Customer Reviews

Harry Potter und der Stein der Weisen

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Chances are if your thinking on buying this book in German, you've probably already read the Englsih version, so I won't bog you down with any lengthy opinion on the story itself except to say it is a modern classic, full of mystery and suspense that can be enjoyed by kids and adults alike.

Foreign language versions of English novels are notoriously difficult to translate, largely due to the high number of English words which have no exact translation in say, German or French. But on the whole, this was an exceptionally translated peice, with no major blunders sticking out (the Spanish version is full of them) The most obvious chnage is of "Hermione" to "Hermine" Perhaps Hermione would feel strange to pronounce to a native German speaker, not sure on that one.

A lot of people will tell you Spanish and French are far easier to learn than German. I found German more fun to learn, most people who say it is a difficult, technical language do not know that English and German belong in the same group of languages (Germanic) French, Spanish and Italian are in a completely different group (Romantic) So to brush up on language skills, or just to have fun reading a novel in another language, HP is probably the most fun and easy to understand novel on the market.

Being German, I read all Harry Potter books in English firsthand and am glad I did, now that I also read Book 1 in German. The translation is not bad - I graduated on German translations of Alice in Wonderland and know how bad translations look - but some things about it really made me angry from knowing I could have done better. It's not only the usual trouble with puns - every translator gets into trouble with names like "Diagon Alley", which was simply translated as "Winkelgasse" - but some phrases simply lose the slight twinkle in Ms. Rowlings eye, though German is not a language lacking fun, or magic, or ... twinkles. The poems (I wonder if there aren't any in books 2 and 3 for translating reasons) are really badly translated. But what disturbed me most was the changing of characters' propper names. If they still call Hogwarts Hogwarts, why then rename Hermione (a Shakespearean name, a true heroine of amazonian rank) to Hermine, which is a name with a taste of old spinsters knitting woolen socks? Well at least Harry kept his name ... Still, the translation seems (for all who have not read the original and don't know the difference) to be good enough to make Harry No. 1 in German bestselling lists as well as elsewhere, everyone loves it and screams for more, so the German publishers have already announced book 5 to be issued in January, 2001 (wonder if Ms. Rowling knows?) Read this book if you're German and think your English won't be sufficient for reading the original text (which is really pleasant to read and will not mean hard work), or if you're a fan and interested in translations. But if you only want to read a German book, read something that was originally written in German, like Michael Ende. But if you're hesitating now, at least read the book in English. No one must go without Harry.

This translation of Harry Potter pulled even this native speaker of English along almost as well as the original book, and I would recommend it for anyone who's had a couple of years of German as a skill and vocabulary builder. If you're struggling with Goethe or Thomas Mann, you need something that will show you that German can be fun to read, and this book will do the trick nicely. I suppose once could carp at a few things here and there, but this translation is so superior to the French translation that I wouldn't waste my time doing that, except to mention that Hermione's name has for some reason been changed to Hermine. If you get stuck, at least the trot's readily available!

Ich bin Amerikanerin, und ich hab das Buch niemals auf Englisch gelesen,also ist es schwer für mich, die Übersetzung mit der englischen Version zu vergleichen, aber ich kann sagen, dass die Übersetzung gut genug war, dass ich ab und zu total vergessen, dass ich im Moment Deutsch lese. Ich habe auch die spanische Version gelesen..aber die spanische Version war überhaupt nicht so gut wie die deutsche. Dieses Buch ist sehr gut für alle Studenten, die ihren deutschen Wortschatz vergrössern möchten. Manche Ausdrücke in diesem Buch, wird man nie im Klassenzimmer lernen. Aber natürlich sind die Gedichte im Buch nicht so gut wie in der englischen Version, aber das ist normal....Ich habe niemals eine Übersetzung gesehen, die besser war als die originale für Gedichten und Lieder.

Harry Potter ist super! Wenn man das Buch einmal in die Hand genommen hat, legt man es erst nach der letzten gelesenen Seite wieder weg. Es ist ein wunderbar spannendes und fesselndes Buch, sehr phantasievoll und sehr gut geschrieben noch dazu. Auf den über dreihundert Seiten ist Spannung angesagt. Man kann es jedem empfehlen, gross oder klein, alle werden von ihm begeistert sein.

I read this in German before reading it in English. It's a lot of fun in both languages. In fact, it's great for improving one's skills in another tongue, because it's so enjoyable, you'll keep on reading. Taught me a lot of words that my German teachers never bothered with.

harry potter ist ein sehr gut Buch, voll von fantastike Geschichte und prachtvolle Menschen! Es gefallt mir sehr viel, und ich kann es fur alle empfehlen! Harry Potter macht viel spass zu lesen. man ist glucklich, wenn er dieses Buch lesen.

This book is a great way to improve your german language skills. I would strongly recommend it to any student of the german language... not to mention it is a great story!!!

Ich finde Harry Potter und der Stein der Weisen absolut fantastisch!! Ich empfehle dieses Buch weil es sehr spannend ist. Das Buch kann dir auch mit der deutschen Sprache helfen.

I bought this book with the hopes that I would be able to understand it, even with my limited command of the German language (Studied for 4 years in high school), and to my surprise, I was able to make my way through it without any real trouble. It stays true to the original English, and its a good direct translation. I'd recommend it if you want to keep up with your German in a fun new way.

I was approaching fluency in German as far as conversation goes, but was still hopeless to read narrative German. This book was a great starting point for learning many of the strong verb forms that are almost impossible to memorize using rote methods. My heart sank when I first opened it up and it was very difficult to get through every page. After just a few chapters though I had learned about twenty of the most important strong verbs, and was able to read through the book with reasonable speed. By the last few chapters I'd learned about fifty of them and was reading the book very briskly. This is a great start to learning narrative German, as long as you're dedicated and know the story well enough to continue to follow it when you run into those rough spots where you just plain can't figure the words out.

It's also a high-quality product. The pages of the book are very thick and durable. Its also bound in such a way that after its been in use for a while, although it will have unsightly creases on the spine, it lies flat open on a table, which I find very useful.

There are, however, a few translation errors that even an intermediate/advanced student was able to notice(such as using "welch" as a relative pronoun), and a lot of the vocabulary relating to magical items won't be at all useful in everyday life.

Overall this was a great purchase and it's a shame Amazon doesn't have the other volumes in the series available for regular purchase as they do with this one.