title: J. K. Rowling

text: The film series concluded with "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows", which was adapted in two parts; part one was released on 19 November 2010, and part two followed on 15 July 2011.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Warner Bros. announced an expanded relationship with Rowling in 2013, including a planned series of films about her character Newt Scamander, fictitious author of "Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them". The first film of five, a prequel to the "Harry Potter" series, set roughly 70 years earlier, was released in November 2016. Rowling wrote the screenplay, which was released as a book. "" was released in November 2018. "" was released in April 2022.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: By 1998, Rowling was portrayed in the media as a "penniless divorcee hitting the jackpot". According to her biographer Sean Smith, the publicity became effective marketing for "Harry Potter", but her journey from living on benefits to wealth brought, along with fame, concerns from parents about the books' portrayals of the occult and gender. Ultimately, Smith says that these concerns served to "increase her public profile rather than damage it".


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Rowling identifies as a Christian. Although she grew up next door to her church, accounts of the family's church attendance differ. She began attending a Church of Scotland congregation, where Jessica was christened, around the time she was writing "Harry Potter". In a 2012 interview, she said she belonged to the Scottish Episcopal Church. Rowling has stated that she believes in God, but has experienced doubt, and that her struggles with faith play a part in her books. She does not believe in magic or witchcraft.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Rowling married Neil Murray, a doctor, in 2001. The couple intended to marry that July in the Galapagos, but when this leaked to the press, they delayed their wedding and changed their holiday destination to Mauritius. After the UK Press Complaints Commission ruled that a magazine had breached Jessica's privacy when the eight-year-old was included in a photograph of the family taken during that trip, Murray and Rowling sought a more private and quiet place to live and work. Rowling bought Killiechassie House and its estate in Perthshire, Scotland, and on 26 December 2001, the couple had a small, private wedding there, officiated by an Episcopalian priest who travelled from Edinburgh. Their son, David Gordon Rowling Murray, was born in 2003, and their daughter Mackenzie Jean Rowling Murray in 2005.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: In 2004, "Forbes" named Rowling "the first billion-dollar author". Rowling denied that she was a billionaire in a 2005 interview. By 2012, "Forbes" concluded she was no longer a billionaire due to her charitable donations and high UK taxes. She was named the world's highest paid author by "Forbes" in 2008, 2017 and 2019. Her UK sales total in excess of £238 million, making her the best-selling living author in Britain. The 2021 "Sunday Times" Rich List estimated Rowling's fortune at £820 million, ranking her as the 196th-richest person in the UK. As of 2020, she also owns a £4.5 million Georgian house in Kensington and a £2 million home in Edinburgh.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: In mid-2011, Rowling left Christopher Little Literary Agency and followed her agent Neil Blair to the Blair Partnership. He represented her for the publication of "The Casual Vacancy", released in September 2012 by Little, Brown and Company. It was Rowling's first since "Harry Potter" ended, and her first book for adults. A contemporary take on 19th-century British fiction about village life, "Casual Vacancy" was promoted as a black comedy, while the critic Ian Parker described it as a "rural comedy of manners". It was adapted to a miniseries co-created by the BBC and HBO.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Little, Brown published "The Cuckoo's Calling", the purported début novel of Robert Galbraith, in April 2013. It initially sold 1,500 copies in hardback. After an investigation prompted by discussion on Twitter, the journalist Richard Brooks contacted Rowling's agent, who confirmed Galbraith was Rowling's pseudonym. Rowling later said she enjoyed working as Robert Galbraith, a name she took from Robert F. Kennedy, a personal hero, and Ella Galbraith, a name she invented for herself in childhood. After the revelation, sales of "Cuckoo's Calling" escalated.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Continuing the "Cormoran Strike" series of detective novels, "The Silkworm" was released in 2014; "Career of Evil" in 2015; "Lethal White" in 2018; "Troubled Blood" in 2020; and "The Ink Black Heart" in 2022. Cormoran Strike, a disabled veteran of the War in Afghanistan with a prosthetic leg, is unfriendly and sometimes oblivious, but acts with a deep moral sensibility. In 2017, BBC One aired the first episode of the four-season series "Strike", a television adaptation of the "Cormoran Strike" novels starring Tom Burke. The series was picked up by HBO for distribution in the United States and Canada.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: "Pottermore", a website with information and stories about characters in the "Harry Potter" universe, launched in 2011. On its release, "Pottermore" was rooted in the "Harry Potter" novels, tracing the series's story in an interactive format. Its brand was associated with Rowling: she introduced the site in a video as a shared media environment to which she and "Harry Potter" fans would contribute. The site was substantially revised in 2015 to resemble an encyclopedia of "Harry Potter". Beyond encyclopedia content, the post-2015 "Pottermore" included promotions for Warner Bros. films including "Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them".


title: J. K. Rowling

text: "Harry Potter and the Cursed Child" premiered in the West End in May 2016 and on Broadway in July. At its London premiere, Rowling confirmed that she would not write any more "Harry Potter" books. Rowling collaborated with writer Jack Thorne and director John Tiffany. "Cursed Child" script was published as a book in July 2016. The play follows the friendship between Harry's son Albus and Scorpius Malfoy, Draco Malfoy's son, at Hogwarts.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: "The Ickabog" was Rowling's first book aimed at children since "Harry Potter". Ickabog is a monster that turns out to be real; a group of children find out the truth about the Ickabog and save the day. Rowling released "The Ickabog" for free online in mid-2020, during the COVID-19 lockdown in the United Kingdom. She began writing it in 2009 but set it aside to focus on other works including "Casual Vacancy". Scholastic held a competition to select children's art for the print edition, which was published in the US and Canada on 10 November 2020. Profits went to charities focused on COVID-19 relief.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: In "The Christmas Pig", a young boy loses his favourite stuffed animal, a pig, and the Christmas Pig guides him through the fantastical Land of the Lost to retrieve it. The novel was published on 12 October 2021 and became a bestseller in the UK and the US.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Rowling has named Jessica Mitford as her greatest influence. She said Mitford had "been my heroine since I was 14 years old, when I overheard my formidable great-aunt discussing how Mitford had run away at the age of 19 to fight with the Reds in the Spanish Civil War", and that what inspired her about Mitford was that she was "incurably and instinctively rebellious, brave, adventurous, funny and irreverent, she liked nothing better than a good fight, preferably against a pompous and hypocritical target". As a child, Rowling read C. S. Lewis's "The Chronicles of Narnia", Elizabeth Goudge's "The Little White Horse", "Manxmouse" by Paul Gallico, and books by E. Nesbit and Noel Streatfeild. Rowling describes Jane Austen as her "favourite author of all time".


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Rowling acknowledges Homer, Geoffrey Chaucer, and William Shakespeare as literary influences. Scholars agree that "Harry Potter" is heavily influenced by the children's fantasy of writers such as Lewis, Goudge, Nesbit, J. R. R. Tolkien, Ursula K. Le Guin, and Diana Wynne Jones. According to the critic Beatrice Groves, "Harry Potter" is also "rooted in the Western literary tradition", including the classics. Commentators also note similarities to the children's stories of Enid Blyton and Roald Dahl. Rowling expresses admiration for Lewis, in whose writing battles between good and evil are also prominent, but rejects any connection with Dahl.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Earlier works prominently featuring characters who learn to use magic include Le Guin's "Earthsea" series, in which a school of wizardry also appears, and the "Chrestomanci" books by Jones. Rowling's setting of a "school of witchcraft and wizardry" departs from the still older tradition of protagonists as apprentices to magicians, exemplified by "The Sorcerer's Apprentice": yet this trope does appear in "Harry Potter", when Harry receives individual instruction from Remus Lupin and other teachers. Rowling also draws on the tradition of stories set in boarding schools, a major example of which is Thomas Hughes's 1857 volume "Tom Brown's School Days".


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Rowling is known primarily as an author of fantasy and children's literature. Her writing in other genres, including literary fiction and murder mystery, has received less critical attention. Rowling's most famous work, "Harry Potter", has been defined as a fairy tale, a Bildungsroman and a boarding-school story. Her other writings have been described by Pugh as gritty contemporary fiction with historical influences ("The Casual Vacancy") and hardboiled detective fiction ("Cormoran Strike").


title: J. K. Rowling

text: In "Harry Potter", Rowling juxtaposes the extraordinary against the ordinary. Her narrative features two worlds – the mundane and the fantastic – but it differs from typical portal fantasy in that its magical elements stay grounded in the everyday. Paintings move and talk; books bite readers; letters shout messages; and maps show live journeys, making the wizarding world "both exotic and cosily familiar" according to the scholar Catherine Butler. This blend of realistic and romantic elements extends to Rowling's characters. Their names often include morphemes that correspond to their characteristics: Malfoy is difficult, Filch unpleasant and Lupin a werewolf. Harry is ordinary and relatable, with down-to-earth features such as wearing broken glasses; Roni Natov terms him an "everychild". These elements serve to highlight Harry when he is heroic, making him both an everyman and a fairytale hero.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Arthurian, Christian and fairytale motifs are frequently found in Rowling's writing. Harry's ability to draw the Sword of Gryffindor from the Sorting Hat resembles the Arthurian sword in the stone legend. His life with the Dursleys has been compared to Cinderella. Like C. S. Lewis's "The Chronicles of Narnia", "Harry Potter" contains Christian symbolism and allegory. The series has been viewed as a Christian moral fable in the psychomachia tradition, in which stand-ins for good and evil fight for supremacy over a person's soul. The critic of children's literature Joy Farmer sees parallels between Harry and Jesus Christ. Comparing Rowling with Lewis, she argues that "magic is both authors' way of talking about spiritual reality". According to Maria Nikolajeva, Christian imagery is particularly strong in the final scenes of the series: she writes that Harry dies in self-sacrifice and Voldemort delivers an speech, after which Harry is resurrected and defeats his enemy.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Death is Rowling's overarching theme in "Harry Potter". In the first book, when Harry looks into the Mirror of Erised, he feels both joy and "a terrible sadness" at seeing his desire: his parents, alive and with him. Confronting their loss is central to Harry's character arc and manifests in different ways through the series, such as in his struggles with Dementors. Other characters in Harry's life die; he even faces his own death in "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows". The series has an existential perspective – Harry must grow mature enough to accept death. In Harry's world, death is not binary but mutable, a state that exists in degrees. Unlike Voldemort, who evades death by separating and hiding his soul in seven parts, Harry's soul is whole, nourished by friendship and love. Love distinguishes the two characters. Harry is a hero because he loves others, even willing to accept death to save them; Voldemort is a villain because he does not.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: While "Harry Potter" can be viewed as a story about good vs. evil, its moral divisions are not absolute. First impressions of characters are often misleading. Harry assumes in the first book that Quirrell is good because he opposes Snape, who appears malicious; in reality, their positions are reversed. This pattern later recurs with Moody and Snape. In Rowling's world, good and evil are choices rather than inherent attributes: second chances and redemption are key themes of the series. This is reflected in Harry's self-doubts after learning his connections to Voldemort, such as the ability of both to communicate with snakes in their language of Parseltongue; and prominently in Snape's characterisation, which has been described as complex and multifaceted. In some scholars' view, while Rowling's narrative appears on the surface to be about Harry, her focus may actually be on Snape's morality and character arc.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Rowling has enjoyed enormous commercial success as an author. Her "Harry Potter" series topped bestseller lists, spawned a global media franchise including films and video games, and was translated into at least 70 languages by 2018. The first three "Harry Potter" books occupied the top three spots of "The New York Times" bestseller list for more than a year; they were then moved to a newly created children's list. The final four books – "Goblet of Fire", "Order of the Phoenix", "Half-Blood Prince", and "Deathly Hallows" – each set records as the fastest-selling books in the UK or US. , the series had sold more than 500 million copies according to Bloomsbury. Neither of Rowling's later works, "The Casual Vacancy" and the "Cormoran Strike" series, have been as successful, though "Casual Vacancy" was still a bestseller in the UK within weeks of its release. "Harry Potter" popularity has been attributed to factors including the nostalgia evoked by the boarding-school story, the endearing nature of Rowling's characters, and the accessibility of her books to a variety of readers. According to Julia Eccleshare, the books are "neither too literary nor too popular, too difficult nor too easy, neither too young nor too old", and hence bridge traditional reading divides.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Critical response to "Harry Potter" has been more mixed. Harold Bloom regards Rowling's prose as poor and her plots as conventional, while Jack Zipes argues that the series would not be successful if it were not formulaic. Zipes states that the early novels have the same plot: in each book, Harry escapes the Dursleys to visit Hogwarts, where he confronts Lord Voldemort and then heads back successful. Rowling's prose has been described as simple and not innovative; Le Guin, like several other critics, considers it "stylistically ordinary". According to the novelist A. S. Byatt, the books reflect a dumbed-down culture dominated by soap operas and reality television. Thus, some critics argue, "Harry Potter" does not innovate on established literary forms; nor does it challenge readers' preconceived ideas. Conversely, the scholar Philip Nel rejects such critiques as "snobbery" that reacts to the novels' popularity, whereas Mary Pharr argues that "Harry Potter" conventionalism is the point: by amalgamating literary forms familiar to her readers, Rowling invites them to "ponder their own ideas". Other critics who see artistic merit in Rowling's writing include Marina Warner, who views "Harry Potter" as part of an "alternative genealogy" of English literature that she traces from Edmund Spenser to Christina Rossetti. Michiko Kakutani praises Rowling's fictional world and the darker tone of the series' later entries.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Reception of Rowling's later works has varied among critics. "The Casual Vacancy", her attempt at literary fiction, drew mixed reviews. Some critics praised its characterisation, while others stated that it would have been better if it had contained magic. The "Cormoran Strike" series was more warmly received as a work of British detective fiction, even as some reviewers noted that its plots are occasionally contrived. Theatrical reviews of "Harry Potter and the Cursed Child" were highly positive. Fans have been more critical of the play's use of time travel, changes to characters' personalities, and perceived queerbaiting in Albus and Scorpius's relationship, leading some to question its connection to the "Harry Potter" canon.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Rowling's portrayal of women in "Harry Potter" has been described as complex and varied, but nonetheless conforming to stereotypical and patriarchal depictions of gender. Gender divides are ostensibly absent in the books: Hogwarts is coeducational and women hold positions of power in wizarding society. However, this setting obscures the typecasting of female characters and the general depiction of conventional gender roles. According to the scholars Elizabeth Heilman and Trevor Donaldson, the subordination of female characters goes further early in the series. The final three books "showcase richer roles and more powerful females": for instance, the series' "most matriarchal character", Molly Weasley, engages substantially in the final battle of "Deathly Hallows", while other women are shown as leaders. Hermione Granger, in particular, becomes an active and independent character essential to the protagonists' battle against evil. Yet, even particularly capable female characters such as Hermione and Minerva McGonagall are placed in supporting roles, and Hermione's status as a feminist model is debated. Girls and women are frequently shown as emotional, defined by their appearance, and denied agency in family settings.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: The social hierarchies in Rowling's magical world have been a matter of debate among scholars and critics. The primary antagonists of "Harry Potter", Voldemort and his followers, believe blood purity is paramount, and that non-wizards, or "muggles", are subhuman. Their ideology of racial difference is depicted as unambiguously evil. However, the series cannot wholly reject racial division, according to several scholars, as it still depicts wizards as fundamentally superior to muggles. Blake and Zipes argue that numerous examples of wizardly superiority are depicted as "natural and comfortable". Thus, according to Gupta, "Harry Potter" depicts superior races as having a moral obligation of tolerance and altruism towards lesser races, rather than explicitly depicting equality.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Rowling's depictions of the status of magical non-humans is similarly debated. Discussing the slavery of house-elves within "Harry Potter", scholars such as Brycchan Carey have praised the books' abolitionist sentiments, viewing Hermione's Society for the Promotion of Elfish Welfare as a model for younger readers' political engagement. Other critics, including Farah Mendlesohn, find the portrayal of house-elves extremely troublesome; they are written as happy in their slavery, and Hermione's efforts on their behalf are implied to be naïve. Pharr terms the house-elves a disharmonious element in the series, writing that Rowling leaves their fate hanging; at the end of "Deathly Hallows", the elves remain enslaved and cheerful. More generally, the subordination of magical non-humans remains in place, unchanged by the defeat of Voldemort. Thus, scholars suggest, the series's message is essentially conservative; it sees no reason to transform social hierarchies, only being concerned with who holds positions of power.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: There have been attempts to ban "Harry Potter" around the world, especially in the United States, and in the Bible Belt in particular. The series topped the American Library Association's list of most challenged books in the first three years of its publication. In the following years, parents in several US cities launched protests against teaching it in schools. Some Christian critics, particularly Evangelical Christians, have claimed that the novels promote witchcraft and harm children; similar opposition has been expressed to the film adaptations. Criticism has taken two main forms: allegations that "Harry Potter" is a pagan text; and claims that it encourages children to oppose authority, derived mainly from Harry's rejection of the Dursleys, his adoptive parents. The author and scholar Amanda Cockrell suggests that "Harry Potter" popularity, and recent preoccupation with fantasy and the occult among Christian fundamentalists, explains why the series received particular opposition. Some groups of Shia and Sunni Muslims also argued that the series contained satanic subtext, and it was banned in private schools in the United Arab Emirates.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: The "Harry Potter" books also have a group of vocal religious supporters who believe that "Harry Potter" espouses Christian values, or that the Bible does not prohibit the forms of magic described in the series. Christian analyses of the series have argued that it embraces ideals of friendship, loyalty, courage, love, and the temptation of power. After the final volume was published, Rowling said she intentionally incorporated Christian themes, in particular the idea that love may hold power over death. According to Farmer, it is a profound misreading to think that "Harry Potter" promotes witchcraft. The scholar Em McAvan writes that evangelical objections to "Harry Potter" are superficial, based on the presence of magic in the books: they do not attempt to understand the moral messages in the series.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Rowling's "Harry Potter" series has been credited with a resurgence in crossover fiction: children's literature with an adult appeal. Crossovers were prevalent in 19th-century American and British fiction, but fell out of favour in the 20th century and did not occur at the same scale. The post-"Harry Potter" crossover trend is associated with the fantasy genre. In the 1970s, children's books were generally realistic as opposed to fantastic, while adult fantasy became popular because of the influence of "The Lord of the Rings". The next decade saw an increasing interest in grim, realist themes, with an outflow of fantasy readers and writers to adult works.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: The commercial success of "Harry Potter" in 1997 reversed this trend. The scale of its growth had no precedent in the children's market: within four years, it occupied 28% of that field by revenue. Children's literature rose in cultural status, and fantasy became a dominant genre. Older works of children's fantasy, including Diana Wynne Jones's "Chrestomanci" series and Diane Duane's "Young Wizards", were reprinted and rose in popularity; some authors re-established their careers. In the following decades, many "Harry Potter" imitators and subversive responses grew popular.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Rowling has been compared with Enid Blyton, who also wrote in simple language about groups of children and long held sway over the British children's market. She has also been described as an heir to Roald Dahl. Some critics view "Harry Potter" rise, along with the concurrent success of Philip Pullman's "His Dark Materials", as part of a broader shift in reading tastes: a rejection of literary fiction in favour of plot and adventure. This is reflected in the BBC's 2003 "Big Read" survey of the UK's favourite books, where Pullman and Rowling ranked at numbers 3 and 5, respectively, with very few British literary classics in the top 10.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: "Harry Potter" popularity led its publishers to plan elaborate releases and spawned a textual afterlife among fans and forgers. Beginning with the release of "Prisoner of Azkaban" on 8 July 1999 at 3:45 pm, its publishers coordinated selling the books at the same time globally, introduced security protocols to prevent premature purchases, and required booksellers to agree not to sell copies before the appointed time. Driven by the growth of the internet, fan fiction about the series proliferated and has spawned a diverse community of readers and writers. While Rowling has supported fan fiction, her statements about characters – for instance, that Harry and Hermione could have been a couple, and that Dumbledore was gay – have complicated her relationship with readers. According to scholars, this shows that modern readers feel a sense of ownership over the text that is independent of, and sometimes contradicts, authorial intent.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: In the 1990s and 2000s, Rowling was both a plaintiff and defendant in lawsuits alleging copyright infringement. Nancy Stouffer sued Rowling in 1999, alleging that "Harry Potter" was based on stories she published in 1984. Rowling won in September 2002. Richard Posner describes Stouffer's suit as deeply flawed and notes that the court, finding she had used "forged and altered documents", assessed a $50,000 penalty against her.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: With her literary agents and Warner Bros., Rowling has brought legal action against publishers and writers of "Harry Potter" knockoffs in several countries. In the mid-2000s, Rowling and her publishers obtained a series of injunctions prohibiting sales or published reviews of her books before their official release dates.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Beginning in 2001, after Rowling sold film rights to Warner Bros., the studio tried to take "Harry Potter" fan sites offline unless it determined that they were made by "authentic" fans for innocuous purposes. In 2007, with Warner Bros., Rowling started proceedings to cease publication of a book based on content from a fan site called "The Harry Potter Lexicon". The court held that "Lexicon" was neither a fair use of Rowling's material nor a derivative work, but it did not prevent the book from being published in a different form. "Lexicon" was published in 2009.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Aware of the good fortune that led to her wealth and fame, Rowling wanted to use her public image to help others despite her concerns about publicity and the press; she became, in the words of Smith, "emboldened ... to stand up and be counted on issues that were important to her". Rowling's charitable donations before 2012 were estimated by "Forbes" at $160 million. She was the second most generous UK donor in 2015 (following the singer Elton John), giving about $14 million.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Long interested in issues affecting women and children, Rowling established the Volant Charitable Trust in 2000, named after her mother to address social deprivation in at-risk women, children and youth. She was appointed president of One Parent Families (now Gingerbread) in 2004, after becoming its first ambassador in 2000. She collaborated with Sarah Brown on a book of children's stories to benefit One Parent Families. Together with the MEP Emma Nicholson, Rowling founded the charity now known as Lumos in 2005. Lumos has worked with an orphanage west of Kyiv, Ukraine since 2013; after the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, Rowling offered to personally match up to £1million in donations to Lumos for Ukraine. Later in 2022, during her advocacy against the proposed Gender Recognition Reform (Scotland) Bill, Rowling stated she would found and fund Beira's Place, a women-centred rape help center to provide free support services for women-only survivors of sexual violence.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Rowling has made donations to support other medical causes. She named another institution after her mother in 2010, when she donated £10 million to found a multiple sclerosis research centre at the University of Edinburgh. She gave an additional £15.3 million to the centre in 2019. During the 2012 Summer Olympics opening ceremony, accompanied by an inflatable representation of Lord Voldemort, she read from "Peter Pan" as part of a tribute to the Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children. To support COVID-19 relief, she donated six-figure sums to both Khalsa Aid and the British Asian Trust from royalties for "The Ickabog".


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Several publications in the "Harry Potter" universe have been sold for charitable purposes. Profits from "Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them" and "Quidditch Through the Ages", both published in 2001, went to Comic Relief. To support Children's Voice, later renamed Lumos, Rowling sold a deluxe copy of "The Tales of Beedle the Bard" at auction in 2007. Amazon's £1.95 million purchase set a record for a contemporary literary work and for children's literature. Rowling published the book and, in 2013, donated the proceeds of nearly £19 million (then about $30 million) to Lumos. Rowling and 12 other writers composed short pieces in 2008 to be sold to benefit Dyslexia Action and English PEN. Rowling's contribution was an 800-word "Harry Potter" prequel. When the revelation that Rowling wrote "The Cuckoo's Calling" led to an increase in sales, she donated the royalties to ABF The Soldiers' Charity (formerly the Army Benevolent Fund).


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Rowling was actively engaged on the internet before author webpages were common. She has at times used Twitter unreservedly to reach her Harry Potter fans and followers. She often tweets about her political opinions using wit and sarcasm, sometimes generating controversy.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: In 2008 Rowling donated £1 million to the Labour Party, endorsed the Labour prime minister Gordon Brown over his Conservative challenger David Cameron, and commended Labour's policies on child poverty. When asked about the 2008 United States presidential election, she stated that "it is a pity that Clinton and Obama have to be rivals because both are extraordinary."


title: J. K. Rowling

text: In her "Single mother's manifesto" published in "The Times" in 2010, Rowling criticised the prime minister David Cameron's plan to offer married couples an annual tax credit. She thought that the proposal discriminated against single parents, whose interests the Conservative Party failed to consider.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Rowling opposed the 2014 Scottish independence referendum, due to concerns about the economic consequences, and donated £1 million to the Better Together anti-independence campaign. She campaigned for the UK to stay in the European Union in the 2016 United Kingdom European Union membership referendum. She defined herself as an internationalist, "the mongrel product of this European continent", and expressed concern that "racists and bigots" were directing parts of the Leave campaign.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: She opposed Benjamin Netanyahu, but believed that depriving Israelis of shared culture would not dislodge him. In 2015, Rowling joined 150 others in signing a letter published in "The Guardian" in favour of cultural engagement with Israel.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Rowling has a difficult relationship with the press and has tried to influence the type of coverage she receives. She described herself in 2003 as "too thin-skinned". As of 2011, she had taken more than 50 actions against the press. Rowling dislikes the British tabloid the "Daily Mail", which she successfully sued in 2014 for libel about her time as a single mother.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: The Leveson Inquiry, an investigation of the British press, named Rowling as a "core participant" in 2011. She was one of many celebrities alleged to have been victims of phone hacking. In 2012, she wrote an op-ed for "The Guardian" in response to Cameron's decision not to implement all the inquiry's recommendations. She reaffirmed her stance on "Hacked Off", a campaign supporting the self-regulation of the press, by co-signing a 2014 declaration to "[safeguard] the press from political interference while also giving vital protection to the vulnerable" with other British celebrities.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Rowling's responses to proposed changes to UK gender recognition laws, and her views on sex and gender, have provoked controversy. Her statements have divided feminists; fuelled debates on freedom of speech, academic freedom and cancel culture; and prompted support for transgender people from the literary, arts and culture sectors.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: When Maya Forstater's employment contract with the London branch of the Center for Global Development was not renewed after she tweeted gender-critical views, Rowling responded in December 2019 with a tweet that transgender people should live their lives as they pleased in "peace and security", but questioned women being "force[d] out of their jobs for stating that sex is real". In another controversial tweet in June 2020, Rowling mocked an article for using the phrase "people who menstruate", and tweeted that women's rights and "lived reality" would be "erased" if "sex isn't real".


title: J. K. Rowling

text: LGBT charities and leading actors of the Wizarding World franchise condemned Rowling's comments; GLAAD called them "cruel" and "inaccurate". Rowling responded with an essay on her website in which she revealed that her views on women's rights were informed by her experience as a survivor of domestic abuse and sexual assault. While affirming that most trans people were "vulnerable" and "deserved protection", she believed that it would be unsafe to allow "any man who believes or feels he's a woman" into bathrooms or changing rooms. Writing of her own experiences with sexism and misogyny, she wondered if the "allure of escaping womanhood" would have led her to transition if she had been born later, and said that trans activism was "seeking to erode 'woman' as a political and biological class".


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Rowling's statements have been called transphobic by critics and she has been referred to as a TERF (trans-exclusionary radical feminist) in response to her Twitter comments. She rejects these characterisations. Criticism of Rowling's views has come from the "Harry Potter" fansites MuggleNet and The Leaky Cauldron; and the charities Mermaids, Stonewall, and Human Rights Campaign. After Kerry Kennedy expressed "profound disappointment" in her views, Rowling returned the Ripple of Hope Award given to her by the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights organisation.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: As Rowling's views on the legal status of transgender people came under scrutiny, she received insults and death threats and discussion moved beyond the Twitter community. Some performers and feminists have supported her. Figures from the arts world criticised "hate speech directed against her".


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Rowling's "Harry Potter" series has won awards for general literature, children's literature and speculative fiction. It has earned multiple British Book Awards, beginning with the Children's Book of the Year for the first two volumes, "Philosopher's Stone" and "Chamber of Secrets". The third novel, "Prisoner of Azkaban", was nominated for an adult award, the Whitbread Book of the Year, where it competed against the Nobel prize laureate Seamus Heaney's . The award body gave Rowling the children's prize instead (worth half the cash amount), which some scholars felt exemplified a literary prejudice against children's books. She won the World Science Fiction Convention's Hugo Award for the fourth book, "Goblet of Fire", and the British Book Awards' adult prize – the Book of the Year – for the sixth novel, "Half-Blood Prince".


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Rowling was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2000 Birthday Honours for services to children's literature, and three years later received Spain's Prince of Asturias Award for Concord. Following the conclusion of the "Harry Potter" series, she won the Outstanding Achievement prize at the 2008 British Book Awards. The next year, she was made a by the French president Nicolas Sarkozy, and leading magazine editors named her the "Most Influential Woman in the UK" in 2010. For services to literature and philanthropy, she was awarded the Order of the Companions of Honour (CH) in 2017.


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Many academic institutions have bestowed honorary degrees on Rowling, including her alma mater, the University of Exeter, and Harvard University, where she spoke at the 2008 commencement ceremony. She is a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature (FRSL), the Royal Society of Edinburgh (HonFRSE), and the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh (FRCPE).


title: J. K. Rowling

text: Rowling shared the British Academy Film Award (BAFTA) for Outstanding British Contribution to Cinema with the cast and crew of the "Harry Potter" films in 2011. Her other awards include the 2017 Laurence Olivier Award for Best New Play for "Harry Potter and the Cursed Child", and the 2021 British Book Awards' Crime and Thriller prize for the fifth volume of her "Cormoran Strike" series.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Quentin Jerome Tarantino (; born March 27, 1963) is an American film director, writer, producer, and actor. His films are characterized by stylized violence, extended dialogue, profanity, dark humor, non-linear storylines, cameos, ensemble casts, and references to popular culture. Other directorial tropes associated with Tarantino include the use of songs from the 1960s and 70s, fictional brand parodies, and the prominent framing of women's bare feet.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Tarantino began his career as an independent filmmaker with the release of the crime film "Reservoir Dogs" in 1992. His second film, "Pulp Fiction" (1994), a dark comedy crime thriller, was a major success with critics and audiences winning numerous awards, including the Palme d'Or and the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay. In 1996, he appeared in "From Dusk till Dawn", also writing the screenplay. Tarantino's third film, "Jackie Brown" (1997), paid homage to blaxploitation films.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In 2003, Tarantino directed "", inspired by the traditions of martial arts films; it was followed by "" in 2004. He then made the exploitation slasher "Death Proof" (2007), part of a double feature with Robert Rodriguez, released under the collective title "Grindhouse". His next film "Inglourious Basterds" (2009) told an alternate history with the war film genre. He followed this with "Django Unchained" (2012), a slave revenge Spaghetti Western, which won him his second Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay. Tarantino's eighth film, "The Hateful Eight" (2015), was a revisionist Western thriller and opened to audiences with a roadshow release. His most recent film, "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood" (2019), is a comedy drama set in the late 1960s about the transition of Old Hollywood to New Hollywood. A novelization of the film was also published in 2021, becoming his debut novel.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Tarantino's work has been subject to controversy, such as the depictions of violence, frequent inclusion of racial slurs and the alleged negligence of safety in his handling of stunt scenes on "Kill Bill: Volume 2". During his career, Tarantino's films have garnered a cult following, as well as critical and commercial success. He has been considered "the single most influential director of his generation", and listed as one of the most influential people in the world. Apart from receiving the Palme d'Or and two Academy Awards, his other major awards include two BAFTAs and four Golden Globes.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Tarantino was born on March 27, 1963, in Knoxville, Tennessee, the only child of Connie McHugh and aspiring actor Tony Tarantino, who left the family before his son's birth. He is of Cherokee and Irish ancestry through his mother; his father is of Italian descent. He was named in part after Quint Asper, Burt Reynolds's character in the TV series "Gunsmoke". Tarantino's mother met his father during a trip to Los Angeles. After a brief marriage and divorce, Connie left Los Angeles and moved to Knoxville, where her parents lived. In 1966, Tarantino returned with his mother to Los Angeles.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Tarantino's mother married musician Curtis Zastoupil soon after arriving in Los Angeles, and the family moved to Torrance, a city in Los Angeles County's South Bay area. Zastoupil accompanied Tarantino to numerous film screenings while his mother allowed him to see more mature movies, such as "Carnal Knowledge" (1971) and "Deliverance" (1972). After his mother divorced Zastoupil in 1973, and received a misdiagnosis of Hodgkin's lymphoma, Tarantino was sent to live with his grandparents in Tennessee. He remained there less than a year before returning to California.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: At 14 years old, Tarantino wrote one of his earliest works, a screenplay called "Captain Peachfuzz and the Anchovy Bandit", based on the 1977 film "Smokey and the Bandit". Tarantino later revealed that his mother had ridiculed his writing skills when he was younger; as a result, he vowed that he would never share his wealth with her. As a 15 year-old, Tarantino was grounded by his mother for shoplifting Elmore Leonard's novel "The Switch" from Kmart. He was allowed to leave only to attend the Torrance Community Theater, where he participated in such plays as "Two Plus Two Makes Sex" and "Romeo and Juliet". The same year, he dropped out of Narbonne High School in Harbor City, Los Angeles.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Through the 1980s, Tarantino had a number of jobs. After lying about his age, he worked as an usher at an adult movie theater in Torrance, called the Pussycat Theater. He spent time as a recruiter in the aerospace industry, and for five years he worked at Video Archives, a video store in Manhattan Beach, California. He was well known in the local community for his film knowledge and video recommendations; Tarantino stated, "When people ask me if I went to film school, I tell them, 'No, I went to films." In 1986, Tarantino was employed in his first Hollywood job, working with Video Archives colleague Roger Avary, as production assistants on Dolph Lundgren's exercise video, "Maximum Potential".


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Before working at Video Archives, Tarantino co-wrote "Love Birds In Bondage" with Scott Magill. Tarantino would go on to produce and direct the short film. Magill committed suicide in 1987, but not before destroying all footage that had been shot. Later, Tarantino attended acting classes at the James Best Theatre Company, where he met several of his eventual collaborators for his next film. In 1987, Tarantino co-wrote and directed, "My Best Friend's Birthday" (1987). It was left uncompleted, but some of its dialogue was included in "True Romance".


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: The following year, he played an Elvis impersonator in "Sophia's Wedding: Part 1", an episode in the fourth season of "The Golden Girls", which was broadcast on November 19, 1988. Tarantino recalled that the pay he received for the part helped support him during the preproduction of "Reservoir Dogs"; he estimated he was initially paid about $650, however the episode was frequently rerun because it was on a "best of..." lineup, therefore received about $3,000 in residuals over three years.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: After meeting Lawrence Bender at a friend's barbecue, Tarantino discussed with him about an unwritten dialogue-driven heist film. Bender encouraged Tarantino to write the screenplay, which he wrote in three-and-a-half weeks and presented to Bender unformatted. Impressed with the script, Bender managed to forward it through contacts to director Monte Hellman. Hellman cleaned up the screenplay and helped secure funding from Richard N. Gladstein at Live Entertainment (which later became Artisan, now known as Lionsgate). Harvey Keitel read the script and also contributed to the budget, taking a role as co-producer and also playing a major part in the picture. In January 1992, it was released as Tarantino's crime thriller "Reservoir Dogs"—which he wrote, directed, and acted in as Mr. Brown—and screened at the Sundance Film Festival. The film was an immediate hit, receiving a positive response from critics.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Tarantino's screenplay "True Romance" was optioned and the film was eventually released in 1993. The second script that Tarantino sold was for the film "Natural Born Killers", which was revised by Dave Veloz, Richard Rutowski and director Oliver Stone. Tarantino was given story credit and stated in an interview that he wished the film well, but later disowned the final film. Tarantino also did an uncredited rewrite on "It's Pat" (1994). Other films where he was an uncredited screenwriter include "Crimson Tide" (1995) and "The Rock" (1996).


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Following the success of "Reservoir Dogs", Tarantino was approached by major film studios and offered projects that included "Speed" (1994) and "Men in Black" (1997), but he instead retreated to Amsterdam to work on his script for "Pulp Fiction".


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Tarantino wrote, directed, and acted in the dark comedy crime film "Pulp Fiction" in 1994, maintaining the stylized violence from his earlier film and also non-linear storylines. Tarantino received the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay, which he shared with Roger Avary, who contributed to the story. He also received a nomination in the Best Director category. The film received another five nominations, including for Best Picture. Tarantino also won the Palme d'Or for the film at the 1994 Cannes Film Festival. The film grossed over $200 million and earned positive reviews.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In 1995, Tarantino participated in the anthology film "Four Rooms", a collaboration that also included directors Robert Rodriguez, Allison Anders and Alexandre Rockwell. Tarantino directed and acted in the fourth segment of "The Man from Hollywood", a tribute to the "Alfred Hitchcock Presents" episode "Man from the South". He joined Rodriguez again later in the year with a supporting role in "Desperado". One of Tarantino's first paid writing assignments was for "From Dusk till Dawn", which Rodriguez directed later in 1996, re-teaming with Tarantino in another acting role, alongside Harvey Keitel, George Clooney and Juliette Lewis.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: His third feature film was "Jackie Brown" (1997), an adaptation of Elmore Leonard's novel "Rum Punch". An homage to blaxploitation films, it starred Pam Grier, who starred in many of the films of that genre in the 1970s. It received positive reviews and was called a "comeback" for Grier and co-star Robert Forster. Leonard considered "Jackie Brown" to be his favorite of the 26 different screen adaptations of his novels and short stories.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In the 1990s, Tarantino had a number of other minor acting roles, including in "Eddie Presley" (1992), "The Coriolis Effect" (1994), "Sleep With Me" (1994), "Somebody to Love" (1994), "All-American Girl" (1995), "Destiny Turns on the Radio" (1995), and "Girl 6" (1996). Also in 1996, he starred in "Steven Spielberg's Director's Chair", a simulation video game that uses pre-generated film clips. In 1998, Tarantino made his major Broadway stage debut as an amoral psycho killer in a revival of the 1966 play "Wait Until Dark", which received unfavorable reviews for his performance from critics.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Tarantino went on to write and direct "", a highly stylized "revenge flick" in the cinematic traditions of Chinese martial arts films, Japanese period dramas, Spaghetti Westerns, and Italian horror. It was based on a character called The Bride and a plot that he and "Kill Bill"s lead actress Uma Thurman had developed during the making of "Pulp Fiction". It was originally set for a single theatrical release, but its four-hour running time prompted Tarantino to divide it into two movies. Tarantino says he still considers it a single film in his overall filmography. "" was released in 2003 and "" was released in 2004.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: From 2002 to 2004, Tarantino portrayed villain McKenas Cole in the ABC television series "Alias". In 2004, Tarantino attended the 2004 Cannes Film Festival, where he served as President of the Jury. Also "Volume 2" of "Kill Bill" had a screening, but was not in competition.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Tarantino then contributed to Robert Rodriguez's 2005 neo-noir film "Sin City", and was credited as "Special Guest Director" for his work directing the car sequence featuring Clive Owen and Benicio del Toro. In May 2005, Tarantino co-wrote and directed "Grave Danger", the finale of "". For this episode, Tarantino was nominated for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series at the 57th Primetime Emmy Awards.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In 2007, Tarantino directed the exploitation slasher film "Death Proof". Released as a take on 1970s double features, under the banner "Grindhouse", it was co-directed with Rodriguez who did the other feature which was the body horror film "Planet Terror". Box-office sales were low but the film garnered mostly positive reviews.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Tarantino's film "Inglourious Basterds", released in 2009, is the story of a group of Jewish-American guerrilla soldiers in Nazi-occupied France in an alternate history of World War II. He had planned to start work on the film after "Jackie Brown" but postponed this to make "Kill Bill" after a meeting with Uma Thurman. Filming began on ""Inglorious Bastards"", as it was provisionally titled, in October 2008. The film opened in August 2009 to positive reviews with the highest box office gross in the US and Canada for the weekend on release. For the film, Tarantino received his second nomination for the Academy Award for Best Director and Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In 2011, production began on "Django Unchained", a film about the revenge of a former slave in the Southern United States in 1858. The film stemmed from Tarantino's desire to produce a Spaghetti Western set in America's Deep South during the Antebellum Period. Tarantino called the proposed style "a southern", stating that he wanted "to do movies that deal with America's horrible past with slavery and stuff but do them like spaghetti westerns, not like big issue movies. I want to do them like they're genre films, but they deal with everything that America has never dealt with because it's ashamed of it, and other countries don't really deal with because they don't feel they have the right to". It was released in December 2012 and became his highest grossing film to date. He also received his second Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In November 2013, Tarantino said he was working on a new film and that it would be another Western, though not a sequel to "Django Unchained". On January 11, 2014, it was revealed that the film would be titled "The Hateful Eight". The script was then leaked in January 2014. Aggrieved by the breach of confidence, Tarantino considered abandoning the production which was due to start the next winter and publish it as a novel instead. He stated that he had given the script to a few trusted colleagues, including Bruce Dern, Tim Roth and Michael Madsen.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: On April 19, 2014, Tarantino directed a live reading of the leaked script at the United Artists Theater in the Ace Hotel Los Angeles for the "Live Read" series. Tarantino explained that they would read the first draft of the script, and added that he was writing two new drafts with a different ending. Filming went ahead as planned with the new draft in January 2015. "The Hateful Eight" was released on December 25, 2015, as a roadshow presentation in 70 mm film-format theaters, before being released in digital theaters on December 30, 2015. The film received mostly positive reviews from critics.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In July 2017, it was reported that Tarantino's next project would be a film about the Manson Family murders. In February 2018, it was announced that the film's title would be "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood," and that Leonardo DiCaprio would play Rick Dalton, a fictional star of television Westerns, with Brad Pitt as Dalton's longtime stunt double Cliff Booth; Margot Robbie would be playing real life actress Sharon Tate, portrayed as Dalton's next-door neighbor. Filming took place in the summer of 2018. In wake of the Harvey Weinstein sexual abuse allegations, Tarantino severed ties to The Weinstein Company and Miramax and sought a new distributor after working with Weinstein for his entire career. The film officially premiered at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival, where it was in competition for the Palme d'Or. Sony Pictures eventually distributed the film, which was theatrically released in July 2019.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In November 2022, Tarantino revealed plans to shoot an eight-episode television series in 2023. No further details were provided.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Tarantino has used his Hollywood power to give smaller and foreign films more attention. These films are often labeled "Presented by Quentin Tarantino" or "Quentin Tarantino Presents". In 1995, Tarantino formed Rolling Thunder Pictures with Miramax to release or re-release several independent and foreign features. By 1997, Miramax had shut down the company due to poor sales. The following films were released by Rolling Thunder Pictures: "Chungking Express" (1994, dir. Wong Kar-wai), "Switchblade Sisters" (1975, dir. Jack Hill), "Sonatine" (1993, dir. Takeshi Kitano), "Hard Core Logo" (1996, dir. Bruce McDonald), "The Mighty Peking Man" (1977, dir. Ho Meng Hua), "Detroit 9000" (1973, dir. Arthur Marks), "The Beyond" (1981, dir. Lucio Fulci), and "Curdled" (1996, dir. Reb Braddock).


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In 2001, he produced the US release of the Hong Kong martial arts film "Iron Monkey", which made over $14 million worldwide. In 2004, he brought the Chinese martial arts film "Hero" to the US. It opened at number-one at the box office and eventually earning $53.5 million.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: While Tarantino was in negotiations with Lucy Liu for "", the two helped produce the Hungarian sports documentary "Freedom's Fury", which was released in 2006. When he was approached about a documentary about the Blood in the Water match, Tarantino said "This is the best story I've ever been told. I'd love to be involved".


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In 2006, another "Quentin Tarantino presents" production, "Hostel", opened at number-one at the box office with a $20.1 million opening weekend. He presented 2006's "The Protector", and is a producer of the 2007 film "". In 2008, he produced the Larry Bishop-helmed "Hell Ride", a revenge biker film.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In February 2010, Tarantino bought the New Beverly Cinema in Los Angeles. Tarantino allowed the previous owners to continue operating the theater, but stated he would make occasional programming suggestions. He was quoted as saying: "As long as I'm alive, and as long as I'm rich, the New Beverly will be there, showing films shot on 35 mm." Starting in 2014, Tarantino took a more active role in programming film screenings at the New Beverly, showing his own films as well as prints from his personal collection. In 2021, Tarantino announced that he had also purchased the Vista Theatre in Los Angeles, stating that he intends to keep it a first-run theatre, and that like The New Beverly it will only show movies on film.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In June 2020 Tarantino became an officially recognized critic on the review aggregation website, Rotten Tomatoes. His reviews are part of the "Tomatometer" rating.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Tarantino reappraises films that go against the views of mainstream film criticism, for example, he considers the 1983 film "Psycho II" to be superior to the original 1960 film "Psycho". He is also among a few notable directors, including Martin Scorsese and Edgar Wright, who appreciate Elaine May's 1987 film "Ishtar", despite its reputation as being a notorious box-office flop and one of the worst films ever made.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Tarantino praised Mel Gibson's 2006 film "Apocalypto", saying, "I think it's a masterpiece. It was perhaps the best film of that year." In 2009, he named Kinji Fukasaku's violent action film "Battle Royale" as his favorite film released since he became a director in 1992. In 2020, Tarantino named David Fincher's film "The Social Network" his favorite movie of the 2010s.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In August 2022, Tarantino stated that Steven Spielberg's "Jaws" is "the greatest movie of all time. Maybe not the best film, but the best movie ever made". The director continued his praise for Spielberg, "I think my favourite Spielberg-directed movie, again with "Jaws" carved out on its own Mount Rushmore, is "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom"", because “He [Spielberg] pushes the envelope, he creates PG-13; a movie so fucking badass it created a new level in the MPAA.” He also views favorably the fourth film in the Indiana Jones franchise, asserting that he found "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull" more enjoyable when compared to "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade".


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In 2020, Tarantino signed a two-book deal with HarperCollins."" He published his first novel in June 2021, a novelization of "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood". It received positive reviews from "The New York Times" and "The Guardian". The second book he published under the deal titled "Cinema Speculation", about films of the New Hollywood era, was inspired by film critic Pauline Kael and published on November 1, 2022.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In June 2021, Tarantino announced plans to start a podcast with Roger Avary. The podcast is named after Video Archives, a video rental store that both directors had worked at prior to their film careers, and will feature the directors, and a guest, examining a film which could have been offered for rental at the store. The podcast premiered on July 18, 2022.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: A number of film projects have been considered by Tarantino throughout his career. They have included comic book adaptations (Green Lantern, Iron Man, Luke Cage, Silver Surfer), sequels ("Kill Bill:Volume 3"), spin-offs of previous works ("The Vega Brothers"), crossovers of his own work with other genres ("Django/Zorro"), literary adaptations of well-known authors (Len Deighton, Bret Easton Ellis), and campaigning to direct in major film franchises ("James Bond" and "Star Trek"). Most of the projects he has discussed have been speculative, but none of them have been accomplished. In November 2014, Tarantino said he would retire from films after directing his tenth film.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In 2009, Tarantino said that he plans to retire from filmmaking when he is 60, in order to focus on writing novels and film literature. He is skeptical of the film industry going digital, saying, "If it actually gets to the place where you can't show 35 mm film in theaters anymore and everything is digital projection, I won't even make it to 60." He has also stated that he has a plan, although "not etched in stone", to retire after making his tenth movie: "If I get to the 10th, do a good job and don't screw it up, well that sounds like a good way to end the old career."


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In the 2012 "Sight & Sound" directors' poll, Tarantino listed his top 12 films: "Apocalypse Now", "The Bad News Bears", "Carrie", "Dazed and Confused", "The Great Escape", "His Girl Friday", "Jaws", "Pretty Maids All in a Row", "Rolling Thunder", "Sorcerer", "Taxi Driver" and "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly".


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Sergio Leone's Spaghetti Western films were a profound influence including "Once Upon a Time in the West". He is an admirer of the 1981 film "Blow Out", directed by Brian De Palma, which led to his casting of John Travolta in "Pulp Fiction". Similarly, Tarantino was captivated with Jim McBride's 1983 remake of "Breathless" and with Richard Gere's unlikable but charismatic protagonist. The film's popular culture references, in particular the comic book Silver Surfer, inspired him to have the character's poster on Mr. Orange’s apartment wall in "Reservoir Dogs". Tarantino has also labeled "Rio Bravo" as one of his influences. He listed the Australian suspense film "Roadgames" (1981) as another favorite film.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Other films he cited as formative influences include Hong Kong martial arts films (such as "Five Fingers of Death" and "Enter the Dragon"), John Woo action films ("A Better Tomorrow II" and "The Killer"), John Carpenter films ("Assault on Precinct 13" and "The Thing"), blaxploitation films (including "The Mack" and "Foxy Brown"), Jean-Luc Godard films ("Bande à Part" and the 1960 version of "Breathless"), and Sonny Chiba's work ("The Street Fighter" and "Shadow Warriors").


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In August 2007, while teaching in a four-hour film course during the 9th Cinemanila International Film Festival in Manila, Tarantino cited Filipino directors Cirio H. Santiago, Eddie Romero and Gerardo de León as personal icons from the 1970s. He referred to De Leon's "soul-shattering, life-extinguishing" movies on vampires and female bondage, citing in particular "Women in Cages"; "It is just harsh, harsh, harsh", he said, and described the final shot as one of "devastating despair". Upon his arrival in the Philippines, Tarantino was quoted in the local newspaper as saying, "I'm a big fan of RP [Republic of the Philippines] cinema."


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Tarantino's films often feature graphic violence, a tendency which has sometimes been criticized. "Reservoir Dogs" was initially denied United Kingdom certification because of his use of torture as entertainment. Tarantino has frequently defended his use of violence, saying that "violence is so good. It affects audiences in a big way". The number of expletives and deaths in Tarantino's films were measured by analytics website FiveThirtyEight. In the examples given by the site, ""Reservoir Dogs" features 'just' 10 on-screen deaths, but 421 profanities. "Django Unchained", on the other hand, has 'just' 262 profanities but 47 deaths." He often blends aesthetic elements, in tribute to his favorite films and filmmakers. In "Kill Bill", he melds comic strip formulas and visuals within a live action film sequence, in some cases by the literal use of cartoon or anime images.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Tarantino has also occasionally used a nonlinear story structure in his films, most notably with "Pulp Fiction." He has also used the style in "Reservoir Dogs", "Kill Bill", and "The Hateful Eight". Tarantino's script for "True Romance" was originally told in a nonlinear style, before director Tony Scott decided to use a more linear approach. Critics have since referred to the use of this shifting timeline in films as the "Tarantino Effect". Actor Steve Buscemi has described Tarantino's novel style of filmmaking as "bursting with energy" and "focused". According to Tarantino, a hallmark of all his movies is that there is a different sense of humor in each one, which prompts the viewer to laugh at scenes that are not funny. However, he insists that his films are dramas, not comedies.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Tarantino's use of dialogue is noted for its mundane conversations with popular culture references. For example, when Jules and Vincent in "Pulp Fiction" are driving to a hit, they talk about Vincent’s trip to Europe, discussing the differences in countries such as a McDonald's "Quarter Pounder with Cheese" being called a "Royale with Cheese" in France because of the metric system. In the opening scene to "Reservoir Dogs", Mr. Brown (played by Tarantino) interprets the meaning of Madonna’s song "Like a Virgin". In "Jackie Brown", Jackie and Max chat over a cup of coffee while listening to a vinyl record by the Delfonics' "Didn't I (Blow Your Mind This Time)".


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: He also creates his own products and brands that he uses in his films to varying degrees. His own fictional brands, including "Acuña Boys Tex-Mex Food", "Big Kahuna Burger", "G.O. Juice", "Jack Rabbit Slim's", "K-Billy", "Red Apple cigarettes", "Tenku Brand Beer" and "Teriyaki Donut", replace the use of product placement, sometimes to a humorous extent. Tarantino is also known for his choice of music in his films, including soundtracks that often use songs from the 1960s and 70s. In 2011, he was recognized at the 16th Critics' Choice Awards with the inaugural Music+Film Award.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: A recurring image in his films are scenes where women's bare feet feature prominently. When asked about foot fetishism, Tarantino responded, "I don't take it seriously. There's a lot of feet in a lot of good directors' movies. That's just good direction. Like, before me, the person foot fetishism was defined by was Luis Buñuel, another film director. And [Alfred] Hitchcock was accused of it and Sofia Coppola has been accused of it."


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Tarantino has stated in many interviews that his writing process is like writing a novel before formatting it into a script, saying that this creates the blueprint of the film and makes the film feel like literature. About his writing process he told website The Talks, "[My] head is a sponge. I listen to what everyone says, I watch little idiosyncratic behavior, people tell me a joke and I remember it. People tell me an interesting story in their life and I remember it. ... when I go and write my new characters, my pen is like an antenna, it gets that information, and all of a sudden these characters come out more or less fully formed. I don't write their dialogue, I get them talking to each other."


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: During his career, Tarantino's films have garnered a cult following, as well as critical and commercial success. In 2005, he was included on the annual "Time" 100 list of the most influential people in the world. Filmmaker and historian Peter Bogdanovich has called him "the single most influential director of his generation". Tarantino has received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for his contributions to the film industry.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In 2013, a survey of seven academics was carried out to discover which filmmakers had been referenced the most in essays and dissertations on film that had been marked in the previous five years. It revealed that Tarantino was the most-studied director in the United Kingdom, ahead of Alfred Hitchcock, Christopher Nolan, Martin Scorsese and Steven Spielberg.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Tarantino has said that he does not believe that violence in film inspires real acts of violence. After the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in 2012, NRA Chief Executive Wayne LaPierre accused him of being insensitive to the event. In an interview with Terry Gross, Tarantino expressed "annoyance" at the suggestion that there is a link between the two, saying, "I think it's disrespectful to [the] memory of those who died to talk about movies ... Obviously the issue is gun control and mental health." Soon after, in response to a Hollywood PSA video titled "Demand a Plan", which featured celebrities rallying for gun control legislation, a pro-gun group used scenes from Tarantino's film "Django Unchained" to label celebrities as "hypocrites" for appearing in violent movies.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In 1997, Spike Lee questioned Tarantino's use of racial slurs in his films, especially the word "nigger", particularly in "Pulp Fiction" and "Jackie Brown". In a "Variety" interview discussing "Jackie Brown", Lee said, "I'm not against the word ... And some people speak that way, but Quentin is infatuated with that word... I want Quentin to know that all African Americans do not think that word is trendy or slick." Tarantino responded on "The Charlie Rose Show":


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Tarantino said on "The Howard Stern Show" that Lee would have to "stand on a chair to kiss [his] ass". Samuel L. Jackson, who has appeared in both directors' films, defended Tarantino. At the Berlin Film Festival, where "Jackie Brown" was screened, Jackson said: "I don't think the word is offensive in the context of this film ... Black artists think they are the only ones allowed to use the word. Well, that's bull. "Jackie Brown" is a wonderful homage to black exploitation films. This is a good film, and Spike hasn't made one of those in a few years." Tarantino argued that black audiences appreciated his blaxploitation-influenced films more than some of his critics, and that "Jackie Brown" was primarily made for black audiences.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: "Django Unchained" was the subject of controversy because of its use of racial slurs and depiction of slavery. Reviewers defended the use of the language by pointing out the historic context of race and slavery in America. Lee, in an interview with "Vibe", said that he would not see the film: "All I'm going to say is that it's disrespectful to my ancestors. That's just me ... I'm not speaking on behalf of anybody else." Lee later tweeted: "American slavery was not a Sergio Leone spaghetti western. It was a holocaust. My ancestors are slaves. Stolen from Africa. I will honor them."


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Uma Thurman was in a serious car crash on the set of "Kill Bill" because Tarantino had insisted she perform her own driving stunts. Tarantino said he did not force her to do the stunt. Although Thurman said the incident was "negligent to the point of criminality", she did not believe Tarantino had malicious intent.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In a 2003 Howard Stern interview, Tarantino defended the director Roman Polanski against charges that Polanski had raped then-13-year-old Samantha Geimer in 1977. He said that Polanski's actions were "not rape" and Geimer "...wanted to have it". The interview resurfaced in 2018 and drew criticism, including from Geimer, who stated in an interview, "He was wrong. I bet he knows it... I hope he doesn't make an ass of himself and keep talking that way." Within days of the interview resurfacing, Tarantino issued an apology, stating "Fifteen years later, I realize how wrong I was... I incorrectly played devil’s advocate in the debate for the sake of being provocative."


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In October 2015, Tarantino attended a rally held in New York protesting police brutality. The event aimed to call attention to "police brutality and its victims". At the event Tarantino made a speech, "I'm a human being with a conscience ... And when I see murder I cannot stand by. And I have to call the murdered the murdered and I have to call the murderers the murderers."


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: As a response to Tarantino's comments police unions across the United States called for a boycott of his upcoming film at the time, "The Hateful Eight". Patrick J. Lynch, union president of the Police Benevolent Association of the City of New York, said, "It's no surprise that someone who makes a living glorifying crime and violence is a cop-hater, too. The police officers that Quentin Tarantino calls 'murderers' aren't living in one of his depraved big screen fantasies — they're risking and sometimes sacrificing their lives to protect communities from real crime and mayhem." The Los Angeles Police Department Chief Charlie Beck said Tarantino "doesn't understand the nature of the violence. Mr. Tarantino lives in a fantasy world. That’s how he makes his living. His movies are extremely violent, but he doesn't understand violence. … Unfortunately, he mistakes lawful use of force for murder, and it's not."


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Tarantino's response to the controversy was, "All cops are not murderers ... I never said that. I never even implied that." In an MSNBC interview with Chris Hayes, he said, "Just because I was at an anti-police brutality protest doesn’t mean I'm anti-police." He clarified his protest comments, "We were at a rally where unarmed people – mostly black and brown – who have been shot and killed or beaten or strangled by the police, and I was obviously referring to the people in those types of situations. I was referring to Eric Garner, I was referring to Sam DuBose, I was referring to Antonio Guzman Lopez, I was referring to Tamir Rice ... In those cases in particular that we're talking about, I actually do believe that they were murder."


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: On October 18, 2017, Tarantino gave an interview discussing sexual harassment and assault allegations against producer Harvey Weinstein. Tarantino said his then girlfriend Mira Sorvino told him in the mid-1990s about her experience with Weinstein. Tarantino confronted Weinstein at the time and received an apology. Tarantino said: "What I did was marginalize the incidents. I knew enough to do more than I did."


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: On February 3, 2018, in an interview with "The New York Times", the "Pulp Fiction" and "Kill Bill" actress Uma Thurman said Weinstein had sexually assaulted her, and that she had reported this to Tarantino. Tarantino said he confronted Weinstein, as he had previously when Weinstein made advances on his former partner, demanding he apologize. He banned him from contact with Thurman for the rest of the production. In a June 2021 interview on the "Joe Rogan Experience" podcast, Tarantino said he regretted not pressing Weinstein further, saying he did not know the extent of his misconduct before the 2017 scandal. He remarked on his "sad" view of his past relationship with Weinstein, saying he once looked up to him for fostering his career and describing him as "a fucked up father figure".


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In 2019, Shannon Lee, daughter of Bruce Lee, called his depiction in "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood" disheartening and inaccurate. Tarantino said: "Bruce Lee was kind of an arrogant guy. The way he was talking, I didn't just make a lot of that up." During that time, China put the release of the movie on halt, with sources claiming that Shannon Lee filed a complaint to China’s National Film Administration. Tarantino refused to recut the movie for the Chinese release.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Tarantino has a history of clashing with people in the entertainment industry and being difficult with journalists.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In 1993, Tarantino sold his script for "Natural Born Killers" which was rewritten, giving him only a story credit. He later disowned the film which caused enmity; and the publication of a "tell-all" book titled "Killer Instinct" by Jane Hamsher—who with Don Murphy, had an original option on the screenplay and produced the film—calling Tarantino a "one-trick pony" and becoming "famous for being famous" led him to physically assault Murphy in the AGO restaurant in West Hollywood, California in October 1997. Murphy subsequently filed a $5 million lawsuit against Tarantino; the case ended with the judge ordering Tarantino to pay Murphy $450.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In 1994, Tarantino had an on-set feud with Denzel Washington during the filming of "Crimson Tide" over what was called "Tarantino's racist dialogue added to the script". A few years later Washington apologized to Tarantino saying he "buried that hatchet".


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In 1997, during the Oscars, Tarantino was accompanying Mira Sorvino who had stopped to speak to "MTV News" host at the time Chris Connelly when he called her from the media scrum. Before she could talk to him Tarantino grabbed Sorvino telling her, "He's the editor of "Premiere" and he did a story on my Dad," and pulled her away. Connelly, a former "Premiere" magazine editor-in-chief said, "No, I didn't." As they walked off, Tarantino gave the journalist the finger saying "Fuck you!" and spat at him. The article that angered Tarantino included a 1995 interview from a biography by Jami Bernard with his biological father Tony Tarantino, someone he had never met, which he considered "pretty tasteless".


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In 2009, Tarantino was set to appear on the talk show "Late Show with David Letterman" to promote "Inglourious Basterds". A few years prior to this event, David Letterman had interviewed a former "unnamed" girlfriend of Tarantino on his show. Letterman joked about the relationship questioning why a "glorious movie star" would date a "little squirrelly guy". A couple of days later, Tarantino phoned Letterman screaming angrily, "I’m going to beat you to death! I’m going to kill you! I’m coming to New York, and I'm gonna beat the crap out of you! How can you say that about me?!" Letterman offered to pay for Tarantino's flight and let him choose the method of fighting, which Tarantino determined would be "bats". However, Letterman never heard from Tarantino again, until years later, when he came on the show to promote the new film. The host approached Tarantino in the make-up room, just before the show went live, and demanded an apology. Tarantino was not forthcoming, but at his publicist’s urging, he begrudgingly conceded.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In 2013, during an interview with Krishnan Guru-Murthy on "Channel 4 News" while promoting "Django Unchained" in the UK, Tarantino reacted angrily when he was questioned about whether there was a link between movie violence and real-life violence. He informed Guru-Murthy that he was "shutting [his] butt down". Tarantino further defied the journalist, saying: "I refuse your question. I'm not your slave and you're not my master. You can't make me dance to your tune. I'm not a monkey."


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In 2019, during the Cannes Film Festival, at the "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood" press conference, a journalist asked why Margot Robbie had so few lines in the film. Tarantino snapped back, "Well, I just reject your hypothesis," giving no further comment.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In the early 1990s Tarantino dated comedians Margaret Cho and Kathy Griffin. From 1995 to 1998 he dated actress Mira Sorvino. He was her date at the 68th Oscars ceremony where she had won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. In March 1998 they separated with Sorvino releasing a statement that "[They] still love each other very much" but had reached a "mutual" decision to go their separate ways." From 2003 to 2005, Tarantino was in a romantic relationship with filmmaker Sofia Coppola. The two have remained friends since their breakup.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: On June 30, 2017, Tarantino became engaged to Israeli singer Daniella Pick, daughter of musician Zvika Pick. They met in 2009 when Tarantino was in Israel to promote "Inglourious Basterds". They married on November 28, 2018, in a Reform Jewish ceremony in their Beverly Hills Home. As of January 2020, they were splitting their time between the Ramat Aviv Gimel neighborhood of Tel Aviv, Israel and Los Angeles. On February 22, 2020 their son was born in Israel. Their second child, a girl, was born in July 2022.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: As a youth, Tarantino attended an Evangelical church, describing himself as "baptized, born again and everything in between". Tarantino said this was an act of rebellion against his Catholic mother as she had encouraged what might usually be considered more conventional forms of rebellion, such as his interests in comic books and horror films. Throughout the 1990s and 2000s, Tarantino was evasive about his religious beliefs but said he believed in God, whom he credited with giving him his writing ability.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In the 2010s, Tarantino continued ascribing his talents to gifts from God but expressed uncertainty regarding God's existence. "I think I was born Catholic, but I was never practiced," said Tarantino. "As time has gone on, as I've become a man and made my way further as an adult, I'm not sure how much any of that I believe in. I don't really know if I believe in God, especially not in this Santa Claus character that people seemed to have conjured up." In June 2021, Tarantino said he was an atheist.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Tarantino has stated that he plans to make a total of just ten films before retiring as a director, as a means of ensuring an overall high quality within his filmography. He believes "most directors have horrible last movies," that ending on a "decent movie is rare," and that ending on a "good movie is kind of phenomenal." Tarantino considers "Kill Bill", which was released in two parts, to be a single movie.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Tarantino has built up an informal "repertory company" of actors who have appeared in many roles in his films. Most notable of these is Samuel L. Jackson, who has appeared in four films directed by Tarantino and a fifth written by him, "True Romance". Other frequent collaborators include Uma Thurman, who has been featured in three films and whom Tarantino has described as his "muse"; Zoë Bell, who has acted or performed stunts in seven Tarantino films; Michael Madsen, James Parks and Tim Roth, who respectively appear in five, four and three films. In addition, Roth appeared in "Four Rooms", an anthology film where Tarantino directed the final segment, and filmed a scene for "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood" before it was cut for time. Other actors who have appeared in several films by Tarantino include Michael Bacall, Michael Bowen, Bruce Dern, Harvey Keitel, Michael Parks, Kurt Russell, and Craig Stark, who have appeared in three films each. Leonardo DiCaprio and Brad Pitt have each appeared in two Tarantino films, the second of which, "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood", they appear in together. Like Jackson, Pitt also appeared in the Tarantino-penned "True Romance". Christoph Waltz appeared in two Tarantino films, "Inglourious Basterds" and "Django Unchained", winning a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for each role. Waltz had been working as an actor since the 1970s in numerous German movies and TV shows but was a relative unknown in America when he was cast as Hans Landa in his first film for Tarantino.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Editor Sally Menke, who worked on all Tarantino films until her death in 2010, was described by Tarantino in 2007 as "hands down my number one collaborator".


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: Throughout his career, Tarantino and his films have frequently received nominations for major awards, including for Academy Awards, BAFTA Awards, Golden Globe Awards, Directors Guild of America Awards, and Saturn Awards. He has won the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay twice, for "Pulp Fiction" and "Django Unchained". He has four times been nominated for the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival, winning once for "Pulp Fiction" in 1994. In addition to his recognition for writing and directing films, Tarantino has received five Grammy Award nominations and a Primetime Emmy Award nomination.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: In 2005, Tarantino was awarded the honorary Icon of the Decade at the 10th Empire Awards. He has earned lifetime achievement awards from two organizations in 2007, from Cinemanila, and from the Rome Film Festival in 2012. In 2011, Tarantino was awarded the Honorary César by the Académie des Arts et Techniques du Cinéma.


title: Quentin Tarantino

text: For his work of "Pulp Fiction", Tarantino became the first director to ever sweep "The Big Four" critics awards (LA, NBR, NY, NSFC) and the first of the five directors (Curtis Hanson, Steven Soderbergh, David Fincher, and Barry Jenkins) to do so.


title: Zlatan Ibrahimović

text: Zlatan Ibrahimović (, ; born 3 October 1981) is a Swedish professional footballer who plays as a striker for club AC Milan and the Sweden national team. Ibrahimović is renowned for his acrobatic strikes and volleys, powerful long-range shots, and excellent technique and ball control. He is regarded as one of the greatest strikers of all time and is one of the most decorated active footballers in the world, having won 34 trophies in his career. He has scored over 570 career goals, including more than 500 club goals, and has scored in each of the last four decades.


title: Zlatan Ibrahimović

text: Ibrahimović began his career at Malmö FF in 1999, and signed for Ajax two years later, where he gained a reputation as one of the most promising forwards in Europe. He departed two years later to sign for Juventus before joining domestic rivals Inter Milan in 2006, where he won three consecutive Serie A titles. In the summer of 2009, he moved to Barcelona in one of the world's most expensive transfers. After just one season, he returned to Italy having signed for Inter's rival Milan. With them, he won the Serie A title in his debut season. In 2012, Ibrahimović joined Paris Saint-Germain, leading them to their first Ligue 1 title in 19 years and soon establishing himself as a leading figure in their dominance of French football. During his four-season stay in France, he won four consecutive Ligue 1 titles, was the top scorer in Ligue 1 for three seasons and became PSG's all-time leading goalscorer at the time. In 2016, he joined Manchester United on a free transfer and won his first European honour in his debut season. Ibrahimović joined American club LA Galaxy in 2018 and rejoined Milan in 2020, winning his fifth Serie A title in 2022.


title: Zlatan Ibrahimović

text: Ibrahimović is one of eleven players to have made 100 or more appearances for the Swedish national team, over a 20-year international career. He is the country's all-time leading goalscorer with 62 goals. He represented Sweden at the 2002 and 2006 FIFA World Cups, as well as the 2004, 2008, 2012, and 2016 UEFA European Championships. He has been awarded "Guldbollen" ("the Golden Ball"), given to the Swedish player of the year, a record 12 times, including 10 consecutive times from 2007 to 2016. Ibrahimović's 35-yard bicycle kick goal for Sweden against England won the 2013 FIFA Puskás Award, and is often considered one of the best goals of all time.


title: Zlatan Ibrahimović

text: Ibrahimović was named in the FIFA FIFPro World XI in 2013 and the UEFA Team of the Year in 2007, 2009, 2013 and 2014. He finished at a peak of fourth for the FIFA Ballon d'Or in 2013. In 2015, UEFA ranked him as the best player ever not to have won the UEFA Champions League, while in 2019, "FourFourTwo" magazine named him the third-greatest player never to win the competition. In December 2014, Swedish newspaper "Dagens Nyheter" ranked him the second-greatest Swedish sportsperson ever, after tennis player Björn Borg. Off the field, Ibrahimović is known for his brash persona and outspoken comments, in addition to referring to himself in the third person.


title: Zlatan Ibrahimović

text: Ibrahimović was born in Malmö, Sweden, on 3 October 1981. He was born to a Muslim Bosniak father, Šefik Ibrahimović, who emigrated to Sweden in 1977, and a Catholic Croat mother, Jurka Gravić, who also emigrated to Sweden where the couple first met. Ibrahimović identifies with his mother's faith and considers himself a devout Catholic Christian. He began playing football at the age of six, after receiving a pair of football boots. He alternated between FBK Balkan, a Malmö club founded by Yugoslav immigrants, Malmö BI and briefly BK Flagg football clubs.


title: Zlatan Ibrahimović

text: As a child, his mother sometimes hit him on the head with a wooden spoon, which would often break. After she was arrested for handling stolen goods, social services intervened. Concerned with his divorced mother's ability to cope with five children, one of whom, Ibrahimović's half-sister, had a drug problem, at age nine he was sent to live with his father. With food scarce at his father's home where the fridge was packed with beer, Ibrahimović often went hungry so he would run to his mother's for dinner. He also shoplifted and stole bikes. On the tough upbringing that shaped his character, author David Lagercrantz, who co-wrote "I Am Zlatan", states:


title: Zlatan Ibrahimović

text: While in his early teens, Ibrahimović was a regular for his hometown club Malmö FF. At the age of 15, he was close to quitting his football career, in favour of working at the docks in Malmö, but his manager convinced him to continue playing. As a boy, his hero was Brazilian forward Ronaldo. An avid viewer of Italian football, another player he admired was prolific striker Gabriel Batistuta – a player with similar characteristics to himself.


title: Zlatan Ibrahimović

text: Ibrahimović signed his first contract with Malmö in 1996, and moved up to the senior side for the 1999 season of Allsvenskan, Sweden's top-flight league. That season, Malmö finished 13th in the league and were relegated to the second division, but returned to the top flight the next season. Arsène Wenger unsuccessfully tried to persuade Ibrahimović to join Arsenal, while Leo Beenhakker (the technical director of Ajax) also expressed interest in the player after watching him in a friendly against Norwegian side Moss FK. On 22 March 2001, a deal between Ajax and Malmö regarding Ibrahimović's transfer to Amsterdam was announced, and in July, Ibrahimović officially joined Ajax for 80 million Swedish kronor (€8.7 million).


title: Zlatan Ibrahimović

text: Ibrahimović received little playing time under manager Co Adriaanse, but when Adriaanse was sacked on 29 November 2001, new coach Ronald Koeman inserted Ibrahimović into the starting lineup as Ajax won the 2001–02 Eredivisie title. The next season, Ibrahimović scored twice in a 2–1 victory over French champions Lyon in his Champions League debut on 17 September 2002. He scored five Champions League goals overall as Ajax fell to Milan in the quarter-finals.


title: Zlatan Ibrahimović

text: Ibrahimović's profile rose when he scored an individual goal against NAC Breda on 22 August 2004 – a slaloming run past five opposition players which the commentator compared with Diego Maradona and Zinedine Zidane – that was eventually voted the Goal of the Year by Eurosport viewers. On 18 August 2004, during an international match against the Netherlands, Ibrahimović injured Ajax teammate Rafael van der Vaart, who later accused Ibrahimović of hurting him intentionally.


title: Zlatan Ibrahimović

text: Ibrahimović moved from Ajax to Juventus for €16 million. He was promptly inserted into the starting eleven due in part to top scorer David Trezeguet's injury problems, and scored 16 goals. The club finished top of the Serie A, and in the Champions League they reached the quarter-finals before being knocked out by eventual champions Liverpool. Near the end of the season, Juventus reportedly rejected a €70 million bid for him from Real Madrid, which was later revealed to be a publicity stunt initiated by Ibrahimović's agent, Mino Raiola, in order to increase his market value. At the end of his first season in Italy Ibrahimović was named Serie A Foreign Footballer of the Year, and in November 2005, he was awarded the "Guldbollen", a prize awarded to the best Swedish footballer of the year.


title: Zlatan Ibrahimović

text: The following season was poor compared to his first season; his role in Juventus' attack changed, as he became less of a goalscorer and moved more to the sidelines, taking much part in the build-up play, especially as a target player, and his assist numbers increased. In the 2005–06 season, Juventus fans often got frustrated with him due to his anonymous presence in certain important games such as the Champions League defeat to Arsenal. Juventus were stripped of their last two "Scudetti" as part of the verdict from the "Calciopoli" scandal, and were relegated to Serie B. The new staff tried to persuade Ibrahimović and other top players to stay with Juventus, but the player and his agent were adamant to move on, with Raiola threatening legal action in order to extricate Ibrahimović from his contract.


title: Zlatan Ibrahimović

text: On 10 August 2006, Ibrahimović completed a €24.8 million move to Inter Milan, signing a four-year-deal. Ibrahimović said that he had supported Inter when he was young.


title: Zlatan Ibrahimović

text: Ibrahimović made his debut for Inter on 26 August 2006 against Roma in the 2006 Supercoppa Italiana, playing the full 90 minutes as Inter won after extra time. He scored in his Serie A debut against Fiorentina on 9 September as Inter commenced the league with a 3–2 win at Stadio Artemio Franchi. Three days later, in his first Champions League appearance for Inter, Ibrahimović was not able to avoid the 1–0 away defeat to Sporting CP as Inter began their European campaign in the wrong way. Later, on 28 October, in his first "Derby della Madonnina" match against cross-town rivals Milan, Ibrahimović scored the third Inter goal of the match and also his third league goal of the season in a 4–3 thriller win. In his first season at the club, Ibrahimović top scored for Inter in Serie A with 15 goals, as the team won the "Scudetto" with a record 97 points.


title: Zlatan Ibrahimović

text: Ibrahimović played his 100th Serie A match on 16 September 2007 at the San Siro against Catania, where he appeared as a second-half substitute for Hernán Crespo in an eventual 2–0 win. In 2007, he signed a new contract until June 2013; it was reported that this contract had made him the world's highest paid footballer. On 18 May 2008, Ibrahimović scored both goals in a 2–0 defeat of Parma on the final day of the 2007–08 Serie A season to give Inter a second consecutive "Scudetto". Overall, he scored 17 goals in 26 league matches, and was named both Serie A Footballer of the Year and Serie A Foreign Footballer of the Year.


title: Zlatan Ibrahimović

text: Ibrahimović started his third Inter season by winning the Supercoppa Italiana against Roma. After the regular and extra time had finished in a draw, the match went to a penalty shootout where he successfully converted his penalty attempt. He scored his team's only goal in the 2008–09 Serie A opening match against Sampdoria, which finished in a 1–1 draw. On 4 October, during the match against Bologna at home which Inter won 2–1, Ibrahimović scored a sensational goal, stunning Francesco Antonioli with an irresistible backheeled shot from Adriano's left-wing cross. The goal was later voted Goal of the Year in Serie A. On 19 October 2008, Ibrahimović continued with his solid performances by scoring twice in an impressive 4–0 win at Roma, taking his tally up to five league goals. He then scored another double in the Matchday 12 win against Palermo to help Inter take the lead in the Serie A table by one point. In the next fixture, Ibrahimović provided the assist on the only goal in the "Derby d'Italia" match against Juventus at home, helping Inter to extend their league lead.


title: Zlatan Ibrahimović

text: Ibrahimović ended the 2008–09 Serie A season as the league's top goalscorer with 25 goals,<ref name="08/09 top scorer"></ref> helping Inter to another league title. He was also named both Footballer of the Year and Foreign Footballer of the Year for the second consecutive season.


title: Zlatan Ibrahimović

text: After Inter teammate Maxwell completed his transfer to Barcelona, Barça president Joan Laporta confirmed that there was an agreement in principle between Barcelona and Inter for Ibrahimović to join the club in exchange for striker Samuel Eto'o, plus a reported fee of £59 million. Ibrahimović left Inter during their United States summer tour in the World Football Challenge on 23 July 2009 for negotiations with Barcelona, with his last match for Inter being against Chelsea. After Inter agreed terms with Eto'o and Barcelona with Ibrahimović, Barcelona announced Ibrahimović would arrive on 26 July 2009 and undergo a medical test on 27 July 2009.


title: Zlatan Ibrahimović

text: Ibrahimović passed his medical and was presented to a crowd of over 60,000 at Camp Nou. He signed a five-year contract, for €46 million and the exchange of Eto'o (valued at €20 million) and loan of Alexander Hleb (with an option to purchase for a €10 million fee), with a €250 million release clause, making Ibrahimović worth €66 million. The Hleb deal, however, collapsed. Eventually, Ibrahimović cost Barcelona €69.884 million, which included other fees. As per the Inter book, the fee was €69.5 million, but part of the Inter fee (max 5% according to FIFA regulation) were deducted and distributed by Barcelona to youth and young professional clubs of Ibrahimović: Malmö FF and AFC Ajax as solidarity contribution.


title: Zlatan Ibrahimović

text: Ibrahimović started the 2009–10 season with his competitive debut for Barcelona on 23 August 2009 by assisting a Lionel Messi goal, leading them to the Supercopa de España, beating Athletic Bilbao 5–1 on aggregate. In his next competitive match, Barcelona won the 2009 UEFA Super Cup with a 1–0 win over Shakhtar Donetsk. In his third appearance, he scored his first goal in Barcelona's La Liga season opener against Sporting Gijón in a 3–0 win. Ibrahimović scored in his next four games, thus setting a team record as the only player ever to score in his first five league matches.


title: Zlatan Ibrahimović

text: On 20 October, he scored his first Champions League goal for Barcelona in a group stage match against Rubin Kazan. Five days later, he scored twice in a 6–1 thrashing of Real Zaragoza, giving him a league-leading seven goals in seven league matches while sending Barcelona to the top of the table. On 7 November, however, he suffered a thigh injury that kept him out for three weeks. He returned to action in week 12 of the season against Real Madrid as a second-half substitute for Thierry Henry, and scored his eighth goal of the campaign. He finished with 11 goals and 4 assists in Barcelona's first 15 league matches. Barcelona capped off 2009 by winning the 2009 FIFA Club World Cup against Estudiantes on 19 December 2009.