Harry Potter goes to court over muggles

OWL POST message to Harry Potter: urgent that you muster magical powers to vapourise American author Nancy Stouffer. If this is not convenient, don't panic. Your creator, J K Rowling is taking her to court.

Joining Ms Rowling in her suit filed in a Manhattan court this week are Scholastic, the US publisher of her three books about young Potter and his wizard friends, and Time Warner, which owns the film rights.

They want the court to declare that the books do not violate any trademark or copyright, and particularly that Rowling's term "Muggles" - mundane humans - is original.

The suit is a pre-emptive strike at Ms Stouffer, who claims that she coined "Muggles", also in a mythical context, in The legend of Rah and Rah and Muggles in the 1980s.