What must strike any intelligent witch or wizard on studying the so-called history of the Elder Wand is that every man who claims to have owned it has insisted that it is "unbeatable," when the known facts of its passage through many owners' hands demonstrate that has it not only been beaten hundreds of times, but that it also attracts trouble as Grumble the Grubby Goat attracted flies.

At fourteen, you really do start realising that the world is not a safe and protected place or not always.

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

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.

He’s gone, Harry told himself. He’s gone. He had to keep thinking it as he washed and dressed, as though repetition would dull the shock of it. He’s gone and he’s not coming back. And that was the simple truth of it, Harry knew, because their protective enchantments meant that it would be impossible, once they vacated this spot, for Ron to find them again.

Honestly, if you were any slower, you’d be going backward.

There is plenty of ambitious competition and hypocrisy in the middle class, which makes it a rather fertile environment for a writer.