Dementor
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In the Harry Potter book series, a Dementor is a soul-sucking fictional fiend. They served as the guardians of the wizard prison, Azkaban until the events of the fifth book.
In the books, Dementors appear to have a generally human shape, approximately three meters in height, but covered in dark, hooded cloaks which reveal only grey, decayed hands and faces. Their movie counterparts appear to be considerably shorter, and fly rather than glide. In addition, close inspection reveals that the Dementors in the movies contain skeletal torsos and heads, leading one to assume that the Dementor is merely an animated skeleton. The wraith-like creatures have no eyes, and there is a large hole where the mouth should be, which is used for sucking the soul out of the victim in a process called the "Dementor's Kiss". According to the author, J.K. Rowling, they grow like fungi in the darkest, dankest places, creating a dense, chilly fog.
Being blind, Dementors sense and feed on the positive emotions of human beings to move around, forcing them to relive their worst memories. The very presence of a Dementor makes the surrounding atmosphere grow cold and dark, and the effects are cumulative with the number of Dementors present. Those kept in the company of a Dementor for too long are often driven insane, which is the main source of Azkaban's well-deserved horrible reputation. Prolonged exposure to a Dementor can also rob a wizard of his power, which is probably the reason the ministry uses them as guards in Azkaban. Their source of sustenance allows the Ministry of Magic to reluctantly employ them; Dementors are at least intelligent enough to be greedy, and to obey as long as doing so provides them with a bigger feast. In Book 4, a Dementor accompanies Cornelius Fudge as a bodyguard, and flashbacks depict Dementors as obeying simple instructions from wizard authorities (e.g. escorting prisoners into and out of the courtroom), but the precise extent to which wizards and Dementors can communicate with each other is unclear. Possibly Dementors react to raw emotion rather than to actual spoken words.
Dementors are invisible to Muggles, but affect them in the same way. While at least one Squib in the series has claimed to see a Dementor, J. K. Rowling has stated that this was a lie.[1] J. K. Rowling has likened the effect of a dementor to the human ailment known as depression, which the author has herself experienced.[2] She describes it as "that absence of being able to envisage that you will ever be cheerful again. The absence of hope. That very deadened feeling, which is so very different from feeling sad."[3]
One way to shield oneself from Dementors is to use the difficult Patronus Charm to drive them away. The charm summons a patronus, a sort of magical manifestation of good will, providing varied levels of protection against the Dementors' influence, based on the caster's strength as a wizard. When summoned by an experienced caster, the patronus will take the form of an animal significant in some way to the individual (remeninscent of the concept of a totem or spirit animal), while the lower level patronus is more amorphous and ephemeral. Corporeal patronuses will chase down Dementors and force them to flee the vicinity. An incorporeal patronus can only slow a Dementor down, as if the thing is walking through quicksand, and tends not to last long. Chocolate is an effective first aid to mild cases of contact. This may be because chocolate is a source of serotonin, an anti-depressant chemical.
In addition to feeding on positive emotions, Dementors can perform what is known as the Dementor's Kiss where the Dementor latches its mouth onto a victim's and sucks out the person's soul. A Dementor's mouth is a circular hole. The victim is left as an empty shell, incapable of thought and with no possibility of recovery. It is believed existing after a Dementor's Kiss is worse than death (in fact, as a person's soul is their self, to be "kissed" by a Dementor is to cease to exist). The Ministry of Magic occasionally allows this as a punishment. It is implied by some wizards that receiving the Kiss is a fate too horrible for any criminal, and as such the Dementor's Kiss can perhaps be seen as an allegory for the death penalty. Muggles who have had their souls sucked out in a Dementor's attack would mistakenly be thought to suffer from the medical condition known as brain death by Muggle doctors since the victim would have no memory or anything after the lethal "kiss". This makes Dementors even more terrifying, since they will attack both Wizards and Muggles alike (yet only magical beings can see their attacker). Aside from this horrifying ability, Dementors are capable of using an ordinary wizard's magic to some degree, perhaps through a form of telekinesis, as evidenced by the Dementor that beckons the door on the train to open in "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban" when it comes for Harry.
Some people have compared Dementors being similar to Nazgûl in The Lord Of The Rings, due the fact they are both robed in black and inspire terror in their presence. There are also similarities between Dementors and the spectres in Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy.
A parallel can also been seen in Charles Dickens' Ghost of Christmas Future, about whom is written:
The Phantom slowly, gravely, silently approached. When it came, Scrooge bent down upon his knee; for in the very air through which this Spirit moved it seemed to scatter gloom and mystery. It was shrouded in a deep black garment, which concealed its head, its face, its form, and left nothing of it visible save one outstretched hand. But for this it would have been difficult to detach its figure from the night, and separate it from the darkness by which it was surrounded.
Lethifolds from J.K Rowling's Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them share many of the same characteristics as Dementors. The Patronus Charm is the only spell that affects them and they have the appearance of black cloaks.
[edit] Dementors in the narrative
Harry Potter first encountered Dementors during the school year of 1993-1994, when they were sent to guard Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry against Sirius Black, who had recently escaped Azkaban Prison. Harry, whenever he got near one, was forced to relive his worst memory: hearing the last moments of his parents before they were murdered by Lord Voldemort. His first encounter with a Dementor was on the Hogwarts Express and he was on the verge of death before he was saved by his Defence Against the Dark Arts professor, Remus Lupin.
Hogwarts Headmaster Albus Dumbledore warned the Hogwarts students not to give the Dementors any reason to harm them.
Harry endured a second encounter with a group of Dementors during a Quidditch game, which caused him to lose consciousness and suffer a near fatal fall from his broom. Disaster was only averted by Dumbledore, who arrested Harry's fall then drove the Dementors away with a patronus.
To overcome the Dementors, Harry asked Lupin for assistance. Lupin taught Harry the Patronus Charm. When Harry finally mastered the Patronus Charm, his patronus took the form of a silver stag.
Harry failed to produce a fully formed patronus when he and Sirius Black were attacked by a group of Dementors. The two were miraculously saved however by the intervention of a powerful and fully formed patronus, which had in fact been conjured by Harry himself, who had used a time turner to travel back into the past from three hours in the future. (This technically counts as both Harry's third and fourth encounters with the Dementors, since, due to his time travelling, he experienced this same encounter twice.)
Harry's fifth encounter was in an alley near his home on Privet Drive, when he and his cousin Dudley Dursley were ambushed by two Dementors (sent secretly and illegally by Dolores Umbridge). He was able to successfully use the Patronus Charm and was subsequently rescued by a Squib named Arabella Figg. JK Rowling has said that she may reveal in book 7 what Dudley's "worst memory" is, i.e. the memory the Dementors forced him to relive during this attack. "What would spoiled, pampered, bullying Dudley have been forced to hear?"[4]
Dementors served the Ministry of Magic as the guards of Azkaban because it allowed them to feast on their human victims. However, at the end of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, the Dementors of Azkaban stage a mass revolt against their employers to join Lord Voldemort, as he can provide them with more humans to feast upon.
In Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, the Dementors from Azkaban joined Voldemort and were multiplying, thus causing the "unseasonal" July mist. Cornelius Fudge also admits they are factors in the Prime Minister's recent decline in terms of public approval, as they are making people less happy in general. Professor Snape also requests a report on Dementors, where Harry disagrees with Snape on the method for confronting a Dementor. One could interpret this to mean there is more than one way to repel a Dementor (we assume Harry chooses the Patronus Charm).
[edit] Pop Culture
In the American version of "The Office" Michael Scott (Steve Carell), as "Prison Mike" explains that "the worst thing about prison was the Dementors. They were flying all over the place, and they were scary. And they’d come down, and they’d suck the soul out of your body, and it hurt."
