Movies - Half-Blood Prince

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The Half-Blood Prince is a fictional character in J. K. Rowling's sixth Harry Potter book, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.

Harry returns to Hogwarts at the start of his 6th year believing that he will be unable to take the NEWT-level Potions course because he has failed to receive the O (Outstanding) in his OWLs that is required by the subject's teacher, Professor Severus Snape. However, he does not realise that Snape has at long last been given the Defence Against the Dark Arts position. Dumbledore has persuaded retired potions master and former head of Slytherin house, Horace Slughorn to return to the school and resume teaching potions. Slughorn retired before Snape became potions master, some 15 years earlier. He taught potions to the class which included Harrys parents James and Lily Potter, Harry's godfather Sirius Black, Remus Lupin and Snape, and in earlier times also taught Tom Riddle. Professor McGonagall informs Harry that Slughorn is more lenient and allows students to advance to NEWT class with an E (Exceeds Expectations) grade. McGonagall also tells Harry that, as he has not purchased the required items for the NEWT potions course, Professor Slughorn will provide him with the necessary supplies temporarily.

Slughorn finds old copies of Advanced Potion-Making by Libatius Borage from the potions storeroom which he lends to Harry and Ron, who is also unexpectedly able to continue potions. The copy that Slughorn lends Harry has alterations to the potions written into it, making most of them much easier to brew and more potent when complete. There is also an inscription in the same handwiting saying that it is the property of the Half-Blood Prince, as well as a collection of jinxes and hexes. Harry's performance in Potions improves greatly when he decides to use the potion modifications, so much so that Horace Slughorn compliments him for having inherited his mother's outstanding ability at potions. Harry wins a Felix Felicis potion which Slughorn offers as a prize to the student who can brew the best potion, when he uses tips from the book.

Harry notices that the jinxes and hexes contain crossings out and corrections, which leads him to believe that they were original work created by the Prince. In particular, the spell Levicorpus contains many changes and seems to have caused the Prince some trouble, but Harry succeeds first time when he tries it on Ron. He notices that the potions tips do not contain such alterations. Harry also feels that the Prince is a better potions teacher than either Snape or Slughorn. Slughorn repeatedly tells Harry of Lily's ability at potions, but only comments on Snape's abilities once, while saying that Harry made a better first attempt at a potion than any student ever.

The difference between the potions tips and spells might be because the potions tips were obtained as-is from another source, or alternatively, because the Prince was better at creating potions tips than at writing spells and didn't need to amend those notes. It may be that Snape was not as skilled as Lily, or may mean that Slughorn knew that Harry would not want to hear if he was. It may also be that the alternative source of tips was Lily; indeed, it has been stated throughout canon that Snape was employed as Potions Master only as a temporary post, and that each year he requested the Defence Against the Dark Arts post from Professor Dumbledore. However, Snape is acknowledged to be excellent at creating potions, even recognising from the student's failures what they did wrong. Dumbledore trusts Snape more than any one to brew him potions, implying that Snape is better at Potions than Dumbledore.

Harry learns other new and sometimes dangerous spells from the notes, including Sectumsempra and Muffliato. Hermione becomes suspicious about the Prince's nature because of these spells and researches the matter in the school's library. Remus Lupin suggests checking the age of the book and Hermione uses the publication date, some 50 years earlier, to look for possible owners. This is earlier than the period when James, Sirius, Remus and Lily went to school, who Harry had originally suspected might be the prince. Lupin confirms that neither James nor Sirius was ever known as 'prince' anything. Hermione first believes that she has discovered the identity of the Half-Blood Prince to be a girl named Eileen Prince, who was a Hogwarts student at the right time. She reveals her findings to Harry, showing him an article from an old copy of the Daily Prophet, which says that Eileen was once the Captain of the Hogwarts Gobstones Team. The fifteen-year-old girl in the paper's photograph is described as being thin, pale, and sullen-looking, with a long face and thick eyebrows.

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