Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone can be seen, on one level, as a critique of the attractiveness of Peter Pan’s eternal youthfulness. Indeed, J.K. Rowling, through Professor Dumbledore, rewrites Peter Pan’s famous comment, “to die would be an awfully big adventure” to “to a well-organised mind, death is but the next great adventure” (Rowling, 1997: 215). In order for the story to reach to a happy conclusion, the elixir of youth must be destroyed and the passage of time acknowledged. Contrary to the countless adaptations of Peter Pan, Barrie’s Edwardian narrative has much in common with this perspective: the myth of timelessness is, indeed, a dangerous one.
