Differences in UK/US version of HBP - potential spoiler I guess?

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 166304

Maria Elmvang wrote:
<snip>
> Apparently in the US and UK versions of HBP there are some quite
major differences in the text. Not just changed words, but actual
added sentences in the US version. One example comes from "Beyond
Hogwarts" (the article addresses clues as to why Dumbledore isn't dead
after all, which I don't believe is the case - he's dead as a doornail
- but the example is still interesting):
<snip>
> 
> US version:
<snip> "*He cannot kill you if you are already dead.* <snip> *Nobody
would be surprised that you had  died in your attempt to kill me --
forgive me, but Lord Voldemort probably expects it. Nor would the
Death Eaters be surprised that we had captured and killed your mother
-- it is what they would do themselves, after all.* <snip>
> 
> Now these additions are not just small changes - they're quite major
ones, and one can't help but wonder why the 'translator' added them.
Was this his/her own doing, or after consultation with JKR or
something else altogether??? <snip>


Carol responds:

This topic has already been discussed, as have other differences in
the US/UK editions of various books.

If by "translator" you mean the U.S. Copyeditor, he or she certainly
would not be authorized to add them, nor would he or she have thought
of doing such a thing, adding such complex thoughts seemingly out of
nowhere in Dumbledore's voice. (I'm a copyeditor myself, and I know
what would happen to me if I did such an outrageous thing!) They must
have been written by JKR herself. Perhaps the copyeditor suggested
taking them out because they gave too much away and JKR complied (an
author can accept or reject a copyeditor's changes). More likely, JKR
herself realized that they gave too much away and requested that they
be deleted, or deleted them herself in the page proofs. Possibly, it
was too late to do that with the U.S. hardback edition. The correction
did, however, make it into the U.S. paperback edition, surely JKR's
own doing.

I'm pretty sure, however, that faked deaths and hidden people will
play a role in DH, perhaps in connection with the Draught of Living
Death (also much discussed on this list) and a certain ex-Potions master.

Carol, whose favorite candidate for a faked death is Emmeline Vance