Re: Translations from UK to US

On Sat, 25 Aug 2007 08:13:42 -0400, Thom-Madura
<thommadura@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Sue H wrote:
On Fri, 24 Aug 2007 21:45:17 -0400, Thom-Madura
<thommadura@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Sue H wrote:
On Fri, 24 Aug 2007 20:00:54 -0400, Thom-Madura
<thommadura@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

mark.foskey@xxxxxxxxx wrote:
On Aug 22, 4:53 am, Ron Hunter <rphun...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
mark.fos...@xxxxxxxxx wrote:
In an interview, Levine made a point about this. Bloomsbury paid a
$5000 or so up front for the book. Scholastic paid $105,000. And it
was Levine's first big book under his own imprint. So he was under a
lot of pressure to sell a lot of copies. Actually, he suggested "HP
and the School for Magic" (which ended up being essentially the French
title, if translated), and she came back with Sorceror's Stone.
Still, it is a shame and it does make us look bad.
I can't see how that kind of change makes anyone look bad.
Because, whatever Levine's thought processes were, it made it look
like he thought American children were too ignorant or anti-
intellectual to be interested in a book with "Philosopher" in the
title. That just reinforces international prejudices about Americans.

I would have liked the way the original book referred to a real idea
from history that some kids actually would have heard of.

No - YOU are wrong.

Levine's thought process is not at issue here - Yours is.

There is absolutely NO indication that Levine thought anything like what
you say about American Children - and I dare you to quote HIM saying
anything of the sort. Or JKR saying anything of the sort - remembering
that the French Title of the Book ended up being what he recommended for
the American Version. It is YOU who are reinforcing YOUR international
prejudices against Americans.

Levine through Scholastic paid a LOT of money to an unknown author for a
book that while it sold well in Europe - there was no guarantee that it
would do so in the USA. In fact - there are LOTS of books that never
made it in the US.

IF Levine thought as you say - I am sure he would have demanded a
complete AMERICAN translation - eliminating all of the archaic British
idioms, usages and spellings. BUT - as I have said many times over -
very few words were actually changed - the basic British text comes
through - so much for the American Children.

While Harry Potter and the Philosophers stone might have been an eye
opening title in England (And I doubt that too) - Levine was looking for
a way of adding MAGIC to the title - and Both his suggestion - and JKR's
final suggestion did just that (Maybe you might remember THe Sorcerors'
Apprentice - from Disney). And when I say Magic - I mean the title
should refer to the magical wizarding world. Philosopher did not do that
- in fact - it would have logically pointed to the religious world here
in the US.

More important to me is that there is nothing basically empowering or
intelligent about the FABLE of a Philosopher's stone - something that
NEVER existed to begin with. It is just another Fairy tale.

So - where you are getting your idea's is beyond reason.
To end this, this is what Wikipedia says:

Both the book and the motion picture were released in the United
States with the revised title Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone.
The book's American editor, Arthur Levine, who was also responsible
for editing out words and usages characteristic of British English,
felt that Philosopher's Stone conveyed an incorrect idea of the
subject matter, and that a title change was necessary. Rowling and
Levine had agreed to change words only when they felt that it would
otherwise be incomprehensible to American readers (i.e. replacing the
word football with soccer in multiple instances). Several alternative
titles were discussed, and Rowling chose Sorcerer's Stone in the
end.[4] The "translations" in the American edition led to criticism by
many readers. The New York Times ran an op-ed titled "Harry Potter,
Minus a Certain Flavour" on July 10, 2000, which heavily criticised
Scholastic's decision to Americanize the U.S. Harry Potter
editions.[5] Many felt that the translations insulted the intelligence
of the American public. In their editions of the sequels, Scholastic
did not Americanize the text as much and did not change the
titles.[citation needed]

Rowling is the one who decided and her reasons were apparently for it
to be more understandable to American children. It was sort of a
dumbing down thing and a little bit of a put down,

You ARE wrong. Levine clearly stated his reason why he thought the title
was not proper - it has NOTHING to do with Dumbing down - read the post
YOU put up above. He clearly says that the title did not convey the
subject matter properly. The subject matter was Wizarding and Magic -
something the title did not convey.

YES IT DID> Here's the sentence copied and pasted from above (I think
you took the first part and didn't read on maybe): Rowling and
Levine had agreed to change words only when they felt that it would
otherwise be incomprehensible to American readers (i.e. replacing the
word football with soccer in multiple instances). Last I knew,
incomprehensible to American readers can be construed as "dumbing
down". At least apparently others on this board felt so and I can
certainly agree is sounds kind of so! I think that is where people
are saying it's dumbed down. As for the title, yes, they didn't think
the title conveyed ... read my response for that below (you'll not you
are talking about Philosophy and not philosopher which is a HUGE
difference here).

It was not a put down - or dumbing down - or anything insulting to the
American public - IT WAS A MARKETING DECISION by the author. I take note
that this is a quote from Wikipedia - not from Levine or JKR. And posts
on Wikipedia are made by individuals who do not have to be unbiased in
their opinions.

but I don't think
it was intentional. both of you have points. Don't get into a
bigotry argument like I did. It only hurts the board. Let's just
agree Rowling made a mistake but her intentions were probably good.
Changing football to soccer etc was actually what needed to be done as
we have both football and soccer in the US and it would be confusing
for those kids not familiar on football in England.

The title
probably should have been entitled something different and used for
BOTH countries like Harry Potter and the Flamel Stone" or maybe just
leave it. All she had to do was in the book point out Nicholas Flamel
was a philosopher and the kids would have understood. As for selling
books, a title does not make or break a book.
While that sounds like it Might be true - you are wrong here. An
interesting title will bring in sales - while a mundane one is less
likely to do so. A great example of this is with an old Movie -
"Krakatoa - East Of Java" - a movie with limited success until it was
retitled "Volcano". And yes - even the first title was worked with -
since Krakatoa is WEST of Java.

Lord of the Rings? What the heck is that? Certainly not a novel
about Hobbits, walking trees, wizards, creatures and elves? For all
we know it's a boxing story. I am sure there are thousand of other
titles which give people NO CLUE as to what the book is about. Or
that is of little interest. Indeed though a book can help sell the
title, I think I saw a study where artwork actually sells more than
the title or synopsis... really if the title is BRILLIANT and the
story sucks, it's not going to sell a lot. But if the story is
brilliant and the title sucks, I'll bet my house it sells more copies?
Am I really wrong here? Show me a sucky book with a brilliant title
on the best seller's list?

In the USA - Philosophy is normally the study of Religion or Faith.
However - the Sorceror is a magician - a wizard (As in the Disney
Sorcerors apprentice). The second title would clearly appeal to children
MORE than the first. I take not that Mr. Levine's suggestion - which was
Harry Potter and the School of Magic was used essentially for the French
Version.

It's not Philosophy that's the word in contention. It's Philosopher.
A philosopher is a person. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone
to me connotates that a Philosopher owns a stone. Since that's in the
book and what it meant, why the change? I think really, kids know
the difference. I know we do have some poorly educated children these
days but they are not THAT stupid. I hope not! LOL

NO - A Philosopher is a person who uses or studies Philosophy - which in
the US is at lest partly the study of belief systems and thought. The
word connotates Religion in the US - sorry - but that is true
regardless of its true meaning.

Yeah; right. I can see a kid going into the store with Little Harry
Potter on the cover in his cartoon artwork flying his broom with the
little unicorn on the cover and them reading "Harry Potter and the
Philosopher's Stone". Then they would say: "Gee mom, this book is in
the kids section and has a boy flying a broom and a unicorn on the
cover but the title says "Philosopher"". Mom, isn't a philosopher
someone who studies a system of belief/thought? What's it doing in
the kids section? I am sorry but you really are over-analying this?
It's a kids book. In the kids section. When it came out, people in the
stores often dressed up with robes and hats. It's obvious it's a kids
book. The back cover has a synopsis on it that clearly states it's a
kids book. It was put out by Scholastic, Inc., a noted and trusted
entitiy in the publishing world known as a kids publisher. And by the
time many kids have heard about this, it was talked about on the news
and by their friends. They already knew what it was about! And to be
honest, all they had to see was "Harry Potter" and it would have sold
no matter WHAT came next. Please understand that kids are not stupid.
They understand packaging . . . and a word like Philosopher would make
little to no difference in buying it. As a matter of fact I read
these books WAY late. I went into Books-a-million which is a large
store. This was when book 6 came out. I had acquired COS in a cheap
store and read it then backtracked on Ebay to get SS/PS, POA and GOF.
I went to get the other two then in that store because HBP had JUST
come out. there were a lot of kids looking at books there. I noticed
something very interesting. Most of the kids (older ones about 10-13
range) were opening lots of different books after just looking at the
covers and then reading the first paragraph to see if it's a book that
interested them. I didn't see one kid looking like they were
analyzing the cover. It was a mere glance! If you don't believe me,
go into a bookstore today and watch the kids. Just make sure you're
not looking like a perv or something! LOL


Since religion and philosophy is not what the book is about - then the
title is not a good one to attract kids. Magic and Wizardry would indeed
create more sales. This is more a matter of the Author choosing a title
that - much like other phrases in the books - sells OK in Britain - but
not here. I continue to believe that Bloomsbury did not believe that the
books would become big sellers and the editor edited the book solely for
the British market - since they did not expect more widespread sales.
Once the book took off - the Book - which could have been edited with
wordlwide sales in mind - now had to be edited for the American Market -
which is - by the way - the LARGEST market in sales of the books. The
reason WHY it had to edited was the large (At least for Scholastic) up
front payment for the rights required they do everything to make the
book sell well.






However - the point of this argument(Ignoring the title change) is that
somehow changing some words for the American Market reflects upon the
intelligence of the American reader (YOU SAID IT _ DUMBING DOWN)- but
that changing ALL of the words for other languages does not. This is
complete and utter nonsense and I will not accept anyone saying that -
period. It is clear that Brits are more upset about this change than
anyone else because they don't want to admit that it was really a money
grab by their British Author.

I don't think it was a money grab though. She needed money yes and
would dare to dream it'd sell, but I bet you she's of been smiling if
it sold 10,000 copies. She she's already done several documentary
types shows and I saw one where she went back to that little cafe and
said she STILL writes there. She also showed her old apartment and
talked of no heat and the baby in the carriage with her etc. It was a
lovely story. (Maybe it was an interview like 20/20 or something; I
can't remember now but I do know it was replayed during a Harry Potter
weekend... She said she just had this story in her for years and had
to get it out. She just dreamed to publish the whole thing and someone
might buy it. She never expected to make that much. At the time of
the point in contention here, she was not at the idea of making
loads... or that's the way it sounded. Did anyone see that
documentary or story where she went back to her old apartment etc? I
am hoping someone remembers it. They also showed as I remembered
where she grew up (Scotland?) and the cottage which she used to smoke
from? They showed her walking with her husband (?) looking over a
bridge. I wish I had a copy of it because that interview told a lot
about her personally and was quite a nice story.

SOOOO - as I asked - please quote JKR and Levine Directly - not from
Wikipedia.

And if you don't want to perpetuate this dicussion - stop insulting the
Americans - for which you have NO BASIS.

?

.

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