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— Hagrid, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Chapter 4
This series of seven children's books and young adult novels by JK Rowling exploded onto the world literary scene in the late 1990s and has become a phenomenon unlike anything seen before in publishing. Blending fantasy with the nearly extinct British boarding school genre, it made a literary superstar out of its ex-schoolteacher author, and the characters and settings she created have permanently entered popular culture the world over. The books also inspired a series of films.
The books in the series are:
- Harry Potter And The Philosophers Stone (Sorcerer's Stone in the United States)
- Harry Potter And The Chamber of Secrets
- Harry Potter And The Prisoner of Azkaban
- Harry Potter And The Goblet of Fire
- Harry Potter And The Order of the Phoenix
- Harry Potter And The Half-Blood Prince
- Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows
The basic story is a deceptively simple one: Harry Potter is a seemingly normal schoolboy, living with his resentful, borderline-abusive Aunt and Uncle after being orphaned in his infancy, who on his eleventh birthday discovers he isn't really normal at all. His parents were both powerful wizards, and Harry himself is the renowned defeater of Voldemort, would-be Evil Overlord of the wizarding world. Years earlier, Voldemort had attempted to kill Harry and perished, an occurrence for which Harry had received all the credit.
Harry goes to Hogwarts, the great school of magic, and is happy. There are the normal school troubles — bullies, unpleasant teachers — but nothing serious, until he sees a dark shadow creeping through the forest. Investigating, he eventually discovers that Voldemort did not truly die. Though his body was destroyed, his spirit clung to life, seeking ways to return from death and resume his campaign of terror.
That year Voldemort is defeated, but each new year brings a fresh confrontation between Harry and the forces of evil. Harry grows stronger over the years, mastering his magic, but so too does Voldemort as he recovers from his death. The wizarding world slips back into war as a final battle looms and a prophecy approaches fulfillment.
This series has a Character Sheet.
The series named the following tropes:
These books provide examples of:
Character tropes:
- Achilles In His Tent (Ron in The Deathly Hallows)
- Apron Matron (Mrs. Weasley and Augusta Longbottom)
- The Atoner (Snape)
- Author Avatar (Hermione=J.K. Rowling, by her own admission. In later interviews she has claimed that Ginny was also an Author Avatar.)
- Badass Abnormal
- Beautiful All Along (Hermione cleans up nicely by the end of the books)
- Because Destiny Says So (played with a little... Harry's destiny is self-fulfilling because Voldemort insists on fulfilling it — however, Dumbledore implies that not all prophecies have to be fulfilled.)
- Card Carrying Villain (Godelot)
- Chekhovs Skill (Ron and Chess, Harry and his Patronus, even Neville and his botany)
- The Chessmaster (Dumbledore)
- The Chosen One (guess... )
- Of note is the fact that Neville Longbottom would have been The Chosen One, had Voldemort attacked him, so it could be considered a slight subversion. Everything else about the trope applies, though.
- So... Schrodingers Chosen One?
- Cloudcuckoolander (Luna Lovegood)
- Commander Contrarian (Zacharias Smith)
- Complete Monster (Dolores Umbridge)
- Conspiracy Theorist (Luna Lovegood)
- Crouching Moron Hidden Badass (Neville)
- Dead Guy Junior
- Dead Little Sister (Ariana Dumbledore)
- Designated Antagonist
- Die For Our Ship (The ferocious and mindboggling hate of Ginny and Ron is one of the reasons why Harry/Hermione fans have... the fame they have)
- Dojikko (Tonks)
- Dorian Gray (Grindelwald)
- Double Agent (Snape. Snape. Severus Snape.)
- Dying Like Animals (Filch, Dolores Umbridge, and various Death Eaters — among others — all qualify)
- Embarrassing Cover Up (The Dursleys tell that Harry attends St Brutus' Secure Centre for Incurably Criminal Boys to cover up the time he spends at Hogwarts)
- Embarrassing First Name (
Nymphadora Tonks, darnit!)
- Embarrassing Middle Name (Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore)
- Evil Sorcerer (Lord Voldemort and the Death Eaters)
- Face Framed In Shadow (Dolores Umbridge's introduction happens this way)
- Fake Defector (Snape)
- Feet Of Clay (Gilderoy Lockhart)
- Gentle Giant (Hagrid)
- Happily Married (Molly and Arthur Weasley)
- Hot Librarian (Hermione, judging by both The Goblet of Fire and Deathly Hallows)
- Hyper Awareness (Luna Lovegood)
- Intrepid Reporter (Rita Skeeter, antagonist version)
- The Libby (Pansy Parkinson)
- Laser Guided Tykebomb (Harry to Voldemort)
- Kendo Team Captain (Oliver Wood)
- Magical Negro: Dobby
- Mary Sue (According to some, Ginny Weasley. Raging debates ensue, so make up your own mind.)
- Martyr Without A Cause (Harry at times, who wants to protect everyone)
- May December Romance (Remus Lupin and Tonks)
- Mentor Occupational Hazard (Dumbledore, but You Should Know This Already)
- Not to mention (Sirius and Lupin, who together with Tonks wins an award for Most Anticlimactic Death.
- Naive Newcomer (Harry)
- Power Trio (Harry, Ron, and Hermione)
- The Quisling
- Reverse Mole (Snape in Deathly Hallows)
- Scary Dogmatic Aliens (While they are not aliens, Voldemort and the Death Eaters fit the Aliens as Nazis archetype to a T.)
- Shrinking Violet (Slightly subverted: Ginny appears to be this throughout the first few books, but only around Harry (due to her having a huge crush on him). Her brothers state that she's pretty normal when he's not around, and she abandons her shyness completely at the beginning of book 5.)
- Smug Snake (Dolores Umbridge)
- The Straight Will And Grace (Harry and Hermione)
- Tall Dark And Snarky (Snape is a rare ugly version of this trope)
- Thoroughly Mistaken Identity: Professer Binns is always calling students by the names of students of long ago.
- Took A Level In Badass (Neville Longbottom, Represent!)
- Team Rocket (Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle.)
- Technicolor Eyes (Harry Potter)
- Ted Baxter (Gilderoy Lockhart)
- Tsundere (Hermione Granger)
- With Friends Like These (Ron and Hermione)
Plot tropes:
- Accidental Athlete
- Accidental Kiss
- Achey Scars
- All Of The Other Reindeer
- Animorphism
- Anyone Can Die (Rather minor in the earlier books, but after Goblet Of Fire all bets were off.)
- Artifact Of Death (Twice, the Elder Wand and Marvolo Gaunt's ring.)
- Bathroom Stall Of Overheard Insults (Moaning Myrtle was going to give Tom Riddle a piece of her mind for using parseltongue in the girls' bathroom, but then...)
- Batman Gambit
- Beam O War (In Goblet of Fire, a rare effect makes Harry's and Voldemort's wands connect and results in an anime-style beam-of-war battle. Unfortunately the filmmakers didn't seem to get the memo, because Dumbledore's and Voldemort's wands do the same in the fifth film, despite their wands having no mystical link whatsoever.)
- Because Destiny Says So
- Black Cloak (Death Eaters, and Dementors, who seem to generate their own.)
- Blasting It Out Of Their Hands (The Expelliarmus spell, which is intended for exactly this purpose. Amusingly, the spell seems capable of disarming a person of anything, whether it's a weapon or a harmless diary.)
- Boarding School (But also...)
- Boarding School Of Horrors (Hogwarts can be one Family Unfriendly place at times)
- Broken Masquerade
- By The Eyes Of The Blind (Thestrals are only visible to people who have seen death.)
- Calling Your Attacks (Played straight at first, then subverted when a major portion of the sixth-year curriculum is learning not to call them.)
- Canon Fodder (and the time between books let it be milked to the limit)
- Care Bear Stare (how Voldemort was driven out of Harry's mind after possessing him)
- Changeling Fantasy
- Character Name And The Noun Phrase
- Chekhovs Armoury (Chekhovs Gun is common in the series, e.g. The Deluminator; fans obsess over details in earlier books, looking for hidden Chekhov's Guns, to the point where J.K. Rowling made a public apology about accidentally giving a minor, unimportant character the same last name as Harry's mum.)
- Circle Of Extinction (between Harry and Voldie during their final showdown)
- Death By Childbirth (Merope Riddle)
- Die Or Fly (Neville)
- Distant Finale
- The Dutiful Son (Aberforth Dumbledore)
- Dying Like Animals (Not just the Muggles, but Wizards too.)
- Easing Into The Adventure (Harry even suggests, in the first novel, that Dumbledore wanted to give them something easy to begin with.)
- Easter Bunny
- Eigen Plot (The gauntlet of puzzles the trio go through at the end of Philosopher's Stone.)
- Enforced Cold War (the House rivalries, especially between Gryffindor and Slytherin)
- Evil Cannot Comprehend Good
- Evil Counterpart (Harry and Voldemort both had very similar beginnings, and Harry occasionally finds himself sympathetic to Voldemort. Nonetheless, the choices that both of them made sent them in totally different directions.)
- Evil Detecting Dog (well, actually a cat: Crookshanks.)
- Evil Is Not A Toy (Draco is proud to be working for Voldemort... to begin with. Possibly Regulus Black also fits this trope.)
- Fandom Nod (the pronunciation of "Hermione", which is finally clarified by Hermione herself in Goblet of Fire.)
- Fantasy Gun Control (Guns exist in the Muggle world, but apparently not even Squibs seem to have them in the Wizarding Community; in an article about Sirius Black, it's mentioned that the Muggles have been warned he's carrying a gun, which is then defined as "a type of metal wand that Muggles use to kill each other")
- Fate Worse Than Death (Neville's parents)
- Filleritis (Arguably, a large portion of Hallows.)
- Finding Judas (Snape anyone?)
- First Girl Wins (While she did not enter Hogwarts until the second book, Harry crossed paths with Ginny Weasley at King's Cross Station before he met any other female lead. Ginny, of course, was the person Harry eventually fell in love with.)
- Fluffy The Terrible (Quite a few monsters, but the most famous is actually called Fluffy.)
- Flying Broomstick (The Nimbus, the Firebolt...)
- Forgot I Could Fly
- Functional Magic (JKR says in interviews that she spent time working out the limits of wizard magic, but the novels only touch on these a few times: magic obeys laws of time and space, it's not possible to create food out of nothing, and death cannot be overcome. Among others.)
- Gondor Calls For Aid (The end of The Deathly Hallows)
- Gotta Kill Them All (Voldemort's Horcruxes)
- Government Conspiracy (the Ministry of Magic's cover-up of Voldemort's return)
- Happiness In Slavery (Most house-elves love being servants)
- Heroes Want Red Heads (Ginny)
- Hero Secret Service (the Order of the Phoenix)
- Hidden Depths
- Hufflepuff House
- Idiot Plot (Order of the Phoenix would have been a lot shorter if the adults had just levelled with Harry about what was going on instead of making him dig through all their obfuscation. The major tragedy of the story takes place because Harry had incomplete information. After defeating or stalemating the Basilisk, Death Eaters, and Voldy himself (three times) you would think they might start giving him some credit.)
- On the other side of the conflict, the entire point of The Goblet of Fire is a hideously over-complicated, year-long plot by the disguised Barty Crouch, Jr. whose goal could have been accomplished better and faster simply by abducting Harry at wand-point during the first week of school.)
- Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy (Especially in Order of the Phoenix; the Death Eaters can't seem to hit a child with a spell even from behind)
- Invisibility Cloak
- Is That What He Told You (Lots of well-meaning deception from Dumbledore.)
- Its Not You Its My Enemies (Harry has to tell Ginny this)
- It Was His Sled (Snape kills Dumbledore)
- Kangaroo Court (Fudge's attempt to discredit Harry is so biased that it's easy for Dumbledore to point out gaping holes in court procedure)
- Karmic Death (Voldemort)
- Killed Off For Real (Time doesn't permit us to list. At least one big death per book from Goblet of Fire on.)
- Lotus Eater Machine (The Mirror of Erised. Reading the name — not to mention the entire inscription — backwards is a dead giveaway.)
- Love Redeems (Snape's motivation for his Heel Face Turn.)
- Machiavelli Was Wrong (Voldemort is betrayed a few times by people who, despite being Slytherins, actually have feelings. Snape, for example, betrayed him for over a decade; Regulus was willing to die to stop him, and Narcissa lied to him to protect her son.)
- Magic A Is Magic A (Followed fairly closely, mainly with the teleporting power; the reader is repeatedly told that it's impossible to teleport in or out of Hogwarts, and is also repeatedly shown it happening. In Book 7 we find out why this is perfectly in line with the rules.)
- Magic Feather (Harry pretends to give Ron a luck potion)
- Magic Hat (The Room of Requirement turns into whatever people need. For a more literal magic hat, there's the Sorting Hat, but ironically, only one, specific item can be pulled from it.)
- Mailer Daemon (Voldemort's Diary (Part Artifact Of Doom and part Soul Jar) slowly worked its hooks into Ginny Weasley, using her to summon the Basilisk and attempting to steal her life to release itself)
- Masquerade
- Massive Multiplayer Crossover
- Meaningful Funeral
- Meaningful Name (Indeed, certain characters "just happen" to have names that relate to what they are to the point of providing more astute readers with a possible spoiler.)
- Methuselah Syndrome
- Missed The Call (Neville — narrowly.)
- The Mole
- Near Death Experience (The effect of multiple magical curses/charms takes Harry about as near death as anyone can go without actually dying.)
- Near Misses
- Never The Selves Shall Meet (A rule of time-travel.)
- No Ontological Inertia (Some spells are made to last after death, most others cease.)
- No Such Thing As Bad Publicity (In real life, Harry Potter got publicity just for being banned in some places for promoting witchcraft. And in the story, this is echoed a few times; for example, in Chamber of Secrets, Lockhart is very happy when a fight breaks out at a book signing for his latest book.)
- And then averted in the story when the Daily Prophet, Wizarding England's primary newspaper, does a massive (and successful) smear campaign on Harry.
- The Noun Of Adjective
- Older Than They Think
- Only I Can Kill Him
- The Power Of Love (alluded to throughout the series. It can protect a loved one from deadly curses, and block mental magic)
- Post Dramatic Stress Disorder (A lot)
- Plot Coupons
- Prophetic Fallacy
- Prophetic Names
- Put Down Your Gun And Step Away (Replace gun with wand; Bellatrix holding Hermione hostage in the last book asks for Harry's and his friends' wands)
- Rage Against The Mentor (Harry, at Dumbledore after Sirius' death in Order of the Phoenix)
- Rasputinian Death (Dumbledore)
- Really Seven Hundred Years Old (Wizards live longer, much longer.)
- The Scottish Trope: subverted by Dumbledore and several other heroic characters, who very determinedly say "Voldemort" despite the name's emotional baggage (and Harry, who just doesn't have that baggage.) Subverted back around to "played straight" in the seventh book, as He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named creates an enchantment that will ping his Mini Map whenever someone does say his name.
- Self Fulfilling Prophecies
- She Is Not My Girlfriend (Hermione. Harry actually says it once.)
- Sickeningly Sweethearts (Ron and Lavender)
- Side Bet
- Significant Anagram (Tom Marvolo Riddle <-> I am Lord Voldemort. Other languages revise the anagram to make sense in their tongues—or change his birth-name, resulting in some backronyms.)
- Created a meta-text flurry during the sixth book, when a locket signed by "R.A.B." became important to the plot. One of the first guesses on this mystery character's identity was Sirius Black's brother Regulus... Especially after foreign readers noticed that, whenever Sirius' surname was changed to that language's word for "black," R.A.B's last initial had followed suit.
- Soul Fragment
- Soul Jar (Horcruxes)
- Spy Speak (Subverted in Goblet of Fire — what a Muggle believes is Spy Speak is actually normal wizard speak)
- Stab The Salad (In Prisoner of Azkaban with the Hippogriff Buckbeak.)
- Steven Ulysses Perhero
- Theme Naming (Not just the characters; there's also Diagon Alley and the nearby roads, which are all puns on words that end in '-ally'.)
- The Trope Without A Title
- Time Travel (Prisoner of Azkaban)
- Tonight Someone Dies
- Three Amigos (Harry, Ron, Hermione)
- Training The Peaceful Villagers (Dumbledore's Army)
- Ultra Super Death Gore Fest Chainsawer 3000 (Mega Mutilation Part Three, Dudley's game)
- Unnecessary Roughness
- Unusual Euphemism
- Wangst (Harry's teenager angst, while perhaps justified, was still an annoyance to many readers)
- We Can Rule Together (Voldemort and Neville in The Deathly Hallows.)
- What Kind Of Lame Power Is Heart Anyway (Voldemort doesn't believe The Power Of Love will stop him.)
- White Haired Pretty Boy (Draco)
- Why Did It Have To Be Snakes (Ron's fear of spiders)
- Witch Species
- Wizarding School (Actually, more than one.)
- Word Of God (J.K. Rowling's interviews)
- Writers Cannot Do Math (Where to begin?)
- Wronski Feint (Trope Namer)
- Xanadu
- Xanatos Gambit (Voldemort's plan in the Half-Blood Prince, and Dumbledore's plan revealed near the end of Deathly Hallows)
- You Already Changed The Past
- You Cant Fight Fate (Literally — it's against the law. You can go back in time, just don't interfere with anything.)
- You Have Failed Me (If you're lucky, after you've ticked off Voldemort, he'll kill you without putting you through the Cruciatus Curse first.)
Video game tropes: Tropes that appear only in the Video Game adaptations:
Fanon tropes:
Other tropes associated with the series:
- Americanitis (Editors at Scholastic Books forced a change from "Philosopher's Stone" — a genuine item of folklore and alchemy — to "Sorcerer's Stone" for the American editions on the grounds that American children would have no idea what a Philosopher's Stone was. David Morgan-Mar has an alternative explanation.
 They have received more than a decade of excoriation since. Due to the negative reaction, British terms and slang in the later books, such as "jumper", "taking the mickey", and "snogging", were left in.)
- The Board Game (yes, and there's even been more than one)
- Door Stopper (all of the books from the fourth onwards; the fifth (weighing in at 766 pages for the Bloomsbury hardback edition) is the winner here)
- Moral Guardians (The seemingly endless parade of whackos who insist that the books entice children into the occult and devil worship.)
- Multiple Demographic Appeal (A major factor in the series' runaway success)
- Popcultural Osmosis
- What Do You Mean Its Not For Kids (arguably the later installments)
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