Warning: This article contains spoilers.
If the world of Harry Potter were real, then May 2 would be the 16th anniversary of the Battle of Hogwarts, the most famous battle in wizarding history.
The series’ biggest battle occurred at the end of the seventh book, because all of Harry’s major showdowns with the dark lord Voldemort conveniently took place at the end of Harry’s school year. While it was thus fitting that Voldemort’s last stand happened at Hogwarts, it wasn’t easy for fans to witness the deaths of familiar characters who’d grown beloved over seven books. Author J.K. (“Jo”) Rowling didn’t go easy on us when it cames to killing off major characters like Remus Lupin and George Weasley, along with Hogwarts students who grew up with many readers, most notably Colin Creevy.
Even though it’s been seven years since we first read it, the scene where the bodies of the fallenare were laid out in the Great Hall—50 casualties in all—is still written on our hearts.
Apparently Rowling didn’t go easy on herself, either. She unexpectedly tweeted about the Battle today, and it’s clear that the universe she created is never very far from her thoughts:
It’s the 16th anniversary of the Battle of Hogwarts. I’m having a moment’s silence over my keyboard. I hated killing some of those people.
— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) May 2, 2014
You know, Jo, unlike the other 400 million readers of your books, you could have actually done something about that by not killing them off.
We can’t complain, though. We always knew the final battle would hurt. And when Rowling, who has only tweeted 57 times since she joined Twitter in 2009, talks about the series with us, it gives us a warm, Alohomora-like glow within.
We’re still mad at her for waiting until after he was dead to out Dumbledore, though. Maybe when it’s the anniversary of his death she’ll come clean about that Dumbledore/Grindelwald romance she was obviously hiding in plain sight.
Photo via sebastiann_bergmann/Flickr (CC BY-S.A.-3.0)