J K Rowling
Born on 31st of July 1965
Quotes from J K Rowling
'There are some things you can''... More
J.K. Rowling, OBE is widely known as the British author of the 'Harry Potter' series of books. She was born Joanne "Jo" Rowling on 31st July 1965, in Yate, Gloucestershire.
The idea for the Harry Potter fantasy books came to her whilst on a train journey between Manchester and London in 1990, and they have since won multiple awards and sold nearly 400 million copies worldwide.
At the age of nine, she moved with her family to the Gloucestershire village of Tutshill, near South Wales. She attended secondary school at Wyedean School and College,
leaving in 1983 to study French at Exeter University. Following a year in Paris, she moved to London to work for Amnesty International. In 1991, following her Mother's death from multiple sclerosis, Rowling relocated to Portugal where she taught English. She was briefly married to a Portuguese journalist with whom she has a daughter, Jessica. In December 1994 Rowling moved to Edinburgh to be near her sister, Dianne, and it was here that she succumbed to depression, living as a single mother on benefits and struggling to complete her first novel.
Twelve publishing houses rejected the first Harry Potter book until Bloomsbury cautiously agreed to go with it, publishing just an initial 1000 copies in 1997. The rest is history and there are now seven books in the series: Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (1997), Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (1998), Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (1999), Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2000), Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2003),
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (2005), and the concluding Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (2007). The last four Potter books are the fastest selling books in history.
The first five have all been released as movies, with Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince in production and the final Deathly Hallows instalment due to be released in two parts in 2010 and 2011. The 2008 Sunday Times Rich List ranked her the twelfth richest woman in Britain. She is notable for her philanthropy and in 2000 established the Volant Charitable Trust to
aid women and children and combat poverty and social inequality. Rowling is also president of the charity, One Parent Families. In December 2001 Rowling married anaesthetist Neil Murray, with whom she now has two more children. She has recently said that she wants to dedicate "lots" of her time to her family, but is currently "sort of writing two things", one for children and the other for adults. She currently owns an estate in Aberfeldy, Perthsire and lives between here and her other two homes in London and Edinburgh.
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