JK Rowling: Depression, the 'terrible place that allowed me to come back stronger'

JK ROWLING told Oprah Winfrey that she suffered from acute depression between the ages of 25 and 28, which she remembered as a "dark time" in her life and a "terrible place to be".

The author, who believes there remains a stigma about mental illness, claiming it "doesn't get spoken about enough", used the interview to articulate the feelings of helplessness she went through.

She said: "It is that absence of feeling, that absence of hope. You don't know you can feel better.

"It is so difficult to describe to someone who hasn't been there, because it isn't sadness.

"Sadness is not a bad thing, to cry, to feel. And it was because of my daughter that I went and got help."

Rowling told how hitting rock bottom was the foundation on which she could come back stronger.

She said: "It was liberating. What did I have to lose? I could be so much worse."

She spoke of her dream of perfect happiness: "In the first Harry Potter book, Dumbledore says to Harry, 'The happiest man alive would be able to look into the mirror and see himself exactly as he is.' So I'd have to say I'm pretty close."

She revealed that she has already decided what her last words will be. Choking back tears, she recalled how the 11 September atrocity convinced her of the most important thing in life.

She said: "This is going to be tricky. I know that love is the most powerful thing of all.

"And I remember thinking that - God, I'm about to make myself cry - but I remember thinking that when 9/11 happened, because those last phone calls were all about… the last thing that I'm going to say on this Earth is 'I love you'.

"What's more powerful than that? What's better proof than that? It's not fear, beyond death.

"It was a defining moment in our lives. I remember thinking: 'They've come down?' and turning on the TV and saw it.

"And I panicked because I have friends in New York and I emailed two of my best friends in New York, one of them is my editor Arthur Levine, and, bizarrely, he was able to e-mail me back immediately. The last line of his e-mail was: 'And they say that we shouldn't teach children about evil.'"

Rowling also told how she had turned down an approach from the late pop star Michael Jackson to do a Harry Potter musical.

She said: "Michael Jackson wanted to do the musical and I said no."

The writer told how despite writing the books she does not control the Potter empire.

She said: "No, I have a say. For me, I love the films, I love the books, and there are elements that are really fun around it."