If you want to see the true measure of a man, watch how he treats his inferiors, not his equals.
J. K. Rowling
It is our choices... that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.
It takes a great deal of bravery to stand up to our enemies, but just as much to stand up to our friends.
It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all, in which case you have failed by default.
What's coming will come and we'll just have to meet it when it does.
Anything's possible if you've got enough nerve.
Indifference and neglect often do much more damage than outright dislike.
The internet has been a boon and a curse for teenagers.
Whether you come back by page or by the big screen, Hogwarts will always be there to welcome you home.
The truth. It is a beautiful and terrible thing, and must therefore be treated with great caution.
And the idea of just wandering off to a cafe with a notebook and writing and seeing where that takes me for awhile is just bliss.
Death is just life's next big adventure.
Never trust anything that can think for itself if you can't see where it keeps its brain.
I was set free because my greatest fear had been realized, and I still had a daughter who I adored, and I had an old typewriter and a big idea. And so rock bottom became a solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.
To the well-organized mind, death is but the next great adventure.
Failure means a stripping away of the inessential.
Youth cannot know how age thinks and feels. But old men are guilty if they forget what it was to be young.
Hearing voices no one else can hear isn't a good sign, even in the wizarding world.
It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live.
Why do I talk about the benefits of failure? Simply because failure meant a stripping away of the inessential. I stopped pretending to myself that I was anything other than what I was, and began to direct all my energy into finishing the only work that mattered to me.
The most important thing is to read as much as you can, like I did. It will give you an understanding of what makes good writing and it will enlarge your vocabulary.
I sometimes have a tendency to walk on the dark side.
Imagination is not only the uniquely human capacity to envision that which is not, and therefore the fount of all invention and innovation. In its arguably most transformative and revelatory capacity, it is the power to that enables us to empathize with humans whose experiences we have never shared.
The moment you are old enough to take the wheel, responsibility lies with you.
I think you have a moral responsibility when you've been given far more than you need, to do wise things with it and give intelligently.
I would like to be remembered as someone who did the best she could with the talent she had.
Fear of a name increases fear of the thing itself.
Poverty entails fear and stress and sometimes depression. It meets a thousand petty humiliations and hardships. Climbing out of poverty by your own efforts that is something on which to pride yourself but poverty itself is romanticized by fools.
Talent and intelligence never yet inoculated anyone against the caprice of the fates.
I really don't believe in magic.
The best of us must sometimes eat our words.
Humans have a knack for choosing precisely the things that are worst for them.
Never be ashamed! There's some who'll hold it against you, but they're not worth bothering with.
There are some things you can't share without ending up liking each other.
I always felt an outsider.
Of all the subjects on this planet, I think my parents would have been hard put to name one less useful than Greek mythology to securing the keys to an executive bathroom.
I remember the first time I heard a teenager say 'LOL.' Just what? But it means 'laugh.' Why don't you just laugh? What are you doing?
The poor are discussed as this homogeneous mash, like porridge. The idea that they might be individuals, and be where they are for very different, diverse reasons, again seems to escape some people.
I was convinced that the only thing I wanted to do ever - was write novels.
'Harry Potter' gave me back self respect. Harry gave me a job to do that I loved more than anything else.
You sort of start thinking anything's possible if you've got enough nerve.
My favorite literary heroine is Jo March. It is hard to overstate what she meant to a small, plain girl called Jo, who had a hot temper and a burning ambition to be a writer.
I just write what I wanted to write. I write what amuses me. It's totally for myself. I never in my wildest dreams expected this popularity.
Honestly, I think we should be delighted people still want to read, be it on a Kindle or a Nook or whatever the latest device is.
Secretly we're all a little more absurd than we make ourselves out to be.
Jane Austen is the pinnacle to which all other authors aspire.
When people are very damaged, they can often meet the world with a kind of defiance.
I've been writing my entire life, and I'll always write.
I am proud of having done what I've done. Very proud.
I imagined being a famous writer would be like being like Jane Austen.
