Irma Pince
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Harry Potter character | |
| Madam Irma Pince | |
|---|---|
| Gender | Female |
| Hair colour | Grey |
| Allegiance | Hogwarts |
| Actor | Sally Motemore |
| First appearance | Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone |
Irma Pince is the Hogwarts librarian in the Harry Potter books and was played by Sally Mortemore in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. In the books, she is compared to an "underfed vulture" and tries to protect her books from students by placing odd jinxes on them.
When Harry, Ron and Hermione were trying to find out who Nicolas Flamel was in Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Madam Pince was an obstacle to their goal. However, she could do nothing to prevent them from taking a book out of the library's Restricted Section in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, as they had a signed note from Gilderoy Lockhart. Perhaps Madam Pince's most famous moment is in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, when she makes Harry and Ginny's things chase them out of the library for bringing chocolate in there.
In Quidditch Through the Ages, which is supposedly published for Muggles using the Hogwarts Library's copy, Madam Pince is referred to in Albus Dumbledore's foreword. She is described as extremely reluctant to let one of the books in her care be made available to Muggles, to the point of Dumbledore having to "pry each of her fingers individually from the spine" of the book to take it. She also gives a written warning, threatening the readers that the consequences of mistreating this book will be "as horrible as it is in my power to make them".
Madam Pince's role in the second film amounted to several appearances, but no speaking parts, although there is evidence to say that any such speaking part was filmed and subsequently cut from the final film.
In the sixth book, while Harry and Hermione are in the Library, Madam Pince chases them off the library, either for insulting Argus Filch (intimating they have a relationship) or after seeing Harry's scribbled-in textbook.
"Pince" is French for "pinch", perhaps a reference to her pinched features, or perhaps short for pince-nez, a style of spectacles without earpieces popular in the 19th century and often associated with old-fashioned bookish types. "Irma Pince" is an anagram for "I'm a Prince", which has led some fans to connect her to Severus Snape.
