Monday, June 15, 2009

Publisher faces Harry Potter copyright claim Bloomsbury Publishing is being sued by the estate of children's writer Adrian Jacobs over claims that J.K. Rowling "copied" his work. The allegation argues that the plot of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, published in 2000, borrowed "substantial parts" from Jacobs' lesser-known The Adventures of Willy the Wizard. [more...] Source:  The Bookseller

Monday, April 20, 2009

Rare Potter drawings go on sale Original Harry Potter book illustrations are to go on sale at the 14th annual Glasgow Art Fair. The preparatory drawings by illustrator Cliff Wright were used as the basis for the front and back cover of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. One drawing depicting Harry and his friend Hermione astride a Hippogriff will be on sale at just under £13,000. [more...] Source:  BBC News

Thursday, April 16, 2009

Harry Potter's schoolbooks republished in larger format Bloomsbury is to re-publish the Harry Potter companion titles, Fantastic Beasts & Where to Find Them by Newt Scamander, and Quidditch Through the Ages, in July. Previous editions were published in a slim format but the latest editions will be chunkier versions comprising 128 rather than 96 pages, including the original illustrations. [more...] Source:  The Bookseller

Friday, April 3, 2009

English footballer Rooney reveals he's a Harry Potter fan England and Manchester United star Wayne Rooney revealed he is a Harry Potter fan as he backed a campaign to get children reading. The footballer picked J.K. Rowling's first novel, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, as one of his favourite books, and said the series "really gets your imagination going". [more...] Source:  Press Association

Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Life after Potter is good for Bloomsbury Bloomsbury has reported better-than-expected profits for 2008 in its first year in the "post-Harry Potter era". The publisher reported a pre-tax profit of £11.63m, down from £17.86m in 2007, when earnings were boosted by sales of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. [more...] Source:  BBC News

Scribd defends itself against piracy accusations Social publishing website Scribd has defended itself against accusations of piracy after novels by J.K. Rowling were discovered in their entirety on its site. Scribd says their policy was to "immediately remove copyrighted material when we receive notices from copyright holders", but it had received no requests from Rowling's lawyers. [more...] [Related Articles]  Source:  The Bookseller

Monday, March 30, 2009

J.K. Rowling leads fight against free books web site J.K. Rowling's publisher was shocked by the news that her books are available to read for free on a US website. Internet users can not only read free copies of books, but also download them. Rowling's lawyer said the Harry Potter downloads were "unauthorised and unlawful" and that the website had been asked to take them down. [more...] [Related Articles]  Source:  The Guardian, UK

Friday, March 27, 2009

Harry Potter: A translation case study Harry Potter highlights many of the potential pitfalls of translation. Translated into over 60 different languages, each translation employs a variety of strategies, with varying degrees of distortion. In the US, switches were made, not in an attempt to Americanise, but to ensure that the books would give a similar literary experience to an American child. [more...] Source:  The Helsinki Times

Monday, March 23, 2009

Harry Potter Book Sells For $19K A rare copy of the first book in the Harry Potter series, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone here in the states, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone in author J.K. Rowling's native England, has sold for $19,120. Autographed by Rowling, the first edition soft cover book was expected to fetch $12,000 at the auction in Texas. [more...] Source:  Babble, Australia

Friday, February 27, 2009

Bidding soars for first edition Harry Potter Bidding for a softcover, first edition copy of "Harry Potter and The Philosopher's Stone" is up to $15,000, a rare book dealer in Dallas said Tuesday. The auction is being conducted online now and at Heritage Auction Galleries in Dallas March 6-7. The volume is one of only 200 such copies issued by the London publisher, Bloomsbury. [more...] Source:  Marketwatch

Monday, February 23, 2009

Chance to bid on signed Harry Potter Book for charity Fans of Harry Potter are able to bid on a rare first edition of The Deathly Hallows, the seventh book in the series, signed by author J.K. Rowling. The auction is being run Celeb2nds.com, a website that specializes in celebrity charity auctions. The Harry Potter auction runs until March 7. [more...] Source:  Look to the Stars

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Scholastic chided for selling toys Scholastic, the U.S. publisher of the Harry Potter books, has come under criticism from a children's advocacy group for using its network of school-based book clubs to market toys and other non-educational items. ''We're losing kids' interest (in reading). We have to keep them engaged,'' said a Scholastic Vice-President. [more...] Source:  The Associated Press

Friday, February 6, 2009

Deathly Hallows most popular library book in Britain Harry Potter is still casting a spell on readers, according to figures released yesterday by Public Lending Right, a body which pays authors for the public's use of their work. Between July 2007 and June 2008, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows was the most popular title in UK libraries last year. [more...] Source:  The Daily Mail, UK

Friday, January 23, 2009

Revealed: Dummy Harry Potter titles registered to keep real one secret J.K. Rowling has revealed her plot to keep the title of the last book secret. Determined that the name of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows should be a total surprise, her publishers set out to throw everyone off the scent by dreaming up dozens of fake titles and using a dummy company to register them all at the UK Patent Office. [more...] Source:  The Daily Record, Scotland

Auction includes signed Harry Potter books The Carter Center in Atlanta plans to auction a set of Harry Potter books signed by author J.K. Rowling and other celebrity memorabilia next month. [more...] Source:  Washington Post

Saturday, January 17, 2009

Book Review: Potter fans will like Beedle tales The Tales of Beedle the Bard is an excellent read for anyone who enjoyed the Harry Potter stories, the films or the books. It's a short book, one that was mentioned in the final Harry Potter book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Each tale offers morals and lessons for readers. This is an easy read, well suited for anyone who enjoyed the Harry Potter saga. [more...] Source:  Guelph Mercury, Canada

Thursday, January 8, 2009

Contest to win collectors edition of Tales of Beedle the Bard To celebrate J.K. Rowling's return with The Tales of Beedle The Bard, AbeBooks has a very special contest prize, up for grabs are a collector's edition of The Tales of Beedle the Bard and a copy of the Sotheby's auction catalog for the hand-written edition of Beedle the Bard from December 2007. The contest closes on January 20. [more...] Source:  Abe Books

Friday, January 2, 2009

Revised Harry Potter encyclopaedia to go on sale A new version of the Harry Potter encyclopaedia which brought multi-millionaire author JK Rowling to the verge of tears will go on sale in the UK later this month. Steve Vander Ark said he spent five or six months working on the new version, which he said meets specifications laid out in the ruling by the judge. [more...] Source:  Metro, UK

Monday, December 29, 2008

Tales of Beedle the Bard released in Persian The Persian translation of J.K. Rowling's "The Tales of Beedle the Bard" has been recently released by Behnam Publications in Iran. Translated into Persian by Mohammad Nurollahi, The Tales of Beedle the Bard has now been translated into 28 languages. [more...] Source:  Wizard News

Tuesday, December 23, 2008

Review: Beedle keeps Potter fans in good reading Anyone who starts the Harry Potter series now and forever after will have the luxury of reading one book right after another, with no agonizing wait for the next piece of the story. But perhaps J.K. Rowling can be enticed to periodically add to the series' auxiliary books, as she has this year with The Tales of Beedle the Bard. [more...] Source:  Sacramento Bee

Monday, December 22, 2008

J.K. Rowling still rules bookstores at Christmas Australian Booksellers Association chief executive Malcolm Neil said Beedle the Bard was a bestseller "because kids want it". Profits from the book are going to charity. Since the start of the month, Angus and Robertson has sold 16,000 copies of Beedle the Bard. "It's the biggest thing since Harry Potter," Mr Neil said. [more...] Source:  The Australian

Friday, December 19, 2008

Beedle the Bard fastest selling book of 2008 J.K. Rowling's new book The Tales of Beedle the Bard has become the fastest selling title of the year, with more than 2.6 million copies sold worldwide in less than two weeks. Since it was released on Dec. 4, The Tales of Beedle the Bard has also become the top selling book of 2008 on both sides of the Atlantic. [more...] Source:  MSNBC

Wednesday, December 17, 2008

Beedle the Bard raises £4.2m in a week The Tales of Beedle the Bard became the fastest selling book of the year when it went on sale on December 4, thanks to a mountain of pre-orders. There were 367,000 copies sold on the first day in Britain, almost five times the next fastest seller. J.K. said, "I am absolutely delighted that so much money has been raised." [more...] Source:  The Telegraph, UK

Saturday, December 13, 2008

Rowling still magical, Potter or not Perhaps the very best thing about the mass production of The Tales of Beedle the Bard is that part of the proceeds and all of Rowling's royalties will be donated to Children's Voice. This will be no small change: Just three days after its release on Dec. 4, 368,000 copies of The Tales of Beedle the Bard had been sold. [more...] Source:  The Globe and Mail, Canada

Sunday Times Review: The Tales of Beedle the Bard In The Tales of Beedle the Bard, J.K. Rowling is tough on her readers. Harry Potter is neither revived nor returned to Hogwarts for another round of adventures in any of these five fairy tales; he is not even mentioned. Rowling's aim in bringing these tales together is to introduce the bard's wisdom to a muggle audience. [more...] Source:  The Times, London

Friday, December 5, 2008

Publisher will issue Harry Potter Lexicon The subject of a lengthy, groundbreaking legal battle with Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling, the soon-to-be-published lexicon has a cover that appears to be one big nod to copyright. "An Unauthorized Guide to Harry Potter Fiction and Related Materials" appears boldly below "The Lexicon" title and above author Steve Vander Ark's name. [more...] Source:  MLive, Michigan

J.K. Rowling hosts tea party to launch Beedle J.K. Rowling hosted a children's tea party yesterday to mark the launch of The Tales Of Beedle The Bard. Rowling read a passage from the tales yesterday to the children gathered at Edinburgh's Parliament Hall, who also got a copy of the book and took part in a question-and-answer session with the writer. [more...] Source:  The Daily Record, Scotland

Beedle the Bard shows why we all need fairy tales The roots of fairy stories run very deep, and The Tales of Beedle the Bard are just the latest little fruits on a very old tree. In fact, the notion that magical children need their fairy stories is a reminder of the importance of the genre. Fairy tales are one of the few elements of popular culture that most of us still have in common. [more...] Source:  The Telegraph, UK

Potter fan demand prompted new book, says Rowling J.K. Rowling said on Thursday that it was demand from Harry Potter fans that prompted her to publish her latest work "The Tales of Beedle the Bard." "The idea actually came from you, by which I mean Harry Potter fans," Rowling told around 200 primary school children gathered at the Beedle the Bard launch party. [more...] Source:  The National Post, Canada

Thursday, December 4, 2008

Harry Potter fans flock for new J.K. Rowling book Recession-hit booksellers are hoping for a magical boost from a new book by Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling. Expectations are high for the Tales of Beedle the Bard, which has a global print run of 8 million copies. The day before publication, Beedle the Bard was ranked No. 1 on Amazon's British and U.S. Web sites. [more...] Source:  CNN Entertainment

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