Stephen says that sometimes he finds clues to the kind of voice a character should have in JK Rowling’s writing or in the character names: ‘Sometimes [there is] a turn of phrase that makes me think well that sounds like a Cockney or that’s an older character or that’s a younger character...’ Luckily he felt that Hagrid was West Country, as JK Rowling says ‘that was the only character I felt protective about accent-wise.’ And otherwise, Stephen says, ‘the sound engineer very kindly has an indexed CD to remind me.’

JK Rowling describes Stephen’s reading as ‘though someone you know well is reading to you and that person happens to be talented at voices but [doesn’t] form a big barrier between the listener and the story.’ Stephen says about reading the Harry Potter books ‘It’s the perfect thing to read. If I was told I was going to have to do a series of big novels I might have thought at first maybe Trollope or the complete Jane Austen but I don’t think I would have got a tenth as much pleasure.’