J.K. Rowling debunks her rumored feud with the actor who narrates the 'Harry Potter' audiobooks

The INSIDER Summary:

• There's an urban legend that Stephen Fry, who narrated the "Harry Potter" audiobooks, is feuding with J.K. Rowling.
• As the story goes, Rowling put in a tongue-twister in her books just to annoy him.
• Rowling debunked the story on Twitter.

J.K. Rowling just debunked a famous Harry Potter myth: Stephen Fry and J.K. Rowling's argument over the audiobooks. It turns out, the oft-quoted story of Rowling deliberately making Stephen Fry's job hard never actually happened. I have to say, I'm pretty relieved: isn't it so much nicer when everyone just gets along?

The old story goes like this: when Stephen Fry first met Rowling, Potter mania hadn't yet taken off — and Fry made the mistake of underestimating quite how important our queen J.K. was going to be. When he heard that her book was getting a sequel, he rather patronizingly told her "good for you"— which did not go down well with our J.K.

Years later, when Fry was recording the audiobook for Prisoner of Azkaban, he was struggling with the phrase "Harry pocketed it"— which is a tongue-twister, to be fair. But when Fry asked Rowling if he could change the phrase to something a bit easier on the lips, like "Harry put it in his pocket," Rowling wouldn't budge — and here's where she got her final, grand revenge. Apparently, if you look close enough, you'll find the phrase "Harry pocketed it" in every book from that point on — all just to mess with poor Stephen Fry.

It's a great story, and a rumor I've been guilty of spreading. But here's the thing: none of that ever actually happened.

As a fan of both Fry and Rowling, I am relieved to hear that Stephen Fry wasn't as condescending as this story makes him out to be — because if he was, I would totally support J.K. Rowling's Slytherin-esque revenge.

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