The Success Story of JK Rowling, The Dreamy Storyteller

This blog post is the success story of JK Rowling.

Some personalities like Abraham Lincoln struggled a lot since childhood. They might not have had a clear cut view of their future as a child. But their sheer will to persevere and prove their worth to the world made them do unfathomable deeds. On the other hand, personalities like Oprah Winfrey knew what they wanted to be, even as a child. Even when life threw garbage against them, they used it and built their own empire. 

JK Rowling is very much like Oprah Winfrey. Since she was a child, she wanted to be a writer. Her inborn talent was obvious to everyone around her. But despite that, she struggled a lot in life. 

At one point in time, as a single mother who depended on government welfare benefits, she struggled for survival. Yet, she overcame all those years of hardships and became the highest-paid British writer. Her Harry Potter books sold more than 500 million copies worldwide and became the best-selling book series of all time. Her books have been translated into 80 different languages. 

Read the story of the woman who helped millions of people forget their sorrows by boarding the Hogwarts express and traveling into the magical world. 

Early life

Birth

Our story begins in 1964 when teenagers Peter James Rowling and Anne Volant met on the train from King's Cross. They were both 18 years old. Peter was in the navy, and Anne was in the women's branch of the UK's royal navy. Their destination was the headquarters of the 45 Commando in Arbroath, where they were stationed. They were both seated across each other in the same compartment. 

Even though it was their first meeting, they were both instantly attracted to each other. When Anne complained that it was cold, Peter, like a gentleman, offered his coat. Several hours later, when they got down in Scotland, they have already fallen in love. In a few months, they both quit the navy, got married in March the next year, and settled in Yate. Peter found a job as an apprentice engineer in a factory in Bristol, a town located ten miles from Yate. 

Four months later, on July 31st 1965, a girl was born. They named her Joanne, who would later become the famous JK Rowling. Two years later, their second child was born, and they named her Dianne.

Winterbourne

A year later, Joanne and her family moved to a new house in Winterbourne. Her parents filled their new house with books because both of them loved to read.

When she was four years old, Joanne got measles and had to stay in bed all day. To cheer her up, her father read out a children's novel called 'The Wind in the Willows.' This story of four animals - The mole, the rat, the toad, and the badger, became Joanne's earliest memory of books. This inspired Joanne to read other storybooks, which were spread around the house. 

Of all the children's stories she read, Joanne particularly loved the stories of Richard Scarry, which often featured animals with human characteristics. Inspired by his books, she made up her own stories about imaginary creatures, which she told to her sister Dianne. Joanne and her sister wanted a rabbit so badly. So, many of these early stories of Joanne focused on rabbits. The influence of this book on Joanne is also obvious in Harry Potter, in which animals and magical creatures are portrayed to be intelligent and come to the aid of Harry and his friends, when they are in dire situations.

The rabbit called Rabbit

When Joanne and her family moved to Winterbourne, their mother became friends with their neighbor called Ruby Potter. Joanne, Dianne, Ruby's son Ian Potter and daughter Vikky Potter often played together. One of the many games they played was the game of Witches and Wizards. To play this game, which Joanne invented, the boys would dress up as wizards, and the girls would dress up as witches. Thus, since an early age, Joanne had an interest in magic, which could have inspired her to write Harry Potter later.

Joanne liked her neighbors' family name Potter much more than her own family name. So, several years later, when she started writing the Harry Potter books, she named the protagonist Harry Potter. After all, Potter is the family name that she liked the most, and Harry is the boy's name she liked the most. 

Tutshill

In 1974, when Joanne was nine years old, her family moved once again, this time to a town called Tutshill. Joanne created several elements in the Harry Potter world based on her real-life experiences in this place. For starters, the old stone cottage in which they lived, has a cupboard under the stairs, much like the one in which Harry Potter lives. It also has a trapdoor that leads to a cellar, like the one that the three-headed dog guards in 'Harry Potter and the Philosopher's stone.' The Forest of Dean, near which Joanne's house was located, is where Harry and Hermione camp during their search of the Horcruxes. 

Second primary school

Even though Joanne used many elements of this house in the Harry Potter series, life there wasn't exactly a happy one. Her first day at her primary school was catastrophic. In a test organized by Slyvia Morgan, a teacher at that school, Joanne received only half a mark out of ten. As a result, she was made to sit with less intellectual students. Joanne, whom the teachers in her primary school in Winterbourne praised for her imagination and story-telling skills, couldn't take it lightly. She wanted to prove herself. So, she worked hard, got good marks, and was eventually made to sit with the highly intellectual students. But despite proving herself, Mrs.Sylvia Morgan still appeared strict and intimidating to Joanne. 

As a young girl, Joanne Rowling read so many books. She was also a know-it-all, pretty much like Hermione Granger. Indeed, she created Hermione Granger based on her 11-year old self. 

Growing up

Secondary school

When she moved to secondary school, she was taught Chemistry by John Nettleship. He was a strict teacher. Joanne didn't particularly enjoy his classes. Even though Joanne was a brilliant student, in Nettleship's classes, she was more like Harry Potter in Snape's class, rather than Hermione. 

Indeed, Sylvia Morgan and John Nettleship affected Joanne's life so much that she created Severus Snape based on them. 

The Lord of the Rings

But besides John Nettleship, at this age, Joanne Rowling had nothing to complain. At this age, Joanne was starting to read more books. During this time, she read 'Lord of the Rings' and fell in love with it. Even though she didn't use any characters from the Lord of the Rings, Lord of the Rings might have motivated her to create a story of her own.

After all, the similarities between both the stories are not easy to ignore. The protagonists in both stories are orphans living with their uncle or his family. In both stories, the plot begins on the birthdays of the protagonists. In both stories, the villains are extremely powerful beings who have lost power and seek to retain it. Moreover, both the villains can be killed only by destroying their source of power, either the ring or the Horcruxes. Gandalf, in Lord of the Rings, is an old, but strong man who is respected by his comrades and feared by his enemies. In the Harry Potter series, Dumbledore holds a similar position.

Another book that Joanne fell in love with, during her teenage, was 'Emma,' written by Jane Austen. She read it more than 20 times. She also started liking pop music. Thus, Joanne was growing up to be a happy teenager. 

Anne's failing health

However, Joanne's life took a turn when she was 15 years old. Her mother was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis. It is a disease in which one's own immune system attacks the fatty material around the nerve fibers. As a result, the nerves stop working properly. When this happens, the brain can't send signals to different parts of the body properly. Eventually, the victim becomes incapable of movement. Thus, the disease is a ticking time bomb.

When Joanne's family found out about her mother's disease, they were devastated. Joanne knew that her mother would be completely paralyzed one day. Looking at her mother suffering from this progressively destructive disease destroyed Joanne. But, she could only watch helplessly, because there is no cure for the disease. Knowing that her mother's days are numbered is the worst thing that could ever happen to any child. So, slowly, Joanne started to fall into depression.

Sean Harris and his car

But luckily, for Joanne, a knight came to save her from the depression. Even though he didn't ride a horse, he drove a car. To save her from the depression, a new pupil in her school, Sean Harris, often took Joanne for a ride in his blue Ford Anglia car. They went to concerts and bars to help Joanne forget about her sorrows. To Joanne, Sean's car became a symbol of hope that rescued her from depression. Like it came to Joanne's aid, in the second Harry Potter book, it comes to Harry and Ron's aid when the entrance to the platform 9 3/4 is blocked. 

Thus, Sean became a very close friend who also encouraged Joanne's secret desire to become a writer. Joanne never forgot what Sean did for her. So, she dedicated the second book in the Harry Potter series to him. 

An idea changes Joanne's life

The University of Exeter

Thanks to Sean, Joanne could focus on her studies once again. She wanted to get into Oxford. But even though she secured good grades, she couldn't get a place in Oxford or Cambridge. So, in 1982, she started studying at the University of Exeter. Joanne wanted to study English. But her parents thought that a Bachelor's degree in a foreign language would give her the opportunity of working as a bilingual secretary. This would give her a stable job when compared to a job in literature. So, they convinced her to take up the Bachelor of Arts in French and Classics. 

At the university, she often borrowed books and read so much outside her syllabus. Once, she even ended up paying a fine of £50 to the University library for the overdue books. The additional reading didn't help her with the exams. But it helped her come up with names for the spells in her Harry Potter books. 

After spending her third year in Paris teaching at a school, Joanne graduated in 1986. After graduating, Joanne started working as a bilingual secretary in London. Even though her work as a secretary was very important, she didn't like it. So, she never took notes during meetings. Instead, she just wrote down ideas for the two adult novels she was writing at that time. 

The train ride

Anne Rowling passes away

But all her excitement and happiness of creating a new magical world was shortlived. A few months later, on December 30th, 1990, Anne Rowling passed away after fighting Multiple Sclerosis for ten years. Even though Joanne had gone home for Christmas, she didn't realize how ill her mother was. So, she didn't even tell her about Harry Potter. The loss of her mother, to whom Joanne was very attached all her life, affected her terribly. So, she used her own feelings of loss to describe how much Lily loved Harry and how much her death affected him. 

After several depressing months, Joanne found an advertisement in The Guardian to teach English as a foreign language in Portugal. The advertisement gave Joanne hope. So, looking for a fresh start, she decided to leave England and all the sorrows behind and move to Portugal. 

No man's land

Porto

Porto, the second-largest city in Portugal, was a busy city. When Joanne moved to Porto, she had to share her apartment with two other girls. The three girls who were working in the same school taught only from 5 pm to 10 pm. After their work, they often went to nightclubs. Since she had to teach only during the night, during the day, Joanne often went to coffee shops and started writing Harry Potter books while sipping a cup of coffee. 

First Marriage and first child

After 18 months of living a carefree life, she met Jorge Arantes, a Portuguese journalist. Even though he was three years younger than her, they connected due to their shared interest in Jane Austin's books. Even though their relationship was passionate, they were both possessive and jealous. Moreover, the money Joanne earned was spent by Jorge to search for meaningful employment, which he couldn't find. Both these factors threatened to end their relationship. However, the tides turned when Joanne's first pregnancy ended in miscarriage. Even though it was a sad moment, this brought them closer. So, in spite of the fact Joanne and Jorge had arguments often and her friends advised her to leave him, they got married on October 16th, 1992. 

Life after marriage wasn't so easy for Joanne. Jorge not only argued with Joanne but also physically abused her. Despite that, Joanne stayed with him because she wanted to make the marriage work. Meanwhile, Joanne got pregnant once again, and, on July 27th, 1993, their daughter Jessica Isabel Rowling Arantes was born. Despite Joanne's efforts, the marriage reached a dead end within a few months. On that fateful day, Jorge slapped Joanne and threw her out of their home. Joanne, who understood that their marriage had reached an end, returned with the police, took her daughter and left to the UK.

As poor as possible, without being homeless

Living on government welfare

After returning to the UK, Joanne couldn't find a job. But she didn't want to trouble her sister and her husband, who let her stay with them. She couldn't stay with her father either because her father had remarried. So, she rented a small apartment and started living on government welfare. 

But the small apartment filled with rodents was not an ideal place for a baby to grow up. So, she started searching for a better apartment. But, nobody was willing to rent an apartment to a single mom living on government welfare.

After a long search, she found an unfurnished apartment. With the help of the money her old friend Sean Harris lent her, she was able to rent it. Her friends donated some of their furniture and helped her furnish it. Finally, she was in a better apartment. But even though she was in a better apartment now, Joanne wasn't happy. 

Depression and Dementors

Whenever she visited her friends' house, she would look at the dolls their children had. She compared it with Jessica's dolls, which could fit in a shoebox. This made her very sad. She understood that she didn't have enough money to provide for her daughter. Indeed, she was living as poor as possible without being homeless. So, Joanne, who, as a kid, was similar to Hermione, came to see herself as a failure seven years after graduation. Moreover, she was often overcome by feelings of guilt for being a failed mother. So, she fell deep into depression and often wanted to kill herself. The depression she underwent during this time inspired her to create the dementors in the Harry Potter series. Her own feelings during this time helped her write how Harry feels when he meets a dementor.

But despite her depression, Joanne wanted to keep writing the Harry Potter books. But a crying baby and an apartment that reminded her of her failures did not provide a great atmosphere to get her creative juices flowing. She longed for the ambiance of a coffee shop. However, living on state benefits, she couldn't afford to spend money on coffee.

Nicholson's cafe

Luckily for her, her brother-in-law opened a coffee shop called Nicholson's cafe. Since she was family, they let her sit at the coffee shop for hours drinking a single cup of coffee. There, Joanne would write the Harry Potter books while rocking Jessica to sleep in her baby stroller. 

Meanwhile, her husband, Jorge, had come to the UK looking for her and their daughter. Scared, Joanne obtained an order of restraint against him and applied for a divorce. This forced Jorge to go back to Portugal. 

For several months, Joanne continued writing in coffee shops and typing on an old typewriter upon returning home. Finally, in 1995, five years after the idea of the boy who lived came to her mind, Joanne completed the manuscript for her first book.

Tides change

Christopher Little Literary Agency

A young reader in the agency had read the three chapters and liked it a lot. So, instead of throwing it away, because the agency didn't handle children's books, she and her colleague persuaded Christopher Little to sign up Rowling. Thus, the Christopher Little Literary Agency became the literary representative of Joanne Rowling.

After signing a deal with Joanne, the agency sent the 200-page script to various publishers. Most of them rejected it. Finally, after one year and 12 rejections, Bloomsbury publication agreed to publish it. They gave Joanne an advance of £1,500. 

Bloomsbury publication

When Bloomsbury's chairman, Barry Cunningham, gave the first chapter to his 8-year-old daughter to read, she read the first chapter eagerly and demanded the next chapter immediately. 

Barry Cunningham knew Joanne's book would sell. But he did not think that Joanne can make considerable money out of it as it was a children's book. He believed that the adult audience will only like crime thrillers and romance novels, but not children's stories. So, he advised Joanne to get a full-time job. 

Heeding to Barry's advice, Joanne decided to become a teacher. But to become a teacher, she needed a Postgraduate degree. Therefore, she started pursuing a post-graduate degree in modern languages at Moray House, which is now part of Edinburgh University. She got her post-graduate degree a year later, in July 1996.

Publishing her first book

Bloomsbury anticipated that boys would not read a book written by a female author. So, they urged Joanne to choose a different pen name. They suggested her to pick a name with two initials. So, Joanne Rowling chose the name J. K. Rowling. J stands for Joanne, and K stands for Kathleen, her paternal grandmother. 

Meanwhile, JK Rowling applied to The Scottish Arts Council for a grant to help her write the second book. After reviewing her application, the council awarded her a grant of £8,000. 

The success story of JK Rowling

Surging popularity

Five months later, the book won the Nestle Smarties Book Prize. This prize, awarded to the book which got the most votes from children and was written by a British author in the preceding year, stood testimony to Harry Potter's surging popularity in the UK. The book also won other prestigious awards, like The British book award for being the Children's book of the year and the Children's book award. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, published in July 1998, also won the Smarties Prize. 

In 1998, Warner Bros. wanted to capitulate on the growing popularity of the Harry Potter books. So, they paid a seven-figure sum and purchased the film rights to the first two Harry Potter stories.

By March 1999, the first two Harry Potter books had sold almost 300,000 copies each, in the UK alone. In December 1999, the third Harry Potter book, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, was published. It, too, won the Nestle Smarties Book Prize. This made JK Rowling the first author to win the award three times in a row. One year later, in July 2000, the fourth book, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, was published. But JK Rowling removed the book from the Smarties Prize competition to give other books a fair chance of winning the prize. 

Slowing down

All JK Rowling ever wanted was to be able to support herself and her daughter. However, by the year 2000, JK Rowling had become wealthy beyond her wildest imagination. But this popularity came at a cost. Unlike before, she couldn't decide when to write her next book. Once the first book became famous, she was forced to write the consequent books in subsequent years. The amount of pressure it produced was overwhelming for JK Rowling. So, after the fourth book was published, she slowed down and published her next book only three years later. 

In 2001, the first Harry Potter movie was released. It became an instant hit, grossing almost 1 billion dollars. It marked the beginning of a movie franchise, which, as of 2019, is the third highest-grossing movie franchise. A month after the movie's release, she married Neil Murray, a Scottish doctor. Their son was born two years later. 

The sixth book was released in 2005, and the seventh book was released in 2007. Both these books broke sales records, selling 9 million copies and 11 million copies, respectively, within 24 hours of release. 

Even though the Harry Potter books made JK Rowling famous, they were not the only books she wrote. In 2012, she published 'A Casual Vacancy,' a political story in a small British town. The book sold one million copies in three weeks. 

Other Books

In 2013, JK Rowling wrote a novel called 'The Cuckoo's Calling' under the pen name Robert Galbraith. The novel was rejected by a few publishers. She later published the rejection letters on Twitter to serve as a motivation for budding writers. One of the rejection letters suggested that Galbraith should join a writers' group or writing course to get constructive criticism on his novel. The novel was eventually published and obtained great reviews. However, a family friend let loose that Robert Galbraith was actually JK Rowling. Soon, the sales of the book jumped 150,000%. As a result, the book, which was in the 4709th position in Amazon, became the best-selling book of the year. Since then, she has written four more parts of the novel. 

Giving back

Charities

JK Rowling might be filthy rich now. But, even after becoming rich, JK Rowling didn't forgot her humble beginnings and the turmoils she went through. So, she wanted to help other people like her. Therefore, she contributed to several charities. In 2003, she set aside a day a week for charity.

As her mother died due to Multiple Sclerosis, JK Rowling has contributed more than 25 million dollars to a center that treats the disease. She has also donated the profits from two of her books, 'Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them' and 'Quidditch through the ages' to fight poverty in the UK and help children and young people in crises throughout the world.

In 2004, while reading Sunday Times, JK Rowling saw the picture of a boy in a caged bed in a Czech orphanage. It made her realize that children in orphanages are not properly taken care of. So, she created an NGO to end the institutionalization of children. In 2010, it was renamed Lumos, based on the light-generating spell in the Harry Potter books. Lumos and other organizations have convinced the European Commission to stop spending more than $367 million to build orphanages. Instead, this money was used to improve the livelihood of children by finding foster families for orphans and improving the family income of poor children who were sent to orphanages because their families couldn't afford to take care of them. 

Facts you probably didn't know

1. The Harry Potter movies have grossed more than 9.1 billion dollars worldwide.
2. Harry Potter books have been translated into 80 languages and sold more than 500 million copies, making Harry Potter the best-selling book series of all time.
3. The boy's name that JK Rowling likes most is Harry. She likes it because it sounds happy. If her first child were a boy, she would have named him Harry. But then, the protagonist of her famous book wouldn't have been called Harry Potter.
4. Little White Horse, a story JK Rowling read as a child, inspired her to write the Harry Potter books. 
5. Whenever she got an idea regarding Harry Potter, she wrote them on small pieces of paper and stored them. While writing the books, she used these bits of paper to connect the dots.
6. July 31st, Harry Potter's birthday, is also JK Rowling's birthday. 
7. She wrote the last chapter of the last Harry Potter book sometime in 1990, five years before she finished the first Harry Potter book.
8. In 2004, she became the first billion-dollar author and also one of the only self-made female billionaires. But she lost her status as a billionaire as she gave a lot of money to charities. 
9. JK Rowling has won several awards for her Harry Potter books and her charitable works.
10. Her sister Dianne was always the first one to listen to her stories. So, she dedicated her first book to her mother, Anne; her sister, Dianne; and her daughter, Jessica. 
11. She dedicated her second book to her friend Sean Harris, who helped her get out of depression when her mother was ill and lent her money when she returned to the UK after a failed marriage.
12. She finally came to terms with her father and dedicated her fourth book to him.

The Message

The success story of JK Rowling

When you think that life is meaningless and you encounter failure after failure, read this success story of JK Rowling. JK Rowling decided to become an author when she was six years old. Yet, by the time the first Harry Potter book was published, she was 32 years old. In the 26 years it took for her dream to become a reality, she had worked various jobs she didn't like, got a Bachelor's degree in a subject her parents chose, her mother died, her father abandoned her, had a failed marriage, suffered from poverty, and fell deep into depression twice. But not once did she think of giving up on her dream. 

Her perseverance made her what she is today. After she became wealthy, she decided to give back a lot of her money to the world. She spent a lot of money on charities to help those in need. So, read this success story of JK Rowling when you want to give up. More importantly, never give up on your dreams and help others when you become successful.