It is not simply a question of translating the plot and keeping all spells and names identical since this would mean that a lot of the magic of reading Harry Potter would be lost. The French translation of the first Harry Potter book, translated by Jean-François Ménard, was released on October 9, 1998: Harry Potter à l’école des sorciers (Gallimard).

The French edition removes all regional accents and colloquialisms for the same reason: proper, correct French is seen as vitally important. In the world of wizards, they aren’t paying for their wands and brooms in pounds or euros, but in bronze Knuts, silver Sickles, and golden Galleons, or Noises de bronze, Mornilles d’argent, and Gallions d’or. Mr et Mrs Dursley, qui habitaient au 4, Privet Drive, avaient toujours affirmé avec la plus grande fierté qu’ils étaient parfaitement normaux, merci pour eux. I've heard from my friends in France that 1st/2nd prints of Chamber are also becoming quite hard to find. The trouble was, I hadn’t read the Harry Potter book in English, or even seen the film, so I had no clue as to what was going on.Apparently, Ménard's sense of humor, interest in magic, and an interest for the history of words and etymology made him the ideal choice for J. As a result, his biggest fear was that his translation of proper nouns would be contradicted later in the series. The books have sold over 450 million copies worldwide, which makes it the highest-selling book series ever. The weird part is Harry’s explanation, that he never found out what prefect meant because he doesn’t… go out?

Her books are stuffed with foreshadowing - setting things up that come to fruition later in the story, so it feels natural. Of course 'beautiful wands' would be even better, and the coat of arms of the French school is two crossed, golden wands. That’s just a gross oversimplification of the story, but if you’re interested, you can read all 4,224 pages in the series to discover everything. The larger of the 2 editions, interestingly, this edition is still a bit smaller than the other large editions Gallimard printed earlier on when the books were first being published. Ménard solved for this by translating the name of the house to "Serdaigle" (literally, "Eagleclaw") as opposed to "Serdecorbeau" ("Ravenclaw"), probably because it sounded better, too.

And with any hit series, that means people all over the world are wanting to get a chance to read it.

The French version loses a few of the jokes behind names like "Diagon Alley" and the "Knight Bus," but Ménard did invent words like "ratconfortant" to stand in for "rat tonic" or "Choixpeau" as the official name of the Sorting Hat. Similar the to the 1st print of the first edition, this 2nd Print French translation of harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, published by Gallimard, features internal chapter illustrations. To celebrate the way Harry Potter can bring communities of different nations, cultures, and language groups together, I thought I’d look into the French version of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone and celebrate the magic behind translation.Having moved to Britain he swept Eliza Smith off her feet, marrying her in 1900 and settling in London. Another term that got longer in French, the disarming spell is “the spell of disarmament,” just as every other French spell is “the spell of [something]. However, reading the French translation has given me a new appreciation for the inventiveness of Rowling and the challenges of a translator approaching such well-loved texts which play endlessly with the English language. Being Knighted by the President was a cherished climax to her relationship with the city, which perhaps drew her to set Fantastic Beast's 2 in Paris. This year 2017 has seen the twentieth anniversary of the publication of the first book in the Harry Potter saga, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, which came out in June 1997.