As announced months ago at her web site, J. K. Rowling received the Robert F. Kennedy Ripple of Hope Human Rights Award last Thursday in NYC. It is an award only given to politically liberal notables and, for Americans, it helps a lot to be a Democratic Party grandee (e.g., Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi also received an award at the event). Two things Rowling said that night are of possible interest to serious readers of her work.

First, she claimed that if her daughter Jessica had been a boy, she would have been named ‘Robert.’ She added that, “lo and behold she has become Mackenzie and I have become a Robert,” i.e., that she took the name ‘Robert Galbraith’ in honor of the late American politician, Robert Kennedy. While she has always claimed that Robert Kennedy was something of a hero to her, this is the first time I can recall her saying her second pseudonym was derived in part from her admiration of the third Kennedy brother. Watch the video clip here.

Second, she said, “He was a man of both empathy and action. He helped bring about real change and he continues to inspire people. I’m not sure we can ask much more of any politician, or indeed, human being.” I’m not sure but I can guess that we can ask a whole lot more of “any politician” — because any politician today who said and did what Bobby Kennedy did with respect to gay people, Jews, and especially to women would be someone loathed by Rowling as “much worse than Voldemort.”

Perhaps when we find out at last how Leda Strike died — was it an actual overdose and accidental death or could it have been a staged suicide to cover the murder of a woman who knew too much about powerful men? — we can re-visit all the conspiracy theories about RFK’s involvement in the seeming suicide of starlet Marilyn Monroe. Is Rowling writing a prolonged wish-fulfillment defense-in-story about her hero’s supposed role in killing Monroe before she talked?

A stretch, I know. The best part of the Rowling comments in NYC Thursday that I can find online was in this bootleg clip from a smart phone. In it, she discusses what it feels like to watch a film celebrating your life and contributions to a better world. “Well done,” indeed.

Let me know in the comment boxes if you’ve found a transcript or video recording of her remarks — and what you think of what pieces of the talk have been made public. Fun to have her back, no? And Happy St Nicholas Day, everyone!

 

Per SnitchSeeker.com:

J.K. Rowling made a rare appearance, attending the premiere of the HBO documentary Finding the Way Home, in New York City on Wednesday night, alongside Fantastic Beasts series star Eddie Redmayne, who narrated the doc.

The documentary, inspired by the work of Rowling’s charity Lumos, focuses on eight orphans who were reunited with family members or placed in loving foster homes after experiencing the trauma of institutionalization.

The film is set to premiere on HBO starting December 18. The trailer can be watched here.

I picked up a copy of Book magazine, a super slick production of Barnes & Noble, in May 2003 because it had a picture of Rowling on the cover and two or three fun feature stories. My favorite part of the magazine, though, and the reason I still have a copy is a side-bar piece titled, ‘Will the Real Harry Potter Please Stand Up?’ It has four cameo pictures of men named ‘Harry Potter’ with brief descriptions — age, work, city of residence — and each Harry’s blurb description of what it is like to be named for the lead character in a tsunami cultural phenomenon.

They were a 45 year old “director of drop out prevention in schools” in Providence, Rhode Island, a 58 year old mailman in Scotia, New York, a 47 year old funeral director in Bedford, Massachusetts, and a 67 year old “retired pastor” in Wauchula, Florida. Only the pastor was a non-reader; he said “I am a Christian and the Bible says we should stay away from witchcraft.” Even he admitted the name business is “humorous to me, though.”

I even had a person call me from London, asking if I had a son named Harry Potter because they wanted a real Harry Potter in the movie. I said I could fit in. I could be the old Harry Potter who’s lost his zap.

AbeBooks.com did a search in 2005 for “ordinary people called Harry Potter,” an investigation that yielded ‘Meet the Real Harry Potters.’ The retired “naval seaman” in Florida was probably the most interesting of that lot because he was Harry Potter III and also had a son named Harry Potter.

I pulled the Book magazine off my Harry Potter shelf today, though, after reading the RadioTimes.com piece, ‘Meet the real-life muggles named Harry Potter: How sharing a name with the Boy Who Lived transfigured the lives of a knighted criminal lawyer, a fitness guru and more.’ It’s a relatively extended and in-depth look at five men named Harry Potter (four in the picture above) and the advantages and drawbacks each has experienced in the two decades of sharing a name with The Boy Who Lived. I recommend it.

The RadioTimes piece includes, for example, this strange bit of nigh on incredible Shared Text data:

“This boy will be famous!” McGonagall whispered to her companion, who was placing yet another lemon drop in the mouth hiding beneath his flowing silver beard. “There will be books written about him – every child in our world will know his name!”

She was, of course, completely correct. The baby, a young wizard called Harry Potter, would soon possess one of the most celebrated names on the planet. It was a name that became emblazoned across JK Rowling’s novels, which went on to sell 500 million copies worldwide in 74 languages. Four syllables that would garner their own registered trademark and font.

And even today, almost 21 years since The Philosopher’s Stone was published, ‘Harry Potter’ is still a name more popular on Google than Donald Trump, Kanye West and Gandalf combined, not to mention 17 times more searched for than Jesus Christ.

But however right McGonagall’s prophecy was, she had overlooked something huge. While the Boy Who Lived would soon bare the world’s most famous name, so too would a set of other Harry Potters across the country. The estimated 23 Harry Potters of voting age residing in the UK, for instance.

John Lennon famously quipped in 1966 that the Beatles were “more popular than Jesus.” I don’t think Rowling is foolish enough to think that, not to mention say it in public, but, if Google searches equate to popularity rather than curiosity, I guess she could.

I share a name with a Harry Potter character, fortunately “the smartest witch of her generation,” and, because the connection is only the relatively common surname not the signature ‘Hermione’ first name, I am never bothered about it in my Walter Mitty existence. As the Dean of Harry Potter Scholars, though, I get comments, invariably a tease or in good humor.

It is a standing joke, for example, that Hermione was given the middle name ‘Jean’ in Deathly Hallows (Dumbledore’s will, right?) because Rowling was making a hat tip to ‘John Granger,’ know-it-all interpreter of children’s books, who like Miss Granger and Tales of Beedle the Bard, identifies the symbol but misses its meaning. Not a very funny joke, I know, but I haven’t got any good stories to share with you about being named ‘Granger.’ Maybe being an old guy rather than a young woman keeps people from making the association — everyone that is except very young readers who inevitably ask at the end of talks if I am related to Harry’s brilliant friend.

The Tom Riddles of the world are having a much harder time. ‘What’s it Like to Share a Name with Lord Voldemort?’

Do you know a Weasley, Snape, or Potter? How is life treating them? Let me know in the comment boxes below!