The Footsteps of Rowling

[starfishstar]

I love Edinburgh for lots of reasons, but one pretty cool thing is how it's chock full of Harry Potter references! Real-life places like the various cafés J.K. Rowling wrote in when she was drafting the first Harry Potter book, but also semi-wizarding-world places like the curving street that's thought to have inspired Diagon Alley and the school that was, maybe, the visual model for Hogwarts.

When I first visited Edinburgh (7 years ago!) I made a point of finding out where J. K. Rowling used to write, and spending an afternoon there, writing. And on this visit, of course, I've come here again. So I am writing to you from one of the places where JKR wrote Harry Potter. It's pretty silly how happy this makes me...but it makes me really, really happy.


When I was here 7 years ago:



That brings back memories! That's when I had my little, very portable netbook, and I was traveling a ton and doing my translation work from all different countries. (In that year alone – 2011, which was definitely the peak of my "working from everywhere" phase – I think I worked from England, the Faroe Islands, Iceland, the US, Spain, Scotland, as well as of course various parts of Germany, and possibly also the Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland and Italy. Ah, my youth!)  ;-) 

I remember sitting in front of that very window, thinking how I'd basically arrived at a point where the whole world could be my "office," and feeling so fortunate.


And here now:

Comments

[scfrankles]

I remember sitting in front of that very window, thinking how I'd basically arrived at a point where the whole world could be my "office," and feeling so fortunate. That does sound like a marvellous feeling ^__^

This may be too personal a question so please ignore if so, but just to be nosy, what nationality are you...?

[starfishstar]

No worries, not too nosy! I'm American. (Which was probably kind of evident from this post's blithe tone of assumption that I'll always be free to travel wherever I like... Ugh, I do try not to be *that* American.)

Anyway, yes, from the US, but I've lived a bunch of different places, including Thailand, Germany (for a long time) and the UK (right now, for a short time).