Meet J.k. Rowling "the Author Of Harry Potter Books"

Who is J.K Rowling (author of the Harry Potter Books)?Joanne "Jo" Murray née Rowling OBE (born 31 July 1965<2>), who writes under the pen name J. K. Rowling,<3> is a British writer and author of the Harry Potter fantasy series. The Potter Books have gained worldwide attention, won multiple awards, and sold over 325 million books.<4> The last four books have been consecutively the fastest-selling books in history,<5> a record which the final Book currently holds.<6> The 2007 Sunday Times Rich List estimated Rowling''s fortune at £545 million, ranking her as the 136th richest person and the thirteenth richest woman in Britain.<7> In 2006, Forbes named Rowling the second-richest female entertainer in the world<8> and ranked her as the forty-eighth most powerful celebrity of 2007.<9> Contents 1 Name 2 Early life 3 Harry Potter 3.1 Harry Potter books 3.2 Harry Potter films 3.3 After Harry Potter 4 Current personal life 5 Philanthropy 5.1 One Parent Families 5.2 Comic Relief 5.3 Multiple Sclerosis Society Scotland 5.4 Other donations 6 Honours 7 Bibliography 7.1 Articles 8 See also 9 References 10 External links Name Although she writes under the pen name "J. K. Rowling", pronounced like rolling (IPA: /rəʊ.lɪŋ/),<10> she actually has no middle name making her full name simply "Joanne Rowling". Before publishing her first book, London-based publisher, Bloomsbury feared that the target audience of young boys might be reluctant to buy books written by a female author. It requested that Rowling use two initials, rather than reveal her first name. As she had no middle name, she chose K. for Kathleen as the second initial of her pseudonym, from her paternal grandmother, Kathleen Ada Bulgen Rowling.<11> The name Kathleen has never been part of her real name.<12> Following her marriage, her official legal name is Joanne Murray.<13> She calls herself "Jo" and claims, "No one ever called me ''Joanne'' when I was young, unless they were angry".<14> Early life Rowling was born to Peter James Rowling and Anne Rowling née Volant on 31 July 1965 at Yate, Gloucestershire, England, UK 10 miles (16.1 km) northeast of Bristol.<2><15><16> Her sister Dianne (Di) was born at their home when Rowling was 23 months old.<15> The family moved to the nearby village Winterbourne when Rowling was four. She attended St Michael''s Primary School,<17> a School founded almost 200 years ago by famed abolitionist William Wilberforce<18> and education reformer Hannah More. Her elderly headmaster at St. Michaels, Alfred Dunn, was claimed as the inspiration for the Harry Potter character Albus Dumbledore.<19><20> As a child, Rowling enjoyed writing fantasy stories, which she often read to her sister. "I can still remember me telling her a story in which she fell down a rabbit hole and was fed strawberries by the rabbit family inside it," she recalls, "Certainly the first story I ever wrote down (when I was five or six) was about a rabbit called Rabbit. He got the measles and was visited by his friends, including a giant bee called Miss Bee".<10> At the age of nine, Rowling moved to Tutshill, near Chepstow, South Wales.<15> When Rowling was a young teen, her great aunt, who Rowling said "taught classics and approved of a thirst for knowledge, even of a questionable kind", gave her a very old copy of Jessica Mitford''s autobiography, Hons and Rebels.<21> Mitford became Rowling''s heroine and she subsequently read all of her books.<22> She attended secondary school at Wyedean School and College. Rowling has said of her adolescence, "Hermione is loosely based on me. She''s a caricature of me when I was 11, which I''m not particularly proud of".<23> Sean Harris, her best friend in the Upper Sixth owned a turquoise Ford Anglia, which she says inspired the one in her books. "Ron Weasley isn'ait of Sean, but he really is very Sean-ish."<24> Of her musical tastes of the time, she said "My favorite group in the world is The Smiths. And when I was going through a punky phase, it was The Clash".<25> Rowling read for a BA in French and Classics at the University of Exeter, which she says was a "bit of a shock" as she "was expecting to be amongst lots of similar people–thinking radical thoughts." Once she made friends with "some like-minded people" she says she began to enjoy herself.<26> With a year of study in Paris, Rowling moved to London to work as a researcher and bilingual secretary for Amnesty International. In 1990, while she was on a four-hour-delayed train trip from Manchester to London, she developed the idea for a story of a young boy attending a school of wizardry.<15> When she had reached her Clapham Junction flat, she began to write immediately.<15><27> On December 30, 1990, Rowling’s mother succumbed to a 10-year battle with the condition multiple sclerosis.<15> Rowling commented, “I was writing Harry Potter at the moment my mother died. I had never told her about Harry Potter".<28> Rowling then moved to Porto, Portugal to teach English as a foreign language.<22> While there, she married Portuguese television journalist Jorge Arantes on 16 October 1992.<29> They had one child, Jessica Isabel Rowling Arantes, born 27 July 1993 in Portugal<29> who was named after Jessica Mitford. They separated in November 1993. Their divorce became final on 26 June 1995.<29><30> In December 1994, Rowling and her daughter moved to be near her sister in Edinburgh, Scotland.<15> Unemployed and living on state benefits, she completed her first novel. She did her work in numerous cafés (e.g. Nicolson''s Café and Elephant House Café), whenever she could get Jessica to fall asleep.<15><31> There was a rumour that she wrote in local cafés to escape from her unheated flat, but in a 2001 BBC interview Rowling remarked, "I am not stupid enough to rent an unheated flat in Edinburgh in midwinter. It had heating." Instead, as she stated on the American TV program A&E Biography, one of the reasons she wrote in cafés was because taking her baby out for a walk around was the way to make her child fall asleep, and as soon as she was asleep, she would go into the nearest café and write.<31> Harry Potter Harry Potter books Main article: Harry Potter In 1995, Rowling finished her manuscript for Harry Potter and the Philosopher''s Stone on an old manual typewriter.<32> Upon the enthusiastic response of Bryony Evans, a reader who had been asked to review the book’s first three chapters, the Fulham-based Christopher Little Literary Agents agreed to represent Rowling in her quest for a publisher. The book was handed to twelve publishing houses, all of which rejected it.<33> A year later she was finally given the green light (and a £1500 advance) by editor Barry Cunningham from the small publisher Bloomsbury.<34><33> The decision to take Rowling on was apparently largely due to Alice Newton, the eight-year-old daughter of the company’s chairman, who was given the first chapter to review by her father, and immediately demanded the next.<35> Although Bloomsbury agreed to publish the book, Cunningham says that he advised Rowling to get a day job, since she had little chance of making money in children’s books.<36> Soon after, Rowling received an £8000 grant from the Scottish Arts Council to enable her to continue writing.<32><37> The following spring, an auction was held in the United States for the rights to publish the novel, and was won by Scholastic Inc., for $105,000. Rowling has said she “nearly died” when she heard the news.<38> In June 1997, Bloomsbury published Philosopher’s Stone with an initial print-run of one thousand copies, five hundred of which were distributed to libraries. Today, such copies are valued between £16,000 and &