JK Rowling is now more popular than Shakespeare

Baku. 12 August. REPORT.AZ/ JK Rowling is now more popular than Shakespeare. Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, the latest instalment of the hit series, has become the biggest-selling edition of a play script since records began, making £8.76 million in just seven days, Report informs citing the Daily Mail.

In the first week since it went on sale, eager fans have snapped up 847,886 copies of the Little, Brown Book Group publication, spending the equivalent of almost £870 per minute.

A Penguin Classics edition of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet is a distant second on the list, having sold 127,726 copies since 1998.

The play, co-written by the Edinburgh author and Jack Thorne, an English screenwriter, takes up the story of Harry Potter 19 years after leaving Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

It is also the biggest title of the year and the fourth-fastest selling of all time – beaten only by Miss Rowling's last three Potter books.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows sold 1.84 million copies in July 2007 while Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince sold 1.47 million copies in June 2003. The third biggest selling is Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, which sold 867,000 in July 2005.