From the margins: JK Rowling, Hilary Mantel and Ian McEwan annotate their own works - in pictures

JK Rowling: 'Changed my life forever.' 'No shield here - crest. I mean all that came in the later editions. This one's a bit wonky but you get the idea. Perhaps Hufflepuff house would have the respect it deserves from the fans if I'd stayed with my original idea of a bear to represent it?' Photograph: PEN

J.K Rowling: Quidditch - ‘was invented in a small hotel in Manchester after a row with my then boyfriend. I had been pondering the things that hold a society together, cause it to congregate and signify its particular character and knew I needed a sport. It infuriates men, in my experience (why is the Snitch so valuable etc), which is quite satisfying given my state of mind when I invented it.’ Photograph: PEN

Alan Bennett: Page 1: 'People often ask me if the Queen has read the book. The answer is, I’ve no idea. I imagine, though, Her Majesty has better things to do.' Photograph: PEN

Helen Fielding on Bridget Jones's Diary: ‘Oh dear. Hugh was really upset about this... putting it in. It was that thing where you forget the famous “person” is the same as the real person. Though had only met him a couple of times. Sent a message via Richard [Curtis] saying ‘will you forgive me if I give you a blow job!’ I won’t tell you what he said but it was very funny...’ Photograph: PEN

Hilary Mantel on Wolf Hall: ‘Frequently asked questions: When did you decide to use the present tense? When did you decide the action should unfold through Cromwell’s eyes? I decided in line one. I knew also that the first line could ‘bookend’ the whole project. It could well be the last line too. Though it probably won’t be.’ Photograph: PEN

Ian McEwan on Amsterdam: ‘Some say Peter Stothard, others Alan Rusbridger. But I had no idea...’ Photograph: PEN

Nick Hornby on Fever Pitch: ‘How different this book would be if I were to write it now! Except of course, I couldn’t write it now, I’m too old. Not too old to write at all, because I’m still writing, and I can see that I’ve got better at it. But I’m too old to care about these things as much as I did then. Life and jobs and children and all sorts of things get in the way now. I’m not disowning the book. I’m very proud of it. I’m just saying that it’s a young man’s book, which is why it worked.’ Photograph: PEN

Jeanette Winterson on Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit: ‘Is this character Jeanette, me? I really believed I could write myself as a fiction. And stories seem to me to be the truth of life. And growing up. Better to read yourself as a fiction than as a fact.’ Photograph: PEN

Ian Rankin Knots and Crosses: ‘I seem to remember I planned to kill Rebus off at the climax; glad now I changed my mind.’ Photograph: PEN

Lionel Shriver on We Need to Talk About Kevin: ‘Mysteriously missing: excerpts from scathing, indignant reviews railing against immoral book, awful narrator or disgusting author who clearly hates children.’ Photograph: PEN

Seamus Heaney on Death of a Naturalist: 'Anthony Thwaite once described me (to my face) as "laureate of the root vegetable".' Photograph: PEN

Philip Pullman on Northern Lights: ‘But before her daemon could answer, they heard voices outside the room. In a flash, Lyra darted into the big oak wardrobe in the corner, and held her breath, peeping through the crack in the door.’ Photograph: PEN

Kazuo Ishiguro: ‘This title came about when on a deserted Australian beach, when I asked a group of writers... to come up with something for my almost finished, as-of-yet unnamed novel... It was Judith Herzberg’s on-the-spot translation of a term Freud had used to describe dreams that stayed with me. When I got home, I wrote it at the front of my typescript.’ Photograph: PEN

John Banville: ‘Nice typographical accident, this sudden top of the page. It still shocks, I think.’ Photograph: PEN

Lynne Truss on Eats, Shoots & Leaves: 'The Zero-Tolerance Approach to Punctuation' Photograph: PEN

Margaret Drabble on A Summer Bird-Cage: ‘Re-reading in 2012: observations. Drink-driving acceptable Smoking acceptable Hair Pins- why so many? Abortion illegal then Too much about clothes- Beatniks why? Louise’s good looks are modelled on a Cambridge contemporary. The portrait of Cousin Daphne is unforgiveable - I’m ashamed of it.’ ‘This is a very flippant piece of blurb-biography. I think Barley Alison wrote it, it’s her style. It must have annoyed an awful lot of people.’ Photograph: PEN

Peter Carey on Oscar and Lucinda: ‘This ending has upset so many people who ask how I could possibly do this. My answer is - this is how the book arrived in my mind, when I had no idea who Oscar was. This was his DNA, his fate.’ Photograph: PEN

Margaret Atwood on The Blind Assasin: ‘The cover image is from a Saturday Evening Post cover of 1934. The model was a real debutante, as was the habit then. We tried to blondify the hair, but it looked too much like a bathing cap.’ 'This space was supposed to be occupied by a quote from Elizabeth Smart, whose publication life was in some respects like Laura's - her mother burnt all the copies of her book she could find - but I could not get an answer from the rights controller.' Photograph: PEN

Michael Morpurgo on War Horse: ‘It turns out that this ‘Author’s Note’ was rather ill-advised. Thanks largely to the National Theatre and Mr Steven Spielberg, people began to turn up at the village hall in Iddesleigh where I live, looking for the picture of Joey. In fact the picture was a fiction if you see what I'm saying. So many disappointed visitors complained to the villagers that we arranged for the fiction to become fact….’ Photograph: PEN

Tom Stoppard: ‘Nov 2012 – My first editions contain lines from which I have to avert my eyes, e.g on p49 – horrible! There are lines I don’t recognise at all (p 20) (21)… and some I cut if involved in rehearsals (24), (33). I’m not sure that p. 68 was ever performed … I think I cut it in rehearsal in 1967! Nowadays one can use previews, like editing in cinema, but R and G opened the day after dress rehearsal.’ ‘I wanted to call the play “Exit Rosencrantz and Guildenstern”, but for the bad grammar – ‘Exeunt R and G’ I didn’t like as a title, so settled for “are dead”.’ Photograph: PR

Andrea Levy on Small Island: ‘This is a copy of a postcard that my dad wrote while he was on the Empire Windrush. It’s a prized possession!’ Photograph: PEN

PD James on Death of an Expert Witness: ‘I aimed for a creative unity of setting, characterisation, plot and themes. This novel is a classical detective story; it is also about the tragedy and destructive power of obsessive sexual love.’ Photograph: PEN

William Boyd on An Ice Cream War: ‘[Note: this map was drawn by me. Too expensive to produce a new one for a young author...]’ Photograph: PEN

Yann Martel on Life of Pi: ‘Never liked this first line. For starters, it should have been “This book was born BECAUSE I was hungry,” and even that isn’t a great line.’ Photograph: PEN

Quentin Blake illustrations for Roald Dahl's Matilda Photograph: PEN