UK vs. US

[Nathaniel]

No: HPFGUIDX 170914

> Kimberly:
> 
> Hosepipes and trainers, jumpers and pudding, snogging and well, 
> you get the idea. All of it was foreign to me. There were a few 
> times that I had a bit of an idea what they meant and a few times 
> I had no idea. 
> 
> Fortunately for the most part I was able to work it out thanks 
> to contextual inferences and my own workable brain. For me, one 
> of the best things about books and literature is the exposure to 
> new worlds, new words, new ideas. 

Nathaniel:

I would like to add my voice to those who dislike the "translating" of 
English to American.  Mercifully this has become less common in each 
succesive book and Dean Thomas has properly become a fan of the West 
Ham football team and not the West Ham soccer team.  I particularly 
dislike this translation because no one would suffer if they were 
under the misapprehension that Dean Thomas is a fan of American-style 
football.  The story makes just as much sense.  It took me out of the 
story the first time I read that because I immediately thought, "No 
one in Great Britain would call it 'soccer.'  What is this bunk?"
 
The most odious example has been mentioned several times; changing the 
title of the first book was truely a poor decision.  Calling it 
a "Sorcerers Stone" does not make any more sense in American 
than "Philosophers Stone" so it doesn't add any clarity.  Furthermore, 
it's been referred to in just about every book since, so once again we 
have this silly translation foisted upon us.

I also dislike the changing of "Minister for Magic" to "Minister of 
Magic."  We don't have ministers of or for anything in American so why 
change a silly preposition every time?

Then there's the changing of "sherbet lemon" to "lemon drop."  I 
dislike this one because for the longest time, I had no clue why 
Dumbledore had lemon drops that were so stuck together.  I thought he 
was buying particularly poor quality lemon drops or something.  If it 
had stayed sherbet lemon, I would have just realized that it's a sweet 
that I'm not familiar with.  To this day I have never tasted or 
seen "Turkish Delight" but I assure you my understanding of "The Lion, 
the Witch, and the Wardrobe" had not diminished.  And yes I understood 
that book just fine as a child.

As for changing of punctuation and spelling, I find that less 
objectionable.  I would understand the meaning either way, and it 
doesn't distract me either way.