Is Harry Potter Based On Real Life?
Ten Harry Potter Characters and Objects that are real.
JK Rowling’s Harry Potter movies and books have become a pop-culture phenomenon in the modern world. They are still watched and read all around the world, even though the movies and books both have ended. The only movies from Harry Potter’s wizarding world now are Fantastic beasts. Which revolve around the character of Newt Scamander, who is the famous writer of the book Fantastic beasts and where to find them, which is an important course book at Hogwarts.
NO matter how impossible it might seem to connect JK Rowling’s wizarding world to the real life, there still are many characters and objects that are based on real life people and objects, as said many a times by the writer herself and as seen in the facts. For sure the best characters are always inspired from real world and not created from mere imagination. In order to know which characters or objects are inspired from real world, you do not have to look in different places, because we have got you covered.
Here are ten Harry Potter characters/objects that are based on real life.
· Characters
1. Harry Potter
The boy who lived, Harry Potter is the protagonist of the whole series and becomes the hero of the wizarding world by killing the dark wizard He-who-must-not-be-named, well you-know-who. The character of Harry is played by Daniel Radcliffe.
As of now there is no real life person who survived the killing curse, Avada Kedavra. But there was a real-life boy who was the inspiration for the boy who lived. Ian Potter, yes, that is his last name. He was a childhood friend and neighbor of JK Rowling’s. Unlike, Harry Potter he was not a wizard and certainly did not survive the killing curse, but he did like to dress himself as a wizard.
He was mischievous like his fictional counterpart and had a habit of putting slugs on his friends’ picnic plates. He also had encouraged JK Rowling to walk on wet concrete with her sister.
2. Blacks and the Malfoys
There aren’t any known people on whom the Malfoys or Blacks were based, but there are constellations, stars and Galaxy names, that make up the name of most of Draco’s and Sirius’s family.
First comes Sirius’s own name, Sirius is the brightest star in the night sky and is in the constellation “Canis Major” which means “The greater dog”, what Hagrid would say to this is probably clear “You’re a star Sirius”.
Then comes his brother, Regulus Arcturus, his name is based on two stars Regulus and Arcturus, both the brightest stars of their constellations. Then Sirius’s cousin Bellatrix Lestrange, the star Bellatrix is the third brightest start in the constellation Orion. The word Bellatrix means “female warrior”. Draco, whose name is Latin for dragon, is a constellation. There are many other stars (well sort of) from the Black family as well.
3. Nicholas Flamel
Nicholas Flamel probably is the only character, whose name exists in real history. He was French scholar and Bookseller. He also has a reputation of an alchemist and lived for about eighty years which was a great feat when the death rate was about thirty to thirty-five.
JK Rowling has also left a note on Pottermore , that she had dreamt of him while writing the first book of Harry Potter. She states “I remember having a highly detailed and exceptionally vivid dream about Flamel, several months into the writing of philosopher’s stone, which was like a Renaissance painting come to life. Flamel was leading me around his cluttered laboratory, which was bathed in golden light, and showing me exactly how to make the stone (I wish I could remember how to do it)”.
Though his fictional counterpart and his wife were more than five-hundred years old. He was the maker of the philosopher’s stone. He had agreed on destroying the stone, when Voldemort had almost succeeded on stealing it from Hogwarts, under the watchful eye of Dumbledore and Hagrid’s giant three-headed dog, fluffy.
4. Professor Snape
Professor Snape was the loathed teacher of Harry Potter’s, and their loathing was mutual. From the start till the almost ending of the whole Harry Potter franchise, he was loathed by Harry and us. But in the end, it turned out he was a good guy and was just there to help. The character of Professor Snape was played by Alan Rickman.
Though according to Rowling, Gilderoy Lockhart is the only character that she based on a real live person. But even then Snape is also based on a real live person. His name is John Nettleship, and he was Rowling’s childhood Chemistry teacher at Wyedean School near Chepstow, South. He was also her mother’s employer, who worked as his assistant. According to Rowling, like Snape he was the least liked teacher in her school. He passed away in 2011.
5. Hermione
Hermione Granger, who was Harry’s best friend and companion until the end. She was smart and brave, a perfect Gryffindor. Her character was played by Emma Watson.
She was based on Rowling herself. As said by her, that Hermione was based on her younger self. Here she says, how different a character Hermione is from others.
“I know that Hermione is incredibly recognizable to a lot of readers and yet you don’t see a lot of Hermiones in film or on TV except to be laughed at. I mean that the intense, clever, in some ways not terribly self-aware, girl is rarely the heroine and I really wanted her to be the heroine. She is part of me, although she is not wholly me. I think that is how I might have appeared to people when I was younger, but that is not really how I was inside.”
JK Rowling had first seen the name Hermione in a Shakespeare play and fell in love with the name. She had originally named her “Puckle” and then changed it.
· Objects
1. Phoenix
Harry Potter first meets Fawkes, who is a Phoenix, in “Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets”. A phoenix is a large swan-sized bird, it is scarlet in color and a magical bird. A long tail, like that of a peacock, with a golden beak and talons and black eyes.
It is a mythical bird that burns and is turned to ashes when it dies and is reborn through its ashes. The Phoenix was not invented by JK Rowling herself, these mythical creatures have been around (in medieval manuscripts and books) for a long time.
2. Hogwarts castle
You will find it hard to find Hogwarts castle as a muggle, but what you can do is go to the castle on which Hogwarts was based. It is called Alnwick castle and is in Northumberland, UK. You could see that many scenes from the franchise were filmed in the castle and could walk around Hogwarts. Then do make some time to visit the castle and live the magical moment.
3. Mandrakes
The mandrakes like the Phoenix were first introduced in “Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets”, Harry and his friends meet them in the first class of their second year of Herbology. The mandrakes are a real life-saver literally. These plants are used to revive the students that were petrified by the basilisk.
Like the movie version the real life Mandrakes also have a Human shape. In the wizarding world they are used for bringing people to their normal state after they are petrified. In folklore they are plants that have hallucinogenic and narcotic effect. A dog is tied to the plant to pull it out, as humans are scared of its scream.
4. The crystal ball
The crystal balls were introduced in “Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban” when Harry took his first divination class with Professor Trelawney. Harry and his friends were not very fond of Professor Trelawney and the crystal ball, though both Trelawney and the crystal ball played an important part in the Harry Potter franchise.
The crystal balls were used by people in Medieval ages to predict the future. They were placed in moonlight and the light would reflect through them to tell them something about the future. The British Library has a crystal ball, that was used by the witch called “Smelly Nelly”. According to an observer from 1960s “This small black crystal is interesting in that it is a moon crystal. That is, it is used at night to catch the reflection of the moon on its surface. The witch then gazes into the moon’s mirrored reflection and gets her reading.”
5. Bezoar
The bezoar in Harry Potter’s wizarding world is a kidney shaped stone that is an antidote for most of the poisons. It is the stone about which Professor Snape questions Harry in the first potions class. This also saves everyone’s favorite, Ronald Weasely when he drinks the poisoned hawk-matured mead given by Professor Slughorn, which was a supposed gift for Dumbledore and was poisoned by Draco.
The word Bezoar comes from Persian pad-zahr which means antidote. Bezoars are food masses that are indigestible and found in the stomach of goats and were thought to be an antidote to poison. They were expensive and bought at a high price.
If you liked this blog, then please make sure to share it with your friends. Make sure to subscribe to my blog, because I will be posting more amazing content such as this. What other lists do you want me to make? Also tell me who your favorite Harry Potter character is. Stay connected for more.
