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00:00Women who change the world.
00:30Women who change the world.
00:32Whether you come back by page or by the big screen, Hogwarts will always be there to
00:36welcome you home.
00:37J.K.
00:38Rowling.
00:39J.K.
00:40Rowling was born in Chipping, Sawdbury, July 31, 1965.
00:45Her childhood was generally happy, although she does remember getting teased because of
00:50her name, Rowling, Rowling Pin, by her less than ingenious school friends.
00:55J.K.
00:56Rowling says she never really warmed to her own name, although she does remember having
01:01a fondness for the name Potter from quite an early age.
01:04J.K.
01:05Rowling studied at St. Michael's Primary School in Gloucestershire before moving to Chepstow,
01:11South Wales at the age of nine.
01:14From an early age, J.K.
01:16Rowling had the ambition to be a writer.
01:19She often tried her hand at writing, although little came from her early efforts.
01:24Aged six, she wrote a book about a rabbit with measles.
01:28It was in 1990 that J.K.
01:31Rowling first conceived of the idea about Harry Potter.
01:35As she recalls, it was on a long train journey from Manchester to London, when she began forming
01:40in her mind the characters of the series.
01:43At the forefront was a young boy, at that time not aware that he was a wizard.
01:48The train was delayed for over four hours, but she didn't have a pen and was too shy to
01:53ask for one.
01:55On arriving at her flat in Clapham Junction, she began work on writing the book immediately,
02:01although it would take several years to come to fruition.
02:05It was also in December of 1990 that J.K.
02:08Rowling lost her mother, who died of multiple sclerosis.
02:11J.K. Rowling was very close to her mother, and she felt the loss deeply.
02:16Her own loss gave an added poignancy to the death of Harry Potter's mother in her book.
02:22She says her favorite scene in the Philosopher's Stone is the Mirror of Veracet, where Harry
02:27sees his parents in the mirror.
02:29In 1991, J.K.
02:31Rowling left England to get a job as an English teacher in Portugal.
02:35It was there she met her first husband, Jorge Orantes, and together they had a child, Jessica.
02:42However, after a couple of years, the couple split after a fierce argument, where by all
02:47accounts, J.K. Rowling was thrown out of the house.
02:51In December 1993, Rowling returned to the UK, moving to Edinburgh, where she tried to finish
02:58her first book.
02:59She was surviving on state benefits, and bringing up her daughter as a single parent.
03:04She would often go to Edinburgh cafes to work on the book, whilst her child had a nap.
03:09Eventually, she finished her first copy of the Philosopher's Stone and sent it off to
03:15various agents.
03:16She found an agent, Christopher, who spent over a year trying to get a publisher.
03:21It was rejected by twelve major publishing houses.
03:24But eventually, a quite small publisher, Bloomsbury, agreed to take the book on.
03:30The editor, Barry Cunningham, also agreed to pay her in advance of fifteen hundred pounds.
03:37The decision to take on the book was, in large part, due to his eight-year-old daughter's
03:41enthusiastic reception of the first chapter.
03:45Within a few weeks of publication , book sales really started to take off.
03:51The initial print run was only one thousand, five hundred of which went to libraries.
03:57In 1998, Warner Bros. secured the film rights to the books, giving a seven-figure sum.
04:05The films have magnified the success of the books, making Harry Potter into one of the
04:10most recognizable media products.
04:13Under the close guidance of J.K. Rowling, the films have sought to stay close to the
04:18original plot.
04:19Also at J.K. Rowling's request, all the actors are British and are filmed in Britain.
04:25On the 21st of December 2006, J.K. Rowling finished her final book of the Harry Potter series.
04:33In 2017, according to Forbes, her estimated wealth stands at $650 million.
04:41It would be higher, but she has donated substantial sums to charity.
04:46The global Harry Potter brand is estimated to be worth £7 billion.
04:56Women Who Change the World
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