Everything that fails brings you closer to what works.

Amazing, how much more difficult it was to extend his arm twelve inches and touch her hand than it was to snatch a speeding Snitch from midair.

Tell me, how is Lucius Malfoy these days? I expect he's delighted his lapdog's working at Hogwarts, isn't he?" "Speaking of dogs," said Snape softly, "did you know that Lucius Malfoy recognized you last time you risked a little jaunt outside? Clever idea, Black, getting yourself seen on a safe station platform. Gave you a cast-iron excuse not to leave your hidey-hole in future, didn't it?

How in the name of Merlin's pants have you managed to get your hands on those Horcrux books?

If you love something - and there are things that I love - you do want more and more and more of it, but that's not the way to produce good work.

Many prefer not to exercise their imaginations at all. They choose to remain comfortably within the bounds of their own experience, never troubling to wonder how it would feel to have been born other than they are. They can refuse to hear screams or to peer inside cages; they can close their minds and hearts to any suffering that does not touch them personally; they can refuse to know. I might be tempted to envy people who can live that way, except that I do not think they have any fewer nightmares than I do. The wilfully unimaginative see more monsters. They are often more afraid.

Draco Malfoy is a bad boy!" squeaked Dobby angrily.