Thursday 17 May 2012
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
Tuesday 15 May 2012
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone by J K Rowling
Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone is the first novel in the Harry Potter series written by J. K. Rowling and featuring Harry Potter, a young wizard. It describes how Harry discovers he is a wizard, makes close friends and a few enemies at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and with the help of his friends thwarts an attempted comeback by the evil wizard Lord Voldemort, who killed Harry's parents when Harry was one year old.
Before the start of the novel, Voldemort, considered the most powerful dark wizard in history, killed Harry's parents but mysteriously vanished after trying to kill Harry. While the wizarding world was celebrating Voldemort's downfall, Professor Dumbledore, Professor McGonagall and Rubeus Hagrid placed the one year-old orphan in the care of his Muggle (non-wizard) uncle and aunt: Vernon and Petunia Dursley.
For ten years, they and their son Dudley neglected and bullied Harry. Shortly before Harry's eleventh birthday, a series of letters addressed to Harry arrive, but Vernon destroys them before Harry can read them. To get away from the letters, Vernon takes the family to a small island. As they are settling in, Hagrid bursts through the door to tell Harry what the Dursleys have kept him from finding out: Harry is a wizard and has been accepted at Hogwarts.
Hagrid takes Harry to Diagon Alley, a magically-concealed shopping precinct in London, where Harry is bewildered to discover how famous he is among wizards as "the boy who lived". He also finds that he is quite wealthy, since a bequest from his parents has remained on deposit at Gringotts Wizarding Bank. Guided by Hagrid, he buys the books and equipment he needs for Hogwarts. At the wand shop, he finds that the wand that suits him best is the twin of Voldemort's; both wands contain feathers from the same phoenix.[1]
A month later Harry leaves the Dursleys' home to catch the Hogwarts Express from King's Cross railway station. There he meets the Weasley family, who show him how to pass through the magical wall to Platform 9¾, where the train is waiting. While on the train Harry makes friends with Ron Weasley, who tells him that someone tried to rob a vault at Gringotts. Another new pupil, Draco Malfoy, accompanied by his sidekicks Vincent Crabbe and Gregory Goyle, offers to advise Harry, but Harry dislikes Draco's arrogance and prejudice.
Before the term's first dinner in the school's Great Hall, the new pupils are allocated to houses by the magical Sorting Hat. Before it is Harry's turn, he catches Professor Snape's eye and feels a pain in the scar Voldemort left on his forehead. When it is Harry's turn to be sorted, the Hat wonders whether he should be in Slytherin, but when Harry objects, the Hat sends him to join the Weasleys in Gryffindor. While Harry is eating, he questions Percy Weasley about Snape.
After a terrible first Potions lesson with Snape, Harry and Ron visit Hagrid, who lives in a rustic house on the edge of the Forbidden Forest. There they learn that the attempted robbery at Gringotts happened the day Harry withdrew money. Harry remembers that Hagrid had removed a small package from the vault that was broken into and searched.
During the new pupils' first broom-flying lesson, Neville Longbottom breaks his wrist, and Draco takes advantage to throw the forgetful Neville's fragile Remembrall high in the air. Harry gives chase on his broomstick, catching the Remembrall inches from the ground. Professor McGonagall dashes out and appoints him as the new Seeker for the Gryffindor Quidditch team.[2]
When Draco tricks Ron and Harry, accompanied by Neville and Hermione Granger, into a midnight excursion, they accidentally enter a forbidden corridor and find a huge three-headed dog. The group hastily retreats, and Hermione notices that the dog is standing over a trap-door. Harry concludes that the monster is guarding the package Hagrid retrieved from Gringotts.
After Ron criticises Hermione's ostentatious proficiency in Charms, she hides in tears in the girls' toilet. Professor Quirrell reports that a troll has entered the dungeons. While everyone else returns to their dormitories, Harry and Ron rush to warn Hermione. The troll corners Hermione in the toilet but when Harry sticks his wand up one of its nostrils, Ron uses the levitation spell to knock out the troll with its own club. Afterwards, several professors arrive and Hermione takes the blame for the battle and becomes a firm friend of the two boys.
The evening before Harry's first Quidditch match, he sees Snape receiving medical attention from Filch for a bite on his leg by the three-headed dog. During the game, Harry's broomstick goes out of control, endangering his life, and Hermione notices that Snape is staring at Harry and muttering. She dashes over to the Professors' stand, knocking over Professor Quirrell in her haste, and sets fire to Snape's robe. Harry regains control of his broomstick and catches the Golden Snitch, winning the game for Gryffindor. Hagrid refuses to believe that Snape was responsible for Harry's danger, but lets slip that he bought the three-headed dog, and that the monster is guarding a secret that belongs to Professor Dumbledore and someone called Nicolas Flamel.
Harry and the Weasleys stay at Hogwarts for Christmas, and one of Harry's presents, from an anonymous donor, is an Invisibility Cloak owned by his father. Harry uses the Cloak to search the library's Restricted Section for information about the mysterious Flamel, has to evade Snape and Filch after an enchanted book shrieks an alarm, and slips into a room containing the Mirror of Erised, which shows his parents and several of their ancestors. Harry becomes addicted to the Mirror's visions and is rescued by Professor Dumbledore, who explains that it shows what the viewer most desperately longs for.
When the rest of the pupils return for the next term, Draco plays a prank on Neville, and Harry consoles Neville with a sweet. The collectible card wrapped with the sweet identifies Flamel as an alchemist. Hermione soon finds that he is a 665-year-old man who possesses the only known Philosopher's Stone, from which can be extracted an elixir of life. A few days later Harry notices Snape sneaking towards the outskirts of the Forbidden Forest. There he half-hears a furtive conversation about the Philosopher's Stone, in which Snape asks Professor Quirrell if he has found a way past the three-headed dog and menacingly tells Quirrell to decide whose side he is on. Harry concludes that Snape is trying to steal the Stone and Quirrell has helped prepare a series of defences for it, which was an almost fatal mistake.
The three friends discover that Hagrid is raising a baby dragon, which is against wizard law, and arrange to smuggle it out of the country around midnight. Draco arrives, hoping to raise the alarm and get them into trouble, and goes to tell Professor McGonagall. Although Ron is bitten by the dragon and is sent to the infirmary, Harry and Hermione spirit the dragon safely away. However, they are caught, and Harry loses the Invisibility Cloak. As part of their punishment, Harry, Hermione, Draco, and Neville (who, trying to stop Harry and Hermione after hearing what Draco had been saying, had been caught by McGonagall as well) are compelled to help Hagrid to rescue a badly-injured unicorn in the Forbidden Forest. They split into two parties, and Harry and Draco find the unicorn dead, surrounded by its blood. A hooded figure crawls to the corpse and drinks the blood, while Draco screams and flees. The hooded figure moves towards Harry, who is knocked out by an agonising pain spreading from his scar. When Harry regains consciousness, the hooded figure has gone and a centaur, Firenze, offers to give him a ride back to the school. The centaur tells Harry that drinking a unicorn's blood will save the life of a mortally injured person, but at the price of having a cursed life from that moment on. Firenze suggests Voldemort drank the unicorn's blood to gain enough strength to make the elixir of life from the Philosopher's Stone, and regain full health by drinking that. On his return, Harry finds that someone has slipped the Invisibility Cloak under his sheets.
A few weeks later, while relaxing after the end-of-session examinations, Harry suddenly wonders how something as illegal as a dragon's egg came into Hagrid's possession. The gamekeeper says he was given it by a hooded stranger who bought him several drinks and asked him how to get past the three-headed dog, which Hagrid admits is easy – music sends it to sleep. Realising that one of the Philosopher's Stone's defences is no longer secure, Harry goes to inform Professor Dumbledore, only to find that the headmaster has just left for an important meeting. Harry concludes that Snape faked the message that called Dumbledore away and will try to steal the Stone that night.
Covered by the Invisibility Cloak, Harry and his two friends go to the three-headed dog's chamber, where Harry sends the beast to sleep by playing a flute given to him by Hagrid for Christmas. After lifting the trap-door, they encounter a series of obstacles, each of which requires special skills possessed by one of the three, and one of which requires Ron to sacrifice himself in a game of wizard's chess. In the final room Harry, now alone, finds Quirrell rather than Snape. Quirrell admits that he let in the troll that tried to kill Hermione on Halloween, and that he tried to kill Harry during the first Quidditch match but was knocked over by Hermione. Snape had been trying to protect Harry and suspected Quirrell. Quirrell serves Voldemort and, after failing to steal the Philosopher's Stone from Gringotts, allowed his master to possess him in order to improve their chances of success. However the only other object in the room is the Mirror of Erised, and Quirrell can see no sign of the Stone. At Voldemort's bidding, Quirrell forces Harry to stand in front of the Mirror. Harry feels the Stone drop into his pocket and tries to stall. Quirrell removes his turban, revealing the face of Voldemort on the back of his head. Voldemort/Quirrell tries to grab the Stone from Harry, but simply touching Harry causes Quirrell's flesh to burn. After further struggles Harry passes out.
He awakes in the school hospital, where Professor Dumbledore tells him that he survived because his mother sacrificed her life to protect him, and Voldemort could not understand the power of such love. Voldemort left Quirrell to die, and is likely to return by some other means. Dumbledore had foreseen that the Mirror would show Voldemort/Quirrell only themselves making the elixir of life, as they wanted to use the Philosopher's Stone; Harry was able to see the Stone in the Mirror because he wanted to find it but not to use it. The Stone has now been destroyed.
Harry returns to the Dursleys for the summer holiday, but does not tell them that under-age wizards are forbidden to use magic outside Hogwarts.
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
A man in the dark enters Privet Drive. Out of his pocket he pulls what looks like a lighter. With this lighter looking thing he sucks the electricity out of the street lights. Then a cat who's watching him transforms into a witch, Prof. McGonagall. Next a man on a flying motorcycle comes out of the sky with a baby in his arms and leave the baby (Harry) on the porch of one of the houses. It turns out the people who live here are Harry's only family who are left. His parents had died because of an evil wizard named Voldemort.
It's now 10-11 years later and we see Harry waking up in a closet under the stairs. This is his room. His family (aunt, uncle , And cousin) don't treat him with respect so they make him live under the stairs. Harry gets up and is forced to make breakfast for Dudley's (his cousin) birthday. Later on they go to the zoo and are in the reptile section. Dudley is looking at a snake that's not even moving. Dudley gets angry and wants to look at the next reptile. Harry sits down in front of the snake. He talks to the snake and it seems to understand him. Dudley sees this and runs over to the glass shouting something like, "Daddy, Harry got it to move!" He shoves Harry out of the way and leans against the glass. All of a sudden the glass disappears and Dudley falls into the "cage" screaming. The snake leaves the zoo telling Harry thanks. His Uncle Vernon knows this has something to do with Harry so once he gets home he locks Harry in his closet.
Later on we see an owl dropping a letter into Harry's mailbox. Harry gets the mail and sees there is a letter for him and he's never gotten a letter in his life. Before he can open it Dudley steals it and shows it to Vernon. Right away his uncle rips it up. Each and everyday Harry gets more and more letters but his uncle rips them all up. Dudley even gets curious. Finally so many fill the house that Harry's uncle decides to get away. They go to an island in the ocean with a little shack.
His uncle and aunt get the bed, Dudley the couch, and Harry has the cold floor. It turns out Harry's birthday is the next day. At exactly 12:00 at midnight according to Dudley's watch a man with big beard (Hagrid, the man in the beginning with the flying motorcycle) bangs down the door. He gives Harry the letter telling him that he has been accepted to the Hogwarts Academy, School for Wizards. Hagrid tells Harry that he's a wizard and takes him away.
They go to a place called Diagon Alley. There Harry finds out his parents left him a small fortune. While they get the money out of the bank Hagrid gets a small package. Harry buys all his supplies including his wand. On the train ride to Hogwarts he meets Ron and Hermione.
On the first night at the school, all the newcomers go up on stage and put on a hat that sorts out which of the 4 houses they will be assigned to.
Harry, Ron and Hermoine each are assigned to Griffindor. While at the school many things happen to Harry. He beats a troll, explores areas where he is not supposed to go such as the third floor and meets a 3 headed dog guarding a trapdoor. He becomes seeker in Quidditch (a witch sport played on broom sticks sorta like flying soccer) and for Christmas is given his father's invisibility cloak.
When he plays Quidditch for the first time someone tries to jinx his broom. Hermione thinks it was Snape because he was staring at Harry saying some sort of spell. (later on we find out he was saying the counter-curse, trying to save him) Hermione stops him by saying a spell to make Snape's cloak catch on fire. All the teachers around him panic, including Prof. McGonagall, an old witch, and Professor Quirrell who always wears a turban.
Harry, Hermione and Ron figure out that someone is trying to steal the Sorcerer's stone. They have figured out that the stone is hiding under the trapdoor in the room with the three headed dog. In order to put the dog to sleep all you have to do is just play it some music. The three of them head to the room with the dog, but when they get there the dog is asleep & right next to it is a harp that's cursed to play for a little bit. The dog's paw is over the door so all three of them have to push it out of the way. Then they open the door and you see a dark hole. They decide to go in one at a time but before they do there is an eerie silence. Then they realized the harp stopped playing and the dog was awake. They all scream and jump into the hole just missing the three headed dog.
They land in dragon snare which will strangle you if you panic. If you relax you will sink through and live. Hermione relaxed, and then so did Harry, but Ron was screaming and kicking so she took her wand out and made a big burst of sunlight weaken the plant so it had to let go of him.
The next room they enter is filled with keys and a broom stick. Each key had wings. There's a door that's locked and no unlocking spell can unlock it. They have to find out which key it is and there's thousands of them. There is one that sticks out, it was rusty and had a broken wing. Harry thought it would be too easy to just grab the key, with the broom, but they still decided to try it. As soon as his hand touched to broom, they all shot at him like darts. He got on the broom stick and flew after the rusty key, while all the other keys went after him. He tried to get the rusty key close to the ground so Hermione could grab it, once she did, she quickly unlocked the door. Harry flew it just as Ron pulled the door shut. As soon as he did you see all the keys crashing into the other side of the door.
Now they were on a giant chessboard. Ron a good chess player, told everyone where to move. He figured that Harry could get to the other side of the board if he sacrificed himself. He did and Hermione stayed with Ron as Harry moved on.
The next room was the final room and someone was already there! Can you guess who it was? The turban man, Professor Quirrel! In the room was a mirror that showed you whatever made you happy. The professor asked Harry where the stone was but Harry didn't know. Harry looked in the mirror and saw what he wanted to see. Where the stone was! And can you guess where it was? That's right, you guessed it, in his pocket! The professor took off his turban and turned around. The back of his head was actually another face! Voldemorts! He wanted the stone 'cause out of it you could make an elixir that would make you immortal. Voldemort tried to get Harry but once he touched him his hand turned to dust. Harry touched Voldemort's face and his face turned to dust. The whole body of the professor disappeared and the soul of Voldemort went away.
Harry blacked out then woke up in the hospital wing of Hogwarts. Dumbledore, the headmaster of Hogwarts explained to him that Voldemort couldn't touch him because of the curse of his mother. Harry's mother had sacrificed herself to save Harry, and because of her, Harry was protected by her love which Voldemort couldn't touch.
The school year ends and Harry 's team, Griffindor wins the house cup, largley due to Harry, Hermoine and Ron.
The movie ends with everyone getting ready to go back home for the summer. Hagrid gives Harry an photo album of Harry's parents.
When asked if he's ready to go home Harry replies that he's not really going "home." He is however ready to scare the heck out of his Aunt, Uncle and cousin with the threat of his new found wizardry.
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