Are Translations Of Harry Potter Spells Different?

As a translator I can tell you these problems are extremely wide-spread and far from unique to Harry Potter. So even if HP is a great example of the struggles translators face, other books have similar aspects. Espcially the “translating this from a culture to another”… that is literally an aspect of every single translation ever. Lastly: thanks for showing the hardships of translation, transaltors are way too often forgotten about and when we’re not, we’re being criticised. This made me happy 🙂

You know the game Exploding Snap from the books? In German it was mistranslated into “Snape Explodiert” meaning “Snape explodes” Once the translators realized that the game wasn’t about blowing up the teacher they changed it to “Zauberschnippschnapp”, but all books printed prior to 2004 still have the mistranslation.

the french versions are my favorite because all the titles translate exactly into english…except for the first one, “harry potter à l’ecole des sorciers”, or (directly) “harry potter at wizard school”. also the french word for wand is “baguette magique” (baguette has a lot of meanings but generally means “stick” and is used to refer to things that are that shape) and they usually just say “baguette” so it’s really funny to imagine everyone carrying around bread all the time

In Swedish “I am Lord Voldemort” is “Jag är Lord Voldemort”. The ä was problematic so the translator changed the name to Tom Gus Mervolo Dolder, so that it could spell out “Ego sum Lord Voldemort”, the latin phrase. Really clever if you ask me, especially since it still contains the pun (dold=hidden)!

I’ve never read the Harry Potter series in English, only in Japanese. It always came with a paper that’s basically a Muggle’s guide to the story and stuff. There was always a small part in those pieces of paper where the translator shared her frustration while she was translating. I remember that she wrote how she couldn’t figure out a way on how to translate Hagrid’s accent while she was translating. It always made me chuckle. Also, in the Japanese version, they don’t change any of the food they eat in the story. (I think. I’ve never read the English version so correct me if I’m wrong) The Muggles guide had a section where it briefly summarized what king of food it was so you basically had to have that piece of paper beside you while you were reading. It was useful because all of the character’s names where written on it as well so I could just look at it when I forgot who a character was.

I feel like the footnote with explanations of the original pun and author’s intent are the best policy. It’s the least amount of work for everyone rather than trying to come up with new puns that work in your language but may deviate from the author’s original vision, you get an unfiltered view and get to learn about whatever culture the author originated from. I feel this way because there are many games from Japan that get their meaning and dialogue ruined in the localisation process, and it’s frustrating because I would’ve been fine with just googling and learning whatever cultural reference I didn’t understand. Fortunately with more modern games like Persona 5 they’re taking that approach.

I can talk about the Dutch translation all day. It truly is the best translation of a book of all time. The translator (Wiebe Budding) made excellent choices in trying to confey a similar meaning while also keeping the same overall ‘feeling’ of the name. He translated almost every name into a Dutch variant that kept the same or a similar alliteration and meaning, even the names of minor side characters. I think some names are even better in Dutch than they are in English. Many of his words actually have a double or even triple meaning. Other people mentioned Wegisweg as the translation for diagonally. That one has so many meanings. First of all it means gone is gone. Diagonally is ‘gone’, invisible, for Muggles. It also sounds funny. Weg also translated to road or street. So goneisstreet. And finally Weg is weg is a common saying for dutch shops when sales are happening: Op is op, weg is weg. So the name already very clearly implies that its a hidden street with shops. That’s just one of the many examples.

IN DUTCH Hermione = Hermelien Luna Lovegood = Loena Leeflang (‘Leeflang’ litterly translates into live long) Tom Marvolo Riddle = Marten Asmodom Vilijn Hogwarts = Zweinstein (‘Zwein’ comes from zwijn, which roughly translates into pig, stein is commonly used in names for castles) Godric Gryffindor = Goderic Griffoendor Helge Hufflepuff = Helga Huffelpuff Rowena Ravenclaw = Rowena Ravenklauw Salazar Slytherin = Zalazar Zwadderich Diagon Ally = Weg is weg (This is a word play; ‘weg’ means road, but it also means gone. Basicly it translates into ‘Gone is gone’) Quidditch = Zwerkbal (it was really funny to hear you pronounce that) Quaffle = Slurk Snitch = Snaai Bludger = Beuker O.W.L = S.L.I.J.M.B.A.L (This translates into slimebal) N.E.W.T = P.U.I.S.T (This translates into pimple) Muggle = Dreuzel Let me know if you want to know more!

The Hungarian translator did quite an awesome job preserving the word plays built in names (or replacing them with other puns that work in Hungarian) and the alliterations. For instance, Diagon Alley became Abszol út, út meaning road and abszolút meaning, of course, absolute(ly). Cornelius Fudge became Cornelius Caramel because we know what caramel means but only those who speak English well or have been to England have an idea what fudge is – and conveniently enough, it even alliterates with the name Cornelius. When an alliteration could have been lost in translation, the other name was usually altered to match: Severus Snape became Perselus just so the name alliterates with the surname (Piton). Professor Grubbly-Plank’s name was translated and intentionally misspelled so perfectly that I had read the books in English AND French by the time I realized that that name makes sense in Hungarian, too. The only important word play the translator couldn’t work out was the double meaning of elder in the elder wand – both meanings of the word were important to the story and I don’t think it’s manageable in any other language. Still, the translator chose to switch back and forth between emphasizing the material one time and the superiority another to somehow still imply it and it worked out OK. I don’t usually like reading books translated when I can read them in the original language, but Harry Potter’s was an outstanding translation which was definitely worth the effort.

I really enjoyed reading the books in German again. The Sorting Hat’s songs, for example, still rhymed quite cleverly, and it was funny reading how “Harry, Ron und Hermine” would eat lots of German food at Christmas instead of British 🙂 respect to Mr. Klaus Fritz for translating (I believe) all seven books.

In Finnish books Hufflepuff is translated really well! It’s “Puuskupuh” Puusku is like when you’ve done a lot of work and you can just relax, you can “puuskahtaa” Puh is there maybe because of its like connected to Puusku or then it just sounds good idk But any case the name refers to how hardworking Hufflepuffs are <3

I love the Norwegian translation! Now I mostly read in English, but my eight year old self loved how I could understand the meaning of names and terms, since they were all wonderfully translated by Torstein Bugge Høverstad. Since I am now mostly trilingual, I’ve tried reading the books in German as well. Most of the names and terms aren’t translated in that version, and I can understand how that would be confusing for kids as well as the fact that it’s weird reading a book that’s very obviously translated. The Norwegian translator has gotten a lot of hate for his translations by adult (!) Harry Potter fans, because they mostly read in English themselves, and obviously wouldn’t have needed name translations. I feel sorry for him, because he really did an awesome job making the books readable for Norwegian kids, which is actually the group of people the book is targeting. You go translators!

I grew up with the Swedish translation. My favourite translation is from the 2nd book “The Chambers of Secrets” where Voldemort reveals to Harry that his (Swedish) real name “Tom Gus Mervolo Dolder” becomes the anagram “Ego sum Lord Voldemort”, meaning “I am Lord Voldemort” in Latin. A very clever translation considering the heavy amount of Latin used in the books.

As a Ukrainian reader of harry potter books I completely disagree with what this article stated about the interpretation of the books in Ukraine. There’s no such thing as changing boarding school to orphanage, it’s clearly stated in the books and the concept of boarding schools is not that foreign to Ukrainian people to make such a drastic change

Why would you translate made up words? English isn’t my first language and I always found so annoying these words translated in my main language because they sounded stupid, that’s why I read the books in English and saw the movies without the subtitles in my language. I think it takes away the magic(pun intended).

The Finnish translation for the Philosopher’s stone (Viisasten kivi) and all together has been consisted with one translator. She kept most first and surnames as same but changed few surnames to fit more to Finnish readers culturially. Severus Snape had his surnames translated into Kalkaros = kalkkarokäärme (rattle snake) Sirius Black means exatcly the same as Sirius Musta. Professor Quirrel was changed into Professori Orave (which is also a wordplay on squirrel (orava)) Tom Marvolo Riddle’s name had his name changed into Tom Lomen Valedro in Finnish and that created acronym = MA OLEN VOLDEMORT She was also able to translate most of places into Finnish and have them some sort of wordplay or have it same meaning as English one would. Hogwarts was translated into Tylypahka = tyly (rude, brusque) and pahkasika (warthog) Diagon Alley became Viistokuja = viisto (diagonal) kuja (alley) Also lots of spells were translated into Finnish to mimic the same understandment for them. Since English and any other Romantic language speaker can somewhat understand Latin, Finnish translator wanted Finnish readers to understand them the same way. Expelliarmus was translated to Karkotaseet = karkota (expell, repel) and aseet (weaponry) Expecto Patronum became Odotum suojelius = Odotan (I wait) and suojelius (the guardian/patron) Lumos was translated into Valois = valo (light) and valoisa (bright) She also changed name of Quidditch into Huispaus. And as well the ball had their names changed into Kaato (Quaffle), Ryhmy (Bludger) and Kultasieppi (Golden Snitch).

I’m surprised how there isn’t a single mention of translations into Indian languages like Marathi or Hindi. Translators have to change the mostly latin-derived spells to sanskrit ones, retaining the touch of a classical language. For instance, ‘Expecto Patronum’ becomes ‘Pitrdev Saurakshanam’, though the meaning remains the same in both. I really wanted Vox to add a point on this. 🙁

I read both original books a d Russian translation. The first Russian translation! We have two of them. The first is much loved by the readers and the second is much hated. Though, as it appeared much later than the first one it has quite a lot of fans of young age. The cool things about the first translator is that the name of Lord Voldemort was translated as “Lord Volandemort”. I think it’s because of the name of the name of the famous character Voland of Russian novel “master and margarita” (don’t know how it’s in English) by Bulgakov. And later in the chamber of secrets the name Lord Volandemort turned into “Tom Narvolo Reddl” (if translate it to English by letters) without “I am”. I thought it was cool. Hagrid unfortunately lacks his accent but it’s really hard to adapt it to Russian. The rest was nearly the same, some names was translated into Russian in a strange but cool way. For example Snape became “Snegg” that in a close way means “snow” and Gilderoy Lockhart became something like “Goldless Curls” (THIS IS VEERRY STRANGE) BUT!! The second translation came way to far: Severus Snape became something like “Evilish Evil” Gilderoy became something like (not even close but still) “Sparklingking Charming” Bathilda badshot turned into “Bugfart”!!!!! That one killed me! Etc. there’re so many oddly translated name in the second translation.

The Norwegian translation is terrific! i love the translation for “revealer” – an object that reveals instead of erasing. in Norwegian an eraser is “viskelær”, which somewhat translates into rub/wipe-leather. the translation for revealer then became “viselær”, as “vise” means to show or reveal, and this would then translate into reveal-leather. just by removing a single letter, the meaning of the word completely changed. 11 year old me never forgot that little detail, i thought it was absolutely brilliant.

Fun story! The norwegian translators of HP came up with all the names at a julebord (Literally christmas table, but basically a christmas fest where you get piss drunk). Names such as Professor Homlesnurr (Professor Bumbleswirl) were invented while they were drunk. The swedish translators were not happy about this.

It really bothers me when they feel the need to change proper nouns (not ones that have direct translations, but ones that have been made up by the author) when translating. I’d much rather read footnotes that teach me about the culture/language that it was originally written in, than be patronized and condescended to as if I were an idiot who couldn’t or didn’t want to figure it out. I speak French, but I couldn’t get past all of the name/word changes to actually finish the first book. Also, I still don’t understand why they felt the need to make a US version, as the UK version is perfectly understandable (I’m American). Of course, I read the US version first, because the originals were not available here, but I eventually was able to procure the UK versions and found them much more satisfying to read. I had to look up a few words and phrases, but that’s what made the experience better; I learned something new.

This is so great, the Dutch translation is very well done as well!! He’s really captured the humour and the atmosphere and translated that to dutch. One translation that I especially like is that of ‘Horcruxes’: in Dutch it’s ‘Gruzielementen’. Gruzelementen (without the ‘i’ after the ‘z’) means that you’ve shattered something to a million pieces, but he added the ‘i’, making it ‘ziel’, which means ‘soul’. So it literally means ‘shattered soul’. 🤯

I don’t usually like translating made up words or names and I always prefer perusal movies with subtitles rather than dubed, but I have to say that in my opinion our Czech translation of Harry Potter is quite well done. First of all, Harry Potter strated as a children’s book so it is understandable that translators need to translate some of the made up words or names so that children can understand them and pronounce them easily. In Czech translation you can find than Dumbledore’s name changed to “Brumbál”. I remember myself having difficulties pronouncing his name in English and also it would be difficult to work with this name in Czech language, so I’m glad it’s translated especially knowing that the translation is not far from the actual meaning of Dumbledore’s name. “Dumbledore” is an old word for “bumblebee” and apparently Rowling named him that way, because she imagined him humming to himself while walking. In “Brumbál” you can find word “brum” which can be recognized as a “humming” sound or a noise that bears make. I also like translation to Hogwarts houses (Speaking of which, “Hogwarts” is translated as “Bradavice” which literally means “warts”) Gryffindor as “Nebelvír” (“nebe” – “heaven/sky”, “lvír=lev” – “lion”), Ravenclaw as “Havraspár” (“havra”=”havran” – “raven”, “spár” – “claw”), Slytherin as “Zmijozel” (“zmijo”=”zmije” – “adder”), Hufflepuff as “Mrzimor” (not really sure about this one though, sorry :D). But still, nothing ever beats the original.

In my amateur translator’s opinion, I find it inappropriate for the translator to feel the need to make the culture of a novel “less foreign” to the readers. As a fan of the novel, the reader would be interested in learning its origins. And even though it got less than 1 second of mention in this article, I think the usage of footnotes to explain the original intentions or “lost in translation” bits for the Chinese translations are brilliant.

In portuguese the house names are Grifinória Sonserina Lufa-lufa Corvinal Im surprised it wasnt mentioned in the article specially because its a clever translation Lufa means a wind blowing Corv in Corvinal its a short for Corvo, meaning a Crow or Raven Grifinoria still keeping and direct mention to a griffin

Indian edition हैरी पॉटर और पारस पत्थर हैरी पॉटर और रहस्यमयी तहख़ाना हैरी पॉटर और अज़्काबान का क़ैदी हैरी पॉटर और आग का प्याला हैरी पॉटर और मायापंछी का समूह Hogwarts houses and their founders: Godric Gryffindor- Gaurav Garuddwar. Salazar Slytherin- Nagesh Nagshakti. Helga Hufflepuff- Maya Mehnatkash Rowena Ravenclaw- Chandrika Cheelghat. Spells (only few which I remember): Explliarmus: Nirastra bhava. Bombarda: Loh-bhasmam Aveda Kedvra: Takshan Marna San (‘Mrityu Dansham’ in book) Crucio: Peedito Imperio: Sammohito Reducto: Bangdham Stupefy: Sharpatham Configro: Pawakam Aquamenti: Neer prakatam Expecto Patronum: Pitrdev Sanrakshanam Vulnera senentur: Ruthi avirodham Lumos (lumos maxima): Prakashit bhawa (ati prakashit bhawha) Accio: aagmano Obliviate: Smriti Virupam (vismrito in book)

The one thing I’m against in translation is translating proper names. In the first Harry Potter book, before it was known what a considerable role Sirius Black would later play, his name last name was translated literally in German to Sirius Schwarz, which not only looked bad, but also sounded bad. Thankfully, the third book left it at Sirius Black and the only two names they changed were Hermione to Hermine, easier to pronounce and Marvolo to Vorlost in order to get the riddle revelation right.

the names of the houses in Russian are: Gryffindor, Slytherin, Kogtevran (Ravenclaw), Puffendooy (Hufflepuff). The names of the founders were altered as well, to keep the alliterations: Godric Gryffindor, Salazar Slytherin, Kondida Kogtevran (Rowena Ravenclaw), Penelope Puffendooy (Helga Hufflepuff).

The most annoying about the American translation is that they changed the “Philosopher’s Stone” into “”Sorcerer’s Stone” Know the term “Philosopher’s Stone” is a term used in Historical Documents! You cannot just question it!!! There are no translations for that! In Greece we also say: Φιλοσοφική Λίθος/Philosophical stone or the Philosopher’s Stone… Is something you cannot change! Many latin-based spells were changed to many languages but this is something written in History, as alchemists trying to create a substance able to turn metals into gold…! It is the “Philosopher’s Stone” a semi-real item for some people. Sorcerer’s stone…no meaning..

I recently read Harry potter and the philosophers stone in French for studying purposes . The amount of translation differences, even in the title ( l’ecole de sorciers ) completely baffled me . what I did like, was the effort the translator went to to make the sorting hat song rhyme, and to keep lots of British cultural references . Hagrid however used very formal language, which completely threw me off, But really it was a very good learning experience

So why in the name of God are translators adapting proper nouns to the target’s audience culture?! If I am reading a book about wizards in britain I’m sure as hell won´t be expecting them to use culture references from my country of origin, lets use the example of the article and say I am a muslim from afghan, and my religion forbids the consuption of bacon, well enough, this book I am reading, which is set in britain, using british culture and customs, isn´t going to use and do things common from my country. What’s the f point of translating a sweet or a food to something from my country instead?! Why would the characters do such a thing?! I get the point of translating puns to another language, but that can be easly solved by just using footnotes by the translator. But translating random stuff from the book´s culture to the target´s audience is unnecesary and senseless

In the early German translations, the translator must have misread the name of the game “exploding snap” as “exploding Snape” and translated it accordingly: “Snape explodiert”. As a child I always envisioned Harry and Ron playing a game where they let figures or pictures of Snape explode 😅 Didn’t even question it when I reread the books in English as an adult 😆 However, they changed it to “Zauberer Schnippschnapp” in the books that were published in later years and I got a little confused when I read the books to my son recently 🤯😉

There is another realm of difficulties beyond this when translating from English, for example, into non-european languages. It’s way more complicated. That’s because european languages have almost the same alphabet as well as a wide variety of vocabulary in common. That makes translating names and puns way easier. When I translate some literary passages from English to Arabic, I find myself authoring more than translating in some cases.

I know what you mean! I’m currently translating a HP fanfiction from french to english and some parts are just a nightmare. Like at one point the characters all come up with ridiculous new names for SPEW and all of them are hilarious puns in french but I dunno how it’s gonna work in english… Oh well

Thanks to Sevin Okyay and Kutlukhan Kutlu, we didn’t have unnecessary translation for the private names. Severus Snape is Severus Snape and Hogwarts is Hogwarts; a Muggle is a Muggle, that’s all. These names might not mean anything to Turkish kids and youth but the kids who were interested in the books checked for these names meanings (me likewise, I was checking the meaning of the spells in Latin-Turkish dictionary). Being a translator always needs creativity but that doesn’t mean you should “rewrite that book”.

Even though I Enjoy both the English and Spanish versions (and that I usually like to stick with the original language of whatever media I’m enjoying), I gotta admit that I love the Spanish version of “Death Eathers” way more, as instead of going with the same litteral simple wording, they used a word more fitting or Rowlings style; they are “Mortífagos” which comes from the Latin word “Morts”/”Mortis” (death) and “Fagia” from the Greek meaning to eat.

Did they really have to translate it for American readers? The rest of the world works out American references by context. What does it say about the American population, that cooperations think they can’t handle unfamiliar words? ‘Motorbike’ is less a cultural reference and more a word. It’s not even slang (some of the translations struggled with that, too). I’ve met Americans who have said I have an accent, but they don’t, as if American English were the national standard.

I am actually pretty happy with the german translation. They let some things the same, like Quidditch, Hogwarts, Ron… made some things sound more german, like Hermine, Schnatz (snitch), Muggel… and “traduced” some, like Winkelstrasse (Diagon Alley), Ligusterweg (Privet Drive) or Fahrender Ritter (Knight Bus). Is just feels very natural, it doesn’t feel like you doesn’t understand anything because its another language, nor like its all traduced. The names may not have exactly the same meaning when they are traduced, but they sound good and fit the feeling and type of object that is described by the name.

Some of translations in hindi that I remeber:- Houses:- Gryffindor – Garuddwar Slytherin – nagshakti Hufflepuff – mehnatkash Ravenclaw – cheelghat Characters :- Mopping Mertyl – Mayus Meena Elfs – Pisach Charms:- Petronous – pitradev sanrakshanam Expelli.. – nirastra bhava Potions:- Luck potion – Khuskismati Kadha Places:- Leaky culdron – Risti Kadhai (EDIT) Others:- Invisiblity cloak – Adrishya Choga Phylospher stone – Paras Patthar Chamber of secrets – Rahasyamayi Tehkhana Deathly hallows – Maut ke tohfe Wizard – Jadugar Witch – Jadugarni Death eater – Pran Bhakshi Dark lord – Anisth Dev Ministry of magic – Jadu Mantralay Daily Prophet – Dainik Jadugar Dementors – Tampisach