The Tales of Beedle the Bard

The Tales of Beedle the Bard
The cover of the UK public paperback edition.
AuthorJ. K. Rowling
IllustratorJ. K. Rowling
LanguageEnglish
SeriesHarry Potter
GenreFantasy
Set inWizarding World
PublisherChildren's High Level Group, Bloomsbury Publishing
Publication date
4 December 2008
Publication placeUnited Kingdom
Pages110 (paperback)
ISBN978-0-7475-9987-6

The Tales of Beedle the Bard is a book of fairy tales by author J. K. Rowling. There is a storybook of the same name mentioned in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, the final novel of the Harry Potter series.[1]

The book was originally produced in a limited edition of only seven copies, each handwritten and illustrated by J. K. Rowling.[2] One of them was offered for auction through Sotheby's in late 2007 and was expected to sell for £50,000 (US$77,000, €69,000); ultimately it was bought for £1.95 million ($3 million, €2.7 million) by Amazon, making the selling price the highest achieved at auction for a modern literary manuscript.[3][4] The money earned at the auction of the book was donated to The Children's Voice charity campaign.[5]

The book was published for the general public on 4 December 2008, with the proceeds going to the Children's High Level Group (renamed Lumos in 2010).[6][7][8]

  1. ^ Rowling, J. K. (2007). "The Will of Albus Dumbledore". Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
  2. ^ "Rare JK Rowling book fetches £2m". BBC News. 13 December 2007. Archived from the original on 11 July 2012. Retrieved 20 May 2008.
  3. ^ Cleland, Gary (14 December 2007). "Amazon admits to record Harry Potter bid". The Daily Telegraph. UK. Archived from the original on 16 June 2013. Retrieved 19 May 2013.
  4. ^ Strange, Hannah (14 December 2007). "Amazon says it bought £2m Rowling book as "thank you"". The Times. UK. Retrieved 11 May 2008.
  5. ^ "Never-Before-Told Wizarding Stories by J. K. Rowling Sell at Sotheby's for £1,950,000". chlg.co.uk. 13 December 2007. Archived from the original on 17 December 2007. Retrieved 21 May 2008.
  6. ^ Cite error: The named reference CHLG was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  7. ^ "New Harry Potter Out In December". booktrade.info. 31 July 2008. Archived from the original on 8 September 2008. Retrieved 31 July 2008.
  8. ^ "J. K. Rowling's Children's Charity to Publish The Tales of Beedle the Bard on 4 December 2008". Scholastic Inc. Archived from the original on 9 August 2008.