J.K. Rowling’s first given name is Joanne. She was born Joanne Rowling on 31 July 1965 at Yate General Hospital near Bristol, England, and grew up in Gloucestershire.
The initials in “J.K. Rowling” do not represent a two-part given name. Rowling has said that Bloomsbury asked her to use initials because it believed that boys might be less likely to read a book by a woman. She adopted “K” from Kathleen, her paternal grandmother, although Kathleen was not part of her birth name.
Rowling later married and was sometimes known as Joanne Murray. She has also used the pen name Robert Galbraith for the Cormoran Strike crime novels. These names are often confused, but Joanne is the author’s original first name.
The “J.” in her best-known byline therefore stands for Joanne, while the “K.” was selected for publishing purposes rather than inherited from a middle name.