Talk:Harry Potter in translation

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[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] 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)

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