There’s an Ananova item parading as news, implying that Daniel Radcliffe could play in the film version of Sebastian Faulks’ WWI book, Birdsong. This is patently untrue for many reasons, the most important of which is that Daniel is on set until the spring doing GoF, and then will be taking his GCSEs (OWLs 🙂 …read more!

The release of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban has been delayed through the school holidays as part of an official government crackdown aimed at strengthening morals. Although the government has not described how the movie might have a negative impact on Chinese youth, the media speculates it is due to concern over growing …read more!

Sotheby’s in London today will auction Harry Potter items, including two preliminary drawings by Giles Greenfield for Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (lots 364, 373, and 374). Sotheby’s site notes that the artist, whose artwork was used in the U.K. for Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, was initially commissioned by …read more!

The National Endowment for the Arts has found that fewer than half of over 17,000 American adults surveyed read literature (defined as ‘poems, plays, or narrative fiction’), a drop of 7 points over the last decade. NEA chairman Dana Gioia expressed concern for the results: “We have a lot of functionally literate people who are …read more!

J.K. Rowling will receive an honorary degree (“doctor honoris causa”) from Edinburgh University today. Her response to the announcement, which was made in February, was “I am delighted and honoured to be receiving an honorary degree from the University of Edinburgh, my adopted home city.”

Harry & the Potters are going to be in Illinois this week, then along the west coast through July before returning to Ohio, Pennsylvania and Massacheusetts towards the start of autumn. Check out their full tour schedule here – and a special note: their September 17 show in Brookline, Mass will be followed by a …read more!

It’s been a while since we mentioned the Get a Clue 2 T-Shirt drive, but our full report on our trip to Book Aid International’s 50th birthday party is finally up. After costs, your contributions yielded $6,300 – an incredible amount for such a brief call to action. When we handed the check to Nicola …read more!

Head over to JKRowling.com‘s FAQ poll question to find a highly hilarious answer to the “Who is Mark Evans?” question that’s been plaguing all of us since last year. We’re not posting it here, but the comments are spoiler-areas, FYI. To get to the post on her site, hit the paperclips (FAQ) on her desk, …read more!

The Independent reports on a debate in the French periodical Le Monde, which started three weeks ago when Ilias Yocaris, maître de conférences of French literature at the Institut Universitaire de Formation de Maîtres in Nice deemend the “fantasy universe of Harry Potter … a capitalist universe”, stuffed with “neo-liberal stereotypes” which caricature approvingly the …read more!

Various film websites are reporting that documentary writer/producer/director Michael Moore has been invited to direct the film version of book VI. It appears to us that this rumor got started when satirical news site the Spoof “reported” the “news”. Chinese news site Xinhuanet.com apparently then picked up the story and reported it as fact. It …read more!