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For Harry Potter fans, identifying yourself as part of a specific Hogwarts house is a debate that never ends, such is everyone’s loyalty to Gryffindor, Slytherin, Hufflepuff, or Ravenclaw. J.K. Rowling did her level best to help settle matters by writing an in-depth Sorting personality quiz for Pottermore, her official Harry Potter website where she drops sporadic updates to her perpetually unfurling wizarding world.
But the far less contentious version of the Sorting has always been the question of one’s Patronus, or the phosphorescent creature that springs out of a wand when a witch is fighting off a Dementor, a hooded ghoul that’s basically misery incarnate.
Patronuses don’t have strict categories; rather, they reflect one’s personality in some way — Harry Potter’s is a mighty stag, Hermione Granger’s is an intelligent otter — so people have been free to imagine whatever they want.
But no more!
As of September 22, Pottermore now has an interactive quiz to help determine what your Patronus is. My editor Genevieve Koski, for example, is a sleek dolphin, Vox film writer Alissa Wilkinson is an industrious mole, while I’m apparently a rambunctious capuchin monkey, which ... okay, fair.
How we came to be these animals, I can’t really tell you. The Pottermore questions are timed to encourage first-response answers to choices like “blade” or “thorn,” or, more cryptically, “make” or “improve” — but the result tells you nothing about why you got that animal or what the hell it means.
Still, it’s a fun way to waste three minutes, and the graphics — which wander through the Forbidden Forest like you’re flying through it — are beautiful. And, hey, if you don’t like your answers, who cares! Be you, whether it’s a dolphin, a monkey, or — as I have always self-identified — the majestic Weddell seal.
Take the quiz now at Pottermore (where you will have to register as a user, if you haven’t already!).
