Lord Voldemort

Lord Voldemort is the main evil character in the Harry Potter stories. He is Harry Potter’s enemy and is the ‘Dark Lord’ of the wizarding world.

At the start of the stories we find that Lord Voldemort has attacked Harry and his parents, who have both been killed but somehow Harry has survived and has seriously weekend Voldemort in the process. Harry is left with a scar on his head and there is a connection between Voldemort and Harry, which neither seem capable of controlling.

He then spends the rest of the stories recovering from the failed attack and regain strength until he is capable of attacking Harry again and finally killing him.

Most wizards are so fearful of Lord Voldemort that they refuse to call him by his name and instead call him ‘He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named’ or ‘You-Know-Who’. In the final book, it becomes a taboo to speak his name and results in Death Eaters instantly knowing the location of the speaker, which Harry, Hermione and Ron experience first hand.

Lord Voldemort’s original name is Tom Marvolo Riddle, which is an anagram of “I am Lord Voldemort”. This is first discovered in the second story, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, where Ginny Weasley is possessed by the diary of Tom Riddle.

He is a deeply racist wizard, who hates half-bloods and Muggles - even though he himself is a half-blood! When he rises to power he plans to persecute non-pure wizards.

We discover, through a prophecy, that neither Harry or Voldemort will survive together and that one of them must die. It also becomes apparent that they both share the same wand-core. Meaning that they cannot destroy each other. This leads Voldemort to search for the Elder Wand.

Lord Voldemort is ultimately terrified of death. And this is his downfall. He splits his soul into Horcruxes to render himself imortal, unless all the Horcruxes are destroyed, which is what happens in the end as Harry manages to destroy Voldemort.

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