Rowling: Harry fans behind new book

7:35pm Thursday 4th December 2008

Author JK Rowling revealed that it was demand from Harry Potter fans which led to the publication of her latest book.

The writer spoke as she hosted a children's tea party in Edinburgh to mark the launch of her new work, The Tales Of Beedle The Bard.

Millions of copies of the book have gone on sale to raise funds for Children's High Level Group (CHLG), a charity co-founded by Rowling to help vulnerable children across Eastern Europe.

The tales were first mentioned in the seventh and final book in the Potter series - Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows.

The stories were originally produced in a limited edition of just seven books, each hand-written and illustrated by Rowling herself.

She gave six of the volumes as gifts to people who helped make Harry Potter a global success, while the seventh hand-written copy was auctioned by CHLG last year and snapped up for £1.95 million.

The author revealed why she decided to make the book much more widely available. "The idea actually came from you, by which I mean Harry Potter fans," she told the 200 primary school children gathered at Edinburgh's Parliament Hall.

"There was quite a lot of high feeling from Harry Potter fans that only someone who had £2 million could afford to read the book. I thought 'fair point', so I thought I'll publish it and then the charity can have that money too."

In the final Potter book, The Tales Of Beedle The Bard was a volume of wizarding fairytales left to Hermione Granger by Hogwarts headmaster Albus Dumbledore. The tales played a crucial role in helping Harry to defeat Lord Voldemort, but only one of the five stories, The Tale Of The Three Brothers, was recounted in the book.