What Jo says about...
Other Locations (outside Hogwarts)

Please note: unless you see quotemarks, these are summaries, and not JKR's words themselves. Please see the linked article for the actual text.

• Though the setting was an influence on her work, only one character in the books is directly drawn from the Forest of Dean: Hagrid, the enormous Keeper of the Keys, whose dropped word-endings are a Chepstow speciality. In shape he's modelled on the Welsh chapter of Hells Angels who'd swoop down on the town and hog the bar, "huge mountains of leather and hair." [Read the exact quote from Scotland on Sunday, 1999]
• Azkaban is in the North Sea. [Read the exact quote from Scholastic chat #1, 2000]
• And I'm going to ask one other question which you'll say isn't clever at all. The significance of the place where Harry and his parents lived, the first name -- Godric Gryffindor.
  Very good, you're a bit good you are, aren't you?
  Thank you.
  I'm impressed. My editor didn't notice, I said to her haven't you noticed any connection between where Harry's parents were born, not born, where they lived, and one of the Hogwarts houses and she's sitting there going erm... I'm not being rude about Emma she's a brilliant editor, the best I've ever [had]. But no she didn't pick that up either. You're a bit good you are. [Read the exact quote from the cBBC Newsround interview, 2000]
• The battleground is Britain at the moment. [Read the exact quote from Entertainment Weekly, 2000]
• JKR wrote platform 9 ¾ whilst in Manchester and wrongly visualized the platforms of Kings Cross and Euston. [Read the exact quote from "Harry Potter and Me," 2001]
• Rowling has discarded a scene (twice) where Theodore Nott goes to the Malfoy home to visit Draco. [Read the exact quote from Jo's website]
• Removed a character named "Mopsy the dog-lover" from Book 4; this character lived near Hogsmeade and took Sirius in. In the final version, Sirius stays in a cave. [Read exact quote from Jo's website]