The terms Harry Potter, Philosophers Stone is actually the first book of J.K. Rowling where it features a young wizard, Harry Potter. Some may notice however that while the actual title of the first of the seven series of Harry Potter books is “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone”, it became “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone” when published (for the book) and shown (for the movie) in the United States. The reason for this is actually very simple. The buyer of its USA rights, Scholastic Corporation, believed that children may not want to read a book with the word “philosopher” in its title. After some discussions with its author, the USA version changed the “Philosopher’s” into “Sorcerer’s” which was suggested by Rowling herself. While the original title was used in many parts of the world, the new title was used in the United States. This, fortunately, did not have a negative impact on most people’s Harry Potter review.
Aside from a word change in the title, there were also several words in the book that were translated from a United Kingdom English version to a version that would fit the United States’ audience’s commonly used English terms. Some examples of these are from “muffin” to “crumpet”, from chips to fries, from jelly to Jell-O, from jacket potato to baked potato, etc. The Harry Potter Philosopher Stone movie and book series have become a phenomenal hit that the next movie immediately went into discussion. It was unfortunate however that the director of the first movie, Chris Columbus, who happens to be the actor who played Dumbledore, dies before the second movie started shooting Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone.
Today, after the initial Harry Potter Philosophers Stone and all the next 6 books have been released and 6 movies shown, the Harry Potter phenomenon still exists. Although a big bulk of the attention switched to the new characters at the movies, the vampires and werewolves (Twilight Series), Harry Potter still has quite a big following. In fact, most of them are awaiting the release of the last of the seven series, the “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows”, which will be divided into two full length movies slated to be shown on November 19, 2010 and July 15, 2011 respectively.
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