Harry Potter author knighted in France

JK Rowling
Arise, Sir Rowling ... Photograph: Murdo Macleod

Forget the millions of sales and the cabinet groaning with prizes. JK Rowling has just received the biggest honour of her career to date: she's been knighted by France.

French president Nicolas Sarkozy yesterday bestowed the title of knight of France's prestigious Legion of Honour on the Harry Potter author at a ceremony in the Elysée presidential palace. "You've helped give young people back the taste for reading and writing," Sarkozy told Rowling, thanking her for making children understand that "reading is not a punishment, but a source of pleasure".

Rowling, speaking in French, assured the ceremony that in picking a name for her arch villain, Lord Voldemort, she had not landed upon a French-sounding name because of "anti-French feelings". "I needed a name which evoked power and exoticism," she said, adding that "Voldemort himself is 100% English".

She also revealed that one of her great-grandfathers, who was French, was also bestowed with the title in 1924 for courage on the battlefield during the Battle of Verdun.

The Legion of Honour was created by Napoleon Bonaparte in the early 19th century. Foreigners cannot be officially inducted, but are routinely made honorary recipients, with previous names including Steven Spielberg and Barbra Streisand.

Since Rowling's first novel Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone was published in 1997, her books have sold more than 400 million copies and been translated into 67 languages. The English version of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix was the first book in English to top the French bestseller lists.

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