Myrtle Warren

"D'you think I don't know what people call me behind my back? Fat Myrtle! Ugly Myrtle! Miserable, moaning, moping Myrtle!"

- Moaning Myrtle to Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, Hermione Granger and Peeves

Moaning Myrtle is the ghost of a witch who haunts the first floor girl's bathroom (and occasionally other bathroom facilities) at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. She was a student at the school in the 1930s and 1940s. She was sorted into Ravenclaw house. Myrtle was killed by Slytherin's Basilisk in 1943 on the orders of Tom Marvolo Riddle who had opened the Chamber of Secrets and would later become Lord Voldemort.

School Years and Death
When Myrtle first went to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry she was sorted into Ravenclaw but failed to make any friends and was constantly teased and bullied by her fellow students.

She was murdered by Tom Marvolo Riddle when the Chamber of Secrets was opened for the first time in 1943. She died while crying in the bathroom after Olive Hornby made fun of her glasses, which is probably why she removed her glasses causing her death as if she kept her glasses on she would have simply been petrified. It is implied that Myrtle was often bullied during her time at Hogwarts. The monster that killed her was Slytherin's Basilisk on the orders of Tom Riddle. Her death was the murder that Tom used to make his first Horcrux: the diary.

1992-1993
Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, and Hermione Granger used Myrtle's bathroom in 1992 to brew Polyjuice Potion that was used to disguise Harry and Ron as Vincent Crabbe and Gregory Goyle so that they could sneak into the Slytherin Dungeon to interrogate Draco Malfoy about the Chamber of Secrets.

In 1993 she helped Harry and Ron to find out about the monster inside the Chamber of Secrets. When Harry asked her about how she died, Myrtle was actually flattered, and acted as though she had never been asked this question before.

She also flooded the bathroom after "somebody" threw Tom Riddle's diary to get dispose of it.

1995
In 1995 Myrtle helped Harry with his second task in the Triwizard Tournament, popping up in the Prefects' Bathroom (which she admits to doing occasionally in order to spy on prefects). Though Cedric Diggory had told Harry to take a bath while thinking about it, and provided him with the password to the prefect's bathroom; it was Myrtle who told Harry how to solve the clue, by opening it underwater. She also appeared before Harry in the Black Lake, and pointed him in the right direction of the captives of the Merpeople during the Triwizard Tournament.

1997
"…he’s sensitive, people bully him, too, and he feels lonely and hasn’t got anybody to talk to, and he’s not afraid to show his feelings and cry!"

- Moaning Myrtle about Draco Malfoy

In 1997 Draco Malfoy confided in Moaning Myrtle about his assasination attempts of Albus Dumbledore. Myrtle comforts him, and feels that she understands him. However when Malfoy and Harry enage in an intense duel, Myrtle does cry out for them to stop, but it is clear to Harry that she enjoys the excitement. Previously,when Harry had asked Myrtle about who the boy she has been seeing is, she does not tell him but states that she has 'learned not to expect too much from boys', as Harry has never once visited her bathroom as she'd asked him to. The last time Myrtle is seen is when she is ordered to leave the bathroom by Severus Snape.

Physical description
Myrtle is a squat ghost with lank hair, pimples, and thick glasses. She hardly ever smiles and takes great offense at the smallest excuses, crying rivers of tears and wailing.

Behind the scenes

 * The myrtle tree is a close relative of the willow tree. "Moaning Myrtle" is a similar phrase to "weeping willow." Her name is also possibly related to the "Moaning Minnie," the British name for a German WWII artillery shell that made a distinctive moaning whine before it hit.
 * Moaning Myrtle was portrayed by Shirley Henderson in the film adaptions of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. Being 5' 0½" (1.54 m) and 37 years old when she first played Moaning Myrtle, she is the oldest actor to play a teenage Hogwarts student in the Harry Potter films.
 * The myrtle ("Myrtus") is a flowering plant of sourthern Europe and north Africa. In Greek mythology, it was sacred to Aphrodite, goddess of love and beauty, and to Demeter, goddess of grain and fertility; Pausanias relates it to the tragedy of Adonis. Romans, through Virgin, relate the myrtle to Venus and used them in wedding rituals, something that Jewish liturgy, which deemed it sacred, also used. Myrtle has also uses in Wiccan rituals, and was considered medicinal by the ancients, including Hippocrates, Pliny, Galen and Arabian writers.
 * Myrtle's surname is not known, as it has never been said in the canon.
 * In one scene of Chamber of Secrets, Ron jokingly suggests that Tom Riddle earned his Special Award for Services to the School for killing Myrtle; this foreshadows the fact that Riddle did indeed kill her.
 * Hermione says Moaning Myrtle haunts the bathroom on the first floor. However, when Harry sees the writing on the wall outside her bathroom, he is on the second floor. This may be attributed to the English/European manner of naming the Ground Floor as the one usually with the main entrance, and the First Floor as one floor up from the Ground Floor.

Appearances

 * Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
 * Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (film)
 * Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (video game)
 * Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
 * Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (film)
 * Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (video game)
 * Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

Notes and references
Плакса Миртл