Diana Wynne Jones' 80th birthday: Google Doodle celebrates 'Harry Potter inspiration' author's birthday

Wynne Jones believed she inspired JK Rowling

The Google Doodle marking the birthday of Diana Wynne Jones

Google has celebrated the 80th birthday of Howl’s Moving Castle author Diana Wynne Jones with a Doodle on its homepage.

The prolific author, who died on 26 March 2011, wrote more than forty fantasy books for young readers, which explored worlds filled with magic, witches, and wizards.

Born 16 August, 1934, in London to Welsh parents, she met her husband-to-be, the Chaucerian scholar John A Burrow, before she studied at the University of Oxford. The couple married in 1956 and had three sons, Richard, Michael and Colin.

Some of her best-known works include Howl’s Moving Castle - which was adapted for film by Studio Ghibli in 2004 - as well as the Chrestomanci series and the Dalemark Quartet.

She began her career as a playwright in London in 1967, before she released an adult-aimed novel, Changeover, in 1970.

The remainder of her work would see her focus on her fantasy novels for the young. She would go on to tell the Guardian in 2003 that she believed JK Rowling had taken inspiration from her.

"I think that she [Rowling] read my books as a young person and remembered lots of stuff; there are so many striking similarities,” she said.