What event inspired J.K. Rowling’s idea for Harry Potter during a 1990 train journey?

A delayed train from Manchester to London inspired J.K. Rowling’s idea for Harry Potter during a journey in 1990. She later said that the character and the basic concept of a boy discovering he was a wizard came to her while she was traveling.

The train was delayed for several hours, giving Rowling time to imagine Harry, Hogwarts, and the wider magical world. She did not immediately write the complete series; the idea developed over years before the first manuscript reached publication.

This origin story concerns the initial conception of Harry Potter, not the later writing location of the books. Rowling subsequently wrote much of the first novel while living in Edinburgh, and Bloomsbury published it in the United Kingdom in 1997.