
Dec 13, 2007 9:11 am US/Pacific
J.K. Rowling Auctions Handwritten Book For Charity
NEW YORK (CBS) ―
A book of fairy tales created, handwritten and illustrated by J.K.
Rowling was being auctioned by Sotheby's on Thursday and was expected
to sell for more than $100,000.
The buyer will get one of only seven copies of "The Tales of Beedle the Bard," which is leather bound with silver mounts.
Rowling, whose Harry Potter books have sold nearly 400 million
copies and been translated into 64 languages, wrote the Beedle tales
after finishing the seventh and final work in her famous series: "Harry
Potter and the Deathly Hallows."
"'The Tales of Beedle the Bard' is really a distillation of the
themes found in the Harry Potter books, and writing it has been the
most wonderful way to say goodbye to a world I have loved and lived in
for 17 years," Rowling said in a statement.
The auction will benefit The Children's Voice, a charity co-founded
in 2005 by Rowling and Emma Nicholson, a member of Britain's House of
Lords. It campaigns for children's rights cross Europe, especially in
Eastern Europe.
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