Category: People

In my English class, we did a biography unit on authors, and, as an introduction, we had to research William Shakespeare (if you don’t know who that is, just wait, you will). We were to accumulate our information into an obituary for him. The following is mine:

William Shakespeare, a man of many words and unparalleled imagination, a man who wrote over three dozen plays and inspired millions, has tragically died on this April 23, 1616, in his hometown of Stratford-Upon-Avon.

On April 23, 1564, the 6th year of Queen Elizabeth I’s rule, Mary and John Shakespeare gave birth to a son. When young William was but 5, his father, who was both a glove maker and a produce trader, was elected as the mayor of their little town, Stratford, which lay upon the Avon River.

Whilst we don’t know all that much about Shakespeare’s school years, since no surviving records of his report cards and the like have been discovered, we can discern a few facts from his work. Studies show that his school experiences may have influenced The Merry Wives of Windsor, and thanks to the era, we know that he studied Latin, since much of the schoolwork of the day was actually in Latin.

At age 12, his father’s financial situation went downhill, never to recover. It is also agreed that he may have discontinued his education when he was roughly 13 to help his father in the shop, quite possibly because of their sinking financial position. For William himself, however, probably the most interesting parts of his teen years were his marriage at 18 and the birth of his first child, Suzanna, at 19. Shakespeare went on to have 2 more kids, twins, just two years after Suzanna’s birth.

We aren’t entirely certain what he did in these first years of his adulthood, but within a decade he had started writing. The young poet made a name for himself in the capital, and when King James I inherited the crown in 1603, he officially made Shakespeare one of the “King’s Men,” a great honor.

Over the course of his career, he wrote many plays, including:

• Romeo and Juliet (produced 1591-96?)
• King John (produced 1594-96?)
• A Midsummer Night’s Dream (produced 1596?)
• The Merchant of Venice (produced 1596-97?)
• The Merry Wives of Windsor (produced 1598-99?)
• Much Ado About Nothing (produced 1598-99?)
• Henry V (produced 1598-99)
• Julius Caesar (produced 1599)
• Hamlet (produced 1599-1601?)
• Twelfth Night; or, What You Will (produced 1601-02?)
• Othello (produced 1602-03?)
• Macbeth (produced 1602-06)
• King Lear (produced 1605)
• Coriolanus (produced 1607-10?)
• The Tempest (produced 1610-11?)
• The Winter’s Tale (produced 1611?)

Especially in the last few years of his career, his plotlines darkened and clear connections could be made between his personal life and his characters. This was particularly noticeable in Hamlet, King Lear and The Tempest.

    Shakespeare’s work was popular during his life, and even more so after his death. He continues to be an inspiration to generations, a god of the literary world, immortally ingrained in our minds and lives.

Disclaimer: In light of more recent events, Random Geek Child no longer supports Ms. Rowling. However, we have chosen not to pull down this post, as that would be erasing part of our blog’s history.

“There’s always room for a story that can transport people to another place.”         – J. K. Rowling.

Joanne Rowling is by far best known for her work on the Harry Potter series, following a teenage boy through a fictitious magical school, shops and death traps, while encountering bewildering people, strange creatures and concerning plants. It is such a world of wonder, yet seeds of reality are cunningly sown within, complete with bits and pieces of Rowling’s personal life. It is this characteristic that makes these books so excellent: Rowling’s ability to create severely flawed characters, who, despite these flaws, or perhaps because of them, rise to the occasion and beat the odds. This allows her characters to be both easy to connect with and a continual inspiration.

J. K. Rowling was born on the 31st of July, 1965, in Chipping Sodbury (near Bristol) to Anne and Peter Rowling. Their second daughter, Dianne, would be born two years later. Rowling wrote her first book at the age of six, about a rabbit with measles. She studied French in college, then moved to Portugal to teach it. Shortly before she moved, she first conceived Harry Potter while on a delayed train. She couldn’t write it down, however, because she didn’t have a pen on her! “To my immense frustration, I didn’t have a pen that worked, and I was too shy to ask anybody if I could borrow one.” The moral: always have a writing utensil on hand!

While in Portugal, she met television journalist Jorge Arantes, whom she married and had a daughter with, before their relationship was ended by frequent quarreling. When she returned to England, she brought not only her daughter, but the first three chapters of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. She has confirmed that her lying, arrogant character Gilderoy Lockhart was not in fact based of off Arantes, but has stated that Lockhart’s real life counterpart “even more objectionable than his fictional counterpart.”

It took talking to thirteen different publishers to find one who would take on the script, but eventually one did. A tiny publishing company, Bloomsbury Children’s Books, eventually agreed to publish the book in 1997, in large part because the editor’s eight-year-old daughter loved the first chapter.

The reaction to Harry Potter was unprecedented. By the time the third book came out in 1999, Harry Potter was on the cover of Time Magazine, and the fourth book sold a record-breaking three million books in the first forty-eight hours. In 1998, Warner Bros purchased the film rights to the series for a seven-figure sum, on the condition the Rowling be directly involved in the film process. Thus, the movies have stayed relatively true to the books, and, per her request, the actors are all British and filmed in Britain.

By the time she remarried on December 26, 2001, to anesthesiologist Neil Murray, she had accumulated $150 million dollars. Neil quit his job to take care of Jessica while her mother wrote and traveled. In 2003, he became a father of his own to their son David, who was followed two years later by their daughter, Mackenzie.

Rowling rode the wave of fame, becoming one of the wealthiest people in the world. She continued to write Harry Potter books, with a total of seven in the central series (not counting Harry Potter and the Cursed Child) and a handful of side books. Alongside, she recently began writing screenplays (Harry Potter and the Cursed Child and the Fantastic Beasts series).

The fame and fortune she acquired would have been satisfying for most, but not Rowling. She felt an obligation to continue her work. She went on to create multiple websites expanding the Harry Potter universe, provide large contributions to more than eight different charities (and more than once, you can be sure), and write four other novels with no relation to Harry Potter (the Cormorant Strike series — currently three books — and The Casual Vacancy).