On May 24th William began to do what he had been putting off for so long. He wrote the second part of Travels with Li Po. “The first part was merely to show the vision and what I had intended for it. Had I played my cards closer to my chest Harry Potter would not exist.”

Here he goes on to explain why he has written it and what it was all about from the beginning.

“After my story had been stolen by Rowling and Little there didn’t seem much point in going on with it. As soon as I duped what had happened incidentally I changed the ending of Part One to include the Virtue Agency the theme of which is the exploitation of what is good by what is evil. I also changed the title of my book from “Owen Muldoon and The Philosopher’s Stone” to “Travels with Li Po” and made a few other changes. Given our circumstances at the time taking Rowling to court was an impossibility for a number of reasons I need not go into.

It was suggested to me by my friends and family to finish my book so that I could elaborate on the vision I had for it, no easy matter I have to say, when all your fundamental ideas have been stolen wholesale, not to mention the philosophy that underpins them. That’s why I kept putting it off having long accepted that my career as a writer ended brutally in the summer of 1990 shortly after I had sent my book to Amnesty. Later I sent it to Little and one or two signed documents later knew beyond doubt I had been royally ‘stitched up’ by both of them.

Still, I wrote Part Two so that people could have access to the real deal, the authentic, genuine wholesome story and not the exploitative derivative. There are a few surprises in it as well for the few intelligent people around who are healthily sceptical of the Rowling-Little money-mining scheme they call “Harry Potter.” I am happy with it. At least it is mine.

My purpose in writing it in the first place was to empower kids with a critical view of life that would protect them from the oligarchic power-mongering and media chicaneries that ironically lie at the heart of the Harry Potter series. Li Po reflects the state of abandonment we all endured in the Bogside in the 1980-90s, a state that afflicted kids in particular and brought them face to face with questions of ultimate concern long before they were able to deal with them. If death is a big thing in both books, this is the reason why. My aim was to write a readable book, not to set up a global franchise. That is where Potter and me part company for good. Children’s literature, being depressingly conservative from a political viewpoint, I had it all to do with a book that was way left of centre from the start. I have not abandoned that position nor will I. Maybe the hour has come at last for Li Po that I considered at the time to be ground-breaking and still do. I also knew in my heart of hearts that some tosser or tossers would plagiarise it. I got that right!

Let me also state for the record that it is my unshakeable conviction that Willy the Wizard met with the same fate as my own work and the Bogside Artists support them in their struggle for justice. The Wizarding world of broomsticks and fantasy is derived totally from Adrian Jacob’s book. It should be obvious to anyone who has a modicum of non-deluded sense left that it is utterly inconceivable that the family of Adrian Jacobs would sink themselves in debt, pay millions to lawyers, mortgage their homes and spend 8 long years trying to drag the felons into court just so that they tell a big lie to the world, and expect it to believe them. If you believe to the contrary then your argument should be that they be removed from the streets forthwith and be subjected to electro-convulsive therapy for their own good. I suggest you were better off to take the more reasonable stand that they deserve the benefit of all out doubts with regards to Rowling and her relationship to Little. And that the argument of greed should be leveled at them not at their victims.

Adrian Jacobs’ family are demonised as “greedy”, “opportunistic” etc by the Rowling camp and her supporters in the media (many of whom are, conveniently, Rowling’s personal friends) but it is clear to us that the greed begins with the plagiarism of what never ever belonged to her or Little and which, I believe, was beyond the intellectual reach of either of them at the time. Let us, on the strength of this common sense, entertain the notion that, as with us, what Adrian Jacobs’ people are saying is the truth and always has been the truth; and Rowling-Little not only have a case to answer but, in the name of democracy, should be forced to answer it.

What is Rowling worth? Like most things to do with dough there is what you are told and then there’s the truth. Rumour has it that she earns 100 million quid every eight months. Whatever the actual figure you can take it that a lorryload of fivers is delivered to her door every month. That being the case why didn’t she settle with the family of the late Adrian Jacobs, whose work she stole, when she had the chance, before the whole shamozzle got out of hand? It is said Neil Gaiman who supplied the mere physical attributes of the hero and nothing else was paid a figure of 10 million quid. He denies it of course. Hard to prove one way or another but Rowling and her boys seem to be able to prove anything. How wonderful it must be to be able to lay claim to absolute truth on anything and have nearly everybody believe you too. The pope doesn’t get that! Idiots believe them too which is rather depressing we have to say. Jacobs’ case is “unsubstantiated, unfounded and untrue,” they tell you. We are in the land of heroic couplets with this sort of drivel. Rowling’s lawyers, Blair/Schillings, wrote the script. Bloomsbury came out with exact same cant when they were asked for a comment in the WTW London High Court case. Clever boys?

Adrian Jacobs’ family may even get a hearing if the Home Office doesn’t get in on the act and remind the judge that he is in bat for England as well as the law… and her image abroad… and all that. Students of the Widgery trial, that is now proven to be a sham after the recent apology by England for Bloody Sunday, will know what we mean.  What would the neighbours think if the canonized Rowling had feet of clay after all?

If we take leave to examine these words one by one we can see they amount to so much hot air, and we, The Bogside Artists, have heard them before and from the same source.

“UNSUBSTANTIATED”:  Means “unsupported”, “unverified”, “not factually proven.” (Encarta)
The Willy the Wizard people claim otherwise and have set up the actual writ they served on Scholastic Inc, New York for all to read. You can access it here;

http://thresq.hollywoodreporter.com/2010/07/harry-potter-willy-wizard.html

Seems to be a lot of substantiation there if you ask us!

“UNFOUNDED”:  Means  “Not supported by evidence”, “not established” (Encarta). More of the same don’t you think? Were it established it would be all over wouldn’t it? It seems clear that the Willy the Wizard people are seeking to establish their claims and will hopefully get their chance to do so in a court of law. This is begging the question isn’t it?  Begging the question means assuming  as already proven what you have set out to prove. People do that… lawyers mostly.

“UNTRUE”: A tricky one this. What is truth asked pilot of its Personification? He got no reply. In law you have to prove something to be true on the basis of evidence. Fair enough, even if many things are true for which there is no evidence and can be no evidence. This is also begging the question since if the claims were proven to be true there would be no ‘claims’ as such since the truth would already have been substantiated, proven and true.

What we are doing here is called thinking for oneself incidentally, a preoccupation much frowned upon by Harry Potter fans and fast becoming as obsolete as harpsichord recitals. Our conclusion? Rowling’s lawyers need a new script, one not designed to convince the gullible they have mastery of words and their usages when it is patently clear they do not. All three words amount to the same thing…  simply “unproven”. Proving is exactly what the WTW are trying to do and what Rowling’s wordsmiths are trying to prevent.

We are also totally convinced that the claims of made by the Willy the Wizard team are verifiably true. That means that Rowling and Little are lying in their teeth and this in turn raises the question… why didn’t they settle much earlier on when they had the chance? Then they would have had only us to deal with. And who is going to listen to us whistling in the dark when the very mountains tremble at the sound of Schillings and Blair? The answer to that is quite simple too. They are arrogant and stupid little people who have a blind faith in their ability to con whoever they want, whenever they want, however they want, as they have been doing for years.

We take this opportunity to make it public that our hat is in the arena with Willy the Wizard and its much sinned-against author Adrian Jacobs because we KNOW beyond any shadow of a doubt these men are telling the truth. We say this because we KNOW the true source of the story. As artists standing for freedom of expression we have no option but to tell the truth as it is known to us.  Not to do so is to lie by omission.

Deceit, Lies and the ‘idea on a train’ con.

Rowling wrote on her website that she was on a train when the idea for Harry Potter “fell into my head”. She didn’t have paper or pen, so for the four-hour journey all she could do was think. In another version she has napkins on which to scrawl. She says being forced to reflect on her ‘great idea’ saved the series. Now then what exactly does she mean by the “idea” for Harry Potter who strolled “fully formed” into her head? Is it

• The actual character of Harry Potter?

• The orphan boy left to figure things out on his own?

• The boy who is a sorcerer but does not know it?

• The college for sorcerers?

• The Philosopher’s Stone?

• A trainee wizard traveling between two worlds that impact on each other?

• A boy of great inadequacies and who is bullied but who triumphs?

• A boy being mentored into magical power by a wise old alchemist?

• A boy whose best friend is a bird that symbolizes his higher intelligence?

• A story addressed intentionally to both children and adults?

• A story of one boy’s quest for spiritual fulfillment?

• A story that encapsulates Jungian psychoanalytic theory and alchemical folklore?

• The perennial struggle between good and evil?

• The triumph of love over death?

Which one of the above ideas do you suppose it was, bearing in mind that the entire success of the Potter is due to ALL of them TOGETHER?

All of them together are to be found in Travels with Li Po, a fact well known to Rowling because that is where she found her ‘great idea’ and all the significant others that go with it. Potter appears as simply an ‘idea’ in the first book to thereby substantiate her ‘inspired from On High’ myth. Book One is to stake her claim to the character as ‘idea’ and serves no other purpose. The label is all that matters, a deed of entitlement, if you will, better known to us as plagiarism. That he is indeed “fully formed” ELSEWHERE and well-known to her a priori and as a fully realized character should be readily discernible to anyone who takes the trouble to read her first book carefully.

Great stories are not just ‘great ideas’ per se any more than one facet makes a diamond. If you called Hamlet merely an ‘idea’ you would be laughed at. Great ideas do not necessarily make great stories, no more than do great fantasies (also pilfered we believe from other sources) Great characters can and do. Which one was it then? If she claims it was Harry Potter the character it should be clear as daylight to you that there is nothing particularly ’great’ about Harry Potter the character when we first meet him in “The Philosopher’s Stone” and nothing at all about him as an ‘idea’ per se that would guarantee his rapid success. The preference of the word “idea” incidentally rather than ‘inspiration’ or ‘vision’ is to correlate with the fact that ‘ideas’ per se are not protected by copyright in the UK. This in turn was intended from the beginning to give ‘intellectual’ substance to the solitary rock on which the Rowling gang stand …. the precedents argument with which the internet has been blogged senseless by Rowling’s private army of supporters many of whom work in reputable newspapers and in the UK media. If the Rowling gang prattle on about ‘ideas’ and ‘precedents’ this is the reason why. The argument of course has no bearing at all on the fact of plagiarism.

Let us ask; if Potter came into her head “fully formed” why does he exist in the first book as an empty vessel? Not “formed” at all indeed…. still less “fully”.

 “Everything comes from Harry,” she states. What Harry? Where was he in Book One? If it wasn’t Harry Potter the character from whom “everything comes” which other idea is she referring to?

Or did she have them all ready and waiting even before she got the miraculous visitation of ”the best  idea I ever had” on a train? “Fully formed” indeed are the exact words used by Will in his letters to her concerning Owen Muldoon, the central character of  his Travels with Li Po where the young orphan is presented “fully formed” along with all of the most significant ideas listed above.

 For further insight into this consult: http://www.travelswithlipo.com

For information about The Bogside Artists see; http://www.bogsideartists.com