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The Harry Potter books are an extremely popular series of fantasy novels by British writer J. K. Rowling and have made her the richest writer in literary history.
The books depict a world of witches and wizards; the protagonist is the eponymous young wizard Harry Potter. Since the release of the first novel, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (retitled Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone in the United States) in 1997, the books have gained immense popularity and commercial success worldwide, spawning films, video games, and a wealth of other items.
The six books have collectively sold more than 300 million copies and have been translated into 47 languages. The first volume has been translated into Latin and even ancient Greek, making it the longest work in that language since the novels of Heliodorus of Emesa in the third century AD.
A large portion of the narrative takes place in Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, focusing on Harry Potter's struggle against the evil wizard Lord Voldemort. At the same time, the books explore the themes of friendship, ambition, choice, prejudice, courage, growing up, love, moral responsibility and the perplexities of death, set against the expansive backdrop of a magical world with its own complex history, diverse inhabitants, unique culture, and parallel societies.
Six of the seven planned books have been published, and the unnamed seventh book is yet to be released. The latest, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, was issued in its English language version on 16 July 2005. The first four books have been made into very successful films, and the fifth began filming in February 2006. English language versions of the books are published by Bloomsbury, Scholastic Press, and Raincoast Books.
Origins and publishing history
In 1990, J. K. Rowling was on a crowded train from Manchester to London when the idea for Harry simply "walked" into her head. Rowling gives an account of the experience on her website saying, "I had been writing almost continuously since the age of six but I had never been so excited about an idea before. I simply sat and thought, for four (delayed train) hours, and all the details bubb
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