Talk:Harry Potter in translation

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Contents

[edit] American Original, not likely!

Further to the comment below i find it incorrect to list the international english version as a translation, this is americocentric nonsense. Obviously the international version (i.e. the non-american version) is the origonal and I know for a fact that changes other than the title were made to the content of the book (see:http://www.hp-lexicon.org/help/strictly_british1.html)(actually mentioned in body of article) to aid the understanding of american readers. will changing this bring me undue criticism or a revert? (82.46.12.240 01:55, 17 March 2006 (UTC))

Can anyone comment on the differences between the American English and the U.K. English versions? (Ideally at a deeper level than that the title of the first volume is different!) Johnh 23:31, 21 July 2005 (UTC)

It's largely a matter of changing words that would be confusing to Americans. For instance, Mrs. Weasley knits jumpers in the British version, and sweaters in the American version. The meaning is the same, but in American English the word "jumper" refers to a pinafore dress so it would be very strange to American readers to imagine Harry and Ron wearing jumpers! For the same reason, football is changed to soccer in the American versions.
There are some other small differences that are not due to words meaning different things. In the American version, for example, the number on Sirius Black's vault at Gringotts is mentioned. In the British version, it is omitted. I don't know why the non-language-related changes like this were made. --Icarus 06:04, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Rationale

Is it really significant to provide how the name of characters or places is translated into languages other than English? -- Taku 20:43 30 May 2003 (UTC)

It's trivia. It's not significant, it's interesting. Why, for example would the cat's name be changed or Professors Snape's? Or Mme Sprout's? The changes reflect that the characters names are meant to imply certain things about them, and the name changes are interesting in that they reflect decisions made with permission of the author. Where else would one discover that the French equivalent of "Hufflepuff" is "Poufsouffle"? -- Someone else 20:49 30 May 2003 (UTC)
It's also useful when you're reading a translation and wonder who "Mr Rusard" equates to. (It's Filch, BTW.) But Harry Potter in translation isn't the best title. How about List of translations of Harry Potter terms, in keeping with other List of x names? Geoffrey 03:46 31 May 2003 (UTC)

Because wikipedia is not a dictionary. Imagine we will be putting names also in Arabic, Korean and Japanese languages. Wikipedia is all about our knowledge not about linguistic information such as translation words. If we allow this, then what about how to call universities, United States, for instance in Japanese language. I know there are a lot of this kind of lists already, but it doesn't mean they are consistent with our policies. -- Taku 15:03 31 May 2003 (UTC)

While I agree in general that wikipedia shouldn't have translation information, Harry Potter is a special case as JK Rowling naming of characters/objects/places has a depth unusual in fiction (except in Tolkien's LotR) and translation may effect that. For instance in book 3 the character Remus Lupin, if you think about his name you'ld notice his last name is derived from the latin Lupus for wolf and his first is shared with the roman mythological character Remus (as in Romulus and Remus). For more information see http://www.verbatimmag.com/26_2.pdf and http://www.theninemuses.net/hp/ --Imran 23:44 31 May 2003 (UTC)

Then I guess this is fine. At least this article hurts nothing. -- Taku 19:15 1 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Should we add terms that are mere literal translations of common nouns, e.g., broomstick = French balai and magic wand = baguette magique? These aren't specific to the Harry Potter series itself, but they were there and untranslated, so I put the literal translation (which is, of course, used in the book). Geoffrey 02:06 10 Jun 2003 (UTC)

I think we probably need keep only those in which there's a witty, amusing or elucidative change in some language (like Choixpeau<G>), but we won't know which those are until we have more languages added. -- Someone else 02:10 10 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Geoffrey, Do you know what the French equivalent is to the English difference in pronunciation that takes Harry to the wrong place when he says "diagonally" instead of "Diagon Alley" when using the floo powder to go shopping with the Weasleys? (book 2 I think) -- Someone else 03:46 11 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Well, what's Knockturn Alley in French? I haven't read Chambre des secrets yet...another website claims it "Allée des Embrumes" which sounds nothing like "Chemin de Traverse". Not everything translates perfectly - but when I read the second book I'll see what happens. Possibly they change the entire mispronunciation scene there because they can't translate it. And Diagon Alley is supposed to be "diagonally". Knockturn Alley is "nocturnally". Both are (supposedly) eponymous. Geoffrey 20:02 23 Jun 2003 (UTC)

[edit] This is a hobby page that hijacks Wikipedia for personal purposes

I feel strongly that this page does not belong in Wikipedia.

The page has virtually no content. A page about Harry Potter in translation should at least collate or summarise material concerning the current state of Harry Potter in translation. What the author does instead is send out a message under the auspices of Wikipedia asking visitors to complete his/her project! In other words, whoever started this page is simply hitching a ride with Wikipedia in order to do his/her own personal project.

Yes, the way Harry Potter is translated is interesting, but the author of this page should go and create his/her own web site instead of taking up space at Wikipedia.

Other people have put a lot of effort into similar pages without acting under the cloak of another project.

In particular, I refer you to:

http://www.eulenfeder.de/int/index.html

Information about Harry Potter in Oriental languages can also be found at:

http://www.cjvlang.com/Hpotter

I would be interested to know why the creator of the Wikipedia page didn't bother to find out what was available on the web before deciding to go ahead with this pet project. Why are there no links to these pages?

I reiterate: This is a hobby page that is riding on the coattails of Wikipedia. The author should take his hobby elsewhere and create his own web page or website.

You are absolutely correct. This article doesn't belong to wikipedia. But remember wikipedia is also a place to hung out, have fun for some people. Unfortunately we don't have enough force to drive this kind of thing out from here. -- Taku 16:56, Feb 9, 2004 (UTC)

I disagree. I think this article, now series of articles, does belong here on Wikipedia. In fact, I think it needs expanding -- it's just as valid, and probably more academic, that the various lists of people, pornstars (!), bands, albums, singles, songs (some people are attempting to catalogue every song ever recorded!), movies, etc -- but I do agree that this particular page needs a few changes. There needs to be more on the actual translations and the lists moved to appropriate pages. I have already done some of that, moving the list of book names to another page for one, but there's a lot more to do. I started by creating a main index page (Harry Potter in translation series which will act as a central link for the various pages, and will attempt to write something here when I have time and can think of something. Exploding Boy 11:55, Mar 22, 2004 (UTC)

Would it be appropriate to add an "FAQ" to this page? I am new to Wikipedia, and an FAQ doesn't seem to be a very Wiki thing. However, I am also a Harry Potter translator, and I could create an FAQ that I think would be relevant to this page, answering questions such as: How are Harry Potter Translators picked? To what degree is J.K.Rowling involved in the translation process? Why does it take so long to translate the books? etc. --Woggly 08:30, 25 Mar 2004 (UTC)
I wouldn't add a FAQ, but that information sounds good, and you can add it as part of the article. Exploding Boy 09:18, Mar 25, 2004 (UTC)

In my opinion, this is an excellent page to have on Wikipedia; I'm not a major contributor, but I like languages, and this article seemed perfect for me. I say you should keep it. Also, I'd like to see more information emerge about specific puns and hard-to-translate enigmata.

[edit] Format

I don't understand the point of having three seperate lists (languages, translators, publishers/countries) that need to be maintained seperately. I think what is interesting and relevant to this page is just how many different languages and dialects the book has been translated into - that's what I'd like to be able to easily count. The information about translators, publishers and countries is only important because it serves to substantiate and elucidate the list of languages, but I reckon this information should somehow be integrated into one list, with language as the important factor.

What I'd like to see, in other words, is one, unified list that goes something like this:

  1. Afrikaans, South Africa: Human & Rousseau (pty) Ltd.,translated by Janie Oosthuysen [1]
  2. Albanian, Albania: Publishing House Dituria, translated by Amik Kasoruho
  3. Arabic, Egypt: Nahdet Misr
  4. Bahasa Indonesia, Indonesia: Penerbit PT Gramedia Pustaka Utama
  5. Basque, Spain, translated by Iñaki Mendiguren
  6. Bulgarian, Bulgaria: Egmont Bulgaria, translated by Mariana Melnishka
  7. Castilian, Spain: Ediciones Salamandra
  8. Catalan, Spain: Editorial Empuries, translated by Laura Escorihuela
  9. Chinese, People's Republic of China (Simplified Characters): People's Literature Publishing House, translated by Ma Ainong, et al
  10. Chinese, Taiwan (Complex Chinese Characters): Crown Publishing Company Ltd, translated by Peng Chien-Wen

I'm bringing this up on the talk page because I know the list used to be more like this suggested format, and Exploding Boy put some effort into breaking it up. Why? I don't see what was gained. --Woggly 08:30, 14 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I see your point but I'm not totally certain that you can combine everything into one list because of possible duplication. My personal preference would be to group information by language with a section for each language, showing who does the translation, and then a list of countries publishing in that language along with the appropriate publisher:
==Afrikaans==
Translated by: Janie Oosthuysen [2]
;South Africa : Human & Rousseau (pty) Ltd.
.
.
.
==Chinese==
===Simplified===
Translated by Ma Ainong, et al
;People's Republic of China : People's Literature Publishing House
===Complex===
Translated by Peng Chien-Wen
;Taiwan : Crown Publishing Company Ltd

etc. Which actually seems to work, despite my worries :-) --Phil | Talk 09:57, Jul 14, 2004 (UTC)

I'm not sure I split the page the way you think I did... I did make a lot of changes and created some new pages, but it was a long time ago... At any rate, I support changing the format of this page to whatever would work better, which is always my intention. Exploding Boy 10:10, Jul 14, 2004 (UTC)

Good! I didn't mean to accuse you of anything, Exploding Boy- I just didn't want to make any drastic changes without considering possible objections, which for some reason I thought you might have. I know you care about this article, that's why I left the note on your talk.
As for the format suggested by Phil: we'd lose the automatic count that way, wouldn't we? Here's what I propose: I'll create an integrated list according to the format I suggested, which could then with relative ease be converted to subheadings the way Phil suggested. Once the integrated list is a part of the history of the article, we can play around with the format and see what looks best, and if necessary revert to our favorite format. --Woggly 11:04, 14 Jul 2004 (UTC)
OK, I'll bite and see if I can twist my idea to fit your requirements ...
  1. Afrikaans
    Translated by: Janie Oosthuysen [3]
    South Africa 
    Human & Rousseau (pty) Ltd.
  2. Chinese (Simplified)
    Translated by Ma Ainong, et al
    People's Republic of China 
    People's Literature Publishing House
  3. Chinese (Complex)
    Translated by Peng Chien-Wen
    Taiwan 
    Crown Publishing Company Ltd
That should work: keeps your automatic numbering and groups stuff together by language. --Phil | Talk 11:21, Jul 14, 2004 (UTC)

Looks good. I won't apply it now because my arm hurts. --Woggly 12:05, 14 Jul 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Czech Pirate translation

I've removed the sentence: Suprisingly, the pirate Czech translation of the Order of Phoenix quickly became extemely popular, and was actually used as the official translation. I'd like to see a reference for this. While I don't actually know it to be false, I have been in correspondence with one of the Medek brothers, and to the best of my knowledge they were not replaced by other translators, nor were their translations ever "pirate' translations. --Woggly 10:23, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Languages

Why not list the Title in each language as well? This would not be frivolous at all in my opinion, especially if you were trying to find a copy of that book. But giving the author's name in that language might be perhaps (i.e. the Chinese). By the way, for anyone who thinks this list is silly, look at it this way; - I've seen maybe one Harry Potter movie, but never read one of the books in the series (even though my parents were teachers and have the whole series). However; I was thinking about reading (or trying to read!) something relatively familiar at an intermediate level in Hindi or Urdu, languages I'm learning. In that sense, knowing that the "Philosopher's Stone" is translated as "Pāras Patthar" (पारस पत्थर)[4] in Hindi, or the Prisoner of Azkaban is "Azkabān ka Qaidi" (ازكبان كا قيدى) in Urdu[5] is crucial information, and not "pet-project" material. And by that token, perhaps there is a nuance to Chinese I am ignorant of and it is necessary to write the name in Chinese. In my experience with other languages though, names are the one and only constant. It is fairly obvious to me that Sudhir Dixit is सुधिर दीक्षित without having to write it in Hindi, though I might be mistaken on the length of a vowel or two. In other words, transliterate all author's names into their respective foreign scripts, or don't do it at all, doesn't really matter to me though - just thought I'd add my observation. Khiradtalk 07:29, 19 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Zulu

Zulu; though some sources refer to translations "from Arabic to Zulu", the books in fact have never officially been translated into Zulu.

Why is this listed if it has not been shown to exist? This is contradictory. --Dforest 12:55, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] English?

Why is this line in the article?

English: Australia, Allen & Unwin Pty Ltd (Distributor); Canada, Bloomsbury/Raincoast; South Africa, Jonathan Ball Publishers (Distributors); USA: Scholastic

This is a list of translations, and as far as I know, for the Australian, Canadian and South-African editions nothing has been translated. They're just regional editions of the same book. MrTroy 23:02, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

You are correct of course, technically, but I like the list the way it is. It's the most complete list of Harry Potter publishers available anywhere. One could start another article about "Harry Potter publishers" in order to preserve that; personally, I'd rather have these superfluous publishers listed here than create yet another almost identical list on a separate article. I don't see what harm can be done by keeping the English language publishers listed here. --woggly 06:56, 6 August 2006 (UTC)
Being an inclusionist I agree with your wish for completeness. However, including the English editions that are not translations may be misleading, because it can lead people to think they are translated. For now, I've included a note that they're not translations to avoid confusion. Furthermore I have removed USA because American English has its own entry in the list. MrTroy 08:48, 6 August 2006 (UTC)
Fine. --woggly 08:55, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Who "translates" the US editions?

I notice there is no name listed as the books' American "translator". Is one person responsible or is this decided by committee? Serendipodous 16:43, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Titles

Please don't add the title names of the books to this article. This content once existed as a separate article, which was deleted per AfD: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of titles of Harry Potter books in other languages (2nd nomination). The decision was to delete these lists, not to merge them. Please respect that. --woggly 14:03, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Turkish example

In the Turkish translation of Pensieve, the author notes that it is a portmanteau of "Düsünmek", to think, and "sel" which is not defined. I had a look on a Turkish dictionary and apparently, "sel" means a flood of water. I'll add that info in if no one has any objections. Serendipodous 09:25, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Fair use rationale for Image:Hoewrqr1.jpg

Image:Hoewrqr1.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images uploaded after 4 May, 2006, and lacking such an explanation will be deleted one week after they have been uploaded, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot 11:13, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Different name translations

Adding a section of translations of names, objects and places might be fun. ϲнʌɴɗɩєʀ 18:53, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] American vs. British English

There should be much more material about the "translation" from British English to American English. And we should be told which version English speakers in other countries are reading. Canada gets the British version? There are many hundreds of changes, mostly minor vocabulary translations. They are listed here[6] and even more thoroughly here.[7] In addition, that second site also lists minor changes that are being made in the newer editions, to make them more consistent. -69.87.201.47 22:47, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Added a section, feel free to edit or expand. --woggly 17:23, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] New table format

I'm sure this table was a lot of work, and it looks good, so thank you. I do however have a few minor issues with it. Firstly, we have lost the automatic count; secondly, some of the entries for Spain look odd now. As far as I understood, Catalan and Valencian are different names for the same dialect; ditto Spanish and Castillian. This should be made clearer on the table (perhaps by putting the alternative name in parenthesis). --woggly 10:24, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Also maybe move "West Frisian" under F for "Frisian". I'm afraid to mess up the table if I do it. --woggly 10:31, 23 September 2007 (UTC)
Sorry for no response, I forget to watch talk pages. Glad you like the table. :) Speaking of automatic numeration, indeed, and I have no idea how to restore the functionality of ordered lists. There is a server-side software extension which I reckon would help us, but unfortunately it’s not installed on Wikipedia, so I repaired the indices manually. If you think it doesn’t matter that much, we could live with manual counting until the developers extend the wikimarkup enough. About the languages, you’re right, but I see they are fixed already. About the West Frisian language – changed! viny.tell // 22:01, 25 September 2007 (UTC)
Thank you! --woggly 22:22, 25 September 2007 (UTC)
Hehe, no problem. I felt so guilty for messing up the number system, I wrote a bookmarklet. Paste it into the address bar while you have the edit window of the article opened, and it will re-calculate the rows in the textarea. Tested in MSIE 6, Opera 9 and Firefox 2.
javascript:(function(e,x){e.value=e.value.replace(/(\| )(\d+)(\. <th>)/g,function(a,b,c,d){return b+(x++)+d})})(document.getElementById('wpTextbox1'), 1);
Well, I’m off now. :) viny.tell // 22:46, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Images

Are the images in this article legal under fair use? I could provide scans of more than 20 different editions of the first Harry Potter book, but I'm not going to go to effort of scanning them if they'll just get deleted. --woggly 10:26, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] American English

1. American English is "the English language as spoken in the U.S.." (Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary, emphasis added.) Therefore, a British book edited by an American does NOT qualify as "American English." It's just, duh, British English edited by an American. Note that some of J.K. Rowling's "Briticisms" were actually left in.

2. While Afrikaans, Albanian, Arabic, etc. are languages, American English is not. British and American English are two (sets of) dialects of the same language: English.

So please don't list "American English" as a language.

3. Sorcerer's stone vs. Philosopher's stone has nothing to do with American vs. British English. It was just a (dismal) choice of the American publisher. The French publisher too wiped the philosopher's stone out of the title.

3.1 Anybody who doesn't know what the philosopher's stone is has severe mental retardation.
;-) Jack(Lumber) 19:25, 1 October 2007 (UTC)


So is a British book translated into Arabic still British English? There's no clear line between dialect and language, and both can clearly be changed by translation.
And calling everyone who doesn't know a fact that you know severely mentally retarded is being an asshole.--Prosfilaes 16:06, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
I second that. woggly 16:08, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
No, no, and no. When you translate a book, for example, from French into Arabic, you actually have to *rewrite* it. The Harry Potter books were neither rewritten nor translated, just adapted---the entire text was virtually unchanged, except for a few edits. And American English can only be written by an American---by definition. An American may use different words, different constructions, different patterns, different word order, and so on. The American changes were quite superficial in this respect---and a lot of the "American" variants are actually perfectly good (if not better) British English (e.g. good for you for good on you, on either side for either side). Not to mention that several Briticisms were left in. If an American and an Englishman decide to write a book together, what "language" are they going to use? When it comes to British and American English, the line is clear enough---much clearer than the one between "functional illiterate" and "imbecile." My comment was supposed to be humorous, as the ";-)" implied. Jack(Lumber) 21:39, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
If we were talking about something that is formally defined, like the meter, you might win by saying "by definition". But a dictionary is merely a tool to explain a word and frequently sacrifices precision for clarity and brevity. Even given that, the definition you give said that American English is English "as" spoken in the US, not "that is" spoken in the US. That is, anyone can write American English as long as they are doing it "as" it is spoken in the US.
Frankly, I don't care about the precise definitions here. There were changes in this edition to bring the book towards proper American English. To produce a list of all the different language versions in the world and leave this one out for pedantry is stupid.
I caught that your statement was meant to be humorous. Why is that my retort didn't have you rolling in the isles? Perhaps it's because insult usually is only funny to the insulter? Perhaps because one of the oldest tricks in the book is to try and escape blame for rude, insulting and out-of-line remarks by claiming they were meant to be humorous?
(Does using an adjective where an adverb is called for qualify as functionally illiterate?) Calling the functionally illiterate imbeciles is attacking a group of people who are relatively powerless, unrespected, with low self-esteem and whose chances for the future are limited. Why not attack cripples while you're at it? What about the deaf, the blind? I guess you're right; those people aren't as completely powerless as the functionally illiterate, so let's stay kicking those who have no chance to defend themselves.--Prosfilaes 01:21, 5 October 2007 (UTC)


Does mistaking a *noun* used as a word for an adjective qualify as functionally illiterate? I think not. I'm just gonna drop the 'tude. I may drink tequila, eat enchiladas, and wear a sombrero, but that ain't gonna make me a Mexican. Just because a text is written in what *formally* looks like proper American English doesn't mean it is actual American English. Disjuncts, predeterminers, tag questions, modal auxiliaries, and the words please and sorry are all less common in American than British. A bit is three times as common in British as in American. I guess is ten times as common in American as in British. These are the kinds of things that distinguish different dialects of the same language. Therefore, if British is red and American is blue, the U.S. editions of the Harry Potter books are red streaked with blue. But language is dynamic; it evolves; it can't be compartmentalized. Suppose I'm moving to England, and suppose I'm going to live there for the rest of my life. What will my English look like five years from now? British? American? Neither. Some shade of purple. The line is more blurred than you might think. No one is going to leave out the American edition. Just don't call it "American English," or else you're gonna have to call the original edition "British English," which would be just as terrible. And the U.S. editions ain't "American English" anyways. Jack(Lumber) 14:37, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] I think the UK English edition should be listed

Because Bloomsbury publishes for both the UK and Ireland and if the English editions for Australia, South Africa and Canada are listed than Ireland should be too. And if Ireland is listed than the UK should be. Also, I'm assuming that Allan and Unwin publish in New Zealand as well as Australia, yes? Serendipodous 12:37, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

I'm all for it, but five minutes later a new pedant will come along and remove it again, scoffing at our ignorance. My personal preference is for an inclusive list that contains comprehensive information about as many as possible different editions worldwide, even if one of them is the original and some of them are not strictly speaking translations, or not authorised translations. (For instance, when and why did someone erase one of the two Farsi editions that had been listed? To the best of my knowledge, there was more than one edition of book one produced in Iran.) However I'm not going to engage in revert scuffles over this.--woggly 08:15, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
I don't see any Farsi ref at all on that list, which is odd. Surely at least one should be there. Maybe someone's making a political statement? Serendipodous 08:08, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

EDIT: Oh, it's under "Persian". Farsi is probably better, but I can live with Persian. Serendipodous 07:38, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

With the new format I've introduced to the table, I don't think you'll have a problem including a separate Farsi translation. Serendipodous 08:37, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Publisher

Is the publisher of the books for Ukraine really called "A-BA-BA-HA-LA-MA-HA"? --Stefán Örvarr Sigmundsson 05:53, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

I know it sounds odd, but yes, it really really is. I own a copy of the first book in Ukrainian. --woggly 06:48, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
Yes, it is. In Ukrainian it sounds like А-БА-БА-ГА-ЛА-МА-ГА (English translation is just a transcription). --Yarko 10:52, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] more covers

As far as I saw plenty of covers of HP books I can say that Ukraininan version is one of the best. May be it could be presented here?
Here are a list of covers:
http://www.mo-productions.com/images/potter7.jpg
http://www.mo-productions.com/images/potter6.jpg
http://www.mo-productions.com/images/potter5.jpg
http://www.mo-productions.com/images/potter4.jpg
http://www.mo-productions.com/images/potter3.jpg
http://www.mo-productions.com/images/potter2.jpg
http://www.mo-productions.com/images/potter.jpg
--Yarko 10:50, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] I've just edited the table

To give a clearer idea of the number of languages into which Harry Potter has been translated (and also to stop edit wars over separate translations being considered separate languages). Including "American", there are sixty on the list. If we include the two unofficial translations and the ditched translation into Scots Gaelic, that makes 63. Most media sources however say that Harry Potter has been translated into 65 languages. So either they're wrong or we're missing a few. I'm currently inclined to go either way. Serendipodous 08:35, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

I'd be willing to wager that media sources that quote the number 65 relied on this Wikipedia article, or a mirror or fork of this article. Journalists, like many people, are often lazy, and Wikipedia is a great resource for lazy people. I'm pretty sure the following news article also relied heavily on this Wikipedia article as a source:[8] --woggly 16:38, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Bear with me, please

I'm attempting a proper reorganisation of this article, but it's confusing work, with so many different aspects to address. I still feel strongly that the table should contain unauthorised published translations as well as the authorised translations: basically, anything that can be purchased in a bookstore and set upon a shelf. Otherwise the list does not add much to that which is already available on J.K.Rowling's official website. The idea is to show the variety: how many different languages the books have been translated into; issues of copyright infringement can and are discussed separately. Anyway, I need to take a break now and get on with my real work, but I plan to come back and continue the rewrite. --woggly 08:46, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Someone who knows comparative linguistics

Please tell me, apart from nationalism, is there anything separating Sperbian and Croatian? Is Ukrainian a language or is is a dialect of Russian? Is Afrikaans a language or a dialect of Dutch? Are Gallician and Catalan languages or Spanish dialects? Serendipodous 15:22, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

The short answer is that they are all distinct languages, though of course there are similarities. You can enter the Wikipedia articles relating to these languages to read more about them and what distinguishes them from related languages.--woggly 17:06, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Adding new languages (Bosnian)

I've erased Bosnian because I haven't been able to verify independently that such an edition exists. The point of this table is to document different editions: not to document linguistic disputes. For example: it is not our business to decide if Serbian and Croatian are one language or two: for purposes of this list, there are two different editions, with two different publishers, and different translators - hence the separate entries are justified. I don't know what the case is for Bosnian, but I need a reference. If you can show me that a Bosnian publisher hired an additional translator to prepare an independent translation, I'll support adding the Bosnian edition to the list; linking to a sales site from which the names of the publisher and translator are absent is not enough. --woggly (talk) 09:59, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Fair use rationale for Image:Potter6-Czech.jpg

Image:Potter6-Czech.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images lacking such an explanation can be deleted one week after being tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot (talk) 07:18, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Fixed Serendipodous 10:49, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Tom the bartender

Just an observation that although 'Tom the bartender' in the text is linked through to the page on minor characters, there does not seem to any longer be an entry for him. The implication of this article seems to be that there is some significance to tom riddle and he sharing the same first name. Is there some justification for this? Sandpiper (talk) 23:58, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Anagrams

I would like to improve the section of anagrams in this article, however I speak hungarian and czech very well (and sorry for my bad English)!
Pro primo: I think in czech "Já, Lord Voldemort" it means "Me, Lord Voldemort" sooner than "Yes," (like affirmative is "Ja" in German, I think the editor thought this).
Pro secundo: the hungarian "Nevem Voldemort" means "My name is Voldemort".
I hope this help you. I don´t want change the article (only help to explain some terms), please do it instead of me.
Thank you:
--91.127.77.61 (talk) 23:52, 2 February 2008 (UTC)