tom riddle graduating hogwarts top of his class and then proceeding to work in retail right after was so real

Grindelald during his imprisonment in Nurmengard

When Voldemort enters the room of Grindelwald’s confinement in Nurmengard he breaks in from a window and he has to do so as a snake, because it’s a slit; not wide enough for a person to get it. There are no guards inside the room and no mentions of anyone being outside and reacting to the voices. Having Grindelwald in total isolation and barely keeping him food to keep him alive would make sense considering the trouble MACUSA had with his silver tongue back when he was first arrested.

Under normal circumstances I don’t think that Grindelwald would be any less capable than Voldemort than breaking through that window. Naturally there would be charms preventing him from going out, but there would also have to be charms to prevent anyone from going in. 

My headcanon is that  the confederation would have chosen to bind his magic for ensurance, which would have initially been very traumtizing to someone who based his ideas of superiority on his magical abilities. But regardless of any measures Ι genuinely believe that, after surrendering to Albus, Gellert would have succumbed to his fate without trying to break out. 

Back to the possible lack of guards. When I had first read DH I thought that someone must have been delivering the most essential news of the Wizarding World to him.

After all, in DH Harry speculates that Grindelwald might have not revealed that Dumbledore had the Elder Wand to prevent Voldemort from desecrating Dumbledore’s final resting place, which presupposes that Grindelwald knows of Dumbledore’s death. Even if this is just Harry’s wistful thinking (after all Harry never met the man), Grindelwald was imprisoned in 1945 and Voldemort had not risen yet. But when Voldemort visits, Grindelwald knows exactly who he is and what he’s there for. 

I thought that having a dark wizard isolated and delivering news to him about his past frenemy and the rise of another dark wizard would have been a stupid thing to do. Also, unless Grindelwald had met young Tom Riddle and Tom had asked about the Hallows, it made little sense for Grindelwald to know he was there to ask after the wand. But that wouldn’t made sense either because Voldemort was late in the chase after the Elder Wand.

What DOES make sense is that Gellert, beind a seer, had known of Voldemort’s possible arrival from a vision. Considering that his visions sometimes shift the line, “So, you have come. I thought you would … one day”, fits perfectly.  

If this is the case, there is the possibility that Grindelwald had had visions of Albus’ death. Even more than that, what if he had foreseen Albus’ hand getting cursed, because of his overwhelming need to see hus family again, and his pain? What if he had seen him at the lake, poisoned, week and still broken by their fallout and by the pain Gellert caused him and his family? What if he kept seeing falling from the tower, again and again and again? 

I genuinely think that Gellert would have been tortured in that prison, by his dawning understanding of his mistakes, by his regret and remorse, and by his one remaining ability which might give him glimpses of the one person he loved with no way of protecting him from harm.

Also, while Grindelwald might have had more visions and seen the white tomb right after Dumbledore’s death, I headcanon that he felt his death. The pact had been broken so there’s not a magical connection and we have no account of anything similar in the Wizarding World, but as a shipper I’d like to believe that they had the kind of connection that would allow Grindelwald to experience Dumbledore’s last breath like a physical blow. 

This is my cheerful post for today. 

really starting to wonder if people who go “well neville’s PARENTS were TORTURED but SNAPE is his BIGGEST FEAR” just like don’t remember how boggarts are supposed to work or don’t understand how fear works. 

because i could do the same thing you know? “well harry’s PARENTS were KILLED but DEMENTORS are his BIGGEST FEAR” or talk about how hermione’s biggest fear is mcgonagall, another teacher. or how lupin’s friends were all murdered by another friend and his biggest fear is still the moon. or like how ron probably knows his uncles were murdered by death eaters but his biggest fear is still spiders. 

fear is weird, man. that’s part of what the boggart lesson is meant to show us. do they get so focused on the half-page of neville’s boggart they entirely forget the whole conversation lupin and harry have where lupin admits he thought harry’s greatest fear would be voldemort and harry’s surprised about that? it doesn’t matter that voldemort killed harry’s parents or that he’s tried to kill harry twice by now - for harry, the more immediate thing that freaks him out are the dementors. 

neville being scared of snape isn’t because he’s oh-so-traumatized. neville’s clumsy and sensitive and snape is a mean teacher - of course neville’s frightened of him. it’s not great but it’s also not a sign that snape’s an irredeemable abuser either. (if he was, wouldn’t all the children have boggarts of him? wouldn’t lupin have reacted with something other than mild surprise about neville’s admission? if a teacher being a boggart makes them an irredeemable abuser, why are these same accusations not flung at mcgonagall, hermione’s boggart?) neville being frightened of snape over bellatrix - a woman he hasn’t met, doesn’t know, and, at 13 years old, has likely only heard largely censored stories about - doesn’t mean snape is somehow more terrifying to him in general than bellatrix. bellatrix is a far-off boogeyman neville never interacts with; snape’s in his everyday life. if i was going to choose between a terrorist i’d never met - no matter how much they’d personally ruined my life - and the mean teacher i have to deal with every day, i’d choose the mean teacher too.

and boggarts. do not. show you. the single thing you’re most frightened of!!!!! they don’t!!!!!! they show A Fear. and our fears develop as we grow older and our fears change based on what we’re feeling at the moment. there’s a REASON harry’s fear is so different from the other kids (which is, to be frank, the entire point of that fucking scene and the reason why i have to roll my eyes at people making it into Some Huge Neville Thing. neville is background flavor in that scene. he exists to color in harry’s experience omfg like i know we all like minor characters but can we PLEASE remember this is a book). 

it’s wild to me that we get this exact example with harry in the same book (and like… the same general portion of the book!!!!) and people still fucking failed to get the message. 

Minerva McGonagall

Harry as Head Auror! The companion piece to my Minister Hermione DTIYS. 

I REALLY LIKE WHERE YOUR HEAD IS AT!!! say what you will but ron had at LEAST a minor celeb crush on viktor

Potions lesson back in 1971!

I think the ultimate proof that there is a classist element in James and Sirius’s bullying of Snape is that James jumps on Snape when Snape says he wanted to be sorted in Slytherin, thus inagurating their hatred of each other. However, when Sirius says that all of his family was in Slytherin, James only says “and here I thought you were alright” but proceeded to allow Sirius into joining him to make fun of Snape and Lily.

Both Snape and Sirius reveal a connection to Slytherin, and James offers condemnation in both cases, but his attitude towards Sirius was already markedly different. Given that Sirius hadn’t yet the chance to disavow Slytherin, James had no way of knowing Sirius’s complicated relationship with his own family. Therefore, James’s antipathy towards Snape surpassed the issue of House rivalry and has to be explained by Snape’s aspect and demeanour - the poor, neglected kid from whom James so clearly differed.

100%.  I’ve said this a billion times.

James makes a snap value judgement based on Snape’s poverty and neglect, and the rest of the Marauders happily run with it for the next 7 years (and beyond).  They then spend the rest of their lives retrospectively justifying the indefensible - suggesting it was deserved because he was an oddball or dark or greasy or a Death Eater - when in reality, none of those elements were a factor in James’ decision making during that chance meeting at 11.  Make no mistake; this was always James’ battle, even if the others continued it long after his death.  

The rest of the Marauders at least have their own problems, whereas James demonstrates a terrifying lack of empathy, happy to ruin another child’s entire school career because of an instant dislike fuelled by appearance.  That would be horrifying enough, but it’s exacerbated by the fact that James enjoyed a great level of privilege and yet was unable to identify that Snape was already suffering greatly; it would’ve cost him nothing just to have kept away from him and to have left him alone, but that wasn’t good enough for James - Snape “existing” within his sphere was sufficient reason to ruin his life.

The analogy is simple - Hogwarts is the exclusive grammar school, and Snape is the kid who passes the 11+ entrance exam.  Despite earning his place on merit and ability, he’ll never fit in socially - and James does his damnedest to ensure that scenario plays out.  

(Which is why I have such a soft spot for Lucius Malfoy.  He holds awful beliefs, and it’s entirely possible that he had ulterior motives, but he had a similar social background to James - and instead of bullying Snape, he extended the hand of friendship, despite Snape’s obvious neglect.)

Okay, new Harry Potter Fandom game.

Reblog and put the answer in the tags.

If you were going to remake the Harry Potter movies, who would you cast Nicholas Cage as?

He can do any role. He’s got the range.

Sirius Black:

Remus Lupin:

Arthur Weasley:

James Potter:

Voldemort:

Bartemius Crouch Jr:

Snape when he finds out he can teach lupin’s class about werewolves:

Peter pettigrew:

The Snape one killed me.

History has a way of repeating itself…

a set if hp bookmarks i’ll have for melbourne supanova next weekend! one (1) boy for each book 

Reasons why snape deserved his redemption arc

Reasons why he shouldn't

What worries me about your post isn’t that you hate Snape - sure, he’s definitely an acquired taste; he is a spiteful and petty man who is mean to Harry and his friends - but that you haven’t seemed to understand the basic theme of the story.

Perhaps you’re clouded by disliking him?  Or maybe you’ve just seen lots of posts on the internet parroting similar opinions?  Anyway, hopefully we can clear some of it up for you!

With regards to Snape’s redemption arc, there’s no suggestion in the text that he wanted to have sex with Lily, and writing off 18 years of being aligned with Dumbledore and the Order as ‘for the good guys, I guess’ is a strange stance - perhaps his efforts as a double agent confused you?  

You come close with the ‘you have your mother’s eyes’ statement - but this isn’t Snape’s redemption arc; this is his initial motivation.  When Snape is devastated after Lily’s death, Dumbledore coerces him into a new mission: keeping Harry safe in Lily’s honour, so her sacrifice wasn’t in vain.  You’re right - Dumbledore manipulates him by telling him that Harry has Lily’s eyes, suggesting that a part of her lives on within her child.

Snape’s redemption arc is that he was involved in a series of events which led to the death of his old best friend - and upon realising this, he desperately scrambled to try and undo the damage he’d caused.  As a 20 year old, he begs solely for Lily’s life - because she was the one he cared about personally.

At the age of 37, during a discussion with Dumbledore, Snape reveals two things: his motivation for his behaviour is still keeping Harry safe in Lily’s honour, and that he only sees those die whom he could not save.  This is a massive turnaround from his behaviour at 20, when he only cared about Lily - now he saves everyone that he can, irrespective of their relationship to him.

At this point, Snape is told that Harry has to die - and Snape realises that his mission all of these years has been pointless.  He is furious, telling Dumbledore that he used him - that he’s spied, and lied, and placed himself in mortal danger, and all along, Dumbledore knew that Harry wouldn’t survive.  

This is a crucial moment in Snape’s story, because if Snape’s sole reason for doing good things / saving people is keeping Harry alive, then Dumbledore has just ripped his purpose away.  If Snape is not a truly changed man, there is no reason why he wouldn’t just revert to being a Death Eater.

And this option is gifted to Snape - he has to murder Dumbledore.  Dumbledore’s plan is for Snape to go deep undercover with the Death Eaters and to gain control of Hogwarts so he can mitigate the worst of Voldemort’s behaviour, saving the staff and students from unnecessary harm.  

...but Dumbledore is dead, so Snape doesn’t have to do this.  He could genuinely defect from the Order, bask in the praise of the Death Eaters for a job well done, and then take up a post elsewhere - perhaps in the Ministry - leaving Harry without assistance (because it’s a pointless endeavour).

Yet he does not do this - he remains true to Dumbledore’s plan.  

So Snape’s redemption arc isn’t that he wanted to have sex with Lily, or that he was perhaps an Order member, or that Harry had his mother’s eyes - Snape’s redemption arc is moving from saving one person because he felt strongly for them as an individual, to saving everyone he could - no matter who they were - because it was the right thing to do, and choosing to do this at no personal benefit to himself.

Given that this post is already very long, I’m not going to dwell on the rest of your points - but I was surprised to see your final lament of, “Why be a teacher?”

In case you missed it, this is explicitly explained in HBP, during the Spinner’s End chapter.  Snape explains that when the Dark Lord fell in 1981, Snape was a teacher at Hogwarts and that Voldemort had requested that Snape take the post, so he could spy on Dumbledore.

He tells Bellatrix that he stayed because it was a comfortable job, and Dumbledore’s assistance kept him from Azkaban.  He further elaborates that by doing so, he now has sixteen years of information to pass to Voldemort - so although he didn’t foresee it, his actions are of use to the Dark Lord.

...but we know some of this is misdirection, because we know that Snape had more reasons for taking the post initially than him being a genuine spy for Voldemort, as he’d already defected to Dumbledore.  Additionally, Snape is explicitly told by Dumbledore that Voldemort will return - so both he and Dumbledore knew that they were cultivating a story ready for the Dark Lord’s return.

And their actions worked, because Snape lived past GoF, despite Voldemort initially stating that he would be murdered.

So the answer to your lament is that Snape probably had no aspirations to be a teacher - he is a spy.  Unfortunately, Dumbledore was a teacher, which meant that for Snape to have a credible story, he also had to be a teacher - irrespective as to whether his interests or talents lay in this direction.  

Hope that helps - you might get a bit more enjoyment out of the series and the character now.  :)

My take on #Slytherin’s Common Room 🐍✨

“Our common room lies behind a concealed entrance down in the dungeons. As you’ll see, it’s windows look into the dephts of the Hogwarts lake. We often see the giant squid swooshing by - and sometimes more interesting creatures.”

Instagram 👉 celia.rguez

Twitter 👉 @celia_theartist

Still and details.

Instagram 👉 celia.rguez

Twitter 👉 @celia_theartist

Train Rides

Are better with you

Dumbledore: Severus I’m still missing your photo for this year’s faculty newsletter

Severus: my apologies here it is

Dumbledore: you can’t even see half of your face. Maybe one less dramatic?

Severus: of course, headmaster.

Severus:

Dumbledore: I said less dramatic and preferably one where you’re not so alarmed

Severus: 

Dumbledore: did you have a photoshoot or something

Severus:

Dumbledore: what no Severus you are not in a boy band what is this pose wait you’re not in one are y-

Severus:

Dumbledore: are those special effects

Severus:

Dumbledore: cool but still a no

Severus:

Dumbledore: dramatic and very fitting for you but you can’t have fanart as your faculty photo who even is your fan and why don’t I have fanart

Severus:

Dumbledore: bold choice going with the profile, I admit I didn’t think you’d go for it, but you can’t have a dramatic death quote on your photo either this is a school for children they still have hope at least until their first class with you

Severus:

Dumbledore: *sigh*

Severus:

Dumbledore: why is the school on fire

Severus:

Dumbledore: is that a Death Eater meeting

Severus:

Dumbledore: oh my god 

Severus:

Dumbledore: seriously did you have a photoshoot

Severus:

Dumbledore: artsy but no

Severus:

Dumbledore: is that a screenshot

Severus:

Dumbledore: please stop

Severus:

Dumbledore: that’s it I’m taking away your photoshop privileges in the muggle studies computer lab

Severus:

Dumbledore: okay you know what fine that’ll do

Severus:

Dumbledore: no.

Severus:

Dumbledore: where are these all coming from

Severus:

Dumbledore: YOU KNOW WHAT NEVER MIND FORGET I ASKED YOU DON’T NEED A PHOTO

Severus:

People saying “ah but if Voldemort had chosen Neville Snape would never have turned” as a kind of gotcha moment is so disingenuous and absurd. We don’t do it for anything else. It’s like asking “would Hamlet want to kill Claudius if his father hadn’t been murdered?” or pointing out that if Dantes hadn’t been wronged then he wouldn’t have sought revenge.

It is at heart like saying that if Snape had had a stable family life and hadn’t been bullied in school, he probably wouldn’t have become a Death Eater. It is interesting to indulge, but at heart it doesn’t matter. Voldemort targeting Lily is the tipping point for Snape. It’s what enables his change and his character development. That’s what’s in the text. What matters for Snape as a character is that after Voldemort targeted Lily, he would have tried to save Neville’s life if it were threatened (which he does in a reduced capacity when Crabbe is suffocating him).

If Voldemort had never used Kreacher to hide his Horcrux, Regulus would never have defied him.

If Voldemort had never threatened the safety and comfort of Lucius and Draco, Narcissa would never have lied for Harry.

There’s this narrative gone awry within the anti-Snape community that his initial choice to defect can be invalidated because it was motivated by a personal connection to a person being targeted by Voldemort. That not only misses the entire point of Rowling’s narrative (i.e. both the idea of the transformative and protective powers of love and the impact we, as individuals, can have on people to the extent we can be agents for change in their lives both for the better and the worse) but is a bit of gate-keeping logic that I’ve noticed they only arbitrarily enforce most of the time (i.e. they praise Regulus and Narcissa for their choices, despite the fact they also have their roots in Voldemort’s personal impact on them). 

The reality is, the Order was comprised almost entirely of people that once bullied Snape or that failed to stop his bullies (e.g. the Marauders and Dumbledore) while the suggestion within the narrative is that Snape may have been groomed by Lucius Malfoy (notably the first person at Hogwarts, and a popular Head Boy, to acknowledge Snape kindly when he was sorted into Slytherin) and those in his social circle to bring a young Snape over to their fold. Even Snape’s own Head of House ignored his talents for potions and left him out of his Slug Club because he felt he lacked the recommendations that would take him places in their society. Between an Order whose members either bullied him, wanted nothing to do with him, or ignored him for seven years at Hogwarts and a group of his peers who were promising him a way around all the barriers that would otherwise have limited his options for entry into wizarding society (e.g. promising him acceptance, promising him power, promising him alternatives to the life of poverty and unhappiness his Muggle father modeled for him, etc.) it’s really not difficult to recognize the psychological grooming that went into Snape making the choices that he did. Were they the right choices? No, and I doubt anyone would seriously argue they were.. However, understanding all the ways that disenfranchised young people may become radicalized or groomed into joining extremist groups or cults like the fictional Death Eaters model for readers is an important aspect of preventing it. 

Regulus was born into privilege, the Noble House of Black, and kept news clippings of Death Eater activity pinned to his walls with the same kind of adolescent fan-boy enthusiasm that Ron’s poster of the Chudley Canons signified. That it took Regulus seeing Voldemort mistreat his family’s House-Elf, Kreacher for him to be repulsed by the reality of the activities of the Death Eaters is maybe not ideal when you consider he delighted enough in their activities before to hang up reports of them in his room. Nonetheless, to make the choice to walk away from an extremist group is an act that is difficult and requires courage on the part of a person doing it. In Regulus’s case, his character’s death is symbolic of all those young people who tragically lose their lives in the act of leaving violent extremist groups like the Death Eaters.

Meanwhile, Narcissa never truly abandons the ideology shared by most of Voldemort’s supporters. Rather, she makes the momentary decision to protect her family when Voldemort’s rise to power began to threaten their safety and their status (Voldemort, a half-blood himself, not only takes command of their estate but usurps Lucius Malfoy’s place at the head of his family’s table after an act of symbolic castration, wherein he orders him to hand over his wand with a mocking jab about how he won’t need it). Furthermore, if we go by the canon of Cursed Child, the in later years Narcissa’s relationship with Draco becomes strained because she doesn’t approve of his wife or the fact he grows into a man who has rejected the blood purist ideology she maintains with her own husband. As a result, of the three I have named, Narcissa’s choice is the most selfishly motivated and the one which most clearly represents the kind of people who are in the highest positions of privilege in our society and choose to support prejudiced ideologies that allow them to retain or increase their power-privileges and who only pay-lip service to regret when they are negatively harmed by their ideologies (e.g. CEOs and celebrities who are caught using racial slurs and then cry crocodile tears when they see the way it damages their image and/or profit-making potential). Ironically, the Malfoy family were doing better before Voldemort’s revival, so Narcissa’s decision to help Harry was her way of protecting her family once supporting Voldemort became more of a threat to them than their more abstract anxieties about Muggle-borns encroaching on their power and status. 

Which brings us back to Snape, who initially undermines Voldemort when he threatens the life of a person he cares for. Importantly, when he goes to Dumbledore and makes it clear that his motivation for betraying Voldemort is solely to save Lily’s life, he’s immediately criticized for failing to think outside of his own personal objective. Unlike Regulus, whose defection was a brief moment of sacrifice in response to the suffering of someone he cared for, after being called out for his selfish moment of short-sightedness, Snape agrees without any resistance to permanently defect from Voldemort and become a spy for the Order for an unforeseen amount of time which ultimately proves to be decades of his life (i.e. from 21 until 38 when he dies during the Battle of Hogwarts). Significantly, he must agree to defect under the new terms Dumbledore set for him and rather than just Lily he now urges Dumbledore to protect all of the Potters (”Hide them. Hide them all.”), . Again, unlike Regulus, Snape’s defection is not a momentary decision that is quickly resolved but one that he must abide by for many years. As such, him going to Dumbledore was only the first-step in his character’s development, which is why Rowling does for him what she did not do for either Regulus or Narcissa in having Dumbledore call attention to the fact that Snape’s initial motivations for coming to him were selfish and didn’t take into account a bigger picture (or even how Lily would have felt had she survived when her husband and son did not). 

By the Battle of Hogwarts, Snape is not only a man who proactively resists the use of the same kind of prejudiced language he once used as a young man, such as Mudblood, when he can afford to do so without revealing his true loyalties and ideological shift (e.g. when Phineas Nigellus referred to Hermione as “the Mudblood” to dehumanize her) but he has also learned the importance of doing the right thing, even for people he may not personally care about and/or may even greatly loathe (e.g. conjuring stretchers for Sirius and Harry, protecting Harry throughout books 1-7, saving Remus Lupin’s life during the Flight of the Seven Potters, etc.). That is why Rowling felt it was important to include in the memories Harry witnesses a scene between Dumbledore and Snape where Snape seems appalled to learn Harry must die for Voldemort to be defeated and seems to insist it’s only because of his decision to protect him as penance for Lily. Importantly, Rowling has Snape immediately contradict his own words in the same memory and not long after denying he doesn’t care that Harry will die for Harry’s sake. In the face of Snape’s accusation (”You’ve been raising him like a pig for slaughter.”) Dumbledore defends himself by asking who Snape had watched die recently and the answers he gives reveals the truth of the changes that his character has underwent from twenty-one to that very moment: “Lately, only those whom I could not save.” With those few words, the reader discovers that Snape has learned to value and defend human life not just when the life in question matters to him but because life itself has an intrinsic value to him. 

This is also proven when he ultimately chooses to remain steadfast against Voldemort, even after learning that boy with Lily’s eyes he believed he had dedicated his life to protecting must die. He could have chosen to return back to Voldemort once he learned Harry was meant to die, he could have warned Harry to save himself, or he could have just attempted to flee like Kakaroff and make a new life for himself. However, as he once told Dumbledore, Snape is not like Kakaroff, he is “no such coward.” Snape does not die selfishly or cowardly, indeed, the moment he lays eyes on Harry he stops trying to staunch the flow of blood from Nagini’s attack and fulfills the final task that Dumbledore gave him to arm Harry with the knowledge he needs. It is his last act as Harry’s teacher and as Dumbledore’s spy and through it Snape’s redemption arc is completed by coming full circle; where he once imparted information to Voldemort that led to the death of the Potters he now has given their son all the information he needs to win the war and stamp out Voldemort and the lasting darkness he threatens to unleash on their world. 

It’s unfortunate to me that the argument of the anti-Snape posters is so commonly focused on invalidating Snape’s decision to defect from Voldemort that they miss the sophistication of the story that Rowling was presenting her readers through his character. A single person once made an impact in Snape’s life that was so significant he was willing to step away from a group of extremists who had promised him belonging and glory just to protect her because he valued her above himself. However, Rowling doesn’t stop there, in spite of this being a YA story, she pushes the narrative further and has Dumbledore point out that it’s not enough for Snape to care only when it’s personal for him; that can only be his starting point. As such, Lily may have been the catalyst for Snape’s defection but Rowling also took great pains to include moments in her narrative that allowed the reader to see the evolution of Snape’s character from a man whose initial betrayal of Voldemort was for reasons very personal and important to him into a man who has not only continued to betray Voldemort at every turn but has also come to reject his ideology and what his rise to power would mean for their world. Snape’s transformation is summarized best by Snape himself in Cursed Child (a contribution to the Harry Potter canon that, while hotly contested by some fans, was still a collaboration effort between J.K. Rowling and Jack Thorne and does count as a part of her world’s canon): 

“One person. All it takes is one person. I couldn’t save Harry for Lily. So now I give my allegiance to the cause she believed in. And it’s possible — that along the way I started believing in it myself.” 

Where Regulus Black symbolizes the tragic way young people can be indoctrinated into extremist groups and lose their lives in the act of leaving them and Narcissa Malfoy demonstrates the way some people with privilege will always act in the way that best protects their own interests (including momentarily lying when their prejudice becomes dangerous for them to maintain); Severus Snape teaches readers the importance of how a single person can be a powerful agent for change and how even when that change may come gradually and require time to evolve into something greater it can still end up being a powerful force for good. That is why we must all take care not to erect barriers that invalidate the changes people make when we feel they are not dramatic enough or done in exactly the right way according to our arbitrary set of standards. It is true there are people who may only pay lip-service to change in the moment and only when it benefits them and recognizing those people and calling attention to their insincerity is important too. However, “[a] journey of a 1,000 miles begins with a single step” and if we don’t allow people the space to take that first step –if we rush to pull the rug out from under them before they’ve even had the chance to put their foot down– then we only have ourselves to blame when enough people stop trying. We should all aim to be that one person who looks for the potential in others and encourage that. We should want to be their catalyst for positive change in this world –encourage and nurture human potential, however small at first, don’t erect barriers around it and appoint yourself gate-keeper.

HARRY POTTER 20th Anniversary Thai Edition - cover art by ARCH APOLAR