A selection of book titles and authors to celebrate the Queen’s Jubilee won’t have one of the most successful books in the last century. The compilation of Commonwealth authors will not include any of the Harry Potter books or any work of J.K Rowling, The Times of London reported.
As part of the Jubilee’s celebration, a list of 70 books from Commonwealth authors to mark the Queen’s 70-year reign is to be published. It was selected by BBC Arts and The Reading Agency and they include titles from 1952 to 2022.
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However, although the first Harry Potter book called “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone” (in the US it was changed to the Sorcerer’s Stone) was included in the first draft of 153 book titles, it didn’t make the cut to the final 70.
“There was a big discussion about JK Rowling,” Susheila Nasta, one of the competition judges and emeritus professor of modern literature at Queen Mary University of London, told The Times of London.
The professor also explained that the list must have authors known for their great work but didn’t have as much exposure as Rowling. “There were some very tricky decisions”, Nasta said.
After the British author was excluded, BBC Arts explained that the decision was not related to her polemic views about transgender women which some have described as TERF or trans-exclusionary radical feminist, mainly because she argues that trans women “are erasing the concept of sex”, which is harmful to women and lesbians, according to an Insider report.
After her claims, many Harry Potter actors have spoken out and shown their support for the transgender community and distanced themselves from Rowling’s opinions or points of view.
