hogwarts houses has its own ghost. Slytherin boasts the Bloody Baron, who is covered in silver bloodstains. The least talkative of the house ghosts is the Grey Lady, who is long-haired and beautiful.

Hufflepuff house is haunted by the Fat Friar, who was executed because senior churchmen grew suspicious of his ability to cure the pox merely by poking peasants with a stick, and his ill-advised habit of pulling rabbits out of the communion cup. Though a genial character in general, the Fat Friar still resents the fact that he was never made a cardinal.

Gryffindor house is home to Nearly Headless Nick, who in life was Sir Nicholas de Mimsy-Porpington. Something of a snob, and a less accomplished wizard than he believed, Sir Nicholas lounged around the court of Henry VII in life, until his foolish attempt to beautify a lady-in-waiting by magic caused the unfortunate woman to sprout tusks. Sir Nicholas was stripped of his wand and inexpertly executed, leaving his head hanging off by a single flap of skin and sinew. He retains a feeling of inadequacy with regard to truly headless ghosts.

Another notable Hogwarts ghost is Moaning Myrtle, who haunts an unpopular girls’ toilet. Myrtle was a student at Hogwarts when she died, and she chose to return to school in perpetuity, with the short-term aim of haunting her arch-rival and bully, Olive Hornby. As the decades have rolled by, Myrtle has made a name for herself as the most miserable ghost in school, usually to be found lurking inside one of the toilets and filling the tiled space with her moans and howls.”

J. K. Rowling’s Thoughts

The inspiration for Moaning Myrtle was the frequent presence of a crying girl in communal bathrooms, especially at the parties and discos of my youth. This does not seem to happen in male bathrooms, so I enjoyed placing Harry and Ron in such uncomfortable and unfamiliar territory in HARRY POTTER and the Chamber of Secrets and HARRY POTTER and the Half-Blood Prince.

The most productive ghost at Hogwarts is, of course, Professor Binns, the old History of Magic teacher who fell asleep in front of the staff-room fire one day and simply got up to give his next class, leaving his body behind. There is some debate as to whether or not Professor Binns realises he is dead. While his entrance to lessons through the blackboard is vaguely amusing the first time students see it, he is not the most stimulating teacher.

The inspiration for Professor Binns was an old professor at my university, who gave every lecture with his eyes closed, rocking backwards and forwards slightly on his toes. While he was a brilliant man, who disgorged an immense amount of valuable information at every lecture, his disconnect with his students was total. Professor Binns is only dimly aware of his living students, and is astonished when they begin asking him questions.

In the very earliest list of ghosts I ever wrote for Hogwarts, I included Myrtle (initially named ‘Wailing Wanda’), Professor Binns, the Grey Lady (then called ‘the Whispering Lady’) and the Bloody Baron. There was also a Black Knight, The Toad (which left ectoplasm all over its classroom), and a ghost I rather regret not using: his name was Edmund Grubb, and the notes beside his name say: Expired in the doorway of the Dining Hall. Sometimes stops people getting in, out of spite. Fat Victorian ghost. (Ate poisonous berries).


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The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black

Index ID: BLACKTREE — Publication date: February 21st, 2006

Note: This genealogical tree of the Black family was made by J.K. Rowling to be offered for sale to benefit Book Aid International. It was sold for £30,000 and the buyer was Daniel Radcliffe, who plays Harry Potter in the film adaptations.

The Noble and Most Ancient House of BLACK
(there are many stories between the lines)
J.K. Rowling

Sirius (1845-1853)

Phineus Nigellus (1847-1925)
Ursula Flint

Elladora (1850-1931)

Sirius (1877-1952)
Hesper Gamp

Cygnus (1889-1943)
Violetta Bulstrode

Belvina (1886-1962)
Herbert Burke

Acrtunus (1884-1959)
Lysandra Yaxley

Arcuturs (1901-1991)
Melania Macmillan

Lycoris (1904-1965)

Regulus (1906-1959)

Pollux (1912-1990)
Irma Crabbe

Cassiapeia (1915-1992)

Dorea (1920-1977)
Charlus Potter

Callidora (1915-)
Harfand Longbottom

Charis (1919-1973)
Caspar Crouch

Lucretia (1925-1992)
Ignatius Prewett

Orion (1929-1979)
Walburga (1925-1985)

Cirgnus (1938-1992)
Druella Rosier

Regulus (1961-1979)

Bellatrix (1951-)
Rodolphus Lestrange

Narcissa (1955-)
Lucius Malfoy

Draco Malfoy (1980-)

Disowned Family Members

Iola Black – married Muggle Bob Hitchens
Phineus – supported Muggle Rights
Marius Black – Squib
Cedrella Black – Married blood traitor Septimus Weasley
Alphard Black – gave gold to runaway nephew Sirius
Sirius Black – ran away from home
Andromeda Black – married Muggle-born Ted Tonks

‘I used to be there,’ said Sirius, pointing at a small, round, charred hole in the tapestry, rather like a cigarette burn. ‘My sweet old mother blasted me off after I ran away from home…’
HARRY POTTER & THE ORDER OF THE PHOENIX


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The Ballad of Nearly Headless Nick

Index ID: BNHN — Publication date: March 24th, 2005

Note: This manuscript was contributed to an auction to raise funds for Scottish Language Dictionaries.

It was a mistake any wizard could make,
Who was tired and caught on the hop,
One piffling error, and then, to my terror,
I found myself facing the chop.
Alas for the eve when I met Lady Grieve,
A-strolling the park in the dusk!
She was of the belief I could straighten her teeth,
Next moment she’d sprouted a tusk.

I cried through the night that I’d soon put her right,
But the process of justice was lax;
They’d brought out the block, though they’d mislaid the rock,
Where they usually sharpened the axe.
Next morning at dawn, with a face most forlorn,
The priest said to try not to cry,
“You can come just like that, no, you won’t need a hat,”
And I knew that my end must be nigh.

The man in the mask who would have the sad task,
Of cleaving my head from my neck,
Said “Nick, if you please, will you get to your knees,”
And I turned to a gibbering wreck.
“This may sting a bit” said the cack-handed twit,
As he swung the axe up in the air,
But oh the blunt blade! No difference it made,
My head was still definitely there.”

The axeman he hacked and he whacked and he thwacked,
“Won’t be too long”, he assured me,
But quick it was not, and the bone-headed clot,
Took forty-five goes ’til he floored me.
And so I was dead, but my faithful old head,
It never saw fit to desert me,
It still lingers on, that’s the end of my song,
And now, please applaud, or you’ll hurt me.

Poem cut from ‘Harry Potter and the
Chamber of Secrets’
by
J.K. Rowling


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Rubbish Bin: Toxic (Desktop Website)

Index ID: RB3DW — Publication date: September 16th, 2004 to November 15th, 2007

Gilderoy Lockhart is based on JKR’s first husband

No, he most certainly is not. I have always been honest about the fact that Gilderoy Lockhart WAS inspired by a real man (see the ‘Extras’ section). For obvious reasons I am not going to identify the person in question – however irritating he was, he does not deserve that – but I can state categorically that I never married him. I do not lie about the inspiration for characters (although at times like these, I wonder why I don’t refuse to answer these questions at all!)

J K Rowling demands 2 million rupees from religious charities in India

Recently there were a number of reports that Warner Bros. and I had taken legal action against religious charities in India because they constructed a Hogwarts castle as part of a Hindu festival. Here are the facts.

The defendants were not religious charities, and theirs was not a religious celebration. On the contrary, it was a large-scale, commercial, sponsored event involving corporations that included a major Indian high street bank. The event was, however, set up while a Hindu festival was going on.

It was Warner Bros who brought the case, because the rights that were being infringed belong to them, not me. My name has to be attached to such proceedings as a legal technicality, because I am the underlying creator of Harry Potter series.

Also due to a technicality, Warner Bros were obliged to claim damages as part of their claim. However, they waived this right, and neither sought nor obtained any financial compensation. It is completely false to assert that they, or I, were trying to take money from anybody, let alone two million rupees.

The court ruled that Warner Bros. rights had indeed been infringed, and that events such as the one in question would need Warner Bros.’ permission in the future. The court also restrained all the defendants from any future events infringing Warner Bros. rights.

Some of the news agencies and newspapers who misreported this story subsequently issued corrections and apologies, but the original, false story is still doing the rounds. In the immortal words of Mark Twain, ‘a lie can get halfway around the world before the truth can even get its boots on.’


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Extra Stuff: Characters (Desktop Website)

Index ID: EXT2DW — Publication date: May 15th, 2004

Some Random Facts About The Weasley Family

Ron was the only one of three major characters whose surname never changed; he has been ‘Weasley’ from start to finish. In Britain and Ireland the weasel has a bad reputation as an unfortunate, even malevolent, animal. However, since childhood I have had a great fondness for the family mustelidae; not so much malignant as maligned, in my opinion.

There are also many superstitions associated with redheaded people and most state that they are in some way unlucky (Judas Escariot was supposedly red-haired), but this is nonsense; I happen to like red hair as well as weasels.

Although I never meant him to be like Sean, once I got Ron onto the page he often behaved like my oldest friend, who is both very funny and deeply loyal. However, there are also substantial differences between Ron and Sean. I have only once set out to faithfully depict a real human being (see Gilderoy Lockhart); everywhere else, though I might have borrowed the occasional real person’s characteristic, they are at least 90% imaginary.

Before her marriage Mrs. Weasley was Molly Prewett. As you will note from chapter one, Philosopher’s Stone, she has lost close family members to Voldemort.

Arthur Weasley was one of three brothers. Ginny (full name Ginevra, not Virginia), is the first girl to be born into the Weasley clan for several generations.

Fred and George were born – when else? – on April Fool’s Day.

Nearly Headless Nick

In the first draft of ‘Chamber of Secrets’, Nick sang a self-penned ballad explaining how his head had (nearly) come off. My editor was not very fond of the song and so I cut it. However, for those who are curious, here is the story of Nick’s decapitation in his own moving words.

It was a mistake any wizard could make

Who was tired and caught on the hop

One piffling error, and then, to my terror,

I found myself facing the chop.

Alas for the eve when I met Lady Grieve

A-strolling the park in the dusk!

She was of the belief I could straighten her teeth

Next moment she’d sprouted a tusk.

I cried through the night that I’d soon put her right

But the process of justice was lax;

They’d brought out the block, though they’d mislaid the rock

Where they usually sharpened the axe.

Next morning at dawn, with a face most forlorn,

The priest said to try not to cry,

“You can come just like that, no, you won’t need a hat,”

And I knew that my end must be nigh.

The man in the mask who would have the sad task

Of cleaving my head from my neck,

Said “Nick, if you please, will you get to your knees,”

And I turned to a gibbering wreck.

“This may sting a bit” said the cack-handed twit

As he swung the axe up in the air,

But oh the blunt blade! No difference it made,

My head was still definitely there.

The axeman he hacked and he whacked and he thwacked,

“Won’t be too long”, he assured me,

But quick it was not, and the bone-headed clot

Took forty-five goes ’til he floored me.

And so I was dead, but my faithful old head

It never saw fit to desert me,

It still lingers on, that’s the end of my song,

And now, please applaud, or you’ll hurt me.

Hermione Granger

In the old days the question I was asked most often was, ‘how do you pronounce the girl’s name?’ As I expect you have noticed, I cunningly inserted the answer to this question in ‘Goblet of Fire’, when I had Hermione instruct Viktor Krum how to say it properly: Her – my – o – nee. I used to hear ‘Her – moyne’ a lot, but my favourite mis-pronunciation ever was ‘Hermy – one.’ I think I like it better than the proper way.

In the dim and distant past Hermione’s surname was ‘Puckle’, but it didn’t suit her at all and was quickly changed for something a little bit less frivolous.

Hermione’s birthday is September the 19th.

When we were editing ‘Philosopher’s Stone’ my editor wanted me to cut the scene in which Harry, Ron and Hermione fight the troll. Although I had accepted most of the smaller cuts he wanted me to make I argued hard for this one. Hermione, bless her, is so very annoying in the early part of ‘Philosopher’s Stone’ that I really felt it needed something (literally) huge to bring her together with Harry and Ron.

I have often said that Hermione is a bit like me when I was younger. I think I was seen by other people as a right little know-it-all, but I hope that it is clear that underneath Hermione’s swottiness there is a lot of insecurity and a great fear of failure (as shown by her Boggart in ‘Prisoner of Azkaban’).

Harry and Dudley: Future Hope?

A couple of people have told me that they hoped to see Dudley at King’s Cross in the Epilogue, accompanying a wizarding child. I must admit that it did occur to me to do that very thing, but a short period of reflection convinced me that any latent wizarding genes would never survive contact with Uncle Vernon’s DNA, so I didn’t do it.

However, I know that after Dudley’s brave attempt at reconciliation at the start of Deathly Hallows, the two cousins would have remained on ‘Christmas Card’ terms for the rest of their lives, and that Harry would have taken his family to visit Dudley’s when they were in the neighbourhood (occasions dreaded by James, Albus and Lily).

Gilderoy Lockhart

I have only once set out to depict somebody I have met and, unlikely though it might seem, the result was Gilderoy Lockhart. I assure you that the person on whom Gilderoy was modelled was even more objectionable than his fictional counterpart. He used to tell whopping great fibs about his past life, all of them designed to demonstrate what a wonderful, brave and brilliant person he was. Perhaps he didn’t really believe he was all that great and wanted to compensate, but I’m afraid I never dug that deep.

You might think it was mean of me to depict him as Gilderoy, but you can rest assured he will never, ever guess. He’s probably out there now telling everybody that he inspired the character of Albus Dumbledore. Or that he wrote the books and lets me take the credit out of kindness.

Crookshanks

I am not overly fond of cats. Like Hagrid, I am allergic to them and much prefer dogs. However, there was an exception. When I was working in London in the late 1980s I used to eat my lunch in a nearby square on sunny days and a large, fluffy ginger cat that looked as though it had run face-first into a wall used to prowl around the sunbathers there; I assume it lived in a nearby house. I didn’t ever get close enough to give myself an asthma attack, but I became distantly fond of this cat, which prowled among the humans around it looking disdainful and refusing to be stroked. When I decided to give Hermione an unusually intelligent cat I gave him the appearance of this haughty animal, with the slightly unfair addition of bandy legs.

Crookshanks, as anybody who has read Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them will have guessed, is half Kneazle. And if you don’t know what a Kneazle is, you need to hurry up and buy Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (all royalties go to help some of the poorest children in the world).


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