Traveling to Universal Studios last month has inspired me to read the Harry Potter books again. In fact, I finished Harry Potter & The Sorcerer’s Stone before I flew out to Florida. I’m currently on the Chamber of Secrets as of this moment, but I hope to have all seven books read by the end of 2019. Briefly, I wanted to share my initial thoughts of little moments in the book I completely forgot about:
- Ron Weasley is a much smarter character than the movies demonstrate. He was one of the first characters to give Harry inside knowledge into magic on the Hogwarts Express. The movie “dumbs” him down a bit.
- Wands at their core are made of unicorn hair, phoenix tail feathers and heartstrings of dragons. I don’t know why I forgot this, but I did.
- Harry named Hedwig after a name he read in “A History of Magic”.
- There are 142 staircases in Hogwarts
- Professor Binns who teaches History of Magic is actually a ghost who died after sleepin gwhile his house caught on fire.
- There’s a paragraph in the first book where several students claimed Professor Quirrell’s turban smelled funny. Foreshadowing much?
- There are 700 fouls in Quidditch
- Seekers are the Quidditch players with the worst injuries
- Nicolas Flamel is 665 years old
- The movie skipped Snape’s potion challenge that Hermione helps Harry with.
Otherwise, I felt the Harry Potter & The Sorcerer’s Stone movie followed the book pretty closely. I didn’t feel much was cut out that was major. I’m glad I’m reading the books again because as you can tell in my list, there’s a lot I forgot about the Harry Potter world. I’m about a fourth of the way through the Chamber of Secrets and when I finish that book, I’ll post my recap on here too.
Enjoying the butterbeer
Bizarre Brunette 
It’s been years since I read the books and I remember very little. One thing I do remember is in The Goblet of Fire there were some creatures in the maze at the third task and Harry encounters a sphinx that will let him pass if he solves a riddle.
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Yes the Sphinx! I remember that too, but barely. I haven’t gotten to that book yet. Honestly, there’s a lot I had kinda forgotten about. I’m excited to finish my re-read of all the books.
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I wish the potion challenge was included, even though it’s not the most exciting challenge.
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It’s not, but it helps demonstrate Hermione’s intelligence. I also found that the books “dumb” down Ron which is actually kinda sad.
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