JK Rowling holds on tight to Harry -- The Register, 2006-09-15

[Andrew]

JK Rowling holds on tight to Harry -- The Register, 2006-09-15

Caught up in the airline security scare last month, JK Rowling won an argument with New York airport officials to allow her to fly with her latest Harry Potter manuscript.

Speaking on her website about being allowed on board with the manuscript, Rowling said: “I don’t know what I would have done if they hadn’t; sailed home, probably.”

[bradk]

well i sure hope the good folks at customs or whoever was on the receiving end of that argument was fired.

she's no less a terrorist than i, but something tells me i couldn't win that fight.

[Andrew]

I'm just amazed that she would travel with her only copies of her manuscripts. Any writing I do (which is usually code of some kind, but the principle applies) is backed up to a server somewhere else as soon as I'm done with it.

[3894]

That story has more holes in it than the typical Harry Potter plot. Like hell she has only one copy of that ms. It is to laugh.

And what would J.K. Rowling have done if they hadn't allowed her to take the ms with her on the plane? Charter her own plane.

[Shinku]

I can't say I blame her. I'd freak out if I was in the same situation.

3894- No disrespect meant at all, but I think it would make more sense for her to keep it on her (maybe one copy stored in a bank vault or something, who knows) because so many people would love to get their hands on it. I'm sure if someone wanted it badly enough, they would try and get into her computer or wherever she decided to keep another copy.

[3894]

I think it would make more sense for her to keep it on her (maybe one copy stored in a bank vault or something, who knows) because so many people would love to get their hands on it.

I hear you but the solution would be to keep the parts of the ms separate, not in the same place. Part A in this vault in Switzerland. Part B in that vault in the Cayman Islands. And so on.

And why in the world would she travel with the entire ms? Wouldn't that be courting trouble?

And again, J.K. Rowling has airplane loads of money. She is not at the mercy of the airlines.

[The Lovely Mrs. tod]

I admit it, I'm wild about Harry. But...come on, Jo. No WAY to I buy that being your ONLY copy. Now...maybe, just maybe, you like to edit with a blue pencil (I do) and you were sitting around making some changes so those were your ONLY edits for that particular session. But...I vividly remember a "Biography" (which is re-run every time a new book is due, BTW) with Ms. Rowling waving a really stuffed manilla envelope around bragging that that was Book 7, it was already written and in a safe. Or are we still writing in longhand on legal pads?

AND...it's due to be published in 2007, right? Wouldn't Scholastic have at least a close to final draft in hand by now?

Although I'm certainly not calling for the head of airport security, for heavens sake, it's a manuscript. I'd fly with a ms on board...

-TLMt

[bradk]

am i missing something? the article says it's mostly handwritten. no mention of a computer at all ?

[JeffG]

While I think the restrictions were over-the-top at that time, I also don't see why she should have been given an exception simply because she is a celebrity. If nobody else was allowed to carry anything other than very specific essentials on flights, she shouldn't have been either.

As others have said, she certainly has the finances that would have allowed her to charter a private flight if she couldn't live with the restrictions.

-Jeff

[Rhiannon8404]

I guess I don't understand what the restrictions were. Were people not allowed to carry paper, notebooks or books onto planes during that time? What if I had planned to work on homework while flying? Would they have taken my notebook away? I don't understand why they wanted to take the manuscript from her in the first place. Can someone explain it?

[Drince88]

Right after the plans were thwarted, flights into and out of London had extra special restrictions on them. My understanding was that handbags were not allowed, even - wallet, passport, reading glasses, but not any reading material.

I don't know how strict they are now, with London flights, though.

[Opus1guy]

A large part of it is handwritten and there was no copy of anything I had done while in the US, she said.

I don't find that hard to believe at all. She probably did some writing while here and hadn't made a copy of those portions yet.

Personally...I don't think she was as concerned about losing her only copy...as to what the consequences would be if a copy...any copy...of it had been lost (from checked luggage) and then appeared in public...spilling the beans in advance of official publication. That would be the real damage, IMHO.

I used to travel domestically and internationally with "hand samples" of many toy products. They were one-of-a-kind sculpts of items that were pretty priceless to the toy companies. I either had to purchase them their own seat (with their protective packaging, they were usually too big for the overhead), or if on the rare occasion when checking them as luggage was the only option...insure them, sometimes for hundreds of thousands of dollars.

But much worse than the actual loss of the item, would be it making its way somehow to the public eye...tipping the competition or inspiring knock-offs or pirated versions, or even just spoiling the surprise of launch.

I think that likely was more along the lines of her real concerns.

[MrsPooh]

I didn't read the story, just commenting.

I know I am worlds apart from Ms. Rowling, there is a lot of writing I do in my notebooks before I put them into the computer. I don't have a lap top yet (I am working on that! ) so I find that a spiral notebook travels wherever I need to go. No power needed! I can write wherever I have a moment. In the doctor's office, at the DMV, wherever I have to wait.

Sometimes I don't get it into the computer right away, and I can have several chapters in there. I think I would have a heart attack if I lost my notebook with all that work in it.

Another point, and this is something MrPooh and I discuss. I don't want anyone seeing my first drafts. MrPooh thinks I should save them in case I ever get famous, someone could sell them for charity or something. Nope. I don't want my mistakes and grammatical errors out there for anyone else to see. Maybe she holds her version that has all the errors & corrections?

Maybe she is doing her writing the old fashioned way first? She is big enough that she doesn't have to do her own typing anymore. Maybe that is it?