Pronunciation

[tesseract197 <jayemelle@earthlink.net>]

No: HPFGUIDX 52570

illyana delorean:
p.s. It does bug me when people say "serious" when reading Sirius' 
name. It is the name of a star (and a satellite radio company), and 
is not made up (I know all of you already know this)! I met a 
self-proclaimed "Harry Potter genius" who mispronounced the name, and 
it really got on my nerves!

Me:
Black's first name isn't supposed to be pronounced "serious"?  Huh--I 
had no idea.  That's how the woman on the Scholastic website says it 
(but see below for more of my thoughts on her).  Could someone please 
tell me how it should be pronounced?  I knew it was the name of a 
star, but I thought the star was also pronounced "serious."  Way to 
go, Astronomy 110!

That said, though, I do disagree with a lot of the pronunciations the 
American publisher's website provides.  I wonder if JKR demonstrated 
or authorized them?  To my ears, many exhibit quite a strong American 
accent that, in the case of words unique to JKR's works, I suspect 
may not be exactly what she had in mind.  The most notable example I 
heard was the extremely nasal voicing of the "a" sounds in "AZ-ka-
ban."  And (apologizing in advance for using movie support on this 
list) IIRC, Robbie Coltrane's pronunciation of the prison name in CoS 
isn't nearly so nasal as the Scholastic lady would have us believe.  
Although I'm admittedly ignorant in the intricacies of British 
accents and therefore don't know how geography may impact his 
pronunciation, I personally prefer the way he says it.

As for the rest of the pronunciation discussion, I (a born and bred 
resident of Ohio in the midwestern United States) say the following:
***an-i-MAG-us (an as in "hand," i as in "sit," mag as in "magic," 
and us as in "bust")
***an-i-MAG-eye
***NOOT(S) (oo as in "moon"; almost the same pronunciation as "newt
(s)," but slightly rounder vowel)
***ri-DIK-yoo-lus (same as "ridiculous")

Tess