After receiving a letter from the girl’s mother, J.K. Rowling not only told the girl what would happen to Harry but read the still unpublished manuscript to her every day over the phone. When the girl passed away, Rowling gave one million pounds to the trust the girl’s parents had set up to work on discovering a cure for the cancer that killed her.
When I wrote my funny book The Queen’s Lives: The Secret Diaries of Queen Elizabeth II, I needed to get permission from Buckingham Palace, which was readily forthcoming.
I also needed to get permission from J. K. Rowling.
You see, she often tells the story of how the idea for Harry Potter simply popped into her mind while on a train ride to London. In my book, I explain how this had happened. Of course I needed her permission to publish my version of her eureka moment. Permission was generously given.
So I am profoundly grateful to Joanne Rowling for her help in keeping me going through five difficult years. And I am filled with admiration for her generosity and for what she did for a sick child. As far as I’m concerned, there is not even a tiny amount of “Death Eater” in J.K. Rowling.
One of Rowling’s characters is Rita Skeeter, a malicious journalist who writes nasty things about Harry and Dumbledore for the Daily Prophet. Many good witches and wizards simply believe whatever they are told. I fear Rowling is similarly too willing to listen to those (CNN, BBC, etc.) who release a steady stream of vicious distortion concerning the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Jews and Israelis do not believe non-Jews are subhuman. It is indeed valid, as she writes, “to draw comparisons between Voldemort and any real human being who regards other races, religions or sexualities as inferior.” But that very comparison rationally would lead you to the door of the Palestinians, not the Israelis.
It would indeed be, going back to her own words, “a fool’s errand to try and talk to” Hamas and increasingly Abbas whose Palestinian authority celebrates those who stab Jewish children with the titles of hero and martyr. Israel’s enemies – Hamas, ISIS, Assad of Syria, Al Qaeda, Iran, etc. – (again, using her words) “have no love of humanity” and they certainly “want domination, not peace.”
It takes real courage to stand against so many who demand you give in to the popular view. Perhaps I can remind Rowling of the words she put into the mouth of Albus Dumbledore when he mourned Cedric Diggory, the Hogwarts student killed by Voldemort: “Remember, if the time should come, when you have to make a choice between what is right and what is easy.”
After all, Ms. Rowling, you did say that of the four houses of Hogwarts Schools of Witchcraft and Wizardry in your series, you would, if you could, belong to Gryffindor House because you value courage beyond almost anything.
So let me end by once again thanking you truly and sincerely for the help you gave me during the most difficult time in my life. I would also like to ask that you summon the courage to look at the facts in this conflict and stand up for what is right – not what is easy.
