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Controversial Hogwarts Headmaster Albus Dumbledore was recently removed from his post, as he clearly did not have the school under control, but the Ministry of Magic has installed a new headmistress: Governor Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan. Whitmer will replace Dumbledore and immediately enact unilateral Educational Decrees to restrict the students' rights and liberties. "We needed someone strict, someone willing to make up arbitrary rules, someone who can rule with an iron fist," said Minister of Magic Cornelius Fudge. "We considered my undersecretary, Dolores Umbridge, but she just didn't have the severity and viciousness we need to whip these students into...

WIZARDING WORLD—Activists descended on embroiled wizarding school Hogwarts today after it was revealed that the institution still has separate dormitories for boys and girls. An independent investigator discovered that bigoted school prefects would instruct boys and girls to sleep in separate areas, as though biological sex is a real thing. The school even has dances where each boy asks a girl if she'd like to attend with him. The boys and girls dress differently and do different parts of the dance together, as though they are biologically designed to fulfill different roles and enjoy different things. "Get this: as soon...

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NEW YORK -- Harry Potter fans, the rumors are true: Albus Dumbledore, master wizard and Headmaster of Hogwarts, is gay. J.K. Rowling, author of the mega-selling fantasy series that ended last summer, outed the beloved character Friday night while appearing before a full house at Carnegie Hall. After reading briefly from the final book, "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows," she took questions from audience members. She was asked by one young fan whether Dumbledore finds "true love." "Dumbledore is gay," the author responded to gasps and applause. She then explained that Dumbledore was smitten with rival Gellert Grindelwald, whom...

Like circus elephants on parade, J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter novels have lumbered past a dazzled young public for the last 10 years. Now the beloved fantasy series is ending with the release of the seventh volume, "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows," at midnight July 21. Media coverage is in overdrive and millions of fans are arguing and obsessing over the fate of young Harry in his struggle with the dark wizard, Lord Voldemort. Others in the world of books and reading, meanwhile, are contemplating the end of the historic series. Besides wondering what, if anything, could take its place,...

Nearly a decade ago, Eileen McNally caught an NPR interview with an obscure writer named J.K. Rowling. The book being discussed, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, sounded like fun, so McNally picked it up for her 9-year-old niece. "I bought it for her to read on the plane home to Buffalo," says McNally, now director of the Florida Center for the Book at the Broward County Library. "But Shannon read the entire thing standing in line at Disney World. I was flabbergasted. That's when I knew this was something special." Special, indeed. The six Harry Potter books published since...

The countdown is on! We're all waiting. Let's talk about it while we're waiting. This countdown ticks down the time to both the Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows book and Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix film. Countdown clocks can be found at http://www.the-leaky-cauldron.org/#static:countdowns

Vandals have attacked the train that takes Harrty Potter and his chums to wizard school in the blockbusteer movies. A teenage gang smashed at least 230 windows in the famous Hogwarts Express at Carnforth in Lancashire.Damage to the train was put at £50,000 by the operator, West Coast Railways. A spokeswoman said the thugs smashed through the toughened glass with hammers.

Dracorex hogwartsia is Tribute to J. K. Rowling Series HARRISBURG – Visitors to the State Museum can get a taste of Harry Potter and brush with prehistoric America with a newly discovered dinosaur species that got its name thanks to the help of a Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission paleontologist. PHMC paleontologist Robert M. Sullivan helped world-renowned paleontologist Robert T. Bakker come up with the name Dracorex hogwartsia in honor of the fictional “Hogwarts Academy” from the popular books and films based on Harry Potter’s adventures by British author J. K. Rowling. The scientific name Dracorex hogwartsia means “dragon king.”...

EDMONTON, January 18, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – It would seem there is truth to the warnings against the Harry Potter series if the opening of an honest-to-goodness witchcraft school in Canada is any indication of increased interest in the occult that has resulted from the books.The new school, Northern Star College of Mystical Studies, is compared to the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry from the Harry Potter books by a CanWest News Service report. The school offers diploma and two-year certificate programs, open to adults only. The school teaches potions, astrology, tarot, hypnotherapy, divination, magic and other occult practices,...

HARRY Potter may die in the next book in the series because author JK Rowling wants to kill him off, it was claimed last night. Actor Jim Dale - the voice of the teenage wizard in the US audio books - believes the seventh and final instalment will spell the end for Harry. He made the astonishing claim after meeting with the writer to discuss his characterisation of the parts. The revelation will shock millions of die-hard Potter fans. He said: "She's lived with Harry Potter so long she really wants to kill him off." Predictions about the fate of...

"There are dark days ahead, Harry," says Dumbledore, Harry's mentor and the avuncular headmaster of Hogwart's Academy at the end of the recently released film, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, "days when we will be forced to choose between what is right and what is easy." One of the most magical things about J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter books and now films, the last two of which have been just splendid, is the way they subtly weave lessons about ethical choice and character into their gripping plots. Indeed, the plots themselves pivot on the crucial choices of the...

After a protracted legal battle, Harry Potter's school, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, has been forced by the national government to accept "muggles," people without native magic skill, as students. Looking weary and strained from the long legal battle, the headmaster of the school, Albus Dumbledore, said, "this just doesn't make any sense. We simply don't know how to teach magic to those without native magical skill. This change can only mean the slow destruction of our ability to turn out top class users of magic. This school had an easier time functioning during the Witch Trials of the...