The J.K. Rowling Index

List of all J.K. Rowling's writings.

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Work Category: Writing

Wizarding Schools

pottermore

Index ID: PMWS — Publication date: January 31st, 2016

The number of countries that have their own magical school is minuscule compared to those that do not. This is because the wizarding populations of most countries choose the option of home schooling. Occasionally, too, the magical community in a given country is tiny or far-flung and correspondence courses have been found a more cost-effective means of educating the young.

There are eleven long-established and prestigious wizarding schools worldwide, all of which are registered with the International Confederation of Wizards. Smaller and less well-regulated institutions have come and gone, are difficult to keep track of, and are rarely registered with the appropriate Ministry (in which case, I cannot vouch for the standard of education they might offer). Anyone wishing to know whether there is an approved magical school in their region should address an owl enquiry to the International Confederation of Wizards, Educational Office.

The precise location of each of the following schools is a closely guarded secret. The schools fear not only Muggle persecution, for it is a sad fact that at various times in their long histories, all of these institutions have been buffeted by the effects of wizard wars, and of hostile attention from both the foreign and domestic magical communities (it is not only in Britain that the education of magical youth has been subject to Ministry interference or pressure). As a general rule, magical schools tend to be situated in landlocked, mountainous areas (although there are notable exceptions, as will be seen), as such regions are difficult for Muggles to access, and easier to defend from Dark wizards.

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Foreword: Lumos Annual Review 2014

lumos foreword

Index ID: FWLA14 — Publication date: November 2015

Note: Foreword for Lumos Annual Review 2014.

EIGHT million children around the world languish ininstitutions and so-called orphanages, though the vastmajority are not in fact orphans but have at least oneliving parent. Why orphanages are full of non-orphansis a question that Lumos continues to ask, and keyanswers – poverty, confict, disability and lack of access toservices that help keep children in families – come backtime and again. There is compelling scientifc evidenceto show that institutional care – separating children fromloving engagement by parents and families – harms achild’s physical, intellectual and emotional development.Research also makes clear that those raised in institutionalcare sufer poor life and health prospects. Societies andcommunities also sufer the social and economic fall-outof an out-dated ‘care’ system that harms the very childrenit is supposed to protect.

The evidence-based argument has been widely acceptedin the European region, where Lumos has worked overthe last decade to tackle a legacy of State-providedinstitutions, in a culture where separating children fromparents became the standard response to families incrisis. We talk of a ‘tipping point’ in Europe becausemost countries have some form of commitment todeinstitutionalisation (DI).

At Lumos, we now believe the evidence is so clear thatwe can take our DI mission onto the global stage – tochallenge the decades-old notion that orphanages are‘good’ or at least ‘necessary’ for children in adversity.They are not and we now know enough about the harmto see that there is a better way. This will be a challengefor many generous people who have supported, or evenworked in, orphanages, and believe they are safe, wellequipped havens for children in a threatening world. Weare confdent in arguing that the solution is not prettymurals, comfer beds, or teddy bears. The solution is noinstitutions or orphanages.

In 2014 Lumos established a platform – with the people,skills, expertise and passion – to enable us to startto make that argument around the world in pursuitof our ambitious but achievable goal of ending theinstitutionalisation of children worldwide by 2050.

It was at such an infuential Lumos policy event in 2014 –In Our Lifetime, focusing on the role of global aid fundingto bring closer the end of institutions and orphanages –that I met Dumitriţa from Moldova, who had lived in aninstitution for fve years. She is one of the 14,280 childrenwho have been reunited with her family thanks to thework of Lumos.

Listening to her speak about her experiences wasprofoundly moving. It was also a powerful message topolicy makers who heard her that change is not onlypossible, it is imperative. Her personal story encapsulatesthe aspirations of the millions of children we work tohelp; giving them a voice is a fundamental part of ourmission. Our aim is that, in their lifetimes, all children willenjoy a family life, which they need and deserve. 2014was the year in which I became Life President of Lumos,a commitment I was proud to make and in taking up thisnew role I handed over the baton of responsibility forchairing the Board of Trustees of Lumos to Neil Blair. I didso with confdence in the Trustees, in our indefatigableCEO Georgette Mulheir, and in the talented staf at Lumos,and in the knowledge that Lumos enjoys the invaluable,continuing support of many partners and generous donors.

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Why Dumbledore went to the hilltop

non fiction

Index ID: DMBHT — Publication date: October 27th, 2015

Note: Published original in TwitLonger: https://www.twitlonger.com/show/n_1sno25c and linked from this tweet: https://twitter.com/jk_rowling/status/658993229094895617

I’ve received a lot of messages over the past few days that use my fictional characters to make points about the Israeli cultural boycott. This isn’t a complaint: those characters belong to the readers as well as to me, and each has their own life in the heads of those who have read them. Sometimes the inner lives of characters as imagined by readers are not what I imagined for them, but the joy of books is that we all make our own mental cast. I’ve always enjoyed hearing about versions of Potter characters that exist in heads other than mine.

Many of the messages I’ve received in the last few days have included variations on the theme ‘talking wouldn’t stop the Wizarding War’ and as far as that goes, it’s true. Talking alone would not have stopped the Wizarding War and talking alone didn’t. Voldemort believed that non-wizards were subhuman, so it’s valid to draw comparisons between Voldemort and any real human being who regards other races, religions or sexualities as inferior. It would indeed have been a fool’s errand to try and talk Voldemort or Bellatrix Lestrange into laying down their wands for love of their fellow humans. They have no love of humanity and they wanted domination, not peace.

I said above, and I stand by it, that every reader has the right to his or her own version of my characters. However, there is one central point about the Potter stories that is not negotiable: we can’t pretend that it isn’t there, or that it doesn’t matter, when it is the crux of the books and in many ways the key to the story. It is also a point that to my knowledge (I get a lot of messages, so I cannot swear to it) has been lost in the many comparisons of Israel to Death Eaters.

In the final book, Deathly Hallows, when many hidden things come to the surface, there is a scene on a windy hilltop. Dumbledore has been summoned by a Death Eater, Severus Snape. At that point, Snape is a subscriber to the inhuman philosophy of Voldemort. He is probably a killer, certainly a betrayer of two of the people Dumbledore loved most, and the man who had sent Voldemort after an innocent child in the knowledge that Voldemort would kill him.

Again, to my knowledge (my memory isn’t infallible, so forgive me if you did), nobody has ever asked me: why did Dumbledore go when Snape asked him to go, and why didn’t he kill him on sight when he got there?

I think readers assume that Dumbledore is wise enough, knowledgeable enough and compassionate enough to sense that Snape, though he has led a despicable adult life, has something human left inside him, something that can be redeemed. Nevertheless, wise and prescient as Dumbledore is, he is not a Seer. At the moment when he answers Snape’s call, he cannot know that Snape isn’t going to try and kill him. He can’t know that Snape will have the moral or physical courage to change course, let alone help defeat Voldemort. Yet still, Dumbledore goes to the hilltop.

I’m going to digress very slightly here, but there is a related point that bears making. Among the messages drawing parallels between the Potter books and Israel have been quite a few saying that ‘Harry would be disappointed’ or ‘Harry wouldn’t understand’ my position. Those people are right, but only up to a clearly defined point. The Harry of six and a half books might not understand. Harry is reckless and angry for a considerable portion of those six and a half books and he has my whole-hearted sympathy. He has lost his family, he has had burdens put upon him that he never wanted, and he has been stigmatised all through his adolescence for carrying a scar left on him by a killer.

There comes a moment in the final book, though, when Harry, whose natural inclination is to fight, to rush to action, to lead from the front, is forced to stop and consider the cryptic message the dead Dumbledore has left him. Unfortunately, this message runs against counter to everything that Harry believes is necessary to win the war. He wants to race Voldemort to a deadly weapon, but Dumbledore has arranged things so that, while Harry will know that the weapon exists, he will also suspect that taking the weapon is the wrong thing to do. Harry cannot understand why using that weapon would be harmful, yet – grudgingly – he decides to act against his own instinct, and according to what he believes are Dumbledore’s wishes. The decision sits uncomfortably with him. He remains doubtful about it almost up to the point where he comes face-to-face with Voldemort for their final encounter.

Unlike Harry, Dumbledore was not acting against his own nature when he chose to meet Snape on the hilltop. Dumbledore, remember, is not a politician; the Ministry is weak and corrupt, it enabled Voldemort’s rise and is now doing a poor job of fighting him. Dumbledore is an academic and he believes that certain channels of communication should always remain open. It was true in the Potter books and it is true in life that talking will not change wilfully closed minds. However, the course of my fictional war was forever changed when Snape chose to abandon the course on which he was set, and Dumbledore helped him do it. Theirs was a partnership without which Harry’s willingness to fight would have been pointless.

The Palestinian community has suffered untold injustice and brutality. I want to see the Israeli government held to account for that injustice and brutality. Boycotting Israel on every possible front has its allure. It satisfies the human urge to do something, anything, in the face of horrific human suffering.

What sits uncomfortably with me is that severing contact with Israel’s cultural and academic community means refusing to engage with some of the Israelis who are most pro-Palestinian, and most critical of Israel’s government. Those are voices I’d like to hear amplified, not silenced. A cultural boycott places immovable barriers between artists and academics who want to talk to each other, understand each other and work side-by-side for peace. I believe in the power of projects like this http://ow.ly/TSYCp and this http://ow.ly/TSZYx and this http://ow.ly/TSYik. I think it is a tragedy when medical research like this http://ow.ly/TSYoD is prevented.

I genuinely don’t take it in ill part when you send me counterarguments framed in terms of the Potter books. All books dealing with morality can be picked apart for those lines and themes that best suit the arguer’s perspective. I can only say that a full discussion of morality within the series is impossible without examining Dumbledore’s actions, because he is the moral heart of the books. He did not consider all weapons equal and he was prepared, always, to go to the hilltop.

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Career of Evil

novel

Index ID: COE — Publication date: October 20th, 2015

Note: Published as Robert Galbraith.
Only the beginning of this text can be displayed here for research purposes. I apologize!

He had not managed to scrub off all her blood. A dark line like a parenthesis lay under the middle fingernail of his left hand. He set to digging it out, although he quited liked seeing it there: a memento of the previous day’s pleasures. After a minute’s fruitless scraping, he put the bloody nail in his mouth and sucked. The ferrous tang recalled the smell of the torrent that had splashed wildly onto the tiled flood, spattering the walls, drenching his jeans and turning the peach-colored bath towels -fluffy, dry and neatly folded- into blood-soaked rags.

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The Potter Family

pottermore

Index ID: PMPFAM — Publication date: September 22nd, 2015

The Potter family is a very old one, but it was never (until the birth of Harry James Potter) at the very forefront of wizarding history, contenting itself with a solid and comfortable existence in the backwaters.

Potter is a not uncommon Muggle surname, and the family did not make the so-called ‘Sacred Twenty-Eight’ for this reason; the anonymous compiler of that supposedly definitive list of pure-bloods suspected that they had sprung from what he considered to be tainted blood. The wizarding Potter family had illustrious beginnings, however, some of which was hinted at in Deathly Hallows.

In the Muggle world ‘Potter’ is an occupational surname, meaning a man who creates pottery. The wizarding family of Potters descends from the twelfth-century wizard Linfred of Stinchcombe, a locally well-beloved and eccentric man, whose nickname, ‘the Potterer’, became corrupted in time to ‘Potter’. Linfred was a vague and absent-minded fellow whose Muggle neighbours often called upon his medicinal services. None of them realised that Linfred’s wonderful cures for pox and ague were magical; they all thought him a harmless and lovable old chap, pottering about in his garden with all his funny plants. His reputation as a well-meaning eccentric served Linfred well, for behind closed doors he was able to continue the series of experiments that laid the foundation of the Potter family’s fortune. Historians credit Linfred as the originator of a number of remedies that evolved into potions still used to this day, including Skele-gro and Pepperup Potion. His sales of such cures to fellow witches and wizards enabled him to leave a significant pile of gold to each of his seven children upon his death.

Linfred’s eldest son, Hardwin, married a beautiful young witch by the name of Iolanthe Peverell, who came from the village of Godric’s Hollow. She was the granddaughter of Ignotus Peverell. In the absence of male heirs, she, the eldest of her generation, had inherited her grandfather’s invisibility cloak. It was, Iolanthe explained to Hardwin, a tradition in her family that the possession of this cloak remained a secret, and her new husband respected her wishes. From this time on, the cloak was handed down to the eldest in each new generation.

The Potters continued to marry their neighbours, occasionally Muggles, and to live in the West of England, for several generations, each one adding to the family coffers by their hard work and, it must be said, by the quiet brand of ingenuity that had characterised their forebear, Linfred.

Occasionally, a Potter made it all the way to London, and a member of the family has twice sat on the Wizengamot: Ralston Potter, who was a member from 1612-1652, and who was a great supporter of the Statute of Secrecy (as opposed to declaring war on the Muggles, as more militant members wished to do) and Henry Potter (Harry to his intimates), who was a direct descendant of Hardwin and Iolanthe, and served on the Wizengamot from 1913 – 1921. Henry caused a minor stir when he publicly condemned then Minister for Magic, Archer Evermonde, who had forbidden the magical community to help Muggles waging the First World War. His outspokenness on the behalf of the Muggle community was also a strong contributing factor in the family’s exclusion from the ‘Sacred Twenty-Eight’.

Henry’s son was called Fleamont Potter. Fleamont was so called because it was the dying wish of Henry’s mother that he perpetuate her maiden name, which would otherwise die out. He bore the burden remarkably well; indeed, he always attributed his dexterity at duelling to the number of times he had to fight people at Hogwarts after they had made fun of his name. It was Fleamont who took the family gold and quadrupled it, by creating magical Sleekeazy’s Hair Potion ( ‘two drops tames even the most bothersome barnet’ ). He sold the company at a vast profit when he retired, but no amount of riches could compensate him or his wife Euphemia for their childlessness. They had quite given up hope of a son or daughter when, to their shock and surprise, Euphemia found that she was pregnant and their beloved boy, James, was born.

Fleamont and Euphemia lived long enough to see James marry a Muggle-born girl called Lily Evans, but not to meet their grandson, Harry. Dragon pox carried them off within days of each other, due to their advanced age, and James Potter then inherited Ignotus Peverell’s Invisibility Cloak.

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A Beginner’s Guide to Transfiguration

pottermore

Index ID: BGTPM — Publication date: August 15th, 2011

When Transfiguring, it is important to make firm and decisive wand movements. Do not wiggle or twirl your wand unnecessarily, or the Transfiguration will certainly be unsuccessful.

Form a clear mental picture of the object you are hoping to create before attempting a Transfiguring spell.

Beginners should say the spell clearly. More advanced wizards do not need to say the spell aloud.

Incomplete Transfigurations are difficult to put right, but you must attempt to do so. Leaving the head of a rabbit on a footstool is irresponsible and dangerous. Say ‘Reparifarge!’ and the object or creature should return to its natural state.

Larger creatures are difficult to Transfigure except by skilled and powerful wizards. Know your limits.

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Alchemy

pottermore

Index ID: APM — Publication date: July 23th, 2015

Alchemy (the search for the Philosopher’s Stone, which would turn base metal to gold and give the possessor eternal youth) was once believed to be possible and real. However, the central quest of alchemy may be more complex, and less materialistic, than it first appears.

One interpretation of the ‘instructions’ left by the alchemists is that they are symbolic of a spiritual journey, leading the alchemist from ignorance (base metal) to enlightenment (gold). There seems to have been a mystical element to the work the alchemist was engaged upon, which set it apart from chemistry (of which it was undoubtedly both an offshoot and forerunner).

The colours red and white are mentioned many times in old texts on alchemy. One interpretation is that they, like base metal and gold, represent two different sides of human nature, which must be reconciled. This was the inspiration for the Christian names of Rubeus (red) Hagrid and Albus (white) Dumbledore. These two men, both hugely important to Harry, seem to me to represent two sides of the ideal father figure he seeks; the former is warm, practical and wild, the latter impressive, intellectual, and somewhat detached.

Although there are books on alchemy in the library at Hogwarts, and I always imagined that it would be studied by very clever students in their sixth and seven years, Hermione most uncharacteristically ignores the opportunity. Perhaps she feels (as Harry and Ron certainly do) that, far from wishing to make another Philosopher’s Stone, they would be happy never to see another one in their lives.

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Extension Charms

pottermore

Index ID: ECPM — Publication date: July 23th, 2015

Hogwarts school trunks, like the majority of wizarding luggage, are issued with capacity enhancing or extension charms as standard. These spells not only increase the interior dimensions of objects, while leaving the outer ones unchanged, they also render the contents lighter.

The Extension Charm (‘Capacious extremis!’) is advanced, but subject to strict control, because of its potential misuse. Theoretically, a hundred wizards could take up residence in a toilet cubicle if they were sufficiently adept at these spells; the potential for infractions of the International Statute of Secrecy are obvious. The Ministry of Magic has therefore laid down a strict rule that capacity-enhancement is not for private use, but only for the production of objects (such as school trunks and family tents), which have been individually approved for manufacture by the relevant Ministry Department. Both Mr Weasley and Hermione Granger were acting unlawfully when they enhanced, respectively, the interior space of a Ford Anglia, and a small handbag. The former is now believed to be living wild in the Forbidden Forest at Hogwarts, and as the latter played no insignificant part in the defeat of the greatest Dark wizard of all time, no charges have been brought.

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Foreword: Bibliography

foreword

Index ID: FWBBL — Publication date: April 23rd, 2015

Note: Foreword for the book "J.K. Rowlin: A Bibliography 1997 - 2013" by Philip W. Errington, published by Bloomsbury.

As someone who respects comprehensive research, I am in awe of the level of detail and amount of time Philip Errington has dedicated to this slavishly thorough and somewhat mind-boggling bibliography. Even in my most deluded moments, I could ever have anticipated that an idea that occurred to me on a train to Manchester could have spawned this amount of verbiage and prose in every language under the sun. I am humbled and deeply flattered.

J.K. Rowling
Edinburgh,
November 2014

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Very Good Lives

non fiction speech

Index ID: VGL — Publication date: April 14th, 2015

Note: In 2008, J.K. Rowling delivered a deeply affecting commencement speech at Harvard University. It was published later as a book.
Only the beginning of this text can be displayed here for research purposes. I apologize!

President Faust, members of the Harvard Corporation and the Board of Overseers, members of the faculty, proud parents, and, above all, graduates.

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