T0dd:

sudanglo:I agree 3rdBlade. It seems most unlikely that J.K. Rowling would not sanction a low volume Esperanto translation.

I don't see what makes it unlikely. The fact that she was once an ESL teacher certainly doesn't necessarily point in that direction.

I am speaking as an author and erstwhile ESL teacher myself; these two pursuits attract a certain kind of person and I think she's one of them. Business people and agents generally have a different way of looking at the world, though. Anyway, it's just speculation.

It's not exactly news to anyone here to point out that there are many, many people in the English-speaking world who view Esperanto either with disdain or outright hostility--people who simply "don't believe in it", for one reason or another. To such people, the very idea of translating work into Esperanto is about as appealing as translating it into Klingon, i.e., ridiculous. It's not about what we think; it's about what the rest of the world thinks. J.K. Rowling may be such a person, and her publisher and agent may be, too.

I dunno, these guys made a mint off a story about a magical boy in a castle with muggles and elves and broomstick soccer-dodgeball-ullamaliztli, I think they'd publish anything if it would make money. (And yes, the manuscript for the first Harry Potter was famously rejected by the first publisher who saw it, who didn't think it'd make money either!) But the publisher may be worried about prestige issues, too as you said. Latin and ancient Greek have prestige, they 'add to the brand'. We here would all say that an Esperanto version has prestige, too, but the publisher might not think so.

sudanglo:However since there is nobody over the age of five who speaks only Esperanto, publishing in Esperanto might well result in extra sales in a national language edition. Esperantists might well buy a national language edition to compare

I think we should ask them. (Someone already has, I know!) A print-on-demand edition would make the whole thing even more convenient for all concerned.

erinja:I heard about a French teen arrested and hauled off to jail for posting his (her?) own French translation of one of the books to the internet, shortly after the book was published.

Now that's excessive - considering the amount of people doing unofficial translations for all sorts of Japanese texts and the like without ending up in gaol, it does make the publishers of Harry Potter look a little too self-important.

Of course, some would argue that all those unofficial translators should go to gaol, which to me would seem pointless as it wouldn't benefit anyone in the short or long term.

Anyway, ultimately though I don't think EOists should bother TOO much with getting a translation of the book, to be honest I don't like it in the slightest and see it as a fantasy version of starwars (don't take that part seriously, as in actual fact most "great stories" are really clones of each other with different settings - I now curse myself for forgetting a great TVtropes link basically summed up as "everything is now a product of every human/nothing is truly original" etc, something like this but not quite )

ceigered:as in actual fact most "great stories" are really clones of each other with different settings

You might be referring to the 'monomyth'.

Meanwhile, one of the things which made Harry Potter a little bit more special was that the yarn about the making of the yarn - poor young woman huddles in cafe in Edinburgh to write, etc., - was also a good one. In fact because of that, it's going to be a movie.

Did Zamenhof have a saucy, adventurous youth? Might make a decent movie if he did... A bit like The Motorcycle Diaries, or something.

Anyway, we may not get this translation for a while, but on the bright side, we still have our out-of-copyright fantasists to turn to, Wells, Verne, etc.

sudanglo:It seems most unlikely that J.K. Rowling would not sanction a low volume Esperanto translation.

Wasn't the first book, at least, translated into Ancient Greek? How did they get permission?

Ancient Greek and Latin enjoy a prestige that Esperanto does not enjoy.

In addition, some articles I read mentioned that Rowling studied Latin at school, and she specifically wanted Latin and Greek translations to be done to teach children that there is nothing to be afraid of in studying these dead languages. So basically the Latin and Ancient Greek translations are a bid to get more kids interested in studying these languages.

I'm assuming Rowling has no particular feelings about Esperanto, and if she does, they are probably negative, since many language teachers seem to have a bias against Esperanto. So I really don't foresee her pushing for an Esperanto translation, ever.

3rdblade:Did Zamenhof have a saucy, adventurous youth? Might make a decent movie if he did... A bit like The Motorcycle Diaries, or something.

I concur, it would make a good movie, although to be honest I did find the Motorcycle Diaries a tiny bit more boring than I thought it'd be (I was... 16 maybe at the time?). Nonetheless, I wonder what sort of director would aim towards a movie about the fellow? While I don't mind the more ambitious or badly known people, I think a good director should attempt it so Zamenhoff and consequently Esperanto and all things related are seen in a different light, and perhaps inspire moviegoers.

ceigered:I think a good director should attempt it so Zamenhoff and consequently Esperanto and all things related are seen in a different light, and perhaps inspire moviegoers.

Agree. Definitely they'd want to emphasise the youth and energy of Esperanto's beginnings rather than other aspects. "Young man, full of energy & idealism, wants to change the world, sets out on his own course, makes a plan, sees it through despite the obstacles, inspires others. He has an older rival, in the form of Volapuk... and there's great costumes and sets." Toss in a few love affairs and it's a winner, I'd say! (Some aspects of the story might need to be semi-fictional)

I don't know if I'd want to emphasise a rivalry between Volapük and Esperanto, but definitely more the competition between *all* those different languages, and how some members of the various conlang communities were almost trying to make it into a war or evangelical competition . Basically, something that allows the audience to understand the scene at that time, how there were actually people who believed it would work, and the pressures they faced, particularly in the face of breaking up the languages into sub-languages over disputes and disagreements. Perhaps the question of whether a language can truly be "perfect" should be raised, and why we feel so attached to certain languages, e.g. what made Esperanto any more special to some than Ido? etc.

Either way, I like where this brainstorming is heading, all we need is someone with the film making talent (well, crowdsourcing is an option for financing, but I doubt it'd be easy to make a movie on this topic without being a well-off filmmaker who can get away with a movie without a very large target audience!).

BTW, yes, the monomyth was what I was thinking of, thanks! I covered it briefly in uni in a class I ended up withdrawing from before I got charged 2k because while I liked the theory behind it I couldn't find the energy to read all the books