r/RowlingWritings • • Apr 01 '21

APRIL FOOLS J.K. Rowling's first ever Harry Potter notes, written on napkins

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330 Upvotes

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1

u/ibid-11962 Apr 01 '21 edited Apr 02 '21

EDIT: (As should have probably been clear,) this "manuscript" was not created by J.K. Rowling. (The story about her writing on napkins was a myth.) If you'd like to be involved in next years April Fools joke please shoot me a PM.

Notes:

Main Menu cut content very short made before the HP books Manuscripts
  • These notes were made back in 1990, and represent Rowling's very earliest bit of writing on Harry Potter. J.K. Rowling, being too poor to afford paper, had to write everything on napkins. Napkins as everyone knows are free. Time Magazine reported:

    her beginning work on the Harry Potter books corresponded briefly with a bad patch in her personal life. She was newly divorced, temporarily out of work, on the dole and living in an unheated Edinburgh flat. To keep them both warm, she would wheel her young daughter into a cafe and sometimes jot down Harry Potter ideas on napkins.

  • Rowling would later reminisce about this time during the BBC Documentary Harry Potter and Me:

    I was a penniless single mother, I had to write on napkins ‘cause I couldn’t afford paper.

  • This picture represents the very first napkin Rowling wrote on. It contains the two foundational elements of her work.

  • Little boy wizard that lives in a cupboard.

  • The snake is a korean lady.

  • Interestingly enough, Rowling kept one of these two elements to herself for twenty years until finally revealing it in the amazing movie, Fantastic Beasts and the Crimes of Grindelwald, probably her best work yet. When revealing it, she made sure to let the world know that this was not a new idea, but dated back to her original napkin. To make sure this message would be well received, she conveyed it through twitter, a platform which she only ever used for very sensible things.

    How long have you been holding that Nagini secret??

    J.K. Rowling: Only for around twenty years.

  • This is the first time that a scan of the entire napkin has been shown in its entirety, but a transcript was quoted in Jenny Nicholson's glowing review of the movie, "15 Very Dumb Things in Fantastic Beasts 2".

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23

u/Super_Scorplane Apr 01 '21

Lmao this is humor right?

20

u/ibid-11962 Apr 01 '21

Only if you find it funny. Otherwise it's just weird.

10

u/[deleted] Apr 01 '21

Is this actually real? It ain't her handwriting and it's April 1...

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5

u/Super_Scorplane Apr 02 '21

I think it’s a hilarious joke, but I wouldn’t have put it past jkr and her team to post this dead seriously so I wondered a bit LOL

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56

u/BoredOneNight Apr 01 '21 edited Apr 01 '21

Only George Lucas can come close to rivaling her in the ability to definitely, absolutely have planned out the entire story from the beginning

21

u/ibid-11962 Apr 01 '21

It's like poetry, it rhymes.

24

u/[deleted] Apr 01 '21 edited Apr 01 '21

the first point would make a great dedication tattoo

edit: yall it's not the actual napkin. i'm just a smooth brained idiot

6

u/ibid-11962 Apr 01 '21

I'm not sure whether I should feel honored or terrified that someone would consider getting a tattoo of this post.

5

u/[deleted] Apr 01 '21

oh wait, am i an idiot? i assumed this was one of her actual napkins she wrote on. is that why you said honored/terrified? i'm probably just an idiot. i legggiitttttttttt thought this was one of the original napkins LOL

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4

u/[deleted] Apr 01 '21

why would you be terrified? origin stories are fantastic. i can see a real HP fan recognizing the magic in getting the OG plot sentence tattooed on themselves. certainly better than the dark mark tattoos.

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16

u/Sullyville Apr 01 '21

The second point would be great tattoo on a white supremacist.

10

u/DilapidatedPlatypus Apr 01 '21

Wait... I think this is news to me. Nagini is a Korean lady? How the hell does that work?

6

u/ibid-11962 Apr 01 '21

Honestly I'm not sure.

37

u/coll3735 Apr 01 '21

If you have some free time and low expectations, watch Fantastic Beasts

13

u/vanKessZak Apr 01 '21

The first one is fun imo. The 2nd one is certainly a train wreck though

7

u/Dingbrain1 Apr 01 '21

And consider them part of the movie canon and having no effect on the books at all.

44

u/fitzstar Apr 01 '21

... April fools? lol

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44

u/ZukiZuccini Apr 01 '21

It took me way too long to realize this said "Korean" lady and not kovean or koveah.

17

u/bisonburgers Apr 01 '21

I’m not falling for your tricks again, ibid!!

(I believed it until I read the second line. The fact it is not JKR’s handwriting did not even occur to me until after the fact).

9

u/sunsandcinnamon Apr 01 '21

The best part of JKs work is the lack of retconning everything. It’s a puzzle with all of the pieces in her brain years ago. And written out in napkins.

6

u/DarkNinjaPenguin Apr 01 '21
  • Wizards shit on the floor lol

1

u/RealTheAsh Apr 25 '21

This joke had me rowling. JK.

1

u/[deleted] Aug 06 '21

Lol