Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

**Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets** is a British children's novel written by J.K. Rowling. It was first published by Bloomsbury in 1998.

## Synopsis

It is the summer holidays. Harry Potter- a boy wizard- has just completed his first year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Harry's 12th birthday is coming up. As always, the Dursleys are completely ignoring the occasion, but much to Harry's distress, Harry's friends seem to have ignored the occassion as well; Harry has not been contacted by his best friends- Ron and Hermione- all summer. Instead, Harry is told to hide in his room while Uncle Vernon entertains an important guest from work -Mr Mason and his wife. Harry dutifully stays in his room. But then, a mysterious little creature appears. The creature introduces himself as Dobby, the house elf. Dobby warns Harry not to go back to school in September and reveals that he has been hiding Harry's letters from his friends. Harry refuses to agree, so Dobby decides to levitate a cake over Mrs Mason. Harry receives an owl with a letter, warning him that underage magic outside of school is illegal. The appearance of the owl upsets Mrs Mason further, as she has a phobia of birds. Uncle Vernon decides to confine Harry to his room as a punishment, going as far as to install metal bars over his window.

Several days latter, Ron and his older brothers, Fred and George appear at Harry's bedroom window in a flying Ford Anglia. They use the car to pull to bars off the window and to get Harry out. The Dursleys try and stop them, but fail. As they fly away, Harry tells them about Dobby. They conclude that Dobby must have been sent by Harry's rival, Draco Malfoy, as a joke. They explain to Harry that elves typically belong to wealthy families, and inform Harry that the Malfoys are very wealthy. They also tell Harry that the Malfoys were supporters of Lord Voldermort. They land at the Weasley's family home, known as the Burrows. Harry is astounded by all the magical items in the home, but Mrs Weasley appears. She is furious with Ron, Fred and George for taking the car and tells them to de-gnome the garden as a punishment. In the wizarding world, gnomes are a common garden pest who are able to talk. De-gnoming involves throwing the gnomes out of the garden. Harry stays with the Weasleys for the rest of the summer, who treat Harry with great kindness.

Shortly before the children are due to return to school, the family make a trip to Diagon Ally- a street full of wizarding shops- to buy school supplies. The family travel via Floo Network, which is a way of traveling to places via fire places. The family take it in turns to use their fire place to get to Diagon Ally, which they do by putting Floo powder into the fire, stepping into the fire and saying the name of their desired destination. When Harry steps into the fire, the soot makes him sneeze and splutter. As a result, he mispronounces Diagon Ally and finds himself in Nocturn Ally, a street with shops that cater to dark wizards and witches. However, Hagrid, the games keeper at Hogwarts, notices Harry and gets him to Diagon Ally. Harry reunites with the Weasleys. Harry also finds Hermione, who is also shopping in Diagon Ally. They all go to Flourish and Blotts, the magical book shop. While they are there, a famous and rather vain author called Gilderoy Lockhart is launching his new book. He also announces that he will be Hogwart's new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher. Lockhart notices Harry in the crowd and gets him to have their photograph taken for the Daily Prophet, the wizarding world's newspaper. After having his picture taken, Harry sees Draco Malfoy with his father, Lucius Malfoy. Ron's father, Arthur Weasley gets into a fight with Lucius Malfoy. During the fight, Draco grabs one of Ginny Weasley's (the youngest child in the Weasley family) books. Hagrid breaks up the fight and Draco returns the book to Ginny.

The family go to King's Cross to go back to school. Everyone else gets through the barrier, but when it comes to Harry and Ron's turn, they find that they cannot get through. They decide to use the flying car to fly to school. Everything goes well until it comes to landing. When they arrive at Hogwarts, they hit the Womping Willow, a magical tree that hits the car with its branches. Fortunately, the car drives itself away and ejects the boys. However, the Womping Willow has snapped Ron's wand. They try to sneak back in, but they are caught by their least favourite teacher: Professor Snape. Snape threatens to have Harry and Ron expelled, but Dumbledore, the headmaster of Hogwarts refuses. However, their head of house, Professor McGonagall puts them both in detention.

Lessons begin. They learn about mandrakes in Herbology, while in Defence Against the Dark Arts, Lockhart constantly fixates on Harry's fame. Ron struggles in lessons because of his broken wand, which he has tried to repair with Spellotape (magical selotape). Harry starts Quiddich practice. He discovers that Malfoy is Slytherin's new skeeker. An arguement starts, where Malfoy calls Hermione a mudblood-an insulting term for witches and wizards who are muggle-born (born to parents who are not witches or wizards). In retaliation, Ron tries to curse Malfoy to vomit slugs. However, the spell backfires and slugs keep falling from Ron's mouth. Harry, Ron and Hermione go to Hagrid's hut to wait for the spell to wear off. While they are there, Hagrid explains how the Malfoys see themselves as supirior ot other wizards and witches because they are pure-blood, meaning they have no muggle family members. Hagrid condemms the Malfoy's attitude. When they return to the castle, they meet McGonagall, who tells them where they will serve their detentions. Ron must polish trophies in the school's trophy room. In Harry's case, he will be helping Lockhart answer his fan mail. While in detention, Harry hears a disembodied voice. Lockhart cannot hear the voice and Harry becomes concerned.

Later in the term, Harry, Ron and Hermione head to the Halloween feast. Harry can hear the voice again, but Ron and Hermione cannot hear it. Then, they see Mrs Norris, the cat belonging to Filch the caretaker. The cat has been petrified. It is hanging from a tourch bracket and the message:"The Chamber of Secrets has been opened. Enemies of the heir, beware" has been written on the wall in blood. A crowd gathers around the scene and Malfoy shouts "you'll be next mudbloods". Filch and Snape blame Harry for what has happened, but Dumbledore says Harry, as a second-year student, does not have the skills to petrify Mrs Norris. The mandrakes which were grown in the herbology lesson can be used to revive the cat once they are fully mature.

When the students return to lessons, Hermione asks Professor Binns, the history of magic teacher about the Chamber of Secrets. Binns explains that Salazar Slytherin, one of the four founders of Hogwarts, disagreed with the other founders on admitting muggle-born witches and wizards to Hogwarts. He eventually left Hogwarts over the matter. A legend had developed that Slytherin had built a concealed room in the castle with a monster that only the heir of Slytherin could control. When the chamber was opened, the monster would be unleashed to kill any muggle-born students. Binns goes on to say that the Chamber of Secrets does not exist, as the castle has been searched numerous times and no such room has ever been found. Harry, Ron and Hermione do not believe Binn's claims that there is no Chamber of Secrets. They also begin to suspect that Malfoy is the heir of Slytherin. Hermione decides to make a polyjuice potion to trick Malfoy into confessing he is the heir of Slytherin. The potion allows a person to take on the appearance of another person for one hour. Hermione suggests chaning into Malfoy's closet confidants, Crabbe and Goyle. However, the potion will take one month to brew. They brew the potion in Moaning Myrtle toilets- a girl's toilets haunted by a morose ghost of a student, which put people off using them.

Harry then has the first Quiddich match of the season, which is against Slytherin. Harry is repeatedly attacked by a bludger which only seems to come after him, rather than all the players on the pitch as it is supposed to. Everyone quickly realises that the bludger has been tampered with. Despite this, Harry still manages to catch the golden snitch, enabling Gryfindor to win the match. However, the bludger breaks Harry's arm. Lockhart attempts to fix the arm with magic, but instead, he unintentionally removes all of the bones in Harry's arm. Harry has to go to the hospital wing over night, where Madam Pomfrey, the matron, regrows Harry's bones with a potion called Skele-Gro. In the night, Dobby the house elf reappears. Dobby tells Harry that he tampered with the bludger and also closed the barrier at platform 9 and 3/4. He says that he only did it to try and stop Harry from staying at Hogwarts. Dobby then says that the Chamber of Secrets has been opened before. Someone else enters the room, and Dobby disapears. Dumbledore, McGonagall and Madam Pomfrey come into the room, with a first-year student called Colin Creevey. Colin has been petrified. Colin was holding a camera at the time, which has now been melted. Dumbledore says to McGonagall and Madam Pomfrey that this means the Chamber of Secrets has been opened again.

Lockhart starts a duelling club to teach the students how to defend themselves against attacks, which he runs with Snape. Harry and Malfoy are paired together to duel. Malfoy conjures up a snake. The snake tries to attack a student in Hufflepuff called Justin Finch-Fletchley and Harry tells the snake to stop. Much to Harry's surprise, the students are displeased by Harry talking to the snake. Afterwards, Harry learns that he is a parcelmouth- he has the ability to talk to snakes. Salazar Slytherin was also a parcelmouth, which raises suspicions amongst the other students that Harry is the heir of Slytherin. The next day, Harry goes to Hagrid's hut, where Hagrid tells him that the school's chickens keep being killed. As Harry leaves, he sees that Justin Finch-Fletchley has been petrified, along with the ghost of Gryfindor, Nearly-Headless Nick. Another Hufflepuff student claims that Harry has been caught red-handed. Dumbledore takes Harry into his office, where he assures Harry that he does not think he is the heir of Slytherin. Harry also sees Fawkes the Phoenix, and Harry learns that phoenixes can heal with their tears.

The polyjuice potion finishes brewing. To complete the potion, a part of the person they want to change to needs to be added to the potion. Hermione reveals that she has taken a hair from a Slytherin girl's robe while she was at the dueling club. She has also made a sleeping potion, and she spikes cakes with the sleeping potions. Crabbe and Goyle eat the cakes and fall asleep. Harry and Ron take pieces of their hair. They all drink the potions. Harry and Ron successfully take on the appearance of Crabbe and Goyle, but Hermione has turned into a human-cat hybrid. It turns out that she had taken a cat's hair from the Slytherin girl, but the polyjuice potion should not be used for animal transformations. Hermione goes to the hospital wing to try and fix her transformation. Ron and Harry go to the Slytherin common room while disguised as Crabbe and Goyle. They try and get Malfoy to confess to being the heir of Slytherin. However, Malfoy tells Harry and Ron that he does not know who has opened the Chamber of Secret, but that last time the Chamber was opened, a muggle-born student died and the student who opened the Chamber was expelled from the school.

A few weeks later, Harry finds a blank diary has been flushed down the toilet in Moaning Myrtle's toilets. The diary belongs to someone called T.M. Riddle. Ron recalls that a student called Tom Riddle had won a large trophy for special services to the school. Hermione realises that this trophy would have been from the same period when the Chamber of Secrets was last opened, and realises that Tom Riddle may have caught the student who opened the Chamber of Secrets. Harry keeps the diary. He tries to find a way to read any hidden writting, but nothing he tries succeeds. On Valentine's Day, Lockhart arranges singing cupids. Harry recieves a song from a singing cupid, but he feels uneasy and tries to run away. As he runs, he falls over and spills ink on the diary. Later, he looks at the diary and sees that there is no longer any ink on the diary. Harry writes in the diary and to his surprise, Tom Riddle writes back. Riddle confirms that he found the student who opened the Chamber of Secrets 50 years ago. The diary takes Harry to see Riddle's memory. It firstly shows Riddle talking to the then-headmaster, Professor Dippet. Dippet tells Tom that after the death of the muggle-born girl, the school may have to close. Hagrid, who has an extremly large spider, being caught by Tom Riddle.

A few months pass. Harry no longer hears the disembodied voice and there have been no further attacks. However, one day, Harry finds the dormetory has been left in disarray. As he checks his possessions, he finds that Tom Riddle's diary has been taken. The next day, the Quiddich match Gryfindor was due to play has been cancelled. McGonagall then takes Harry and Ron to the hospital wing, where she shows them that Hermione has been petrified. Students are now kept under contant surveilence for safety. Harry and Ron use Harry's invisibility cloak to sneek out of the castle and see Hagrid. Shortly after arriving at Hagrid's hut, the minister of magic, Cornellius Fudge arrives, along with Dumbledore. Harry and Ron hastily cover themselves with the invisibility cloak before Fudge or Dumbledore see them. Fudge tells Hagrid that he is being sent to Azkaban, the wizarding prison, because they suspect he has opened the Chamber of Secrets, based on him being caught while he was a student at Hogwarts. Lucius Malfoy then enters the hut. He tells Dumbledore that the school governers have decided to suspend Dumbledore from being the headmaster of Hogwarts. Hagrid is taken away. As he leaves, he tells anyone who wants to find the truth to follow the spiders. Dumbledore also leaves, saying that help will always be avaliable at Hogwarts for those who ask for it.

After Harry and Ron notice a long line of spiders running away from the castle, they decide to follow them. They take Hagrid's dog, Fang with them. The spiders take them to the Forbidden Forest. Ron has severe arachnophobia and finds the journey very difficult. They eventually arrive at the lare of a extremely large spider who is much bigger than Ron or Harry. The spider is called Aragog. Aragog tells Harry and Ron that he is not the monster in the Chamber of Secrets. Aragog refuses to name the monster, but explains it is an ancient creature. Aragog also says that the dead girl was found in a toilet. Aragog then allows the other spiders in the lair to attack Ron and Harry. The Ford Anglia, which Harry and Ron had driven to school in at the start of the year, drives and comes to rescue Harry and Ron.

When Harry and Ron return to the castle, they deduce that the girl who died is Moaning Myrtle, but they do not get an opportunity to speak to her ghost. They convince Lockhart into letting them travel around the school without being accompanied, but McGonagall spots them. They claim they were going to see Hermione in the hospital wing. They go to the hospital wing and notice she is clutching a page out of a book. The page is about the Basilisk- a giant snake. The page explains that the Basilisk can kill simply by looking a person in the eye. Harry and Ron initially wonder why no-one has died yet, but realise that everyone who was petrified had seen the snake's eyes indirectly (for instance, through a reflection). Harry and Ron also see that Hermione has written the word "pipes" on the paper. They deduce that this means that the snake is travelling through the castle via the plumbing system, and that the entrance to the chamber is in Moaning Myrtle's toilets. Harry and Ron rush to the staff room, but on the way they hear the staff saying that a pupil has been taken into the Chamber of Secrets. Harry and Ron hear that the pupil in question in Ginny Weasley. The heir of Slytherin has written "Her skeleton will lie in the Chamber forever" on the wall in blood. Lockhart, who has spent much of the year boasting about his magical talents and claiming that he could easily defeat the monster, is pushed into dealing with the monster. Lockhart goes to his office, and Harry and Ron go to see him. Lockhart is packing his possessions away. He then confesses to Harry and Ron that he did not acheive any of the feats he had written about in his books. Rather, he took the stories of other witches and wizards and put a memory charm on them, which made them forget about their accomplishments, allowing Lockhart to take credit. Lockhart then tries to perform a memory charm on Harry and Ron, but they stop him and make him go to Moaning Myrtle's toilets. When they get to the toilet, they ask Moaning Myrtle about the day she died. She tells them that the last thing she saw was a big pair of eyes, near a sink where the taps did not work. Harry goes to that sink and finds a snake inscribed into the tap. He asks the sink to open in parceltongue, and it does. They all then slide down a large pipe and land in a tunnel under the castle. Lockhart then pretends to faint, taking Ron's wand in the process. Lockhart tries to cast a memory charm on them, but it backfires, and Lockhart loses his memory. The backfired spell also causes the ceiling to collapse. Ron and Lockhart are trapped and cannot go any further, leaving Harry to face the Basalisk alone. Harry then sees a wall with stone carvings of snakes. Harry talks to the snakes in parseltongue. This opens the Chamber of Secrets.

Harry finds Ginny lying in the Chamber. Harry runs to her, dropping his wand in the process. Tom Riddle then appears. He tells Harry that he is a memory, which was preserved in the diary. Riddle confesses that he opened the Chamber of Secrets, but he stopped the attacks after he heard that the school would close if they continued and Dumbledore began to keep a closer eye on Riddle. Riddle framed Hagrid for the attacks. He created the diary so that someone else would be able to open the Chamber in the future. The diary fell into Ginny's hands. Ginny wrote in the diary and formed a bond with Riddle. Riddle managed to sap Ginny's strengh and become stronger. He then possessed Ginny and used her to carry out the attacks. Ginny, who has no memory of the attacks, began to worry that she was carrying out the attacks. She tries to flush the diary down the toilet. When she realised Harry had the diary, she stole it from the dormetory. Riddle has taken Ginny into the Chamber to lure Harry to come and rescue her, so that he could kill Harry. Riddle demands to know how Harry defeated Lord Voldermort. Harry is confused, because Voldermort was around much later than Riddle. At this point, Riddle reveals that he is Voldermort. His full name-Tom Marvolo Riddle- is an anagram of "I am Lord Voldermort". Riddle then insults Dumbledore. Harry defends Dumbledore, which has the effect of triggering Falkes the phoenix, with the sorting hat. Riddle mocks Dumbledore further, saying these items are useless. Riddle then summons the Baselisk to kill Harry. Falkes then pecks out the Baselisk's eyes, which makes it much less dangerous. Harry is still very fearful that the Baselisk will attack him. In despiration, Harry puts on the sorting hat in the hope it will provide some assistance. Instead, a ruby-encrusted sword drops out of the hat. Harry then stabs the Baselisk repeatedly, killing it. But the Baselisk bites Harry just before it dies. Riddle gloats that Harry will die soon because of the venom in the fangs. Harry then pulls out one of the Baselisk's teeth and pushes it through the diary. Ink squirts out of the diary and Riddle begins to disapear. Ginny then wakes up, and Falkes cries over Harry's wounds, which heals them and saves his life. Harry and Ginny then leave the Chamber and go and meet Ron and Lockhart. Falkes then holds on to then all and flies them back up to Moaning Myrtle's toilets, where the Chamber closes.

Then, they all head to McGonagall's office. To everyone's suprise, Dumbledore is there, along with McGonagall and Arthur Weasley. Ginny is afraid she will be in trouble, but Dumbledore exonerates her, as she was possessed by Voldermort. Ginny leaves, and Dumbledore gives Ron and Harry 200 housepoints each and a trophy for special services to the school. Harry is concerned about his links to Voldermort, but Dumbledore assures him that Harry is a good person because he chooses to be, while Voldermort is a bad person because he chooses to be. Dumbledore also points out the ruby-encrusted sword is enscribed with Godric Gryfindor's name. Lucius Malfoy then enters the room, along with Dobby, angry about Dumbledore's return to the school. It turns out that Malfoy had blackmailed the other school governers into voting for Dumbledore's suspension. Dumbledore and Harry then work out that Lucius Malfoy put the diary in Ginny's couldron when they were in Flourish and Botts in the summer holidays. Malfoy responds that there is no evidence, and Dumbledore warns him not to do anything similar ever again.

Malfoy and Harry then leave the office. Harry gives Malfoy the diary. Malfoy throws the diary to Dobby. Unbeknown to Malfoy, Harry has put a sock in the diary. A house-elf owner presenting clothes to their elf frees them from service, so Malfoy inadvertantly sets Dobby free. Dobby delightedly thanks Harry. The pretrified people are revived using the mandrakes and Hagrid is freed from Azkaban. Meanwhile, Lockhart, whose memory is still seriously damaged, is sent to hospital to be cared for and Malfoy is sacked from being a school governer. The children then go home from school for the summer holidays.

## Publication

After publishing Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Rowling received an £8,000 grant from the Scottish Arts Council to enable her to write more books in the Harry Potter series. Bloomsbury published Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets in the UK in 1998, and Scholtastic published it in the United States of America in 1999.

## Critical response

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets was awarded numerous awards.

## References

1. ↑ https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=GJgbW9c9mpwC&pg=PA62&lpg=PA62&dq=rowling+grant+8,000&redir\_esc=y#v=onepage&q=rowling%20grant%208%2C000&f=false
2. ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20100106143234/http://www.scholastic.com/harrypotter/books/author/index.htm
3. ↑ https://harrypotter.bloomsbury.com/uk/jkrowling/awards/