Harry Potter and The Magician With Words!

No,this ain't Harry Potter's eighth book,its just what I think about J.K.Rowling. People may either like her work,or they may rubbish it, but theirs no avoiding this Mistress of Words!! People who have read the Harry Potter series may argue that their was no extraordinary vocabulary that was used or the grammar,too was slack at times, but what intrigued me the most was the use of etymology(the science of origin of words), intricate meaning of the names and the reason behind naming them! Mind blowing,to say the least!(And yes this blog isn't out of the fatigue due to the marathon completion of "Word Power Made Easy"by Norman Lewis... a must read!)

For starters,lets start with the protagonist,Harry,coming from the word Harried,meaning to annoy,trouble more precisely from the root Hergian,meaning "at war". Wasn't Harry always troubled and at war with Voldemort?? Ah,Voldemort, mort coming from Latin Mori,meaning "to die", and like we know Voldemort didn't want to die. His follower,Lucius Malfoy,derives its origin from Latin Lucifer,meaning Satan and the morning star.That explains his white hair and evil behaviour.His son Draco Malfoy comes from Greek drakonem, meaning serpent like,the one with a deadly glance.Don't we think of serpents when we think of Draco? And even his Slytherin house had a serpent as its symbol. Their last name, Malfoy, has Latin root Mal, meaning not good,evil....This explains a lot,doesn't it?

Albus Dumbledore,has Alba in it,meaning the colour White...remember the silver beard? Remus Lupin,the DADA teacher, comes from Latin lupus,meaning wolf..... he was a werewolf!! The friendly ghost,Peeves, comes from Latin perversus,meaning "perverse, capricious, silly,".This very much describes Peeves' antics!! Remember the sadist Dolores Umbridge, of course you do! In Latin "Dol" means sad,gloomy,macabre....getting my point?? Molly Weasley, the loving mother of the Weasley kids,derives her name from the root Mol as in soft,warm...its the same thing in molluscs! Aragog,the creepy tarantula in the second book/movie comes from two roots,both Latin, Ara from Aracnoids,spiders and gog from agog,meaning leader.... he was actually the leader of spiders!! How much have we loved Harry shouting Expecto Patronum to get rid of those demented dementors, and James' stag comes to Harry's rescue.... Patronum comes from Latin Padre, meaning Father!

Harry Potter seems so different when reviewed like this! I was in awe of Ms.Rowling when i first began to decipher these names!I'm sure there are many more and its just a matter of time before I decrypt them!

P.S: Special thanks to Norman Lewis,the author of "Word Power Made Easy", www.dictionary.com, www.http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?l=m&p=14, all teachers at TIME's verbal dept. and Aanchal for sharing the bewildered expressions with me when we first deciphered Harry Potter names!!