This paper will look at the ghosts as they are presented in the Harry Potter books and seek to explore the various different contexts in which the ghosts might best be read. I will argue that in the earlier books ghosts should be read in the context of English folklore. Nearly Headless Nick, for example, can be considered as a type of the various headless cavaliers which are well known throughout the length of Britain, such as the one said to haunt the basement of the George tavern in the Strand, or the spectre said to walk the upper storey of Tudor House on Lower Bridge Street in Chester. However, I would propose that the portrayal of ghosts, while stemming from folkloric traditions has been filtered through the use of spectres in juvenile literature, particularly in IPC humour strips such as "The Spooks of St. Lukes" (images in the Potter series, such as the Deathday party in The Chamber of Secrets, resonate with the IPC tradition of grotesque humour) and also the portrayal of ghosts in the BBC's childrens' series, such as "Rent-a-Ghost".
The paper will also look at how these portrayals have been a source for criticism, particularly by Christians in the United states of America who were formerly involved in occult practises. They tend to locate these portrayals in the tradition of post-Reformation interpretations of ghosts, and see this as an aspect of the books that contravenes Christian norms. I will examine the specific contexts in which certain critics read the ghosts. Marcia Montenagro sees interaction with ghosts in the books as violating the Mosaic prohibitions about contacting the dead: 'the Harry Potter books endorse the idea that spirit contact is possible and that it can be a good thing.' While Matthew Arnold reads the depiction of ghosts, particularly the Deathday party as an open and 'offensive' attack on the Roman Catholic faith. I will argue that while some of the elements Arnold critiques historically had their roots in anti-Catholic narratives (such as Matthew Lewis' The Monk) that these elements have long since passed into general folklore (in tales such as the phantom monk of Lesnes Abbey) and are removed from any religious polemic as they are presented in Harry Potter.
I will conclude the paper by suggesting that in the later books a shift occurs in the presentation of ghosts, and that the spirits seen in Harry's confrontation with Voldemort in The Goblet of Fire, and the general presentations of ghosts in The Order of the Phoenix marks a shift in the presentation of ghosts. They begin to take on features which are found in Platonic thought, and particularly in Paracelsus' modification of the classical tradition. Notably I will show how these views were utilised by the Cambridge Neo-Platonists in the seventeenth century, and how this appears to be the most likely context for reading the spectres in the more recent books.