•
Harry Potter is an orphan whom Rowling imagined as a "scrawny, black-haired, green eyed and bespectacled boy who didn't know he was a wizard." She developed the series' story and characters to explain how Harry came to be in this situation and how his life unfolded from there. Apart from the first chapter, the events of this book take place just before and in the year following Harry's eleventh birthday. Voldemort's attack left a lightning bolt-shaped scar on Harry's forehead, He is freckled, red-haired, and quite tall. He grew up in a fairly large pure-blood family as the sixth born of seven children. Although his family is quite poor, they still live comfortably and happily. His loyalty and bravery in the face of a game of Wizard Chess plays a vital part in finding the Philosopher's Stone. •
Hermione Granger, the daughter of an all-
Muggle family, is a bossy girl who has apparently memorised most of the textbooks before the start of term. Rowling described Hermione as a "very logical, upright, and good" character with "a lot of insecurity and a great fear of failure beneath her swottiness". Despite her nagging efforts to keep Harry and Ron out of trouble, she becomes a close friend of the two boys after they save her from a troll and her magical and analytical skills play an important role in finding the Philosopher's Stone. She has bushy brown hair and rather large front teeth. •
Neville Longbottom is a plump, diffident boy, so forgetful that his grandmother gives him a
Remembrall, to remind him if he forgets something. Neville's magical abilities are weak and appeared just in time to save his life when he was eight. Despite his timidity, Neville will fight anyone after some encouragement or if he thinks it is right and important. •
Rubeus Hagrid, a half-giant nearly tall, with tangled black hair and beard, who was expelled from Hogwarts and his
wand was snapped in half (resulting in him never to use a wand again), though Professor Dumbledore let him stay on as the school's
gamekeeper, a job which enables him to give lavish affection, care and even pet names (such as Norbert the dragon) on even the most dangerous of magical creatures. Hagrid is fiercely loyal to Dumbledore and quickly becomes a close friend of Harry, Ron and, later, Hermione, but his carelessness makes him unreliable. • Professor
Albus Dumbledore, a tall, thin man who wears half-moon spectacles and has silver hair and a beard that tucks into his belt, is the headmaster of Hogwarts, and thought to be the only wizard Voldemort fears. Dumbledore, while renowned for his achievements in magic, shrugs off praise, though he is aware of his own brilliance. Rowling described him as the "epitome of goodness". • Professor
Minerva McGonagall, a tall, severe-looking woman with black hair tied in a tight bun, teaches
Transfiguration and is able to transform herself into a cat. She is Deputy Headmistress and Head of Gryffindor House. •
Petunia Dursley, the sister of Harry's mother Lily, is a thin woman with a long neck that she uses for spying on the neighbours. As a Muggle, she regards her magical sister as a freak and tries to pretend that she never existed. •
Vernon Dursley, the husband of Petunia Dursley, is a heavily built man whose irascible bluster covers a narrow mind and a fear of anything unusual. •
Dudley Dursley is an overweight, spoilt bully and Harry's cousin. •
Draco Malfoy is a slim, pale boy who speaks in a bored drawl. He is arrogant about his skill in Quidditch, and despises anyone who is not a pure-blood wizard and wizards who do not share his views. His parents had supported Voldemort, but changed sides after the dark wizard's disappearance, claiming they had been
bewitched. Draco avoids direct confrontations and tries to get Harry and his friends into trouble. •
Oliver Wood is a fifth year who acts as Harry's Quidditch captain and keeper for the Gryffindor Quidditch team. •
Professor Quirrell is a twitching, stammering, and nervous man who teaches Defence Against the Dark Arts. Reputedly he was a brilliant scholar, but his nerve was shattered by an encounter with vampires. Quirrell wears a turban to conceal the fact that he is voluntarily possessed by Voldemort, whose face appears on the back of Quirrell's head. • Professor
Severus Snape, who has a hooked nose, sallow complexion, and greasy black hair, teaches Potions, but would prefer to teach Defence Against the Dark Arts. Snape favours pupils in his own House of Slytherin, and appears to delight in humiliating those from other houses, especially Harry. Several incidents, beginning with the shooting pain in Harry's scar during the start-of-term feast, lead Harry and his friends to think Snape is aiding Voldemort. •
Argus Filch, the school caretaker who knows the school's
secret passages better than anyone else except, perhaps, the Weasley twins. His cat, Mrs. Norris, aids his constant hunt for misbehaving pupils. Other members of staff include: the dumpy
Herbology teacher and Head of Hufflepuff House
Professor Sprout,
Professor Flitwick, the tiny and excitable
Charms teacher and Head of Ravenclaw House, the soporific
History of magic teacher,
Professor Binns, a ghost who does not seem to have noticed his own death, and
Madam Hooch, the Quidditch coach, who is strict, but a considerate and methodical teacher.A year later, the US edition was selected as an
American Library Association Notable Book, a
Publishers Weekly Best Book of 1998 and a
New York Public Library 1998 Best Book of the Year and won
Parenting Magazine Book of the Year Award for 1998, In August 1999, ''Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
topped the New York Times
list of best-selling fiction and stayed near the top of the list for much of 1999 and 2000, until the New York Times'' split its list into children's and adult sections under pressure from other publishers who were eager to see their books given higher placings.
Publishers Weekly report in December 2001 on cumulative sales of children's fiction placed ''Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone'' 19th among hardbacks (over 5 million copies) and 7th among paperbacks (over 6.6 million copies). In May 2008, Scholastic announced the creation of a 10th Anniversary Edition of the book that was released on 1 October 2008 to mark the tenth anniversary of the original American release.
Translations By mid-2008, official translations of the book had been published in 67 languages. By November 2017, the book had been translated into 80 languages, the 80th being
Lowland Scots. In 2025, Rowling's website reported that the novel had been translated into 85 languages. Bloomsbury have published translations in
Latin and in
Ancient Greek, with the latter being described as "one of the most important pieces of Ancient Greek prose written in many centuries". ==Style and themes==