Harry Potter: The Complete Collection (1-7)

by J.K. Rowling

Harry looked at Ron and was relieved to see by his stunned face that he hadn’t learnt all the set books off by heart either.

He heard Hermione whisper, ‘It’s bewitched to look like the sky outside, I read about it in Hogwarts: A History.

Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw, If you’ve a ready mind, Where those of wit and learning, Will always find their kind;

‘Ah, music,’ he said, wiping his eyes. ‘A magic beyond all we do here! And now, bedtime. Off you trot!’

‘You!’ said Ron furiously. ‘Go back to bed!’ ‘I almost told your brother,’ Hermione snapped. ‘Percy – he’s a Prefect, he’d put a stop to this.’ Harry couldn’t believe anyone could be so interfering.

‘I hope you’re pleased with yourselves. We could all have been killed – or worse, expelled. Now, if you don’t mind, I’m going to bed.’

But from that moment on, Hermione Granger became their friend. There are some things you can’t share without ending up liking each other, and knocking out a twelve-foot mountain troll is one of them.

It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live, remember that.

‘Me!’ said Hermione. ‘Books! And cleverness! There are more important things – friendship and bravery and – oh Harry – be careful!

After all, to the well-organised mind, death is but the next great adventure.

humans do have a knack of choosing precisely those things which are worst for them.’

Always use the proper name for things. Fear of a name increases fear of the thing itself.’

‘The truth.’ Dumbledore sighed. ‘It is a beautiful and terrible thing, and should therefore be treated with great caution.

It was one of those rare occasions when the true story is even more strange and exciting than the wild rumours.

‘It takes a great deal of bravery to stand up to our enemies, but just as much to stand up to our friends.

What Harry found most unusual about life at Ron’s, however, wasn’t the talking mirror or the clanking ghoul: it was the fact that everybody there seemed to like him.

‘It was Hagrid, Ron. Hagrid opened the Chamber of Secrets fifty years ago.’

In the end, he chose the same new subjects as Ron, feeling that if he was rubbish at them, at least he’d have someone friendly to help him.

‘Because that’s what Hermione does,’ said Ron, shrugging. ‘When in doubt, go to the library.’

It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.’

‘You bought that monster?’ said Ron, his mouth hanging open. ‘He’s gorgeous, isn’t he?’ said Hermione, glowing.

‘I don’t go looking for trouble,’ said Harry, nettled. ‘Trouble usually finds me

‘The Dark Lord lies alone and friendless, abandoned by his followers. His servant has been chained these twelve years. Tonight, before midnight, the servant will break free and set out to rejoin his master. The Dark Lord will rise again with his servant’s aid, greater and more terrible than ever before. Tonight … before midnight … the servant … will set out … to rejoin … his master …

‘It does not,’ said Dumbledore quietly. ‘Hasn’t your experience with the Time-Turner taught you anything, Harry? The consequences of our actions are always so complicated, so diverse, that predicting the future is a very difficult business indeed … Professor Trelawney, bless her, is living proof of that. You did a very noble thing, in saving Pettigrew’s life.’

‘You think the dead we have loved ever truly leave us? You think that we don’t recall them more clearly than ever in times of great trouble? Your father is alive in you, Harry, and shows himself most plainly when you have need of him. How else could you produce that particular Patronus? Prongs rode again last night.’

Ron told Malfoy to do something that Harry knew he would never have dared say in front of Mrs Weasley.

There was a pause in which Hermione beamed at the pair of them, and Harry sat, torn between exasperation at Hermione, and amusement at the look on Ron’s face.

If you want to know what a man’s like, take a good look at how he treats his inferiors, not his equals.’

‘Curiosity is not a sin,’ he said. ‘But we should exercise caution with our curiosity … yes, indeed …

It was Voldemort, Harry thought, staring up at the canopy of his bed in the darkness, it all came back to Voldemort … he was the one who had torn these families apart, who had ruined all these lives …

‘Understanding is the first step to acceptance, and only with acceptance can there be recovery.

You fail to recognise that it matters not what someone is born, but what they grow to be!

As Hagrid had said, what would come, would come … and he would have to meet it when it did.

Young people are so infernally convinced that they are absolutely right about everything.

‘The thing about growing up with Fred and George,’ said Ginny thoughtfully, ‘is that you sort of start thinking anything’s possible if you’ve got enough nerve.’

Indifference and neglect often do much more damage than outright dislike

I make mistakes like the next man. In fact, being – forgive me – rather cleverer than most men, my mistakes tend to be correspondingly huger.’

Have you any idea how much tyrants fear the people they oppress? All of them realise that, one day, amongst their many victims, there is sure to be one who rises against them and strikes back!

It was, he thought, the difference between being dragged into the arena to face a battle to the death and walking into the arena with your head held high.

Harry had long since learned that bangs and smoke were more often the marks of ineptitude than expertise.

age is foolish and forgetful when it underestimates youth

It is the unknown we fear when we look upon death and darkness, nothing more.’

‘Because I am much older, much cleverer, and much less valuable,’

‘DON’T –’ screamed Snape, and his face was suddenly demented, inhuman, as though he was in as much pain as the yelping, howling dog stuck in the burning house behind them, ‘– CALL ME COWARD!’

The significance of this sentence hits you hard, when you have read the last book…

‘The Ministry has fallen. Scrimgeour is dead. They are coming.’

This was their first encounter with the fact that a full stomach meant good spirits; an empty one, bickering and gloom.

‘Luna has told me all about you, young lady,’ said Xenophilius, ‘you are, I gather, not unintelligent, but painfully limited. Narrow. Close-minded.’

Harry felt a great rush of affection for Luna.

‘Dobby has no master!’ squealed the elf. ‘Dobby is a free elf, and Dobby has come to save Harry Potter and his friends!’

Here lies Dobby, a Free Elf.