Rowling
í ROYAL ALBERT HALL
Í
júnílok 2003
(Ég á eftir að þýða,
en þetta var sýnt í beinni á
Netinu í júní 2003 þegar bók
5 var nýútkomin á ensku. Milljónir
manna um allan heim horfðu á þáttinn
í beinni)
Assistant
Caretaker: J K Rowling is here everybody! She’s in
the building! Ooh! Ooh! I’m so excited. I’m
very, very excited. Hey! Hold on, hold on! I bet some
of you are literally bursting with excitement. Oh no!
Not literally, not literally - I’ve got enough mess
to clear up. Hey! I’ve got to get moving. Let’s
get this place ship-shape, she’ll be here.
FX:
Eerie noise.
Ooh
someone’s coming. Come on you guys look lively, smarten
up because she’ll be here soon. I’d better poke
the fire. There we go. Ooh! Hey that noise you just heard
means there’s a magic portal opening up and we have
Muggles from all over the world joining us. Hello, welcome
to our show. You’re in for a big, big treat. Oh yes
you are!
In
a moment we shall meet “She who shall be named”
with “He who shall ask the questions” and his
name is…he is a marvellous Muggle, called Stephen
Fry, who you will know is the voice of the Harry Potter
books and he’s here, yes, right now!
Enjoy
the show everybody! Goodbye!
FX:
Explosion and puff of smoke as Stephen Fry comes out of
the fireplace.
Stephen
Fry: Oh dear me. Hello! Hello there! Hello, am I in the
right place? It’s a long time since I’ve used
floo powder and I sometimes end up in the wrong place.
Is this the Royal Albert Hall?
Audience:
YESSSSS!
Stephen
Fry: Good. Now most of you might know why we are here.
Have you see an assistant caretaker anywhere? He was supposed
to be welcoming me here. With any luck he might have been
fired. We are here to meet the most famous and the most
popular writer in the whole wide world!
Audience:
Cheers
Stephen
Fry: Now I have to ask you a question. Are you ready to
meet her?
Audience:
YESSSS!
Stephen
Fry: In that case, let me welcome onto this stage boys
and girls, ladies and gentlemen J K ROWLING
Audience:
Very very loud CHEERS!
JK
Rowling: Hello. Oh Wow!
Stephen
Fry: How about that?
JK
Rowling: That’s amazing.
Stephen
Fry: Shall we go and sit down. There are some questions
to ask you. You pop there. Now, as you may know everybody,
we are webcasting around the planet and many people have
lots of questions to ask
JK
Rowling: Good good
Stephen
Fry: I have one to start with… what am I going to
call you?
JK
Rowling: Jo
Stephen
Fry: Jo?
JK
Rowling: Yes
Stephen
Fry: Can we settle a really important question? How do
you pronounce your last name?
JK
Rowling: It is Rowling — as in rolling pin.
Stephen
Fry: Rolling! You now all have to say after me, the word
“rolling” boys and girls, 1…2…3…
Audience:
ROLLING!
Stephen
Fry: If you hear anybody in the future say JK “Row-elling”
you have my permission to hit them on the head - not with
a copy of the Order of the Phoenix because that would
be cruel
JK
Rowling: That would kill them.
Stephen
Fry: No use something smaller than the last book - like
a fridge.
JK
Rowling at the Royal Albert Hall continued
Stephen
Fry: We’ve got lots of questions to get through so
let’s hear our first question which is from a young
man not too far away. He’s in Stevenage in Hertfordshire
and his name is James.
What
kind of books did you read when you were a child? Did
they inspire you to become a writer?
JK
Rowling: That’s a very good question, a very intelligent
question. I would read absolutely anything at all. My
favourite writers were E. Nesbit… I liked C.S. Lewis,
and I used to read adult writers as well. I would read
absolutely anything: the backs of cereal packets —
anything.
Stephen Fry: Are you one of those people that can’t
eat breakfast cereal without reading the packet?
JK
Rowling: I am indeed one of those people.
Stephen
Fry: I’m the same. I go mad if I have to eat cereal
and there’s no packet anywhere.
One
of the things I suppose a lot of people always like to
know about writers, is the very basic question of what
your average writing day is like. Now I’m sure there’s
no average writing day. It’s a silly question or
may sound silly to you, but people always love to know
them… like: Do you use computer or do you write with
a pen? Do you drink coffee or tea? Do you listen to music
when you write? Those sorts of things. Can you give us
a rough example of a day?
JK
Rowling: My favourite way to write used to be to go to
cafes. I used to love doing that because I find being
surrounded by people, even though I can’t talk to
them while I’m writing, is very helpful. Being a
writer is a very, very lonely job obviously, but these
days I can’t write in cafes because too many people
come up to me and say “Are you that woman that writes
that Harry Potter”? So I write at home now —
and I write much more on the computer than I used do
Stephen
Fry: Do you listen to music when you’re writing?
JK
Rowling: I never listen to music when I’m writing
— I find music much too distracting
Stephen
Fry: Do you drink tea or coffee?
JK
Rowling: I drink both of them - in excessive quantities.
Stephen
Fry: Just to be really dull. Do you start very early and
write till very late? Is it regular?
JK
Rowling: I start after I have taken my daughter to school
and I keep writing till I’m so hungry I can’t
focus on the computer any more — then I go and have
sandwich then write till Jessica comes home from school
then sometimes I’ll do a bit in the evening.
Stephen
Fry: and after about a year or so …
JK
Rowling: and after a year or so you finally think “Ooh
I’ve finished the book”.
Stephen
Fry: Do you print it out as you go along and read it on
paper?
JK
Rowling: I do, yes — waste a lot of paper.
Stephen
Fry: Good well. Those are the details out of the way
Question
from Anna Beatrice from Rio de Janeiro in Brazil
On
video: Did you find it harder to write now that the whole
world is eagerly waiting for the launching of the new
Harry Potter book in the series?
JK
Rowling: Umm, I don’t think I did find it harder
to write but it can get a little bit scary being published
these days. Look where we are! The first reading I ever
did; there were two people who’d wandered into the
basement of Waterstone’s (UK Book Store) by mistake
and were too polite to leave when they saw someone was
going a reading and they had to get all the staff in the
shop downstairs to bulk out the crowd a bit. I was terrified.
I was shaking so badly.
Stephen
Fry: Now when you go to a book shop to do a signing people
dress up — don’t they…
JK
Rowling: They do. Best one I ever saw was one woman in
America who dressed up as the fat lady in pink dress and
she’d hung a picture frame around herself. She looked
fabulous.
Stephen
Fry: How wonderful! Particularly in America where they’re
more perhaps theatrical than we are about these things
— you get boys dressed as Harry and girls as Hermione?
JK
Rowling: Many boys dressed as Harry. Lately I’ve
noticed people like dressing up as Draco a lot more, which
I’m finding a little bit worrying. You’re all
getting far too fond of Draco.
Stephen
Fry: The dark forces are rising Jo
JK
Rowling: The dark forces are indeed rising!
JK
Rowling at the Royal Albert Hall
Stephen
Fry: There’s no question about it! Now to Manchester
where there is a question from Jess:
On
video: What advice would you give to any kids who want
to become authors?
Stephen
Fry: Now Jess is of course is a name you like…
JK
Rowling: My daughter is called Jessica. I always say the
same thing — which is to read as much you possibly
can. Nothing will help you as much as reading. Then you’ll
go through a phase and imitate your favourite authors
and that’s fine - that’s a learning experience
too and you are also going to have to accept that you’re
going to hate a lot of things you write before you find
you like something.
Stephen
Fry: There seem to be lots of popular children’s
authors around at the moment. Philip Pullman…do you
like him?
JK
Rowling: Philip Pullman is fantastic. David Almond, Jacqueline
Wilson.
Stephen
Fry: Lemony Snicket. I like that — I wish I were
called Lemony Snicket.
JK Rowling: What a name- I would love to be called Lemony
Snicket.
Stephen
Fry: Almost better than being called Mundungus.
JK
Rowling: Almost…. You know what Mundungus means?
Mundungus is an old word for tobacco because, Mundungus’s
always smelling of his pipe and other various unsavoury
things so that’s why he called Mundungus.
Stephen
Fry: I didn’t know that. There we’ve learnt...
Now let’s go 6000 miles to Lily in Seattle USA.
On
video: Which character do you miss most when you finish
writing a book?
JK
Rowling: I really miss all of them but I suppose I’m
going to have to say Harry because you know he is my hero
and there’s a lot of me in Harry.
Stephen
Fry: People ask me in the reading of them who my favourite
character is and I always say Harry. You didn’t choose
to make ‘Anyone else’ and the Philosopher's
Stone or ‘Anyone Else’ and the Chamber of Secrets
— its Harry’s story and Harry’s growth
as a person.
JK
Rowling: It’s Harry’s journey. Harry is the
eyes through which you see the world so he’s crucial
to the story.
Stephen
Fry: Can you remind us how it all popped into your head,
almost fully formed?
JK
Rowling: I was on a train going from Manchester to London,
looking out of window at cows and I just thought “boy
doesn’t know he’s a wizard goes off to wizard
school”. I have no idea where it came from. The idea
were just floating along the train and looking for someone
and my mind was vacant enough and so it decided to zoom
in there.
Stephen
Fry: You played with the idea in your head?
JK
Rowling: Exactly. From that moment I thought “Why
doesn’t he know he’s a wizard?” It was
as though the story was just there for me to discover.
His parents are dead he needs to find out they’re
wizards and on we went from there.
Stephen
Fry: And the names I have to mention the names, you mentioned
Munduingus being tobacco…. A lot of the names have
very particular meanings; Albus Dumbledore is on the side
of light his name means “white” in Latin. Alba
was an old name for Britain.
JK
Rowling: It also means wisdom in Latin.
Stephen
Fry: Yes, “Alb” - What about Malfoy? What does
that mean?
JK
Rowling: Malfoy is a made-up name but you could say it
was old French for bad faith. It really suits him.
Stephen
Fry: Bad Faith…Malfoy…perfect isn’t it.
I’m sure the boys and girls nave noticed that the
Hogwarts School motto is Latin and what is it?
JK
Rowling: Well, you’re one of the few people I’ve
met who knew what it meant “Never tickle a sleeping
dragon”.
Stephen
Fry: There never tickle a sleeping dragon, probably the
wisest advice you will ever hear. It’s good advice.
It’s like the magic equivalent of “let sleeping
dogs lie”
JK
Rowling: Exactly!
Stephen
Fry: Question from Neil in Sydney, Australia
On
video: Have you ever considered writing a book about Harry
5 or 10 years later - after he’s left Hogwarts?
JK
Rowling: I get asked this question about whether I’m
going to write about Harry when he’s grown up. I
always say “You’ll have to wait and see whether
he survives to be a grown up”
Stephen
Fry: Uhn..that’s a frightening thought…isn’t
it my goodness!
JK
Rowling: Sorry. I’m not saying he won’t but
I don’t want to give anything away at this point.
Stephen
Fry: He is growing up of course and it’s intriguing
about reading these books to watch him and his friends
- age. Which do you think he’d fine the more difficult
— to fight Voldemort - You’ve got to be able
to say it or he’ll have too much power over you to
fight Voldemort - or to kiss Cho?
JK
Rowling: People who’ve read the Order of the Phoenix
will have a fairly shrewd idea of what the answer might
be…
Stephen
Fry: Were not going to give away too much about the book
because not everyone can read that fast. I could read
a few telephone directories in a week but not that book.
Another thing about the ageing (of the characters growing
up) I feel. If you look back now at the first and second
books, they almost seem innocent by comparison —
they had monsters, they had real villains, everything
now is more complicated isn’t it …
JK
Rowling: Yes, very much so.
Stephen
Fry: They are. Everything is more complicated now as Harry
gets older. When he entered the wizarding world after
a horrible time at the Dursleys he expected Wonderland.
He almost immediately he wandered into Draco Malfoy and
found out that some wizards are racists. Slowly but surely
he found out many people in power in the wizarding world
are just as nasty and corrupt as in our world.
JK
Rowling: That’s because it’s about human nature
and people with less pure motives have wands too. A lot
of time is trying to legislate for them.
Stephen
Fry: Exactly, politicians and journalists. It’s also
true in the real world. People say we haven’t got
a magic wand to cure all ills of the world but what you
show is that even if you have got a magic wand it doesn’t
cure all the ills.
JK Rowling at the Royal Albert Hall continued
Stephen
Fry: Another question now from Daniel in Croydon (UK)
Video:
How do you decide what the baddies would be like?
JK
Rowling: This is going to sound awful but I’ve met
enough people I didn’t like in my life to have a
fairly shrewd idea of what I want baddies to be like.
I think from letters I get from people your age that nearly
all of you here knows a Draco Malfoy and girls will almost
certainly know a Pansy Parkinson. We all grow up with
those sort of people and certainly as adults we’ve
all have met people like Lucius Malfoy and some of the
other characters.
Stephen
Fry: Malfoy, Goyle and Crabbe are almost irredeemably
bad — certainly there’s almost nothing attractive
about about Goyle and Crabbe, repulsive — Malfoy
is reasonably stylish…
JK
Rowling: Malfoy is certainly stylish in the film —
Stephen
Fry: Yes, and even in the books there is a certain flair.
Most characters like Snape are hard to love but there
is a sort of ambiguity — you can’t quite decide
- something sad about him — lonely and it’s
fascinating when you think he’s going to be the evil
one a party from Voldemort obviously in the first book
then slowly you get this idea he’s not so bad after
all.
JK
Rowling: Yes but you shouldn’t think him too nice.
It is worth keeping an eye on old Severus definitely!
Stephen
Fry: One of the most awful things in the world when we
are young, is injustice — when something’s unfair
it makes us so angry. One of the things is I get upset
on Harry’s behalf about how people tell lies about
him. We know he’s brave and actually saved the magical
world on numerous occasions, yet he has to start all over
again in each book and do all over again and prove himself
again. Dumbledore knows how good he is and how bad the
fathers of Deatheaters, Crabbe and Goyle are.
JK
Rowling: I don’t want to say too much but Dumbledore
is a very wise man who knows that Harry is going to have
to learn a few hard lessons to prepare him for what may
be coming in his life. He allows Harry to get into what
he wouldn’t allow another pupil to do and he also
unwillingly permits Harry to confront things he’d
rather protect him from. As people who’ve read the
Order of The Phoenix will know; Dumbledore has had to
step back from Harry to teach him some of life’s
harder lessons.
Stephen
Fry: You have to push you’re beloved chickens out
of the nest so they can fly. Question from Hong Kong —
China Korea International School
Video:
Do you believe in magic?
Stephen
Fry: Well there’s a good question, do you believe
in magic?
JK
Rowling: I’m sorry to say, because often when I answer
this question I get a groan, that I don’t believe
in magic. (Groan from the audience) I really don’t
in magic the way that it appears in book. I could be slightly
corny and say I do believe in other kinds of magic; the
magic of the imagination for example, and love, but magic
as in waving a wand - no. I’d love to believe in
it but I’m afraid I can’t.
Stephen
Fry: But it doesn’t matter that it sounds corny …
it’s desperately important that the way Harry solves
all his problems is really through his courage, his friendship,
and his loyalty and stoutness of heart.
JK
Rowling: “Stoutness of heart” — is a very
good phrase!”
Harry
is not a good enough wizard yet to even attempt to take
on Voldemort as wizard to wizard. He’s escaped him
three, four times if you count the encounter with Tom
Riddle. He keeps doing it because there is one thing that
Voldemort doesn’t understand and that’s the
power that keeps Harry going. And we all know what that
power is.
Stephen
Fry: Exactly right we now have Natasha, Suffolk
Video:
If you could have any magical power for one day what would
you have and how would you use it?
JK
Rowling: If I could have a power, I would have the power
of invisibility and, it is a little bit sad, but I’d
probably sneak off to a café and write all day.
Stephen
Fry: I’m just thinking of all the wicked things I
would do if I were invisible and they wouldn’t include
writing!
JK
Rowling: I’ve just been asked, on my way here I was
asked for the first time when book 6 will be ready so
I think you’ll agree I’d better get working
soon.
Stephen
Fry: It can’t be soon enough for any of us. Question
from Paris, France: Antoine.
Video:
If you looked into the Mirror of Erised what do you think
you would see?
Stephen
Fry: The Mirror of Erised is as everyone knows …what
is Erised spelt backwards?
Audience:
Desire!
Stephen
Fry: Desire spelt backwards.
JK
Rowling: Very good. I would, at the moment, probably see
myself very much as I am because one of the most wonderful
things that could possibly have happened has happened
and I’ve had another child — myself and family.
I’d also like to see what Harry sees - my mother
alive again. There’d be room over my shoulder to
see a scientist inventing a cigarette that would be healthy,
that would be lovely and I can think of a particular journalist
being boiled in oil.
Stephen
Fry: If your first book had been a reasonable success
and your second book ok too so a few people would have
heard your name, and they might have just done well enough,
do you think the stories would have developed in different
ways? Has some element of the huge and unparalleled fame
and success you’ve had, has given you different view
of the world and affected the way the books developed?
JK
Rowling: Mmmm yes that had entered the story. I think
that I always thought Harry would feel the pressure of
his position both as famous wizard — as in the first
book when he enters, you do see that when he walked into
the Leaky Cauldron for the first time and he’s stunned
that people have been talking about him for eleven years
without his knowledge — and I always knew he would
meet someone from the Daily Prophet. I think it would
be foolish to pretend I don’t write Rita Skeeter
with a little more enjoyment these days. I try and avoid
reading about myself..
JK
Rowling at the Royal Albert Hall continued
Stephen
Fry: I never got past throwing the gnomes over the hedges
which is level a half never mind level one…so…hello?
Caretaker:
Hello Master Muggle. Question from the Muggle machine
Stephen
Fry: Of course with everybody watching we’re getting
a lot of questions emailed in. That is not from a real
boy or girl, it is from you isn’t it?
Caretaker:
No… No ! ..How can you tell?
Stephen
Fry: None of the nice boys and girls would want to know
if wizards could make farts smell really bad, nor do they
want to know what type of underpants Harry Potter wears,
or which smells worse Unicorn poo or Dragon pee? You’re
a disgrace! Don’t come back until you have a real
question…Ridiculous!
JK
Rowling: Dragon Pee smells worse.
We
still have time to take questions from around the world
so keep emailing and Mr Emulsion will bring them in…
Question from Jackson in the audience, competition winner
Jackson:
Professor Snape has always wanted to be Defence Against
Dark Arts teacher. In book 5 he still hasn’t got
the job. Why does Professor Dumbedore not allow him to
be Defence Against The Dark Arts teacher?
JK
Rowling: That is an excellent question and the reason
is that I have to be careful what I say here. To answer
it fully would give a lot away about the remaining two
books.
When
Professor Dumbledore took Professor Snape onto the staff
and Professor Snape said “I’d like to be Professor
of Defence Against the Dark Arts please” and Professor
Dumbledore felt it might bring out the worst in Snape
so said “I think we’ll get you to teach Potions
and see how you get along there”.
Stephen
Fry: Now, Snape, we talked about him a little before,
there’s something about letter “s”, isn’t
there especially with that ”n” with it, you
can’t help saying it without sneering or snarling…
Snarl, sneer…
JK
Rowling: Snake! I could have very easily called him, Snicket
instead but it’s a funnier, kinder word so I didn’t.
Stephen
Fry: Or sneeze is pleasant and of course and the Founder
of the House (at Hogwarts) was Salazar Slytherin - another
snaky thing. Snakes feature a lot — is a Parselmouth
a real thing or did you make that up?
JK
Rowling: Parselmouth is an old word for someone who has
a problem with the mouth, like a hare lip.
Stephen
Fry: So it is a real word again — very clever. Order
of the Phoenix is 766 pages long — that’s a
big book by any standards and as I’ve got to sit
in front of a microphone and read it all out every word,
I’m a bit cross with you. On the other hand it’s
extraordinarily good value. You could have written eight
books with the words you’ve done in these first five.
Did you know it was going to be this long?
JK
Rowling: No… I didn’t, I will say this. I had
to put in some things because of what’s coming in
books 6 and 7 and I didn’t want anyone to say to
me “what a cheat you never gave us clues”. If
I didn’t mention things in Order of the Phoenix I
think you’ve said “well, you sprang that on
us”! Whereas I want you to be able to guess if you’ve
got your wits about you.
Stephen
Fry: To set up surprises..
JK
Rowling: Yes, there are few surprises coming.
Stephen
Fry: You are pretty cruel to Harry - he gets such misery
heaped on him, you pile on all the injustices, betrayals…against
him.
JK
Rowling: I do — I think he has the hardest time in
this book although there are some scary things coming
for Harry. In this book no-one believes him and also he’s
a teenager. To have these two burdens in life at once
is quite horrible. But from now on at least everyone knows
he’s telling the truth. Whatever he has to face in
the coming books he doesn’t have to deal with people
being so distrustful of him.
Stephen
Fry: Are we going to meet Hermione’s parents?
JK
Rowling: We’ve seen them briefly but they’re
dentists so they’re not that interesting.
Stephen
Fry: (Laughing) You’ll be getting so many letters
of complaints from dentists
JK
Rowling: I love dentists really — I should never
have been rude! I take that back— imagine next time
I’m having my fillings done.
JK Rowling at the Royal Albert Hall continued
Stephen
Fry: It is another one of the most horrible and brilliant
inventions of the books is this snobbery this idea of
purebloods and mudbloods and this idea of mingling, mixed
breeding which is a reflection of some of the things like
racism and intolerance that we have in our world. Is that
deliberate or did it come to you in a flash again or did
it just suddenly…
JK
Rowling: That was deliberate it was always there from
the beginning as you saw with Draco — even from first
book with Draco Harry discovers him first being rude about
Muggles. I was also playing with that when I created Professor
Lupin having a contagious disease so people are frightened
of him. I really liked him as a character but he also
has his failing though he’s a nice man and a wonderful
teacher — in fact he’s the one time I’ve
written a teacher… the kind of teacher I’d have
loved to have had. McGonagall is a good teacher but scary
at times. Lupin’s failing is he likes to be liked.
That’s where he slips up — he’s been disliked
so often he’s always pleased to have friends so cuts
them an awful lot of slack.
Stephen
Fry: Very true…very true we’re not going to
go into the business who dies because not everyone has
read the book but did it did cause a stir when you admitted
it caused you some distress. Do you feel emotional about
a lot of the characters you write?
JK
Rowling: I do. What I was trying to do with the death
in this book was that I wanted to show how very arbitrary
and sudden death is. This is a death with no big deathbed
scene — it happens almost accidentally. It’s
one of the cruel things about death and we’re now
in a war situation where that does happen. That’s
how it happens — one minute you are talking to your
friend and the next minute he is gone, so shocking and
inexplicable — one minute they are there but now
where did they go? I found it upsetting to write because
I knew what it would mean to Harry.
Stephen
Fry: Luna Lovegood, let's talk about Luna Lovegood …
JK
Rowling: Yes! I don’t know where she came from but
I really like Luna — really fun to write. She’s
slightly out of step in many ways but she’s the anti-Hermione.
Hermione’s so logical and inflexible in so many ways
and Luna is likely to believe 10 impossible things before
breakfast…
Stephen
Fry: Now to go back to one of the most infuriating characters
you’ve ever written, Umbridge.
JK
Rowling: She’s horrible isn’t she? I’m
glad you hate her because I really loathe Umbridge.
Stephen
Fry: She is the worst. (To Caretaker) Have we got a real
one from the Muggle world?
Internet
question from Jessica, originally from Australia now living
in London.
Email:
Harry saw his parents die so why hasn’t he been able
to see the Thestrals before?
JK
Rowling: I knew I was going to get that one…that
is an excellent question. And here is the truth. At the
end of Goblet of Fire we sent Harry home more depressed
than he had ever been leaving Howarts. I knew that Thestrals
were coming, and I can prove that because they’re
in the book I’d produced for Comic Relief (UK) Fantastic
Beaststs and Where to Find Them.
These
are lucky Black Winged Horses. However, if Harry had seen
them and it had not been explained then it would cheat
the reader. So, to explain that to myself, I decided you
had to have seen the death and allowed it to sink in a
bit… slowly…these creatures became solid in
front of you. So that’s how I’m going to sneak
past that one.
Stephen
Fry: Absolutely, I mean if you can’t write new characters
in new books that would be a bit hard on you. Can you
explain in words of not more that two syllables, what
is Arithmancy?
JK
Rowling: Well your guess is as good as mine Stephen. Arithmancy
is predicting the future using numbers. I’ve decided
there’s a bit of numerology in there as well but
how you do it I really don’t know.
Stephen Fry: Well that’s very honest of you thank
goodness for that. This seems to be all the time we have
for questions but I’m pleased to say this is far
from the end of the show because very shortly Jo’s
going to be reading from her new book
But
just before, if there’s anyone here in the Royal
Albert Hall in London or around the big blue world who
doesn’t know what happened in the first 4 books —
I don’t think there can be anybody, but somebody
might have had their memory modified by a peculiar charm
for example, we’re going to steal offstage while
some experts tell you the story so far — see you
in a bit.
Latest | Albert Hall Interview | BBC Interview | The Times
Interview | Gallery
JK Rowling at the Royal Albert Hall continued
The
story so far..... told by children from around the world,
recorded on video.
SPOILER!
Do not read unless you have read the Harry Potter books
already as this text gives away elements of the stories.
In
the beginning: Lord Voldemort tried to kill Harry Potter
when he was a young baby, he came around and he killed
his parents…he tried to kill Harry, but he just escaped
with a scar because his mum loved him a lot. Albus Dumbledore
left Harry as a baby on the doorstep of The Dursleys who
are Harry’s only living relatives. There’s Aunt
Petunia, Uncle Vernon and their son Dudley.
And
his mum was really rude and looked like a horse a bit,
Harry was 11 when he just found out he was a wizard.
Hagrid
took Harry to Diagon Alley to buy all his Wizard goods
and that, like his wand. The wand chooses the owner like
the owner can’t choose the wand. So, he was given
a few wands to flick about. He got one with a Phoenix
feather and it (The Phoenix) had only ever given one other
feather to someone and that was to Lord Voldemort, on
the train you can get all kinds of different and unusual
flavoured sweets (they are magical and can taste like
anything) e.g. like bogey flavour.
To
get to Hogwarts you need to get the train at King’s
Cross Station is platform 9 and ¾.
At
Hogwarts they teach all kinds of Magic Like Charms, Defense
Against The Dark Arts, Potions err…Spells. There
is a “Sorting Hat” that puts them into Houses
(These are like Domes or Fraternity/Sorority Houses).
There is Gryffindor, Slytherin, Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff.
The
school game is Quidditch — four balls released from
the centre, 7 people on broomsticks — snitch caught
- game over. Then suddenly Muggles born children (those
born from a one non-magical parent) are getting petrified
— frozen, all over Hogwarts, There are all sorts
of rumours about the Chamber of Secrets. In the Chamber
is a big snake called a Basilisk which roams the school
and kills Mudbloods. A Mudblood is a really disgusting
name for someone who is a Muggle born.
A
Muggle is someone who can’t do magic, for instance,
the Dursleys. Lord Voldemort, or as I call him Vorldy,
he used to call himself Tom Marvolo the real given him
by his dad but he just re-arranged the letters.
Sirius
Black, a notorious wizard accused of killing 13 people
with one single curse, escapes from Azkaban (Prison),
but actually it had been another wizard, Pettrigrew who
had framed him. Pettigrew used his wand behind his back
and blew up a street and cut of his finger and joined
the sewer rats.
He
had been hiding for 12 years as a rat with Ron (Harry’s
best friend) to escape from Sirious Black. Pettigrew escapes
back to Voldemort and Sirious escapes on a big black winged
thing to live happily ever after.
This
year at Hogwarts the Quidditch tournament isn’t taking
place instead there is the Tri-Wwizard tournament. The
three champions have already been picked but The Goblet
sparks up again and Harry’s name comes out of it
They
get to the trophy at the end of the maze, Cedric and Harry
decide to take it at the same time and they get transported
to the location where Lord Voldemort is. So at the end
of the book we have Lord Voldemort where all his followers
were back in action and ready to wreak havoc!
Harry
Potter watch out Voldemort is after you!
The
story continues….
(JKRowling
comes back onstage)
JK
Rowling: You can imagine how scary it is to read in front
of Stephen Fry and I did say — “wouldn’t
it be better if he did it”, but they decided I should
do it so - sorry about that.
I
need to explain to you what I’m going to read. If
you have got your book with you and you’d like to
read along, as I know some people like to do, I’m
reading from page 583 (of the Bloomsbury edition).
It
was quite hard to find a bit that doesn’t give too
much away if you haven’t finished the book. But this
bit is where Harry has to talk about what he might do
after Hogwarts, and he has a bit of career advice from
Professor McGonagall. As you may remember from the 4th
book, Goblet of Fire, Harry decided it would be quite
interesting to be an Auror which means to work at The
Ministry of Magic to catch Dark Wizards. So he’s
come along thinking he might do that and this is what
happens.
During this reading you might get a hint of what might
stand in his way of becoming an Auror apart from The Ministry’s
current attitude toward to him, he needs a qualification
that can be quite difficult to get… so here we go….
JK
Rowling then read from page 583 of Harry Potter and the
Order of the Phoenix.
Stephen
Fry: Boys and Girls, Ladies and Gentlemen, just one more
time we should thank this remarkable woman who has given
so many millions of people such deep, lasting and eternal
pleasure… JK Rowling!
ENDIR
All
photographs © Justin Williams
(Þýðing: Anna Heiða Pálsdóttir,
2003) Smelltu
hér til að hlusta á viðtalið.
