03:22 AM EDT 10/15/2009
J.K. Rowling
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J.K. Rowling to Publish First Post-Potter Book
Originally posted 08/01/2008 07:45AM
Christmas comes early for Harry Potter fans! J.K. Rowling's new book, The Tales of Beedle the Bard – her first major work since retiring the boy wizard last year – hits shelves December 4.
The 157-page collection of five wizardry-inspired fairy tales was mentioned in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, the seventh and final novel in the best-selling series.
Permalink | Filed Under: J.K. Rowling
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J.K. Rowling to Harvard Grads: Giving's a Gift
Originally posted 06/06/2008 12:15PM
J.K. Rowling has challenged Harvard University graduates to act charitably toward those less fortunate.
"That is your privilege and your burden," the Harry Potter author, 42, is quoted as saying Thursday by the Boston Globe.
"If you choose to use your status and influence to raise your voice on behalf of those who have no voice, if you choose to identify not only with the powerful, but with the powerless, if you retain the ability to imagine yourself into the lives of those who do not have your advantages, then it will not only be your proud families who celebrate your existence, but thousands and millions of people whose reality you have helped transform for the better."
Receiving an honorary doctor of letters degree – at the same ceremony where Massachusetts's Edward Kennedy, now recovering from this week's brain surgery, was also to honored – Rowling seemed to have taken a page from the senator's book by saying that those "who choose not to empathize are real monsters."
– Amy Green
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J.K. Rowling Writes Potter Prequel
Originally posted 05/29/2008 10:00AM
Within the past month, J.K. Rowling has written a prequel to Harry Potter.
And the succinct, 800-word story, written in the author's own hand, will be auctioned off for charity in London on June 10. (The tale is so shrouded in secrecy, it’s not even clear if the boy wizard makes an appearance.)
Proceeds will go to the writers' association English PEN and to Dyslexia Action.
Fans – who have gone almost a whole year since Rowling's last installment, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – will be able to read the prequel for themselves when it's published by Waterstone's in August.
In her sign-off to the story (written on a piece of paper not much bigger than a postcard), Rowling said, "That was fun!"
Permalink | Filed Under: J.K. Rowling
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Judge Tells J.K. Rowling: Harry Potter Is Hard to Follow
Originally posted 04/18/2008 01:20PM
One fan J.K. Rowling can't count on: Manhattan Judge Robert Patterson Jr., who will spend the next several weeks deciding her federal copyright infringement case over an unauthorized Harry Potter lexicon.
During Thursday's final day of testimony, the jurist, admitting he read the half of the first book, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, to his grandchildren, said he found Rowling's work difficult to follow, filled with strange names and, well, such "gibberish" that it possibly required a guidebook.
Permalink | Filed Under: Crime & Courts, J.K. Rowling
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More Tears in J.K. Rowling Court Fight
Originally posted 04/15/2008 07:15PM
Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling watched as the creator of a book at the center of Rowling’s copyright-infringement lawsuit sobbed on the witness stand Tuesday.
Asked whether he still feels part of the Harry Potter fan community, Steven Vander Ark, a librarian who created the Harry Potter Lexicon and runs a Harry Potter fansite, www.hp-lexicon.org, said he regrets that his decision to publish a reference guide to Rowling’s series has ostracized him from fellow Potter fans.
Permalink | Filed Under: Crime & Courts, J.K. Rowling
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J.K. Rowling Testifies in Harry Potter Suit
Originally posted 04/14/2008 07:05AM
J.K. Rowling faced a Manhattan judge Monday in a bid to squash the publication of Harry Potter Lexicon, an unauthorized encyclopedia devoted to the fantasy world she created.
"I really don't want to cry," said the British-born author, 42, who added that she was forced to cease progress on a new novel because her concern over this legal matter had "decimated my creative work," reports the BBC.
Rowling also reportedly denied the case was about money and said she considered the prospective volume by author Steve Vander Ark, a librarian, and his publisher, RDR Books, in Muskegon, Mich., "an act of betrayal."
Permalink | Filed Under: Crime & Courts, J.K. Rowling
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J.K. Rowling Admits She Was Suicidal
Originally posted 03/24/2008 09:00AM
Though she has made no secret of how her life had sunk before her immense success with the Harry Potter series, J.K. Rowling has never before detailed that despondent period of her life.
That now has changed, with the author, 42, opening up to an Edinburgh University student magazine, the BBC and British newspapers report.
Rowling also admits that she contemplated taking her own life back in the early 1990s, after separating from her first husband, Portuguese journalist Jorge Arantes.
"We're talking suicidal thoughts here, we're not talking 'I'm a little bit miserable,' " Rowling told student Adeel Amini, 22.
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J.K. Rowling Seeks to Block Potter Fan Book
Originally posted 02/29/2008 09:00AM
J.K. Rowling has filed a lawsuit in Manhattan against the publisher of a proposed, unauthorized reference work, Harry Potter Lexicon.
"I am deeply troubled by the portrayal of my efforts to protect and preserve the copyrights I have been granted in the Harry Potter books," say court papers filed on Wednesday by Rowling, whose co-plaintiff in the suit is Warner Bros. Entertainment, the Associated Press reports. The defendant is RDR Books, a small Muskegon, Mich., publisher.
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J.K. Rowling Conjures Up Her Latest Book
Originally posted 11/01/2007 12:15PM
With Harry Potter's adventures having come to their breathless end, J.K. Rowling is wasting no time when it comes to what's next.
The mega-selling author (400 million copies worldwide) has completed – and illustrated! – her first book since the publication of the seventh final Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
Only seven copies of the new book – a collection of fairytales titled The Tales of Beedle the Bard – will be printed, and one will be auctioned next month to raise money for the charity The Children’s Voice, which helps youngsters at risk throughout Europe.
Bids will start at $60,000, reports The Times in London. – Shelly Akers
Permalink | Filed Under: J.K. Rowling
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J.K. Rowling's Confession: Dumbledore Is Gay
Originally posted 10/20/2007 09:15AM
It was a little late for National Coming Out Day, but a huge revelation nonetheless: Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling revealed Friday night that one of her main characters, Hogwarts Headmaster Albus Dumbledore, is gay.
The Associated Press reports that during a Q&A session with audience members, a young fan asked if Dumbledore finds true love.
Permalink | Filed Under: , Harry Potter, J.K. Rowling
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