7 ‘Harry Potter’ rumors, mythbusted
Harry Potter mastermind and scribe, J.K. Rowling, is a very busy woman and does not have time for silly things. That’s why her latest debunk of a crazy Harry Potter rumor is so beautiful, succinct, and hilarious, it’s absolutely perfect. It’s also less than 140 characters. And the rumor that caused her Twitter clarification in the first place? Totally bonkers.
The other day a fan asked Rowling if something she had seen on a blog was true or not. Here’s the real/not real HP trivia in question:
In 2009, J.K. Rowling announced that Harry Potter lost his virginity in the second half of Goblet of Fire but had to edit it out because her editors said it would cause parents to complain and call Bloomsbury during office hours.
Rowling was quick to nip this in the bud.
This is still not the first time that an insane rumor about Harry needed to be squashed. She’s taken time out of her busy schedule to answer some of our toughest/weirdest theories about the books. Here are just some of the best times she bestowed us with TRUE Harry Potter wisdom.
1. Rumor: Snape is a vampire
Fact or fiction? FICTION
For some reason, readers have always speculated that Snape was a vampire — crazy, right? During our new favorite holiday tradition, Pottermore Christmas, Rowling took the time to clear this notion up once and for all. “While it is true that he has an unhealthy pallor, and is sometimes described as looking like a large bat in his long black coat, he never actually turns into a bat,” she wrote on Pottermore, “We meet him outside in the castle by daylight, and no corpses with puncture marks in their necks ever turn up at Hogwarts.”
2. There’s a completed Harry Potter romance novel
Fact or fiction? FICTION
Someone with a little too much time on their hands made a fake HP press release. Yeah, toy with our hearts a little more, why don’t you? In it, they describe that Rowling has recently completely her newest book, and it’s a romance novel. Nope. not true at all. Rowling wrote a series of tweets explaining that it simply wasn’t true.
3. There are Jewish students at Hogwarts
Fact or fiction? FACT
Sometimes, if you tweet questions at Rowling, she responds!
3.a There’s A Jedi at Hogwarts, too
Fact or Fiction? FACT
Sorry but this is just TOO GOOD.
4. Neville and Luna were totally supposed to hook up
Fact or Fiction? FICTION
This rumor goes waaaaay back to before the Half Blood Prince was published (so, before 2005). As you might be well aware, character relationships are a pretty big thing. There were many who had their heart set on a Neville and Luna pairing because they seemed like the odd ones out. So it’s totally going to happen, right? Wrong. Rowling addressed the issue on her website waaaaay back in 2005.
The Luna/Neville shippers are much less vehement and scary than the Harry/Hermione, Ron/Hermione tribes, so I hope I won’t receive too much hate mail for quashing this rumour. I see Neville and Luna as very different kinds of people and while they share a certain isolation within Hogwarts, I don’t think that’s enough to foster true love – friendship, perhaps, although I think that Neville would always find Luna’s wilder flights of fancy alarming.
5. Hermoine and Ron together wasn’t the best idea
Fact or Fiction? FACT
You better sit down for this one. The triangle of Harry-Ron-Hermione that would eventually become the couple of Ron-Hermione is something Rowling wishes she could do over. Hear that? It’s my heart shattering all over again.
In an interview with Wonderland magazine, Rowling describes that, “For reasons that have very little to do with literature and far more to do with me clinging to the plot as I first imagined it, Hermione ended up with Ron. I know, I’m sorry. I can hear the rage and fury it might cause some fans, but if I’m absolutely honest, distance has given me perspective on that. It was a choice I made for very personal reasons, not for reasons of credibility. Am I breaking people’s hearts by saying this? I hope not.” TOO LATE, ROWLING. TOO LATE.
6. There’s a Harry Potter 8
Fact or Fiction? FICTION for the thousandth time.
Though we might pray to the literary and wizarding gods every night, there is no planned eight installment. There’s a rumor about this every other week. Just FOUR DAYS AGO, Rowling cleared this rumor up — again — during a Today Show interview and insisted that there is no HP8. She knows that’s not what we want to hear, though, and then mentioned that, “Even as I answer that I know that someone’s cutting this on YouTube to make it as though I gave you hope.”
7. Dumbledore is Gay
Fact or fiction? FACT
This is something Rowling offered up unprompted. She happened to be at a book reading when a fan asked her if the headmaster had ever fallen in love, and she responded that he had with another wizard, Grindelwald. Rowling announced this way back in 2007, but she’s still fielding questions about it left and right. Just the other day someone brought it up to her again, and she responded beautifully (the tweet has since been deleted, but The Independent has the full Twitter conversation).
So now that we’ve got all these things cleared up (again), can we stop bothering Rowling and let her write?
