Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets characters

Appears from the start

Now twelve and heading into his second year at Hogwarts, Harry spends a miserable summer with the Dursleys, cut off from his friends and the wizarding world. Famous among wizards for surviving Voldemort as a baby, he is still an outsider at home. He is desperate to return to school, the first place he has ever belonged.

First appears in chapter 3

Harry's loyal best friend, who rescues him from the Dursleys' house in his father's flying car along with his older twin brothers. One of many children in the warm, cheerfully chaotic Weasley family, he is still touchy about being poor but steadfast whenever Harry is in trouble.

First appears in chapter 4

Harry and Ron's studious, quick-thinking friend, born to non-magical parents. Her wide reading and careful planning repeatedly steer the trio, and this year her research proves central to uncovering what is stalking the school. She feels the sting of prejudice against Muggle-borns more sharply than before.

First appears in chapter 3

The youngest Weasley and the family's only girl, beginning her first year at Hogwarts. Shy and easily flustered around Harry, on whom she plainly has a crush, she is otherwise easily overlooked among her loud older brothers.

First appears in chapter 2

A house-elf bound to serve a wizarding family, who appears uninvited in Harry's bedroom to warn him not to return to Hogwarts, insisting a deadly plot threatens him there. Small, big-eyed, and painfully devoted, he punishes himself whenever he criticizes his masters, and he is willing to endanger Harry in his clumsy efforts to save his life.

First appears in chapter 4

A famous, self-adoring author of best-selling books about his supposed adventures fighting dark creatures, newly hired to teach Defence Against the Dark Arts. Beaming, handsome, and endlessly self-promoting, he turns every lesson into an advertisement for himself and proves far more interested in fame than in teaching.

First appears in chapter 4

Draco's father, a cold, wealthy, and influential wizard who moves easily among the powerful. Openly contemptuous of Muggle-borns and of the Weasleys, he carries himself with disdain and clearly holds sway over the school's board of governors.

First appears in chapter 4

Harry's sneering rival, more spiteful this year as attacks on Muggle-born students begin. He taunts Hermione with a slur for her parentage and openly hopes the school's hidden danger will target students like her, though he seems to know little of what is really behind it.

First appears in chapter 7

The Hogwarts gamekeeper and Harry's steadfast friend, as fond as ever of dangerous creatures. As fear spreads through the school, old suspicion resurfaces about a scandal from his own student days, and he becomes an early target when the authorities look for someone to blame.

First appears in chapter 9

The Hogwarts headmaster, calm and watchful as attacks on students throw the school into fear. He alone seems unafraid of the danger and continues to trust Harry, but pressure from the governors threatens his position as the crisis deepens.

First appears in chapter 13

A memory of a Hogwarts student from fifty years earlier, preserved inside an enchanted diary that writes back to whoever confides in it. Polite and helpful in tone, he offers to show Harry the truth about the last time the school's hidden chamber was opened, and the deaths that followed.