This has not been the best year for the Harry Potter franchise, assailed as it has been by the fallout from transphobic comments by JK Rowling and an abuse scandal surrounding Johnny Depp, star of the Fantastic Beasts spin-off franchise.
Of course, this hasn’t been the best year for a lot of things as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic and subsequent isolation protocols. It is curious, then, that this beleaguered franchise – so dear to the hearts of a generation of readers – and the lockdown of the global population might combine to create something with resonance, entirely by accident.
The first six books of the Harry Potter series took place at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, an enchanted boarding school filled with danger, mystery and magic. But for the seventh book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Rowling chose to deviate from her established practice by setting it in isolation. Harry, Hermione and (sometimes) Ron were cut off from their familiar…