10 quick less known facts about J. K. Rowling, the world’s first billionaire author.
Fact 1: In 1982 J. K. Rowling was rejected by Oxford University.
Fact 2: In 1990 she first got the idea of Harry Potter while travelling in a train, from Manchester to London.
Fact 3: In 1992 she moved to Portugal to teach English.
Fact 4: In 1993 She had a divorce and became a single parent to a baby girl.
Fact 5: She was then jobless with a dependent child and was living on government assisted welfare.
Fact 6: In 1995 all 12 giant publishing houses rejected Harry Potter
Fact 7: In 1996 Bloomsbury publishing said yes! Rowling got £1500 as advance.
Fact 8: In 1999 Rowling became the first in the history of New York Times bestsellers list to have all top 3 books by the same author.
Fact 9: Her full name is Joanne Kathleen Rowling and Kathleen is the name of her grandmother.
Fact 10: In June 2008 Rowling gave a Harvard commencement speech on the importance of failure.
“You might never fail on the scale I did, but some failure in life is inevitable. It is impossible to live without failing at something,unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all – in which case, you fail by default.” – J. K. Rowling, Harvard University, June 2008.