J. K. Rowling famous quotes

There is an expiry date on blaming your parents for steering you in the wrong direction; the moment you are old enough to take the wheel, responsibility lies with you.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Lying #Responsibility #Parent

We've all got both light and dark inside us. What matters is the part we choose to act on. That's who we really are.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Love #Inspirational #Dark

October extinguished itself in a rush of howling winds and driving rain and November arrived, cold as frozen iron, with hard frosts every morning and icy drafts that bit at exposed hands and faces.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Morning #Rain #Winter

We're all human, aren't we? Every human life is worth the same, and worth saving.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Life #Inspiration #Abortion

Understanding is the first step to acceptance, and only with acceptance can there be recovery.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Inspirational #Change #Wise

Numbing the pain for a while will make it worse when you finally feel it.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Inspirational #Life #Depression

People ask me if there are going to be stories of Harry Potter as an adult. Frankly, if I wanted to, I could keep writing stories until Harry is a senior citizen, but I don't know how many people would actually want to read about a 65 year old Harry still at Hogwarts playing bingo with Ron and Hermione.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Senior #Writing #Years

Wherever I am, if I've got a book with me, I have a place I can go and be happy
-- J. K. Rowling

#Happiness #Book

The world is full of wonderful things you haven't seen yet. Don't ever give up on the chance of seeing them.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Giving Up #World #Chance

Things we lose have a way of coming back to us in the end, if not always in the way we expect.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Love #Death #Way

It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might has well not have lived at all, in which case you have failed by default.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Inspirational #Success #Graduation

Indifference and neglect often do much more damage than outright dislike.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Relationship #Boyfriend #Husband

Happiness can be found, even in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on the light.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Happiness #Inspiring #Philosophical

Remus Lupin was supposed to be on the H.I.V. metaphor. It was someone who had been infected young, who suffered stigma, who had a fear of infecting others, who was terrified he would pass on his condition to his son. And it was a way of examining prejudice, unwarranted prejudice towards a group of people. And also, examining why people might become embittered when they're treated that unfairly.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Son #People #Groups

If it's a good book, anyone will read it. I'm totally unashamed about still reading things I loved in my childhood.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Wise #Witty #Reading

Is 'fat' really the worst thing a human being can be? Is 'fat' worse than 'vindictive', 'jealous', 'shallow', 'vain', 'boring' or 'cruel'? Not to me.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Inspirational #Beauty #Wise

Failure is so important. We speak about success all the time. It is the ability to resist failure or use failure that often leads to greater success. I've met people who don't want to try for fear of failing.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Failure #People #Trying

Words are, in my not-so-humble opinion, our most inexhaustible source of magic. Capable of both inflicting injury, and remedying it.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Humble #Magic #Opinion

The knowledge that you have emerged wiser and stronger from setbacks means that you are, ever after, secure in your ability to survive. You will never truly know yourself, or the strength of your relationships, until both have been tested by adversity. Such knowledge is a true gift, for all that it is painfully won, and it has been worth more than any qualification I ever earned.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Adversity #Mean #Stronger

If you don’t like to read, you haven’t found the right book.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Inspiring #Book #Reading

It takes a great deal of bravery to stand up to our enemies, but just as much to stand up to our friends.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Inspirational #Friendship #Courage

When you have seen as much of life as I have, you will not underestimate the power of obsessive love.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Love #Life #Underestimate

What was there to be gained by fighting the most evil wizard who has ever existed?" said Black, with a terrible fury in his face. "Only innocent lives, Peter!" "You don't understand!" whined Pettigrew. "He would have killed me, Sirius!" "THEN YOU SHOULD HAVE DIED!" roared Black. "DIED RATHER THAN BETRAY YOUR FRIENDS, AS WE WOULD HAVE DONE FOR YOU!
-- J. K. Rowling

#Fighting #Evil #Black

You do not seek to kill me, Dumbledore?” called Voldemort, his scarlet eyes narrowed. “Above such brutality, are you?” “We both know that there are other ways of destroying a man, Tom,” Dumbledore said calmly. “Merely taking your life would not satisfy me, I admit —” “There is nothing worse than death, Dumbledore!” snarled Voldemort. “You are quite wrong,” said Dumbledore, speaking as lightly as though they were discussing the matter over drinks. “Indeed, your failure to understand that there are things much worse than death has always been your greatest weakness..
-- J. K. Rowling

#Eye #Men #Matter

It’s so difficult to describe depression to someone who’s never been there, because it’s not sadness. I know sadness. Sadness is to cry and to feel. But it’s that cold absence of feeling— that really hollowed-out feeling.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Sadness #Feelings #Cold

Aunt Petunia often said that Dudley looked like a baby angel — Harry often said that Dudley looked like a pig in a wig.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Baby #Angel #Aunt

I think it’s the books that you read when you’re young that live with you forever.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Book #Thinking #Forever

Do not pity the dead, Harry. Pity the living, and, above all those who live without love.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Love #Silly #Inspire

I'm a writer, and I will write what I want to write.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Writing #Want

I don't believe in the kind of magic in my books. But I do believe something very magical can happen when you read a good book.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Inspirational #Funny #Believe

You think the dead we loved truly ever leave us? You think that we don't recall them more clearly in times of great trouble?
-- J. K. Rowling

#Thinking #Trouble

Your mother died to save you. If there is one thing Voldemort cannot understand, it is love. Love as powerful as your mother's for you leaves it's own mark. To have been loved so deeply, even though the person who loved us is gone, will give us some protection forever.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Love #Death #Mother

You care so much you feel as though you will bleed to death with the pain of it.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Pain #Grief #Sorrow

Youth cannot know how age thinks and feels. But old men are guilty if they forget what it was to be young.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Inspirational #Family #Home

It is a strange thing, but when you are dreading something, and would give anything to slow down time, it has a disobliging habit of speeding up.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Time #Giving #Strange

Let my girls be Hermiones, rather than Pansy Parkinsons.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Girl #Hermione #Pansies

Hogwarts is threatened!” shouted Professor McGonagall. “Man the boundaries, protect us, do your duty to our school!
-- J. K. Rowling

#School #Men #Hogwarts

On the other hand, the Prince had proved a much more effective teacher than Snape so far.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Teacher #Hands #Effective Teacher

Dumbledore paused, and although his voice remained light and calm, and he gave no obvious sign of anger, Harry felt a kind of chill emanating from him and noticed that the Dursleys drew very slightly closer together. “You did not do as I asked. You have never treated Harry as a son. He has known nothing but neglect and often cruelty at your hands. The best that can be said is that he has at least escaped the appalling damage you have inflicted upon the unfortunate boy sitting between you.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Son #Boys #Hands

Imperfect understanding is often more dangerous than ignorance.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Ignorance #Understanding #Imperfect

Depression isn't just being a bit sad. It's feeling nothing. It's not wanting to be alive anymore.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Depression #Feelings #Alive

There was a lot more to magic, as Harry quickly found out, than waving your wand and saying a few funny words.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Magic #Found #Wands

Course Dumbledore trusts you,” growled Moody. “He’s a trusting man, isn’t he? Believes in second chances. But me — I say there are spots that don’t come off, Snape. Spots that never come off, d’you know what I mean?
-- J. K. Rowling

#Believe #Mean #Men

I know what you are known as . . . but to me, you will always be Tom Riddle. It is one of the irritating things about old teachers. I am afraid that they never quite forget their charges’ youthful beginnings.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Teacher #Forget #Riddle

He tried to give his wife pleasure in little ways, because he had come to realize, after nearly two decades together, how often he disappointed her in the big things. It was never intentional. They simply had very different notions of what ought to take up most space in life.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Two #Space #Wife

You must accept the reality of other people. You think that reality is up for negotiation, that we think it's whatever you say it is. You must accept that we are as real as you are; you must accept that you are not God.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Life #Real #Thinking

Just think how many books I could've sold if Harry had been a bit more creative with his wand." -[On the success of 50 Shades of Grey]
-- J. K. Rowling

#Book #Thinking #Creative

It was strange how your brain could know what your heart refused to accept.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Heart #Brain #Strange

Things denied, things untold, things hidden and disguised.
-- J. K. Rowling

Everything had shattered. The fact that it was all still there — the walls and the chairs and the children’s pictures on the walls — meant nothing. Every atom of it had been blasted apart and reconstituted in an instant, and its appearance of permanence and solidity was laughable; it would dissolve at a touch, for everything was suddenly tissue-thin and friable.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Children #Wall #Facts

But Dobby shouted, "You shall not harm Harry Potter! ... He got up, face livid, and pulled out his wand, but Dobby raised a long, threatening finger. "You shall go now," he said fiercely, pointing down at Mr. Malfoy. "You shall not touch Harry Potter. You shall go now.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Long #Dobby #Faces

Dumbledore was on his feet again, pale as any of the surrounding Inferi, but taller than any too, the fire dancing in his eyes; his wand was raised like a torch and from its tip emanated the flames, like a vast lasso, encircling them all with warmth.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Eye #Feet #Fire

Abundance is the quality of life you live and quality of life you give to others.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Giving #Quality #Abundance

Once, long ago, Parminder had told Barry the story of Bhai Kanhaiya, the Sikh hero who had administered to the needs of those wounded in combat, whether friend or fo. When asked why he gave aid indiscriminately, Bahai Kanhaiya had replied that the light of God shone from every soul, and that he had been unable to distinguish between them.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Hero #Light #Long

You're the one who is weak. You will never know love or friendship. And I feel sorry for you.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Love #Sorry #Weak

You will never truly know yourself or the strength of your relationships until both have been tested by adversity.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Positive #Adversity #Our Relationship

It is important to remember that we all have magic inside us.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Believe #Magic #Important

What's the worst that could happen? Everyone turned me down; big deal.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Positive Thinking #Bigs #Worst

I will defend the importance of bedtime stories to my last gasp.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Reading #Stories #Lasts

We have to choose between what is right, and what is easy.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Choices #Easy

... perhaps those who are best suited to power are those who have never sought it.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Silly

... you could claim that anything's real if the only basis for believing in it is that nobody's proved it doesn't exist!
-- J. K. Rowling

#Real #Believe #Silly

Poverty is a lot like childbirth - you know it is going to hurt before it happens, but you'll never know how much until you experience it.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Hurt #Being Hurt #Poverty

I think the single biggest thing that money gave me-and obviously I came from a place where I was a single mother and it really was hand to mouth at one point. It was literally as poor as you can get in Britain without being homeless at one point. If you've ever been there you will never, ever take for granted that you don't need to worry. Never.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Wise #Mother #Witty

Poverty entails fear and stress and sometimes depression. It means a thousand petty humiliations and hardships.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Stress #Mean #Poverty

I've been writing since I was six. It is a compulsion, so I can't really say where the desire came from; I've always had it. My breakthrough with the first book came through persistence, because a lot of publishers turned it down!
-- J. K. Rowling

#Book #Writing #Persistence

I've only suffered writer's block badly once, and that was during the writing of Chamber of Secrets. I had my first burst of publicity about the first book and it paralysed me. I was scared the second book wouldn't measure up, but I got through it!
-- J. K. Rowling

#Block #Book #Writing

I didn't write with a target audience in mind. What excited me was how much I would enjoy writing about Harry. I never thought about writing for children - children's books chose me. I think if it is a good book anyone will read it.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Children #Book #Writing

Read a lot. Reading really helps. Read anything you can get your hands on.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Reading #Writing #Hands

To have been loved so deeply, even though the person who loved us is gone, will give us some protection forever.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Inspirational #Motivational #Giving

Ah, music. A magic beyond all we do here!
-- J. K. Rowling

#Music #Magic

I believe in hard work and luck, and that the first often leads to the second
-- J. K. Rowling

#Believe #Hard Work #Luck

I think you have a moral responsibility when you've been given far more than you need, to do wise things with it and give intelligently.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Wise #Responsibility #Thinking

I have never been remotely ashamed of having been depressed. Never. What's to be ashamed of? I went through a really rough time and I am quite proud that I got out of that.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Depression #Proud #Rough Times

Failure means a stripping away of the inessential.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Failure #Mean #Stripping

Harry found the [tea]... seemed to burn away a little of the fear fluttering in his chest.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Tea #Littles #Found

Print will never die. There's no substitute for the feel of an actual book. I adore physically turning pages, and being able to underline passages and not worrying about dropping them in the bath or running out of power. I also find print books objects of beauty.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Running #Book #Worry

Talent and intelligence never yet inoculated anyone against the caprice of the fates.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Fate #Talent #Caprice

I am indebted to the British welfare state; the very one that Mr Cameron would like to replace with charity handouts. When my life hit rock bottom, that safety net, threadbare though it had become under John Major's Government, was there to break the fall. I cannot help feeling, therefore, that it would have been contemptible to scarper for the West Indies at the first sniff of a seven-figure royalty cheque. This, if you like, is my notion of patriotism.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Fall #Rocks #Government

In truth, I never consider the audience for whom I'm writing. I just write what I want to write.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Writing #Want #Audience

I find that discussing an idea out loud is often the way to kill it stone dead.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Ideas #Stones #Way

Yes, it's rather funny, really, that next to no-one realized the snake that Harry set free in Philosopher's Stone turned out to be Voldemort's final Horcrux, Nagini
-- J. K. Rowling

#Snakes #Finals #Stones

In many, many ways... Hufflepuff is my favorite house.
-- J. K. Rowling

#House #Way #My Favorite

Achievable goals are the first step to self improvement.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Self #Goal #Firsts

Failure is not fun. It can be awful. But living so cautiously that you never fail is worse.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Fun #Awful #Failing

Some people do not seem to grasp that I still have to sit down in peace and write the books, apparently believing that they pop up like mushrooms without my connivance.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Believe #Book #Writing

You don't have sex near unicorns. It's an ironclad rule. It's tacky.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Sex #Tacky #Unicorn

Those who choose not to empathize enable real monsters, for without ever committing an act of outright evil ourselves we collude with it through our apathy.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Real #Evil #Monsters

Imagination is ... the foundation of all invention and innovation.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Imagination #Innovation #Foundation

Be ruthless about protecting writing days.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Writing

There is no part of me that feels that I represented myself as your children’s babysitter or their teacher. I was always, I think, completely honest. I’m a writer, and I will write what I want to write.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Teacher #Children #Writing

Read as much as you possibly can. Nothing will help you as much as reading and you'll go through a phase where you will imitate your favorite writers and that's fine because that's a learning experience too.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Reading #Phases #Helping

If you want to see the true measure of a man, watch how he treats his inferiors, not his equals.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Life #Men #Watches

It is our choices... that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Inspirational #Life #Motivational

I was set free because my greatest fear had been realized, and I still had a daughter who I adored, and I had an old typewriter and a big idea. And so rock bottom became a solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Inspirational #Motivational #Suicide

Poverty entails fear and stress and sometimes depression. It meets a thousand petty humiliations and hardships. Climbing out of poverty by your own efforts that is something on which to pride yourself but poverty itself is romanticized by fools.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Stress #Pride #Climbing

Never trust anything that can think for itself if you can't see where it keeps its brain.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Halloween #Technology #Thinking

The truth. It is a beautiful and terrible thing, and must therefore be treated with great caution.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Beautiful #Truth #Literature

Why do I talk about the benefits of failure? Simply because failure meant a stripping away of the inessential. I stopped pretending to myself that I was anything other than what I was, and began to direct all my energy into finishing the only work that mattered to me.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Failure #Energy #Finishing

And the idea of just wandering off to a cafe with a notebook and writing and seeing where that takes me for awhile is just bliss.
-- J. K. Rowling

#Notebook #Writing #Ideas