Translating 'Harry Potter' into French.

In this posting, I want to begin to talk about how the Harry Potter novels by J.K. Rowling have been translated into French by the translator Jean-François Ménard, who is also a writer of original children's literature of his own, in French. In the same way as i've spoken, in earlier postings to this blog, about the translations of various aspects of Jules Verne' novels from French into English, I want to talk about the Harry Potter renderings into French from the viewpoint of Descriptive-Explanatory Translation Studies (DTS) and especially norms of translation as one of the underlying causes of translation decisions and outcomes.

Gideon Toury is the 'father' of Descriptive-Explanatory Translation Studies and of norm theory in translation; when I wrote my MA dissertation on the translation of Rowling into French, one of my main sources was Toury's seminal monograph Descriptive Translation Studies and Beyond (1995). Other translation scholars who have written extensively on topics of multiple causation of translation outcomes include Siobhan Brownlie, Andrew Chesterman and Anthony Pym. Victor Longa has written about complexity science as applied to translation, while Lawrence Venuti has written about the concepts of foreignization and domestication in describing translation types; the former concept has similarities with Toury's notion of adequacy or source text-orientedness, the latter concept being somewhat akin to Toury's acceptability or target-orientedness, e.g. idiomaticity of target language, use of target culture familiar references, and so on.

What were the norms of translation which were apparently followed by the French translator of Rowling's bestselling novels? And why were such norms followed? Who and what were the different multiple influences on the final form which Harry Potter took in his Francophone reincarnation? These are the sort of questions for which I try to suggest explanations in this and in future postings.


I should mention at the outset that the norms of translation of Anglophone children’s literature into French appear to have shifted over the last number of decades. In the 1950s, Enid Blyton’s children's novels, such as the stories from such series as the Famous Five and the Secret Seven were translated, sometimes anonymously, into French (i.e. the publishers didn't bother to give the translator's name) and all characters and place names were given French equivalents. These translations were thus totally target culture (TC)-oriented.

On the other hand, Rowling’s novels show, through their French translations, that a hybrid orientation is now the norm, as some character names and place names have been kept in their original English forms, while others have been creatively rendered into French by clever, witty choices on the translator's part.

Blyton’s novels are perhaps considered to be of less literary merit than Rowling’s. The Blyton novels may seem less original, being more repetitive and, in a sense, ‘mass-produced’. I therefore suggest that Blyton’s novels had lower status, and were, and indeed probably still are, perceived as being less canonical than Rowling’s within the polysystem of French-language literature for younger readers. For this reason, it was probably uncontroversial to completely domesticate Blyton's novels when translating them into French, disguising their British origins and, indeed, concealing the fact that they were translations. But Rowling's novels are global bestsellers, cultural sensations; therefore, as French readers would have been hugely aware of all things Potter-related through publicity and films, the translator may have had less freedom to alter ST details in his rendering.


Though major characters such as Harry Potter, Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley and his family thus do not have their names altered by the French translator, some of the other characters' names as coined by Rowling have been inventively rendered in French by Gallic-sounding equivalents which show the translator's creative, personal imprint. It is a notable feature of Rowling’s novels that the names of many characters are chosen for comic effect, and help to communicate essential personality traits. Thus, the character Madam Hooch becomes Madame Bibine – the term ‘hooch’ in English refers to an alcoholic drink, whereas ‘bibine’ in French signifies weak beer or dishwater. Professor Sprout is rendered as ‘le professeur Chourave’, the latter French term referring to a type of cabbage – this character is a teacher of horticulture. Mad-Eye Moody becomes Fol Oeil Maugrey, the latter word recalling the French verb ‘maugréer’, meaning to grumble. Moaning Myrtle is translated as Mimi Geignarde, the latter word perfectly conveying the notion of whingeing or whining, while the name Mimi is typically French. Professor Snape, a name suggesting a snappy, irritable character, becomes ‘Rogue’ in translation, this being a French adjective conveying the notion of a person being haughty or arrogant, qualities which describe this character appropriately. The school caretaker, Filch ( a word meaning to pilfer or take surreptitiously, thus conveying the slyness of the character), becomes Rusard, a name recalling the French word ‘rusé’, meaning sly or cunning. Furthermore, the suffix ‘-ard’ is derogatory. Adalbert Waffling becomes Adalbert Lasornette – the lexical item ‘sornettes’ communicates the notion of balderdash, thus being an apt equivalent to the source text (ST) surname’s connotations. Bartemius Crouch becomes Bartemius Croupton – in French, the term ‘être à crouptons’ signifies the idea of crouching. Emeric Switch is suitably rendered as Emeric Changé. Miranda Goshawk is rendered as Miranda Fauconnette, the latter word conveying the idea of a young, perhaps also female, falcon or hawk. The French suffix ‘-ette’ is, of course, sometimes perceived negatively as a deprecatory appendage indicating female gender. Quentin Trimble, the author of a textbook on the Dark Arts, whose surname comically suggests fear, becomes Quentin Jentremble, a cleverly chosen equivalent. The caretaker’s cat, Mrs Norris, who is portrayed as sharing her owner’s unsympathetic persona, becomes ‘Miss Teigne’, the latter lexical item communicating the concept of a shrew or vixen, with the term ‘Miss’ being, perhaps, a fashionable Anglicism in French.

The wizarding exams known as OWLs (Ordinary Wizarding Levels) are cleverly translated by the term BUSE (Brevet Universel de Sorcellerie Elementaire). This translation is oriented towards TC norms, given that the lexical item ‘brevet’ refers to educational certificates. The ST pun on the acronym ‘owl’ is matched, in that the French word ‘buse’ signifies a buzzard. Similarly, the ST item NEWTs (Nastily Exhausting Wizarding Tests), the Leaving Certificate of wizards, is rendered as ASPIC (Accumulation de Sorcellerie Particulièrement Intensive et Contraignante), with the French word ‘aspic’referring to an asp, and, humorously, to a type of meat jelly. These two translations, while unable to precisely reproduce the ST items ‘owl’ or ‘newt’, are nevertheless competent attempts at achieving equivalent effect. The French translator is here being individually creative and self-inscribing, in choosing alternative humorous French 'jeux de mots', just as the various translators of Jules Verne's wordplays chose their own English equivalent puns, as discussed in a previous posting to this blog.

The wizarding newspaper known as the ‘Daily Prophet’ is altered to ‘La Gazette des sorciers’, the word ‘gazette’ having literary or humorous connotations in French and thus constituting a TC-oriented translation, and a sort of neutralization which cancels out the slightly more humorous title of the original. The Sorting Hat, an artefact used to choose which of the four houses of the school of wizardry each new pupil will be assigned to, becomes ‘le Choixpeau Magique’, a pun which cleverly conveys the notions of ‘chapeau’ and ‘choix’. This example involves the substitution of a source text non-wordplay by a target text wordplay, which is one of the procedures for translating wordplay which have been documented by the translation scholar Dirk Delabastita. This target wordplay also compensates, perhaps, for the 'loss' of other ST wordplays and of other ST humorous effects. Compensation is an important strategy within the translator's armoury of approaches.

The ST neologism ‘Muggles’, which refers to non-magical humans, is creatively rendered by a TT neologism ‘Moldus’, with 'molle' humorously having the sense of 'soft', to try to convey equivalent effect to the notion of 'mug' in the original. Yet the name of the wizarding game of ‘Quidditch’ (a neologism which has now found its way into the Collins English Dictionary) is unaltered, perhaps because of copyright constraints. It is reported that a video game version of Quidditch is about to be marketed, so that this label no doubt represents a valuable international brand name which it was advisable to preserve cross-culturally.

There is a hybrid but principally TL orientation evident in the rendering of the shop name ‘Quality Quidditch Supplies’ as ‘Magasin d’accessoires de Quidditch’ – while the title of the game Quidditch itself is transferred, the rest of this title is toward the TL in normative orientation, being in French and also having only the first word ‘Magasin’ capitalised (apart from Quidditch). This capitalisation of the first word only is the norm in French organisational titles. The alliteration in the ST shop title is not reproduced in the TL, partly because of material differences between English and French and also perhaps because of conflicting choices here facing the translator, between achieving semantic accuracy and achieving equivalent poetic effect; accuracy was prioritized. This is also another example of neutralization and standardization.

‘Gambol and Japes Wizarding Joke Shop’ becomes ‘Pirouette et Badin, le magasin de farces et attrapes pour sorciers’. This translation clearly seeks out Gallic equivalents for ST connotations. The notion of ‘gambolling’ is rendered by the TL item ‘pirouette’, with similarly playful connotations. The ST pun on the name ‘Japes’ is skilfully matched by the TT item ‘Badin’, which refers to ‘un farceur’. There is modulation to TL idiomatic usage in the rendering of ‘Dr Filibuster’s Fabulous Wet-Start, No-Heat Fireworks’ as ‘Pétards mouillés du Dr Flibuste. Explosion garantie sans chaleur’, which also preserves the humour of the original.

As regards domesticating translations of certain place names, the village of Hogsmeade is rendered as Pré-au-Lard, a neologism which creates somewhat equivalent effect by reproducing the notion of a meadow and of bacon or the fat of a pig. The School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, Hogwarts, is rendered by the neologism ‘Poudlard’ which suggests the idea of a hog’s lice, a translation which parallels the unpleasantness of the ST image, while simultaneously Gallicizing it for heightened acceptability, losing the sonorous, British original name. As regards the four houses which the school comprises, Gryffindor is rendered as Gryffondor, which conveys the image of the claws of the lion who is the symbol on the coat-of-arms; Hufflepuff beomes Poufsouffle, which secures equivalence in suggesting the notion of a puff or breath; Ravenclaw is adapted to Serdaigle, which suggests the claw of an eagle, this change of bird having undoubtedly been made for phonetic reasons, while Slytherin becomes Serpentard, conveying the notion of a snake slithering, with the negative connotations intended by the original author for this name, carried into the TT, but in accordance with French morphology. On the other hand, major place names such as London, Scotland and England are not disguised, but are accorded their established translations.

The rendering of proper names in this corpus thus demonstrates the hybridity of adequacy and acceptability characterising this translation. The more important ST names – those of central characters – have been preserved, thus orienting the TTs towards SL and SC (source culture) norms. Yet in many other cases, the translator has been at pains to devise a TL equivalent neologism, and this tendency illustrates a leaning towards target cultural norms.
There thus appear to be contradictory or opposing norms in operation in the translation of proper names, given that some are transferred directly, even where they would create pronunciation difficulties for the French reader or problems in understanding the allusions, while others are skilfully Gallicized. This is why it is felt that copyright specifications and JK Rowling's own preferences may have dictated or at least influenced the preservation of certain significant proper names in translation. Further, the global reach and celebrity of the Harry Potter stories and characters is such that even readers in non-English-speaking communities such as Francophone regions are familiar with the character names and locations, in English, used by Rowling, and are thus aware that what they read in, say, French, is a translation, and they therefore may expect that the source language principal names will be left intact. Therefore, French readers may have been seen as less tolerant or credulous of a complete French makeover for Harry Potter's world; that world had to remain essentially British.

However, the use of language throughout this corpus conforms to TL norms, in that every effort is made to ensure that idiomatic, acceptable French is used.

In future postings, I will talk about other aspects of the Potter renderings into French. I've also been doing some research on how other contemporary children's literature such as the Series of Unfortunate Events (Lemony Snicket) have been translated into French, and how other contemporary popular fiction, by US writers such as John Grogan (Marley et moi - mon histoire d'amour avec le pire chien du monde) and thriller-writer John Grisham have been translated into French, and I will speak more about these translations in future postings.

Suffice it to say, for now, that the French renderings of Snicket, Grogan, Grisham and of Philip Pullman (the Sally Lockhart series) seem to show similar translation strategies to those observed in the Harry Potter translations. Thus, there is a general use of idiomatic French, producing, therefore, domesticating translations, and complete and accurate renderings are also the norm. Most ST proper names, of characters and Anglophone place names, are transferred without change into French, and there is some evidence of SL interference which can detract from the idiomaticity of the French TL usage; this points to the hybrid nature of these translations, which are mainly domesticating but partly foreignizing, mainly Target Language-oriented but partly Source Language-oriented. In the French renderings of novels by John Grisham, the translator strives to use equivalent French legal terms in order to translate the American legal terms used by Grisham, so this is a domesticating, acceptable, target culture-oriented approach. On the other hand, the French translator transfers, intact, the names of the US characters, place names, and institutional (including judicial bodies) names of Grisham's original, so that there is a hybrid of source culture and target culture orientation in the Grisham French renderings. There are probably similar multiple influences on this hybridity of translation strategy as were postulated for the Rowling renderings, viz. the French readers' awareness of the US setting of the originals, thus, their expectation of 'honesty' in the translation. Loyalty to the US setting entails the transfer of proper names, intact, to the French renderings.

These observations point to the complexity and unpredictability of translation, its multiple causation, and to the nature of translational language as being a sort of Third Code, in which the translator has, as translation theorist Andrew Chesterman has described it, 'reduced linguistic control' and is in a state of what his fellow translation scholar Siobhan Brownlie calls 'disorientation'. I will discuss these concepts from Translation Theory - viz. adequacy, acceptability, foreignization, domestication, Third Code, reduced linguistic control and disorientation - in greater detail in future articles.

I would be interested in hearing from readers about their thoughts on how contemporary popular English-language literature has been translated into other languages. What are people's opinions of the quality of such translations, and how do they describe and explain the translators' strategies?

Formulating a statement of personal teaching philosophy

The following is a draft statement of my personal teaching philosophy, a document which applicants for academic posts are often asked to provide, or at the very least, to speak about at interview. I drafted this statement in the recent past.

I would appreciate if readers of this blog could give me some feedback on this statement, and perhaps share their own philosophies of teaching and lecturing:

For me, it has always been important, when teaching, to convey my enthusiasm for my subjects to students of all levels and in all various aspects of French language, literature, translation and culture. I seek at all times to convey my knowledge and learning to my students, in order to transmit the fruits of my study, research and writings, to new learners. This is akin to the manner in which St Benedict metaphorically passed on a torch of intellectual ardour when he founded the first Benedictine monastery many centuries ago.

I seek to be well-prepared for the courses and lectures/classes/workshops/seminars that I deliver, and to transmit my own passion and intellectual curiosity for all aspects of French and English language and literature to my students.

I especially seek to view each student as a unique human being in a Christian ethos of respect and sincerity, and to encourage the students themselves to respect each other, and to treat each other in a collegial and supportive manner. As an Irish Roman Catholic, I have been educated in Christian values of love and community action. It is vital to encourage camaraderie and co-operation among students throughout their learning careers, as opposed to individual competitiveness, thus fostering warmth, and ensuring that hostility is avoided.

I believe that my teaching role is thus to inculcate personal values of Christian friendship and support to my students, through my personal example and expression of values, and giving of advice, in class. This group co-operation will serve my students well throughout their future personal and professional lives, in treating family, friends and professional colleagues well and in being able to work as part of a friendly team, to achieve common goals. In my teaching, I have thus set group projects, e.g. students work together in pairs or in groups of sometimes up to four or five people, on collaborative research and writing on various aspects of French culture, e.g. when I taught French for the Tourism Industry, groups of students completed projects on individually chosen aspects of French tourist and cultural attractions. I generally used to meet each group once a week to discuss progress, give advice and answer queries and concerns, and suggest useful sources of information, online or in hard copy form (books, French magazines, etc.), and to monitor group progress. When these Tourism students were doing French orals, I had them sit their oral examination in pairs, which had prepared together and which made the oral situation less nerve-wracking for students with less advanced language skills. I found that my students enjoyed working with each other and that it stimulated their learning and made study and assignments more engaging and less intimidating.

The spirit of learning and scholarship is inherently collegial and group and community-based. Scholars do not operate in a vacuum; instead, we grow and share knowledge through contributing the findings of our individual research in our writings and conference addresses, and in our teaching. The aim of teachers and scholars should be to encourage the learning and research of others. Thus, students should, as much as possible, work together on common projects in and outside class.

As a French lecturer and teacher, my goal is to develop courses in all aspects of French Studies, based partly on my own research interests and discoveries, in tandem with the overall requirements and course content of the schools in which I work. Thus, for example, when teaching French literary translation practice and theory, I use lots of practical examples of how different writers have had their texts rendered between French and English. This includes sharing my findings of how writers such as Verne have been variously translated over many years, or how J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter novels have been rendered into French. When teaching literature, I include French and English novels, poems and short stories from different eras which have personally inspired me. Using contemporary material like Rowling, and evergreen literature such as that of Jules Verne, from my own postgraduate research, has made the learning process more relevant to the students’ own readings outside college, thus helping them engage more enthusiastically with their course work

This means that undergraduate students are directly involved with the sort of material that I am researching as a post-doctoral level lecturer, and are thus benefiting from and contributing to faculty-level research. This is a very community-centred, university-wide mission sharing.

But in addition to passing on my own knowledge and findings to my students, I believe it is equally vital to foster their own individual creativity and facilitate their own personal journeys of discovery of ideas, thus helping them to feel the joy of learning, reading, writing, discovering newness and sharing their own ideas and opinions in class. This sharing by students of their findings and ideas should take place in an atmosphere of respect and encouragement within the classroom.

Thus, my role as a teacher is not just to transmit existing knowledge and the ideas of other scholars, but equally, to stimulate creativity and intellectual curiosity in each individual student. For instance, students should be encouraged to share their own thoughts and interpretations of a literary text. If translating, say, a French poem, students should be encouraged to develop their own individual use of translational, poetic language, and thus inscribe their translations with their own creative stamp of personal style and interpretations.

Similarly, when writing essays of all kinds, students should be helped to combine rigorous research with their own commentary, for discussion and feedback from fellow students and from myself as a teacher. When learning about other cultures and communities, e.g. different Francophone communities across the world, including, say, post-colonial Francophone communities of immigrants, students should be helped to respect and appreciate difference and diversity in cultural, social and religious practices, but also to share their own cultural values. Respect for a different cultural group does not imply that we always agree with certain practices or values, and this is where individual ideas and class discussion, conducted with an overriding concern for respect of others, can prove very stimulating. For instance, individual students may feel, from their study of Francophone culture and literature, that certain practices such as circumcision are inhumane, or they may have individual views on integration of French immigrants within mainstream French society, on respect for cultural otherness within the host culture, on individuals’ rights to choose their unique cultural identity, or on the value of having a hybrid identity which belongs to more than one culture, as is often the case for second- and third-generation Algerian immigrants living in France, who may have less strong attachments to their parents’ North African traditions, language, cultural practices such as dress, religion, etc. As a lecturer, I strive to study literature such as that written by culturally hybrid writers living in France, and thus help students to empathically understand the situation of these writers. But I then encourage the students to express their own reactions and opinions. Literary texts thus become an open space of interpretation, a launching pad for all sorts of thematic development and reactions. I have found that students of mine feel more engaged with their learning when they have a space to express their own ideas.

Therefore, as a teacher, I consider that I have as much to learn from my students as they from me. I also learn from the fact that my students will come from diverse cultural backgrounds, and this diversity must also inform my teaching approaches to different individuals and groups of learners. The more I teach, the more I can learn about best teaching practice. The teacher is equally a lifelong learner.

I especially enjoy working with smaller groups of learners where there can be individual attention to students and enjoyable interaction. I like to use a variety of approaches and pedagogical practices and materials, and this is especially useful in teaching language, where students have to be nurtured in the four key skills of reading, writing, speaking and listening to/understanding a foreign language. I thus favour the use of varied materials such as online learning, computer-assisted language learning, videos, recordings, diverse reading materials and also giving more advanced French language learners the opportunity to select personally-preferred aspects of Francophone culture for individual study.

Finally, as a teacher, I have a pastoral role in assisting students with personal and academic challenges. This includes being able to refer students to the appropriate sources of support e.g. college counselling, learning support, funding, and so on. It also includes being able to personally assist students in many cases, e.g. learning support. My teaching in the past has included giving additional, individualized attention and academic support to students with learning disabilities.

My Catholicism includes an ecumenical spirit of respect for, and interest in, other world religions and cultures. This ecumenical mindset, in its broadest sense, is something I would wish to inculcate in my students.

Academic Job Interview

Earlier this afternoon, I had a long-awaited telephone interview for a post of French lecturer with a University abroad. Earlier attempts to communicate through Skype had, unfortunately, proved unsuccessful, so a telephone discussion was arranged instead.

It seemed to go well. There were five people on the interview board, all lecturers in French, whose profiles I had studied on the University website. The interview was conducted in both languages, French and English, alternately. The telephone line was occasionally unreliable, but for the most part, we could hear each other fairly clearly.

The questions were, in some cases, the standard ones which you would expect to be asked at most interviews for an academic post, for instance, I had the opportunity to describe in detail the type of research conducted up to now, at MA and PhD levels, and to elaborate on future research plans in the areas of French Studies and, particularly, Translation Studies. This part of the discussion was carried out through the medium of French. They also asked me to speak in English about my teaching philosophy and techniques, the type of courses I had taught in the past, and in what ways I brought original approaches to my teaching. Luckily, I had, in the recent past, prepared a Statement of Teaching Philosophy for an application to a US university so I had thoughts prepared on that philosophy, which I will now post to this blog and ask for your feedback on.

I also had the chance to talk about the type of teaching that I could conduct if successful in this application, e.g. the areas I could contribute to, including French for Business, French for Tourism, Translation Studies, Francophone North African literature, postcolonial theory and postcolonial translation theory.

I was asked how would I rank, in order of importance, the three principal academic duties of research, teaching and administration. I feel that, for a new lecturer starting out on an academic career following the completion of his or her doctorate, strong attention must be paid to meeting the teaching needs of the University and its students, preparing courses, marking, giving feedback and so on. Having said that, there should also be a sufficient block of time allocated each week to research, in order to continue to boost the researcher's profile as well as contributing to the research profile of the University, but research should not be allowed to take strong priority over, and to the detriment of, the lecturer's responsibilities to her students as a teacher, mentor and examiner. Administrative duties should probably take up the least of the lecturer's time at this beginning stage of an academic career, though obviously there are important but restricted administrative responsibilities which are directly connected to one's teaching, e.g. keeping records of marks, writing reports on exam outcomes and on individual students, taking part in exam board and course board meetings. This question was answered through English.

I was also asked, in French, about my extra-curricular activities outside of academia, so I mentioned and described in detail my interests in reading, films, and musical interests.

These were the principal topics discussed throughout the interview. Though I consider that it went well, and that I had done a fair bit of preparation for it, I must say that, if I had a choice, I think that a face-to-face interview is probably more comfortable than a phone conversation. But it is good to be stretched beyond one's comfort zones. What have other readers experienced at job interviews, and what thoughts do you have on answers to the above types of typical interview questions for academic posts?