Success Story of J.K. Rowling's Wizarding World | The Inspirational Passage of Life and Connecting Ideas

 Success Story of J.K. Rowling's Wizarding World 

The Inspirational Passage of Life and Connecting Ideas 

Hey friends! How have you been? It's been more than two decades since the first book of the phenomenal series of Harry Potter was released in 1997. There is no denying the fact that the Harry Potter series has been one of the best franchises of books and movies all around the world. Movies earned more than 9.9 billion dollars only through collections and excluding merchandises and all. This would be equal to 7,35,34,27,95,000 Indian Rupees in today's world! Much more than 70,000 crores! And books also collected about 10 billion dollars including merchandises. In total, the series earned more than 1,40,000 crores in Indian rupees or about 20 billion dollars! 

My personal opinion of reading the first book or even the first movie was not quite satisfying. The book was just like any other fantasy... Then, what were the factors that created a difference between these books and movies? And also, was this all very easy for J.K. Rowling to set up? Let's have a brief look about her life and some world records by the Wizarding World.

Early Life

J.K. Rowling is not the real name of Rowling. Her real name was Joanne Rowling. J.K. Rowling is her pen name in which 'K' stands for 'Kathleen', her paternal grandmother. It was added at her publisher's request, who thought a book by a female author might not appeal to the target audience of young boys. Her idea shows that she was purely successful.

Joanne Rowling was born on 31st July 1965. The youngest memory that she has is of her little sister, Dianne, who was born two years later. She, her sister and her parents lived in Winterbourne, Gloucestershire, until Joanne was nine, when the family moved to Tutshill, near Chepstow.

Rowling grew up surrounded by books. Her family loved to read. She says, "I lived for books … I was your basic common-or-garden bookworm, complete with freckles and National Health spectacles."

From an early age, Rowling had a dream to become a writer. She wanted to pursue this dream of hers and had a deep and sheer determination to make this dream come true.

Amazingly, she wrote her first book at the age of six based on a story about a rabbit and the book was named Rabbit, too! Then, she wrote a book, at the age of eleven, which was focused on seven cursed diamonds and the people who owned them! 

Joanne studied at Exeter University, where she read so widely outside her French and Classics syllabus that she clocked up a fine of £50 for overdue books at the university library. Her knowledge of Classics would one day come in handy for creating the spells in the Harry Potter series, some of which are based on Latin.

Her course included a year in Paris. “I lived in Paris for a year as a student,” Jo tweeted after the 2015 terrorist attacks there. “It’s one of my favourite places on earth.”

After her degree, she moved to London and worked in a series of jobs, including one as a researcher at Amnesty International.  “There, in my little office, I read hastily scribbled letters smuggled out of totalitarian regimes by men and women who were risking imprisonment to inform the outside world of what was happening to them.” She said later.  “My small participation in that process was one of the most humbling and inspiring experiences of my life.”

Her early life was quite satisfying but the path to fame is never easy and so, she had to suffer in later phases which ultimately led to her success. We shall see about the origin in our next section.

The Idea For Harry Potter

This section of the success story of J.K. Rowling, though, is the most important part but is the shortest, too. 

J.K. Rowling first had the idea for Harry Potter while delayed on a train travelling from Manchester to London King’s Cross in 1990.

As I mentioned in the title, Joanne connected her ideas with the inspirational passage of her life. The place Harry Potter's idea was born was made one of the ways through which Harry Potter and his friends would catch their train to Hogwarts (fantasy school of Harry Potter in books and movies)! 

Rowling spent the following five years to plan out the massive structure of a story that would be written in seven books and more than ten lakh words. Well, she was not acquainted with the fact, at that time, that this story would give her such a big break. She used to keep thinking about the spells that were mostly written in the Latin language. She wrote mostly in longhand and amassed a mountain of notes, many of which were on scraps of scribbled paper.

These five years were not easy for her to plan out the whole series. She had to face a lot about which we shall talk about in our next section. Her depressing moments and connecting ideas.

The Struggles / The Inspirational Tale

J.K. Rowling had to face a lot and especially after 1990 because the most depressing era of her life had started.

Rowling’s mother died when Rowling was 25. At twenty-six, most likely tired of her office job, consequently, Rowling moved to Portugal to teach English as a foreign language.

She took the Harry Potter notes she had written with her. Her mother's demise was a setback for the author. She was completely disrupted from deep within.

Well, There she met and married a Portuguese journalist named Jorge Arantas. The couple had a child together, Jessica, named after the favourite author of Rowling’s. 

Both of them didn't go along with each other for so long. They both broke up shortly after Jessica's birth in July 1993 with the relationship ending in November. Joanne was left with her daughter alone. Not in much time, Rowling headed back to the United Kingdom to live in Edinburgh, with  Jessica and a suitcase containing the first three chapters of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. She did not earn much for a living. She was left depressed and her mental conditions were growing severe as days passed. 

In Edinburgh, Joanne trained as a teacher and began teaching in the city’s schools, but she continued to write in every spare moment.

Being a single parent, especially a mother, is always a struggle and mental illness occurs and develops gradually. In these days, too, Joanne spent much of her spare time on her book. But these all were not the only struggles Joanne would face at this time. These all were accompanied by a situation where she was left without a job and didn't have much money, developing a financial crisis for her. She merely earned for a living and that too, on welfare. 

All of these struggles left a deep imprint on her ill mind. The mind which was tired with all the things going around in her life. She was overwhelmed because of all these depressing moments and that led her to depression.

That's right, J.K. Rowling suffered from depression because of her mental illness but she wouldn't leave to write the series and plan it, accordingly. This illness of hers gave rise to a special kind of creatures in the Wizarding World, Dementors. These were huge cloaked black hooded figures roaming around mid-air without a face but with the most fearful expressions, as shown in the figure.

These were an inspiration from the negative thoughts in her life. These dementors were the most astonishing creatures known to the wizardkind (as given in books and movies). They don't have eyes but would chase and feed people's happiest memories which would leave the host with a whole lot of negative thoughts. They would feed on them until they would suck the host's soul out of their body. 

Rowling's mother's death is known to be the best inspiration for these magical creatures. It was not the first time when Rowling had connected her real life to her magical books. 

The things I am telling appears to be as short as a paragraph but she struggled for five years and didn't leave her passion. This courage of hers should be praised but unfortunately, the series of her struggles didn't stop till this time, too.

After completing the manuscript of the first three chapters, Rowling went to over more than twelve publishing companies but was rejected for her childish ideas. It's not very easy to see the rejection of one's own book but Rowling was rejected for more than twelve times. 

But, even later, she had full confidence in her storyline and went to more and more publishing companies. She, finally, came to Bloomsbury Children's Books, a small publishing company. The editor rejected her book and Rowling was disheartened again. But that manuscript was read by the editor's eight-year-old daughter who was present in the office at that time. She read the first three chapters and insisted forcefully that she wanted to read the full manuscript. 

The editor, then, decided to publish the book but ensured Joanne that she wouldn't earn much money for a children's book. She had received a written letter for that and she remarks it "the best letter I had ever received". 

Only 500 initial books were published in June 1997 and distributed among stores in London and the United Kingdom. The book gained high popularity among children. 

The book experienced great success – it sold 300,000 copies in two years in the U.K. and earned honours and recognition. Rowling then sold the book to Scholastic in the U.S. From there, her success gained speed as she accepted a seven-figure movie deal with Warner Bros. by 1998. Her fame spiked again in 2000 with the worldwide premiere of the fourth book. She wrote the 636 pages in just one year.

The first editions of Harry Potter have been sold in auctions and a book bought for £1 was sold for more than £46,000!

This was Rowling's swift rise to fame. The book which was rejected by twelve publishing companies even gave a chance for Bloomsbury to see an international standard. Rowling's popularity was not only her success but it was a high deal of profit for the publishing companies too i.e. Scholastic and Bloomsbury.

Books To Movies

J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter and The Philosopher's Stone became wildly popular all around the globe as the children's most favourite books.

Thousands of children sent fan mails to their best author. After all that she suffered, she found a sudden rise to stardom. Her mental illness was cured with the success of her book. The first part of Harry Potter has now sold over more than 120 million copies all around. It is counted in the top ten most sold books ever and the counting is incessantly increasing till this moment even after more than two decades of the book.

As told earlier, this series was sold to Warner Bros. in 1998, so the company decided to bring this topic to the cinematic world. This led to the arrival of the first Harry Potter Movie in 2001. You can just estimate the popularity of the book. The book was published in 1997 and the movie was released just four years later!

After a lot of auditions, fans' favourite Harry Potter found a face. The face of Daniel Radcliffe. The movie was basically focused on children and their excitement. It starred Rupert Grint as Ron Weasley and Emma Watson as Hermoine Granger (Harry's best friends). The director, Chris Columbus, had put a lot of magical stuff for children but the movie seemed to be quite boring for adults. The movie managed to collect 950 million dollars and that's a huge amount!

But in the second part, the series held breaths of people and even adults enjoyed all the magic. But still, the movie was basically for children, but from the third instalment in the series, the Wizarding World grabbed a darker tone and a concentrated storyline between the good and the evil. Magic is an old fashioned notion and especially pleases children but the third movie showed a side that only children weren't meant to enjoy the franchise. The Magical tone seemed to become darker and darker as each movie went on. The franchise dragged adults, too! As a fan of Harry Potter, I understand why the series is remarked as 'too dark for magic' but that suits. 

A franchise which started from the criteria of Children Audience had shifted to the criteria of Young- Adult Childhood audience! People saw the children grow over time. Character development was highly emphasized for the franchise and the audience connected themselves with the adventures of the trio. 

This image is of the premiere of the final instalment of the series. This movie was released with two main subtitles 'It All Ends' and 'The Finale of the Worldwide Phenomenon' and that was true, too. Why is it true will be seen in later sections! This was a brief description of the movies of the franchise.

Other Extensions Related to the Wizarding World 

And

J.K. Rowling Further Life

After a record-breaking movie franchise of Harry Potter that ended in 2011, many fans thought that this magical era had ended but J.K. Rowling is not a person who would disappoint their fans. She had, earlier, written two companion volumes in the same magical world but with different timelines. Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them and Quidditch Through the Ages were published in March 2001 in aid of Comic Relief.  In December 2008, a third companion volume, The Tales of Beedle the Bard was published in aid of her international children’s charity, Lumos.

After the arrival of Fantastic Beasts, this series of magical events was given a name other than Harry Potter: WIZARDING WORLD! 

In 2012, J.K. Rowling’s digital company Pottermore was launched, which became Wizarding World Digital in 2019. Pottermore Publishing continues to be the global digital publisher of Harry Potter, Fantastic Beasts and the Wizarding World. 

The Fantastic Beasts was also decided to be brought to the cinematic universe in 2016. The movie Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them was released to critical acclaim in November the same year. J.K. Rowling made her screenwriting debut with the film's release. This was the first in a series of new adventures featuring Magizoologist Newt Scamander and set before the time of Harry Potter.  The second in the series, Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald, was released in 2018 and the third instalment is about to go into production. J.K. Rowling has also worked with playwright Jack Thorn and director John Tifanny to work on a very new project for the stage: Harry Potter and the Cursed Child Parts One and Two opened in London and is now playing in the USA and Australia.

In March 2020, J.K. Rowling and Wizarding World partners launched the Harry Potter At Home initiative to entertain children stuck at home during the Covid-19 pandemic with the first Harry Potter book read aloud by celebrities on video, and made available for free through audiobook and ebook streaming.  In May 2020, she announced another initiative to help families in lockdown – The Ickabog, a story for younger children serialised for free online, and an accompanying illustration competition (check out the site here).

Now, that's too much about the Wizarding World, let's talk about the creations of J.K. Rowling other than Harry Potter. This data has been received from the official site of J.K. Rowling.

In 2012, J.K. Rowling published her first novel for adults, The Casual Vacancy, which has now been translated into 44 languages and was adapted for TV by the BBC in 2015.

Under the pseudonym Robert Galbraith, J.K. Rowling also writes crime novels, featuring private detective Cormoran Strike. The first of these, The Cuckoo’s Calling, was published to critical acclaim in 2013, at first without its author’s true identity being known.  The Silkworm followed in 2014, Career of Evil in 2015 and Lethal White in 2018. The first three books have been adapted for a major television series for BBC One, produced by Brontë Film and Television and Lethal White is in production. The fifth book, Troubled Blood, will be published in September 2020.

J.K. Rowling’s 2008 Harvard commencement speech was published in 2015 as an illustrated book, Very Good Lives: The Fringe Benefits of Failure and the Importance of Imagination, and sold in aid of Lumos and university-wide financial aid at Harvard.

Later, J.K. Rowling married Dr Neil Murray in 2001. They live in Edinburgh with their son, David (born 2003) and daughter, Mackenzie (born 2005).

World Records

This success story has been one-way still. There has been no criticism but there will come a point where you might think Harry Potter wasn't written by J.K. Rowling but that we'll talk later. For the next two sections, we shall go on talking about the World Records of Harry Potter and what makes it different.

The Harry Potter books and movies have broken many records and even established some:-

• In its first 24 hours on sale, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows the seventh and final instalment of Harry Potter that officially went on sale at 12:01 a.m. Saturday, sold a record 8.3 million copies in the United States, according to Scholastic Inc., the book’s publisher. In 2007 Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows became the fastest-selling book ever, selling 2.65 million in the first 24 hours in the UK. That exceeded the 6.9 million copies that Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, the sixth in the series, sold in its first 24 hours (Only U.S) on sale two years ago.

•  The Harry Potter series is now published in 80 languages, and over 500 million copies have been sold across the world. It makes it the third most sold book in the world in which the first position is occupied by THE BIBLE with 3.9 billion sales in the last fifty years. Harry Potter's first part sold over 120 million copies and makes its position in the top ten books ever sold. And all the parts of Harry Potter are counted in the first fifty most sold books with an approximate 65 million sales from each book.

• When the Harry Potter movie franchise came to an end, it was the highest-grossing franchise of the world at that time. Now the position is occupied by Marvel Studios but even nine years later, the franchise is on the third position after Marvel Studios and Star Wars. James Bond Series follow Harry Potter and the Wizarding World.

• Harry Potter movies together make the best movie franchise ever in terms of rating by Rotten Tomatoes, one of the biggest movie-reviewing companies. I don't count the parts of Fantastic Beasts in this criteria. I count where the franchise's had a conclusive end. Harry Potter's average score of all the eight movies is exactly 84.5%. Marvel follows the same criteria. I don't count Spider-Man: Far From Home in this or even the web series. Then, Marvel's average score is 84.45% but if we count the latest Spider-Man movie, then Marvel exceeds the Harry Potter franchise by a very small decimal number. Its average score, then, is about 84.69%. This surpasses Harry Potter but by a very minute difference as it was preceded by a very minute difference!
• J.K. Rowling has received many awards for her writing skills; let's have a look!

1. The Robert F Kennedy Ripple of Hope Award 2019
2. Companion of Honour, for services to literature and philanthropy, 2017
3. PEN America Literary Service Award, 2016
4. Freedom of the City of London, 2012
5. Hans Christian Andersen Award, Denmark, 2010
6. Chevalier de la Legion d’Honneur: France, 2009
7. Lifetime Achievement Award, British Book Awards, 2008
8. South Bank Show Award for Outstanding Achievement, 2008
9. James Joyce Award, University College Dublin, 2008
10. The Edinburgh Award, 2008
11. Commencement Day Speaker, Harvard University, USA, 2008
12. Blue Peter Gold Badge, 2007
13. WH Smith Fiction Award, 2004
14. Prince of Asturias Award for Concord, Spain, 2003
15. Order of the British Empire (OBE), 2001
16. Children’s Book of the Year, British Book Awards, 1998 and 1999
17. Booksellers Association Author of the Year, 1998 and 1999

What Makes the Idea of J.K. Rowling Different?

As I said in the starting of this article, Harry Potter is just a book of fantasy like any other but we will see the factors that make it so special, long-lasting and different.

The first and foremost reason lies in the writing of J.K. Rowling that connected people through hearts and the scriptwriters for the movies. 

It portrays its protagonist as searching for and eventually embracing power. That is what adolescence, and indeed life is all about. According to Lois Lowry, author of The Giver, another reason for the series’ popularity is that it includes “the same things that exist in ordinary, unmagical life: the same uncertainties, missteps and pitfalls, the same mentors, villains, and conflicts between light and dark: all writ large by the nature of the genre.” In other words, Harry Potter is popular because people can relate to it. Though it takes place in a fantasy setting, the problems that Harry deals with are all too human. The genre just reveals these issues.

Harry Potter, not just only focuses its fantasy but also, it's well-tended in the criteria of love, friendship and character development!

Harry Potter also lasted so long because so many people grew up with Harry. By doing so, Rowling secured fans for life for the boy wizard, who will most likely pass the love on to everyone they possibly can. 

Daniel Radcliffe's Evolution in Every Movie!

People connected themselves with these children and that's one of the reason, it's so popular!

Another reason for Harry Potter’s longevity is that the series has a positive effect on people. 

J.K. Rowling Conspiracy 

Full of wizards, muggles, spells and Quidditch, the Harry Potter franchise is a global phenomenon that still garners the support of loyal fans to this day. The author of the Harry Potter series, J.K. Rowling, is the first person to become a billionaire from being a novelist. In 2011, the movie series was the highest-grossing film franchise ever. Her swift rise to fame has caused some to question how that would even be possible for one person to achieve, sparking the conspiracy that Rowling didn’t write the series.

As I told earlier, J.K. Rowling was a poor and struggling single mother when she planned outlines for the books on napkins. Her rags-to-riches story inspires her readers and staunch supporters. Yet, some people find her story hard to believe. She wrote six hefty books that grossed a staggering 250 million in copies sold in the short span of 10 years. Through her success, Rowling became a household name in just a few years, even though she started without any notoriety. While her story may seem impossible, luck and timing can likely be attributed to her massive success.

While living in Portugal, Rowling continued writing stories about the boy who went to wizarding school. Her book was picked by a small publisher and the book was published about two years later! Quite fast!

The book found great success and the world records set by the franchise are extraordinary.

Her fast rise to success and quick pace of churning out books caught the attention of the Norwegian Film Director, Nina Grünfeld. Grünfeld sparked controversy by questioning whether Rowling truly wrote Harry Potter. She believed Rowling’s hopeful story was no more than a fabrication by major corporations looking to profit off the rags-to-riches story. She argued that there was no way Rowling could’ve experienced this amount of success by coincidence, as the publishing and media industries had a rigid power structure that would make it impossible for Rowling to reach that level of fame. Her conspiracy theory claimed that a team of writers collaborated on the series and that Rowling herself is just an actress.

Other Norweigan publishers have refuted Grünfeld’s claims, pointing out that there are flaws in Rowling’s writing that prove she wrote the novels in a short period. While major corporations could probably pull off the elaborate lie, the history behind Rowling’s story is too convincing. There are numerous cafes in Edinburgh that publicize that Rowling worked on Harry Potter in their facilities, which would be hard to orchestrate among that many business owners. The complexity of Rowling’s novels also may make it seem like multiple writers collaborated on the series, as the details of spells and rules to Quidditch are impressive and imaginative. Yet, readers can’t underestimate Rowling’s capabilities, as she did graduate from the University of Exeter, a prestigious and high-ranking university.

The one aspect of Rowling’s story that seems far-fetched is the publishing of her first book. It’s difficult to get published as an unknown author. While Rowling faced rejection before she got an offer, she still published her first book fairly quickly after she wrote it. Besides, she was published under a small publisher, so it seems unusual that she would’ve been able to get the exposure for her series to gain speed.

While Rowling’s small, humble beginning turned to international recognition may seem impossible, her big break can likely be attributed to her uniqueness in the publishing industry. Rowling created a series so beloved because of its originality. The conspiracy that she didn’t write Harry Potter is compelling, but her history was too specific to be a fabrication. I don't confirm or even believe this fabrication or imagination of the Norwegian Director but this was something that should be known to all!

J.K. Rowling has also been in conspiracies regarding her comments on twitter but she has apologized for that and the reasons for those comments even mark a page on her official website.

Conclusion/ My Opinion

As a real Harry Potter fan, I wanted to write this success story for a long time. J.K. Rowling is my personal inspiration and my habit of writing novels was started with the line- 'If J.K. Rowling could do it, why can't I?'. There's no doubt on J.K. Rowling's capabilities and she has provided a fantasy franchise which can be seen by all ages and groups of people without getting bored. 

Her success story inspires us not to fail in life because when things start to happen, they take a sudden face-lift and if you were determined to your success, then there's no man, woman, child, power or even anything else that would stop you!

In the end, I would like to say, 'ENJOY READING!'

"Happiness can be found, even in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on the light."

 -J.K. Rowling

 

- Abhinav Srivastava