Avada Kedavra!
Wingardium Leviosa!
And now you are thinking, what in the world are these!?
If you have already watched the film ‘Harry Potter’ or read books in the series, without a shadow of doubt, you’ll understand that such things are spells used in the magical world created by J.K. Rowling in ‘Harry Potter’. The domestication of magic as it is known is what creates nightmares.
But what else, aside from wizards and magic, do you think is their utopia fantasy?
When it comes to J.K. Rowling’s biography, we are looking into a Czech version of the American Dream, with subtle differences. Joanne Rowling was born in Yate, England, with a loaded imagination and love for telling stories. However, there were no such things as easy or simple for Rowling. In her twenties, the bright future she pictured for herself had come crashing down; her mother whom she was very close to died of multiple sclerosis, her first marriage dissolved, and she alone was left to care for her daughter, Jessica as a single mother.
“Even though I had everything material, I did not spare a single day without worrying about money. I was as poor as it is possible to be in modern Britain without the risk of being abyss”, she once confessed.
Attempting to overcome her depression and the excessive burden of distressing circumstances, Rowling spoke of this time in her life as a high point. A low point filled with despair and hopelessness so deep, it was difficult to imagine the dawn; Ah! yet it was indeed then that the magic began to glow embers.
The idea of the ‘Harry Potter’ plan came to J.K. Rowling in probably the most bizarre place possible while on a train from Manchester to London that was over an hour late. She realized she did not have one with her and so simply relaxed in her chair or imagined a boy who wore glasses and later discovered he possessed a wizard. Just one thought sparked what has now become the most popular read book series of all time.
“Anything’s possible if you’ve got enough nerve”, and her this quote had no reference to miracles at all.
In the beginning, the writing process of “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone” was not so smooth. J.K. Rowling could be often found in the cafes with her sleeping infant beside her. She then wrote the entire manuscript on an old typewriter. After completing the writing it was rejected 12 times but it was not the end here. It was then that Bloomsbury Publishing company, which finally published the story, offered encouragement but also warned her during the publishing process to look out for other jobs because no one really considered children’s literature a money-making venture.
The first book was published in 1997 and at that time, every young and old could hardly get bored with the concept of “Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry”. Finally, the seventh and last book “Harry Potter’ was published in July in the year 2007, and Harry Potter is not only a book now, but a business field, which has sold more than 500 million across the globe, translated into 80 languages excluding a couple of films.
The former British single-mother-writer’s rise is exceedingly inspiring. “Rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life…,” she said, the focus being directed to fighting her own personal demons. We remember that at the most important, the darkest periods – the most unexpected revolutions take place.
Rowling didn’t just create magic only on papers, she also turned her success into practical purposes. As any other noble person would do, she gave away a considerable sum of her earnings towards charitable activities mainly to help single mothers as well as for the research of multiple sclerosis.
Moreover, the achievements of Rowling were not limited to material gains and popularity, in her case, it was the example and inspiration her life created to all who dare to dream. Imagine was proved to be more powerful than swords.
“We do not need magic to transform our world. We carry all the power we need inside ourselves already; we have the power to imagine better,” stated Rowling during the commencement program at Harvard.
Her life strongly establishes that rejection does not signify the end, failures are not deadly, and most importantly, dreaming does have its strongest magical spell cast over everyone. When we start from the practical experience of writing in cafés and end up living transformative legacies through incursive idiosyncratic history, it is a tangible story of J.K Rowling – it demonstrates that adeptness and persistence are indeed creative arts. It does not matter how dark the outlook is, there is always a Hogwarts present somewhere to be found.
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Writer,
Jemi Sailuk
Intern, Content Writing Department,
YSSE.