50. the shy sorceress

not even a decade ago she was unknown and poor, a single mom on welfare who sometimes pretended to browse2 in maternity3 stores so she could cadge4 a free diaper5 in the changing room6 . now, after four harry potter books, two movies and an armada of7 related merchandise , j. k. rowling has a fortune estimated at 450 million, according to the london sunday times8 rich list, making her 50 million wealthier than the queen of england. her personal life has picked up too . she has bought multimillion-dollar houses in london, edinburgh and the scottish hills near perth. and at the end of 2001 , rowling, 37 , married neil murray, a steady, brainy anesthetist and in march 2003 they had a son david. rowling has admitted that — no surprise — harry is her favorite boy’s name, but she wisely avoided saddling her son with that lifelong invitation to teasing.

in fact, rowling has tried to throw a cloak of invisibility around her family so they can live almost normal lives. 9 but simple pleasures like strolling to the supermarket in edinburgh or attending her 11 -year-old daughter jessica’s christmas pageant10 require constant vigilance11 against an army of tabloid reporters12.

the intrusions are only part of the reason rowling is uneasy with fame.“ i never set out to make a mark, ”she tells time.“ i set out to do the thing i love best in the world and find out whether i was any good at it. ”she’s so good at it that her lawyers are constantly swatting down copycats trying to cash in on pottermania 13. .. . rowling was badly shaken when an american writer named nancy stouffer claimed she had stolen the word muggle and otherwise plagiarized stouffer’s work. a new york city federal judge found that stouffer had“ perpetrated a fraud”. it felt, rowling says,“as if some strange woman had come out of nowhere saying she was my children’s mother . . . it was like a punch in the stomach14 . people think that if you have been successful, you are insulated from15 normal feelings of hurt, but you aren’t. ”英语六级作文

rowling appreciates that she can use her name and money to support charities, including those for one-parent families and victims of multiple sclerosis. .. .“one of the few upsides of being famous is being able to do something meaningful, ”she tells time. after publication of order of the phoenix, rowling will retreat from the spotlight to write book no. 6 and care for her family. she hopes to be remembered as“ someone who did the best she could with the talent she was given”and she“wouldn’t mind being remembered as a good parent”

阅读自测

Ⅰ. fill the blanks with the words or phrases in the passage :

1. after four harry potter books, two movies and related merchandise, j. k. rowling has a fortune estimated at 450 million.

2. rowling has admitted that harry is her favorite boy’s name , but she wisely avoided her son that lifelong invitation to teasing.

3. her lawyers are constantly copycats trying to cash in on pottermania.

4.“i never set out to , ”she tells time.

Ⅱ. question :

does j. k. rowling cherish her work? how do you know?

参考答案

Ⅰ. 1. an armada of 2 . saddling . .. with 3 . swatting down 4. make a mark

Ⅱ. yes. when she was wrongly accused of plagiarism, she felt“ as if some strange woman had come out of nowhere saying she was my children’s mother .. . it was like a punch in the stomach. ”