The Wizarding World of Harry Potter through the Magic of Muggle Languages!
Today I was taking a look through Harry Potter en die Kamer van Geheimenisse (Afrikaans Chamber of Secrets, translated by Janie Oosthuysen). I happened across this printing error in Chapter 16. The page header says “Die Man met Twee Gesigte” (“The Man with Two Faces”) throughout the chapter. I've highlighted it in the image below,... Continue Reading →
Harry Potter has been translated into everything from Ancient Greek to Greenlandic to Māori. So what's left?
A reader wrote in about Dumbledore's favorite sweet turning into a drink. How does he "unstick" two lemonades? Also: how are "sherbet balls" translated?
Some communities around the world use two languages for different situations. So what happens when only one of those languages is used for reading and writing?
Collectors got their 100th translation in late 2022! Here are some preliminary observations on how it compares with the previous Croatian translation.
Albus Dumbledore loves sherbet lemon so much that it's the password to his office. But sherbet lemon is a candy specific to the UK. So when the story was brought to other countries—including the US—nobody knew what to call it in the local language.
Harry Potter has been translated into nearly 100 languages. The very first sentence is one of the most challenging to translate. Take a look.
Genies. Ghouls. Alchemy. And Percy staging a coup? These are all features you'll find in the Arabic editions of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone.
Foods, as a literary device, are commonly changed in translation. Here are some of the hearty holiday comfort foods from around the world that have made their way into the Harry Potter translations.
The Spellman Spectrum has an update! Here's more about how it works, why the changes were needed, and how it still needs improvement.