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''Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets'' is the second novel in the ''Harry Potter'' series, written by J. K. Rowling. The plot follows Harry's second year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, during which a series of messages on the walls of the school's corridors warn that the "Chamber of Secrets" has been opened and that the "heir of Slytherin" would kill all pupils who do not come from all-magical families. These threats are followed by attacks which leave residents of the school "petrified" (frozen like stone). Throughout the year, Harry and his friends Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger investigate the attacks. The book was published in the United Kingdom on 2 July 1998 by Bloomsbury and in the United States on 2 June 1999 by Scholastic Inc. Although Rowling found it difficult to finish the book, it won high praise and awards from critics, young readers and the book industry, although some critics thought the story was perhaps too frightening for younger children. Much like with other novels in the series, ''Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets'' triggered religious debates; some religious authorities have condemned its use of magical themes, while others have praised its emphasis on self-sacrifice and on the way in which a person's character is the result of the person's choices. Several commentators have noted that personal identity is a strong theme in the book, and that it addresses issues of racism through the treatment of non-magical, non-human and non-living characters. Some commentators regard the diary as a warning against uncritical acceptance of information from sources whose motives and reliability cannot be checked. Institutional authority is portrayed as self-serving and incompetent. The book is also known to have some connections to the sixth novel of the series, ''Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince''. The film adaptation of the novel, released in 2002, became (at that time) the seventh highest grossing film ever and received generally favourable reviews. Video games loosely based on ''Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets'' were also released for several platforms, and most obtained favourable reviews. ==Plot== Harry spends another miserable summer with his only remaining family, the Dursleys. During a dinner party given by Harry's aunt and uncle, Dobby, a house-elf, pops into Harry's bedroom, warning him that if he returns to Hogwarts, terrible things will happen. Harry disregards it, and Dobby wreaks havoc in the kitchen, infuriating the Dursleys, who angrily imprison Harry. Harry is rescued by his friend Ron Weasley and brothers Fred and George in their flying car, spending the summer at the Weasley home. Harry accidentally ends up in Knockturn Alley, the dark arts section of Diagon Alley. Fortunately, he encounters his friend Hagrid, Hogwarts' gamekeeper, there to buy flesh-eating slug repellent, who guides him safely back into Diagon Alley to shop for school supplies. In the company of the Weasleys, Harry encounters the famous Gilderoy Lockhart who informs everyone that he is the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher and demands to be in a photoshoot with Harry, revealing his enthusiasm for self-promotion. Soon after, the Weasleys depart with Harry for King's Cross, but when they arrive, Harry and Ron inexplicably cannot get through the secret entrance to Platform 9 ¾, so they decide to fly the Weasley's car to Hogwarts instead. Things get dangerous when Ron loses control of the car, and it falls from the sky into a Whomping Willow (a tree that attacks anyone who approaches it). Ron and Harry escape from the tree, but Ron's wand is broken in the process. The next day, Ron receives a Howler from his mother, Molly Weasley, threatening to send him home if he puts another toe out of line. Lockhart turns out to be an incompetent teacher, more concerned with personal celebrity than teaching. On Halloween, Mrs. Norris, a cat belonging to the school caretaker's is found petrified. On a wall nearby appears a message: "The Chamber of Secrets has been opened. Enemies of the heir, beware." Harry, Ron, and their best friend Hermione Granger discover that one of Hogwarts' founders, Salazar Slytherin, secretly built the Chamber of Secrets, which is rumoured to contain a monster that only Slytherin's heir can directly control. Slytherin disapproved of wizards and witches with Muggle parents (muggleborns) being allowed to attend Hogwarts and supposedly built the Chamber so that one day his heir could purge the school of them. Suspecting that Harry's nemesis, Draco Malfoy, is the heir of Slytherin, the trio spends a month making Polyjuice Potion, a brew that will allow them, for a period, to look like someone else. Their makeshift laboratory is in a bathroom haunted by the ghost of Moaning Myrtle. During a game of Quidditch, Harry's arm is broken by a rogue Bludger, although he still catches the snitch to win the game. Lockhart volunteers to heal the broken bones but removes them instead. That night, as Harry lies mending in his hospital bed, Dobby appears and admits responsibility for the platform incident and the rogue Bludger, out of a desire to stop Harry from being able to attend Hogwarts. He begs Harry to leave Hogwarts, insisting that he is in danger, and lets slip that the Chamber of Secrets has been opened before. Soon after, a first-year student, Colin Creevey, is attacked and petrified. During the first meeting of Lockhart's new dueling club, Harry duels with Draco, who casts a snake that tries to attack a student, Justin Finch-Fletchley. In his efforts to stop it, Harry unwittingly speaks Parseltongue. The sudden appearance of this ability—also possessed by Salazar Slytherin—shocks everyone, since it suggests that Harry might be Slytherin's heir. Harry comes under further suspicion when he stumbles upon the petrified bodies of Justin Finch-Fletchley and Nearly Headless Nick. At Christmas, Harry and Ron use the finished Polyjuice Potion to disguise themselves as Draco's two friends Crabbe and Goyle. Hermione is unable to join them, having accidentally used cat hairs instead of human hairs in her sample of the potion, and subsequently turning into a human-cat hybrid when she drank it. Talking to Draco in the Slytherin common room, Harry and Ron discover that Draco is not the Heir of Slytherin and that the Chamber was last opened fifty years before. After a few quiet months, Harry finds a diary in Myrtle's bathroom, which has flooded. He writes in the diary, which responds by displaying the name "Tom Riddle." Communicating with "Riddle" by writing in the diary, Harry learns that Hagrid was found to handle opening the Chamber of Secrets fifty years ago. Some time later, Harry's room is ransacked, and the diary taken. Hermione and a Ravenclaw girl, Penelope Clearwater, are petrified as well. Harry and Ron intend to question Hagrid, but before they can, he is accused of opening the Chamber of Secrets again and is taken to Azkaban prison. Before Hagrid is led away, he secretly instructs the boys to "follow the spiders" into the Forbidden Forest. There they encounter Aragog, a giant spider whom Hagrid had raised in secret during his days at Hogwarts, who tells them the monster who killed the girl 50 years before was not a spider, that the girl's body was found in a bathroom, and that Hagrid is innocent. The boys escape a colony of giant spiders, who are instructed by Aragog to eat them. They also realise that the girl Aragog referred to must have been Moaning Myrtle. Harry and Ron learn from a piece of paper Hermione was holding when she was attacked that the monster is a Basilisk, a giant snake that kills those who look it in the eye, although the petrified victims only ever saw it in a reflection or through a medium. They later discover the entrance to the Chamber in Myrtle's bathroom, which Harry opens by speaking Parseltongue. They have brought with them Lockhart, whom they have caught trying to run away from Hogwarts. He steals Ron's wand and attempts a memory charm on them, revealing that he is a fraud whose "great accomplishments" were stories he stole from other wizards whose memories he then erased. He admits that the memory charm is the only one that he can do right. As he attempts to erase their memories, Ron's broken wand reflects the spell back at Lockhart, knocking him down and erasing all of Lockhart's memory. Harry is forced to go on alone after the spell causes a cave-in. Inside the chamber, Harry finds the unconscious body of Ron's sister Ginny, as well as the almost physical form of Riddle who reveals that Ginny had been communicating with him by writing in his diary, allowing him to possess her and have her set the Basilisk on the Muggleborns. Ginny had realised that the diary was not what it seemed and tried to dispose of it in Myrtle's bathroom, but stole it back when she saw Harry with it, afraid that her crimes would be revealed. Riddle then forced Ginny to enter the Chamber, to lure Harry down there, and, by possessing Ginny's soul, began to take physical form. Riddle reveals that his name, Tom Marvolo Riddle, is an anagram for ''I am Lord Voldemort'' and that he is Voldemort's past self. Riddle then summons the Basilisk and orders it to attack Harry. Just when it seems Harry will be killed, Fawkes, Dumbledore's pet phoenix, appears and blinds the Basilisk. Fawkes carries the Sorting Hat, from which Harry draws a sword and kills the Basilisk, but one of its fangs pierces Harry's arm. Healed by Fawkes's healing tears, Harry stabs the diary with a Basilisk fang, defeating Riddle and saving Ginny. The two return with Ron and Lockhart to the school, where Ginny is reunited with her parents, and Harry and Ron are commended by Dumbledore. In the aftermath, Harry accuses the school governor, Lucius Malfoy (Draco's father), of putting the journal in Ginny's cauldron in the first place, and later tricks him into freeing Dobby. Malfoy is sacked as governor, the final exams are cancelled, and Lockhart resigns as a professor. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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