Jk rowling story
J. K. Rowling
British author and philanthropist
Joanne Rowling (ROH-ling; born 31 July ), known by her pen nameJ. K. Rowling, is a British author and philanthropist. She is the author of Harry Potter, a seven-volume fantasy novel series published from to The series has sold over &#;million copies, been translated into 84&#;languages, and spawned a global media franchise including films and video games.
J&k rowling biography summary Born on July 31, , to Peter James Rowling, a Rolls-Royce aircraft engineer, and Anne Rowling nee Volant , Joanne Rowling was a divorced mother living in Gloucestershire, England when she hit upon the idea of a book about a young wizard boy, who is alone and trying to overcome obstacles to find his way to becoming the hero of his story. Harry Potter Box Set at Amazon. Use limited data to select advertising. The self-improvement guide offers personal anecdotes and advice on how to embrace failure and use your imagination to succeed.The Casual Vacancy was her first novel for adults. She writes Cormoran Strike, an ongoing crime fiction series, under the alias Robert Galbraith.
Born in Yate, Gloucestershire, Rowling was working as a researcher and bilingual secretary for Amnesty International in when she conceived the idea for the Harry Potter series.
The seven-year period that followed saw the death of her mother, the birth of her first child, divorce from her first husband, and relative poverty until the first novel in the series, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, was published in Six sequels followed, concluding with Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows ().
By , Forbes had named her the world's highest-paid author.
The novels follow a boy called Harry Potter as he attends Hogwarts (a school for wizards), and battles Lord Voldemort. Death and the divide between good and evil are the central themes of the series. Its influences include Bildungsroman (the coming-of-age genre), school stories, fairy tales, and Christian allegory.
The series revived fantasy as a genre in the children's market, spawned a host of imitators, and inspired an active fandom. Critical reception has been more mixed. Many reviewers see Rowling's writing as conventional; some regard her portrayal of gender and social division as regressive. There were also religious debates over the Harry Potter series.
Rowling has won many accolades for her work. She has received an OBE and made a Companion of Honour for services to literature and philanthropy. Harry Potter brought her wealth and recognition, which she has used to advance philanthropic endeavours and political causes. She established the Volant Charitable Trust in , and co-founded the charity Lumos in Rowling's philanthropy centres on medical causes and supporting at-risk women and children.
In , Forbes estimated that Rowling's charitable giving totaled US$ million. She has also donated to Britain's Labour Party, and opposed Scottish independence and Brexit. Since , Rowling has been vocal about her opinions on transgender people and related civil rights. Her comments, described as transphobic by critics and LGBT rights organisations, have divided feminists, fuelled debates on freedom of speech and cancel culture, and prompted declarations of support for transgender people from the culture sector.
Name
Although she writes under the pen name J. K. Rowling, before her remarriage her name was Joanne Rowling, or Jo. At birth, she had no middle name. Staff at Bloomsbury Publishing suggested that she use two initials rather than her full name, anticipating that young boys – their target audience – would not want to read a book written by a woman.
She chose K as the second initial, from her paternal grandmother Kathleen Rowling, and because of the ease of pronunciation of the two consecutive letters. Following her remarriage, she has sometimes used the name Joanne Murray when conducting personal business.[6]
Life and career
Early life and family
Joanne Rowling was born on 31 July in Yate, Gloucestershire,[8][b] to a middle-class family.
Her parents Anne (née Volant) and Peter ("Pete") James Rowling had met the previous year on a train, sharing a trip from King's Cross station, London, to their naval postings at Arbroath, Scotland. Rowling's mother was with the Wrens and her father with the Royal Navy. Pete Rowling was the son of a machine-tool setter who later opened a grocery shop.
They left the navy life and sought a country home to raise the baby they were expecting, and married on 14 March when both were [16] The Rowlings settled in Yate, where Pete started work as an assembly-line production worker at the Bristol Siddeley factory. The company became part of Rolls-Royce, and he worked his way into management as a chartered engineer.
Anne Rowling later worked as a science technician. Neither of Rowling's parents attended university.
Rowling is two years older than her sister, Dianne, whose birth was Rowling's earliest memory.[22] When she was four, Rowling's family moved to Winterbourne, Gloucestershire.[16] She began at St Michael's Church of England Primary School in Winterbourne when she was five.[c] The Rowlings lived near a family called Potter – a name Rowling always liked.[d] Rowling's mother liked to read and the family's homes were filled with books.
Her father read The Wind in the Willows to his daughters, while her mother introduced them to the animals in Richard Scarry's books. Rowling's first attempt at writing, a story called "Rabbit" composed when she was six, was inspired by Scarry's creatures.
When Rowling was about nine, the family purchased the historic Church Cottage in Tutshill.[e] In , Rowling began attending the nearby Church of England School.
Biographer Sean Smith describes her teacher as a "battleaxe" who "struck fear into the hearts of the children"; Rowling's teacher seated her in "dunces' row" after she performed poorly on an arithmetic test.[f] In , Rowling joined a Brownies pack. Its special events and parties, and the pack groups (Fairies, Pixies, Sprites, Elves, Gnomes and Imps) provided a magical world away from her stern teacher.
J.jill womens clothing FREE short summaries for all! Rosenberg, Jennifer. Some of her ideas for her stories came from the romantic stories she heard all her life. After her authorship was discovered, sales went through the roof.When she was eleven or twelve, she wrote a short story, "The Seven Cursed Diamonds". She later described herself during this period as "the epitome of a bookish child – short and squat, thick National Health glasses, living in a world of complete daydreams".
Secondary school and university
Rowling's secondary school was Wyedean School and College, a state school she began attending at the age of eleven and where she was bullied.
Rowling was inspired by her favourite teacher, Lucy Shepherd, who taught the importance of structure and precision in writing. Smith writes that Rowling "craved to play heavy electric guitar", and describes her as "intelligent yet shy". Her teacher Dale Neuschwander was impressed by her imagination. When she was a young teenager, Rowling's great-aunt gave her Hons and Rebels, the autobiography of the civil rights activist Jessica Mitford.
Mitford became Rowling's heroine, and she read all her books.[53]
Anne had a strong influence on her daughter. Early in Rowling's life, the support of her mother and sister instilled confidence and enthusiasm for storytelling. Anne was a creative and accomplished cook,[g] who helped lead her daughters' Brownie activities, and took a job in the chemistry department at Wyedean while her daughters were there.
The three walked to and from school together, with a relationship more like sisters than mother and daughters.[tone]John Nettleship, the head of science at Wyedean, described Anne as "absolutely brilliant, a sparkling character&#; very imaginative".[11] Anne was diagnosed with a "virulent strain" of multiple sclerosis when she was 34 or 35 and Jo was 15, and had to quit her job.
J.jill Rowling, the films have sought to stay close to the original plot; also at J. The timing of the second move was clouded by the death of Rowling's favorite grandmother, Kathleen. Stories about her heroic grandparents gave her ideas of courage under extreme circumstances. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince was the biggest opening in publishing history.Rowling's home life was complicated by her mother's illness and a strained relationship with her father. Rowling later said "home was a difficult place to be", and that her teenage years were unhappy.[32] In , she wrote that her father would have preferred a son and described herself as having severe obsessive–compulsive disorder in her teens.[66] She began to smoke, took an interest in alternative rock, and adopted Siouxsie Sioux's back-combed hair and black eyeliner.[11] Sean Harris, her best friend in the Upper Sixth, owned a turquoise Ford Anglia that provided an escape from her difficult home life and the means for Harris and Rowling to broaden their activities.[h]
Living in a small town with pressures at home, Rowling became more interested in her schoolwork.
Steve Eddy, her first secondary school English teacher, remembers her as "not exceptional" but "one of a group of girls who were bright, and quite good at English".[32] Rowling took A-levels in English, French, and German, achieving two As and a B, and was named head girl at Wyedean. She applied to Oxford University in but was rejected.
Biographers attribute her rejection to privilege, as she had attended a state school rather than a private one.
Rowling always wanted to be a writer, but chose to study French and the classics at the University of Exeter for practical reasons, influenced by her parents who thought job prospects would be better with evidence of bilingualism.
She later stated that Exeter was not initially what she expected ("to be among lots of similar people – thinking radical thoughts") but that she enjoyed herself after she met more people like her.[53] She was an average student at Exeter, described by biographers as prioritising her social life over her studies, and lacking ambition and enthusiasm.
Rowling recalls doing little work at university, preferring to read Dickens and Tolkien.[32] She earned a BA in French from Exeter, graduating in after a year of study in Paris.
Inspiration and mother's death
After university, Rowling moved to a flat in Clapham Junction with friends,[79] and took a course to become a bilingual secretary.
While she was working temporary jobs in London, Amnesty International hired her to document human rights issues in French-speaking Africa. She began writing adult novels while working as a temp, although they were never published.[11] In , she planned to move with her boyfriend to Manchester,[16] and frequently took long train trips to visit.
In mid, she was on a train delayed by four hours from Manchester to London, when the characters Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, and Hermione Granger came plainly into her mind.[83] Having no pen or paper allowed her to fully explore the characters and their story in her imagination before she reached her flat and began to write.
Rowling moved to Manchester around November [53] She described her time in Manchester, where she worked for the Chamber of Commerce and at Manchester University in temp jobs, as a "year of misery".
Her mother died of multiple sclerosis on 30 December At the time, she was writing Harry Potter and had never told her mother about it.[87] Her mother's death heavily affected Rowling's writing.
J&t tracking: The series has sold more than million copies and was adapted into a blockbuster film franchise. Instead of ever entering remission, Rowling's mother grew increasingly sick. Pressured by her parents to become a secretary, Rowling attended the University of Exeter beginning at age 18 and studied French. The timing of the second move was clouded by the death of Rowling's favorite grandmother, Kathleen.
She later said that her literary creation of the Mirror of Erised is about her mother's death, and noted an "evident parallelism" between Harry confronting his own mortality and her life.
The pain of the loss of her mother was compounded when some personal effects her mother had left her were stolen.[53] With the end of the relationship with her boyfriend, and "being made redundant from an office job in Manchester", Rowling described herself as being in a state of "fight or flight".[32] An advertisement in The Guardian led her to move to Porto, Portugal, in November to teach night classes in English as a foreign language, writing during the day.[32]
Marriage, divorce and single parenthood
Five months after arriving in Porto, Rowling met the Portuguese television journalist Jorge Arantes in a bar and found that they shared an interest in Jane Austen.
By mid, they were planning a trip to London to introduce Arantes to Rowling's family, when she had a miscarriage. The relationship was troubled, but they married on 16 October [i] Their daughter Jessica Isabel Rowling Arantes (named after Jessica Mitford[j]) was born on 27 July in Portugal.[11] By this time, Rowling had finished the first three chapters of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone – almost as they were eventually published – and had drafted the rest of the novel.
Rowling experienced domestic abuse during her marriage.[66][97] Arantes said in June that he had slapped her and did not regret it.[98] Rowling described the marriage as "short and catastrophic".
She says she was not allowed to have a house key and that her husband used the growing manuscript of her first book as a hostage.[99] Rowling and Arantes separated on 17 November after Arantes threw her out of the house; she returned with the police to retrieve Jessica and her belongings and went into hiding for two weeks before she left Portugal.[11] In late , with a draft of Harry Potter in her suitcase,[32] Rowling moved with her daughter to Edinburgh, Scotland,[8] planning to stay with her sister until Christmas.[53]
Her biographer Sean Smith raises the question of why Rowling chose to stay with her sister rather than her father.
Rowling has spoken of an estrangement from her father, stating in an interview with Oprah Winfrey that "It wasn't a good relationship from my point of view for a very long time but I had a need to please and I kept that going for a long time and then there&#; just came a point at which I had to pull up and say I can't do this anymore." Pete had married his secretary within two years of Anne's death, and The Scotsman reported in that "[t]he speed of his decision to move in with his secretary&#; distressed both sisters and a fault-line now separated them and their father."[11] Rowling said in that they had not spoken in the last nine years.[32]
Rowling sought government assistance and got £69 (US$) per week from Social Security; not wanting to burden her recently married sister, she moved to a flat that she described as mouse-ridden.
J crew outlet They have two children together, David born in and Mackenzie born in K Rowling was born in Chipping Sodbury, July 31st, Her publisher asked her to use a more male sounding name "since young boys might not want to read a book written by a woman". Born on July 31, , to Peter James Rowling, a Rolls-Royce aircraft engineer, and Anne Rowling nee Volant , Joanne Rowling was a divorced mother living in Gloucestershire, England when she hit upon the idea of a book about a young wizard boy, who is alone and trying to overcome obstacles to find his way to becoming the hero of his story.She later described her economic status as being as "poor as it is possible to be in modern Britain, without being homeless".[32] Seven years after graduating from university, she saw herself as a failure.[]Tison Pugh writes that the "grinding effects of poverty, coupled with her concern for providing for her daughter as a single parent, caused great hardship".
Her marriage had failed, and she was jobless with a dependent child, but she later described this as "liberating" her to focus on writing.[] She has said that "Jessica kept me going". Her old school friend, Sean Harris, lent her £ ($), which allowed her to move to a flat in Leith, where she finished Philosopher's Stone.
Arantes arrived in Scotland in March seeking both Rowling and Jessica.[11] On 15 March , Rowling sought an action of interdict (order of restraint); the interdict was granted and Arantes returned to Portugal.[11] Early in the year, Rowling began to experience a deep depression and sought medical help when she contemplated suicide.[k] With nine months of therapy, her mental health gradually improved.
She filed for divorce on 10 August ; the divorce was finalised on 26 June
Rowling wanted to finish the book before enrolling in a teacher training course, fearing she might not be able to finish once she started the course.[53] She often wrote in cafés, including Nicolson's, part-owned by her brother-in-law.
Secretarial work brought in £15 ($) per week, but she would lose government benefits if she earned more. In mid, a friend gave her money that allowed her to come off benefits and enrol full-time in college. Still needing money and expecting to make a living by teaching, Rowling began a teacher training course in August at Moray House School of Education[a] after completing her first novel.
She earned her teaching certificate in July and began teaching at Leith Academy. Rowling later said that writing the first Harry Potter book had saved her life and that her concerns about "love, loss, separation, death&#; are reflected in the first book".
Publishing Harry Potter
Main article: Harry Potter
Rowling completed Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone in June The initial draft included an illustration of Harry by a fireplace, showing a lightning-shaped scar on his forehead.
Following an enthusiastic report from an early reader,Christopher Little Literary Agency agreed to represent Rowling. Her manuscript was submitted to twelve publishers, all of which rejected it.[11]Barry Cunningham, who ran the children's literature department at Bloomsbury Publishing, bought it, after Nigel Newton, who headed Bloomsbury at the time, saw his eight-year-old daughter finish one chapter and want to keep reading.[] Rowling recalls Cunningham telling her, "You'll never make any money out of children's books, Jo." Rowling was awarded a writer's grant by the Scottish Arts Council[l] to support her childcare costs and finances before Philosopher's Stone's publication, and to aid in writing the sequel, Chamber of Secrets.
On 26 June , Bloomsbury published Philosopher's Stone with an initial print run of 5,&#;copies.[m] Before Chamber of Secrets was published, Rowling had received £2, ($4,) in royalties.
Philosopher's Stone introduces Harry Potter. Harry is a wizard who lives with his non-magical relatives until his eleventh birthday, when he is invited to attend Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
Rowling wrote six sequels, which follow Harry's adventures at Hogwarts with friends Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley and his attempts to defeat Lord Voldemort, who killed Harry's parents when he was a child.
Rowling received the news that the US rights were being auctioned at the Bologna Children's Book Fair.
To her surprise and delight, Scholastic Corporation bought the rights for $, She bought a flat in Edinburgh with the money from the sale. Arthur A. Levine, head of the imprint at Scholastic, pushed for a name change. He wanted Harry Potter and the School of Magic; as a compromise Rowling suggested Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone.Sorcerer's Stone was released in the United States in September [] It was not widely reviewed, but the reviews it received were generally positive.Sorcerer's Stone became a New York Times bestseller by December.
The next three books in the series were released in quick succession between and Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (), Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (), and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (), each selling millions of copies.
When Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix had not appeared by , rumours circulated that Rowling was suffering writer's block. Rowling denied these rumours, stating the page book took three years to write because of its length.[] It was published in June , selling millions of copies on the first day.[]Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince was released two years later in July , again selling millions of copies on the first day.[] The series ended with Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, published in July []
Films
Main article: Harry Potter (film series)
In , Warner Bros.
purchased film rights to the first two Harry Potter novels for a reported $1&#;million. Rowling accepted the offer with the provision that the studio only produce Harry Potter films based on books she authored, while retaining the right to final script approval, and some control over merchandising.Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, an adaptation of the first Harry Potter book, was released in November []Steve Kloves wrote the screenplays for all but the fifth film,[] with Rowling's assistance, ensuring that his scripts kept to the plots of the novels.[] The film series concluded with Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, which was adapted in two parts; part one was released on 19 November ,[] and part two followed on 15 July []
Warner Bros.
announced an expanded relationship with Rowling in , including a planned series of films about her character Newt Scamander, fictitious author of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.[] The first film of five, a prequel to the Harry Potter series, set roughly 70&#;years earlier, was released in November [] Rowling wrote the screenplay, which was released as a book.[]Crimes of Grindelwald was released in November []Secrets of Dumbledore was released in April [] In November , Variety reported that Warner Bros.
Discovery was not actively planning to continue the film series or to develop any further films related to the Wizarding World franchise.[]
Religion, wealth and remarriage
Further information: Religious debates over the Harry Potter series and List of celebrities by net worth
By , Rowling was portrayed in the media as a "penniless divorcee hitting the jackpot".
According to her biographer Sean Smith, the publicity became effective marketing for Harry Potter, but her journey from living on benefits to wealth brought, along with fame, concerns from different groups about the books' portrayals of the occult and gender roles. Ultimately, Smith says that these concerns served to "enhance [her] public profile rather than damage it".
Rowling identifies as a Christian.[] Although she grew up next door to her church, accounts of the family's church attendance differ.[n] She began attending a Church of Scotland congregation, where Jessica was christened, around the time she was writing Harry Potter.[] In a interview, she said she belonged to the Scottish Episcopal Church.[] Rowling has stated that she believes in God, but has experienced doubt,[] and that her struggles with faith play a part in her books.
She does not believe in magic or witchcraft.[]
Rowling married Neil Murray, a doctor, in The couple intended to marry that July in the Galapagos, but when this leaked to the press, they delayed their wedding and changed their holiday destination to Mauritius. After the UK Press Complaints Commission ruled that a magazine had breached Jessica's privacy when the eight-year-old was included in a photograph of the family taken during that trip,[] Murray and Rowling sought a more private and quiet place to live and work.
Rowling bought Killiechassie House and its estate in Perthshire, Scotland,[] and on 26 December , the couple had a small, private wedding there, officiated by an Episcopalian priest who travelled from Edinburgh. Their son, David Gordon Rowling Murray, was born in ,[] and their daughter Mackenzie Jean Rowling Murray in []
In , Forbes named Rowling "the first billion-dollar author".[] Rowling denied that she was a billionaire in a interview.[] By , Forbes concluded she was no longer a billionaire due to her charitable donations and high UK taxes.[] She was named the world's highest paid author by Forbes in ,[] [] and [] Her UK sales total in excess of £&#;million, which made her the best-selling living author in Britain,[] until when she was supplanted by Julia Donaldson.[] The Sunday Times Rich List estimated Rowling's fortune at £&#;million, ranking her as the th-richest person in the UK.[] As of , she also owns a £&#;million Georgian house in Kensington and a £2&#;million home in Edinburgh,[] where she lives with Murray and her two youngest children.[8]
Adult fiction and Robert Galbraith
Main articles: The Casual Vacancy, The Casual Vacancy (miniseries), Cormoran Strike, and Strike (TV series)
In mid, Rowling left Christopher Little Literary Agency and followed her agent Neil Blair to the Blair Partnership.
He represented her for the publication of The Casual Vacancy, released in September by Little, Brown and Company.[] It was Rowling's first since Harry Potter ended, and her first book for adults.[] A contemporary take on 19th-century British fiction about village life,Casual Vacancy was promoted as a black comedy, while the critic Ian Parker described it as a "rural comedy of manners".[32] It was adapted to a miniseries co-created by the BBC and HBO.[]
Little, Brown and Company also published The Cuckoo's Calling, the purported début novel of Robert Galbraith, in April [] Telling the story of detective Cormoran Strike, a disabled veteran of the War in Afghanistan, it initially sold 1,&#;copies in hardback.[] After an investigation prompted by discussion on Twitter, the journalist Richard Brooks contacted Rowling's agent, who confirmed Galbraith was Rowling's pseudonym.[] Rowling later said she enjoyed working as Robert Galbraith,[] a name she took from Robert F.
Kennedy, a personal hero, and Ella Galbraith, a name she invented for herself in childhood. After the revelation of her identity, sales of Cuckoo's Calling escalated.[]
Continuing the Cormoran Strike series of detective novels, The Silkworm was released in ;Career of Evil in ;Lethal White in ;[]Troubled Blood in ;[]The Ink Black Heart in ;[] and The Running Grave in [] In , BBC One aired the first episode[] of the five-season series Strike, a television adaptation of the Cormoran Strike novels starring Tom Burke and Holliday Grainger, with a sixth season being shot in [][] The series was picked up by HBO for distribution in the United States and Canada.[]
In September , Rowling tweeted that she had begun work on a futuristic novel; she added that there were three different projects she could turn to, once the tenth and final planned Strike novel had been published.[]
Later Harry Potter works
Main articles: Pottermore and Harry Potter and the Cursed Child
For the material written for Comic Relief and other charities, see §&#;Philanthropy.
Pottermore, a website with information and stories about characters in the Harry Potter universe, launched in On its release, Pottermore was rooted in the Harry Potter novels, tracing the series's story in an interactive format.
Its brand was associated with Rowling: she introduced the site in a video as a shared media environment to which she and Harry Potter fans would contribute. The site was substantially revised in to resemble an encyclopedia of Harry Potter. []
Harry Potter and the Cursed Child premiered in the West End in May and on Broadway in July.[] At its London premiere, Rowling confirmed that she would not write any more Harry Potter books.[] Rowling collaborated with writer Jack Thorne and director John Tiffany.[]Cursed Child's script was published as a book in July The play follows the friendship between Harry's son Albus and Scorpius Malfoy, Draco Malfoy's son, at Hogwarts.[]
In April , it was announced that the Harry Potter television series will span 10 years of production[] and feature a season dedicated to each of the seven Harry Potter books, with Rowling as executive producer.[] It will release in [][]
Children's stories
Main articles: The Ickabog and The Christmas Pig
The Ickabog was Rowling's first book aimed at children since Harry Potter.[] Ickabog is a monster that turns out to be real; a group of children find out the truth about the Ickabog and save the day.[] Rowling released The Ickabog for free online in mid, during the COVID lockdown in the United Kingdom.[] She began writing it in but set it aside to focus on other works including Casual Vacancy.[] Scholastic held a competition to select children's art for the print edition, which was published in the US and Canada on 10 November []