Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Book 7)
The notoriously shy author is ready to testify herself to protect her ownership of Harry Potter against RDR Books, an independent American publisher, next month.
A US court is to decide whether she can block the publication of an unauthorised encyclopaedia of the wizarding world that she created.
Rowling and Warner Bros, the Hollywood studio behind the epic film adaptations of the Hogwarts adventures, are taking legal action to stop RDR from profiting from a Harry Potter Lexicon, a 400-page guide to the Potter books and movies.
Accusing the unauthorised book of lifting 2,034 of its 2,437 entries straight from her work, Rowling condemned the Lexicon as “a Harry Potter ‘rip-off’ . . . [that] interferes with my rights as a creator and copyright holder”.
She noted that RDR’s attempt “to co-opt my work for financial gain” was out of keeping with the spirit of the Potter stories, which are “full of moral choices and ethical dilemmas”.
She claims that the RDR book not only infringes her copyright but undermines her own planned lexicon. As she will donate its royalties to charity, “the losers in such a situation would be the charities that I hope, eventually, to benefit”. [...]
