Are you Harry Potter fans ready for the biggest news to hit Hogwarts? Albus Dumbledore, master wizard and Headmaster of Hogwarts, is GAY.. J.K. Rowling, author of the mega - selling fantasy series that ended last summer, outed the beloved character Friday night while appearing before a full house at Carnegie Hall..

After reading briefly from her mega - selling book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, on Friday night, Rowling took questions from an audience of 1,600 students.. A 19 - year - old from Colorado asked about the avuncular headmaster of Hogwarts School..

” Did Dumbledore, who believed in the prevailing power of love, ever fall in love himself?”

The author replied..

” My truthful answer to you; I always thought of Dumbledore as gay..”

The audience reportedly fell silent - then erupted into prolonged applause..

Rowling, 42, continued..

” Dumbledore fell in love with Grindelwald ( A bad wizard, think he joined the Dark Side of the Force, he defeated long ago ), and that added to his horror when Grindelwald showed himself to be what he was.. To an extent, do we say it excused Dumbledore a little more because falling in love can blind us to an extent, but he met someone as brilliant as he was and, rather like Bellatrix, he was very drawn to this brilliant person and horribly, terribly let down by him..”

” Yeah, that’s how I always saw Dumbledore.. In fact, recently I was in a script read - through for the sixth film, and they had Dumbledore saying a line to Harry early in the script saying, ” I knew a girl once, whose hair..” I had to write a little note in the margin and slide it along to the scriptwriter, Dumbledore’s gay!”

Amazed by the warm reaction of the audience, Rowling, on her first US tour in seven years, joked..

” Just imagine the fan fiction now..”

Potter readers on fan sites and elsewhere on the Internet have speculated on the sexuality of Dumbledore, noting that he has no close relationship with women and a mysterious, troubled past.. And explicit scenes with Dumbledore already have appeared in fan fiction..

Not everyone likes her work, Rowling said, likely referring to Christian groups that have alleged the books promote witchcraft.. Her news about Dumbledore, she said, will give them one more reason..

Some other questions that the audience asked Rowling was..

” Did Hagrid marry?” Rowling replied that sadly, no.. The half - giant had a flirtation with a giantess but she found him ” a tad unsophisticated ” and the relationship never went forward.. In response to the audience’s groans of dismay, Rowling said, jokingly..

” OK, I’ll write another book..”

And when the audience continued to express disapproval added..

” At least I didn’t kill him..”

Other minor characters, according to Rowling, came to happier ends.. Neville Longbottom, Harry’s meek and hapless classmate, married Hannah Abbott, another classmate..

Rowling, a mother of three, is now estimated to be worth $1.12 billion, making her the first dollar - billionaire author..

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, the seventh and final book in the boy wizard series, became the fastest - selling book in history when it was released in July..

More than 11 million copies were sold in the first 24 hours in the United States and Britain alone..

The fifth film adaptation of the series, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix was released this summer.. Harry Potter and the Half - Blood Prince is due for release late next year..