The Granger Family
"But you're Muggles!
We must have a drink! What's that you've got there? Oh, you're changing
Muggle money. Molly, look!"
-- Arthur Weasley upon meeting the Grangers in Gringotts
"An' they haven't
invented a spell our Hermione can' do."
-- Rubeus Hagrid
Hermione is easily the brightest witch in her year at Hogwarts. She is a Gryffindor who entered Hogwarts in 1991. Her parents are Muggles, and both dentists. She reads voraciously and tends to believe that anything worth knowing about can be learned about in books. When she discovered, for example, that Divination was more of an imprecise art than an exact science, and that all her reading and researching couldn't make a Seer out of her, she quit the class. In her first year at Hogwarts, Hermione found herself disliked by most of the other kids. She was a bossy know-it-all who told everyone else off for not doing everything according to the rules. She mellowed somewhat over that first year and even more in the years that followed, but she has not lost her disapproval of rule-breaking.
Hermione has a brilliant mind. She
has memorized many, many spells and can logic her way through difficult
situations that stump everyone else. She alone knows how to cast the Alohomora
charm and portable, waterproof fires
are a specialty of hers. She even spent one school year taking double classes
using a Time Turner to be in two places at once, but she found this too
exhausting to keep up. She excels at most subject and often helps Neville
Longbottom through difficult Potions
classes. Most teachers consider her a star pupil, although Snape
calls her a show-off.
Hermione has bushy brown hair and
brown eyes (CS13). Her birthday is September 19 (AOL) and for a birthday
present in 1993 she bought herself a large ginger cat named Crookshanks.
Her best friends are Ron Weasley and Harry Potter; she also gets along
very well with Ginny Weasley. In her fourth year at Hogwarts, she found
herself the object of the affection of Viktor Krum, a famous Quidditch
player from Bulgaria, who was a visiting student at Hogwarts from Durmstrang
Institute. She returned his affection to some extent, although she seems
to be developing an interesting relationship with Ron which might grow
into something more. Only time will tell.
Hermione has a developing social conscience and will work tirelessly for those she sees as oppressed or an underdog. She is quick to take Neville under her wing and help him along, especially in Potions class. She bought Crookshanks from a magical creatures store because no one had wanted him. She spent hours preparing a defense for Buckbeak, a falsely-accused hippogriff, and later began to take an interest in the plight of house-elves.
Hermione's name
JKR chose the name
Hermione from a Shakespeare play, "A Winter's Tale," although she says
that the characters are not at all similar. She thought it made sense for
a couple of professional dentists to name their only daughter something
like that to show how clever they were. But she chose a very unusual
name because she worried that, if there were a real child somewhere who
was bright and had larger-than-usual front teeth that had the same name,
she might get teased. (NPC)
Mr. and Mrs. Granger
Muggle dentists who have a very
precocious daughter named Hermione. The Grangers, while accepting the Wizarding
world and their daughter's place in it, do not approve of using magic for
quick fixes. They insisted, for example, that Hermione's somewhat
oversized front teeth be dealt with in the usual way: with braces. They
send healthy snacks by owl to Hermione at Hogwarts and come with her to
Diagon Alley in August to help her buy her things for school. What they
tell their family and friends about their daughter and her school is anyone's
guess, but they are certainly proud of her.
