Secret things you not know about HARRY POTTER SERIES BY @over the limit
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
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. In an exclusive extract from PhilipW. Errington’s new book,J.K. Rowling A Bibliography 1997 – 2013, EW brings you a skulk peep into some of the most fascinating secrets from the world of Harry Potter. From alternate book titles (Harry Potter and the Death Eaters?) to the high- position security measures used to transport top secret calligraphies, indeed the most zealous Potter addict will learn commodity new.
The Conjurer’s Gravestone
1. Nigel Newton, the author and principal superintendent of Bloomsbury Publishing, said that the day the Bloomsbury tract commission considered Harry Potter and the Champion’s Gravestone, “ I cast my vote … in favour, as did everybody differently, with amenability. My confidence came from the fact that my also-8-year-old son, Alice, had read it for me the night ahead and came down the stairs glowing about it.” The company offered a-pound advance.
2. The reason the American edition is called Harry Potter and the Conjurer’s Gravestone and not Harry Potter and the Champion’s Gravestone like the British interpretation is that Arthur Levine, the editor who acquired theU.S. rights for Scholastic, felt it did n’t convey magic overtly enough for American compendiums. “ So the title (that I suggested) to Jo was Harry Potter and the School of Magic. Jo veritably courteously said,‘No — that does n’t feel right to me.’”
The Chamber of Secrets
3. In August 1997 Emma Matthewson — who came Rowling’s editor at Bloomsbury beginning with the alternate book — transferred the edited draft of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets back to the author, saying, “ My first study I should say right now is that it's going to be absolutely brilliant! … Enclosed is the handwriting where I've written colorful commentary and suggestions … generally, as we ’ve bandied, the handwriting isover-long. I've suggested some possible places for cuts.” Rowling returned the handwriting to Bloomsbury in October with a note that said in part “ I ’ve done further to it that you suggested, but I'm veritably happy with it now, which was n’t the case ahead. The hard work, the significant rewrites I wanted to do, are over, so if it needs further cuts after this, I ’m ready to make them, hastily.” Rowling noted that losing a song for Nearly Headless Nick, which was cut in the rewritten handwriting, was “ a wrench,” but admitted the tune was “ redundant.”
4. The publisher’s blurb for an American edition of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets inaptly claimed that Aunt Petunia, rather than Aunt Marge, would be accidentally inflated by Harry in the coming book. In the early days, there were a number of similar problems with details. Indeed The New York Times got it wrong when trying to describe Harry Potter and the Conjurer’s Gravestone for its best- dealer list “ A Scottish boy, neglected by his cousins, finds his fortune attending a academy of necromancy.”
5. Ahead long, the books were so notorious that Bloomsbury had to “ secure (Matthewson’s) house …. The first thing we did was make sure she had a computer that was n’t attached to the Internet. No hacking in the world could get at commodity that was n’t plugged-in.”
The Internee of Azkaban
6. After completing a modification of the third volume, Harry Potter and the Internee of Azkaban, Rowling wrote Emma Matthewson “ Eventually! I ’ve read this book so much I ’m sick of it. I noway read either of the others over and over again when editing them, but I really had to this time …. Still, I ’m willing and suitable, but I do suppose this draft represents an enhancement on the first; the dementors are much further of a presence this time round, If you suppose it needs further work.”
The Goblet of Fire
7. Title possibilities for Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire suggested by Rowling included Harry Potter and the Death Eaters, Harry Potter and the Fire Tableware, and Harry Potter and the Three Titleholders.
The Order of the Phoenix
8. By the time Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix came around, Bloomsbury had to resort to chicane indeed to take delivery of the handwriting. Nigel Newton recalled “ (Rowling’s also agent) Christopher Little telephoned me out of the blue and said,‘Nigel, drink at the Pelican tonight?’and I said,‘ Drink at the Pelican? Yes, Chris, 6p.m.’That was where he'd delivered the former book to me. So I drove to the Pelican, a cantina off the Fulham Road, in a state of high alert. And I went by and there was a massive plastic bag at his bases …. He said nothing about that and I said nothing and he just said‘ Drink?’and I said,‘A pint, please.’
So we stood at the bar and drank our pints and said nothing about Harry Potter. But when we left I walked out with the carrier bag. It was a classic dead letter drop. So I put this bag into the reverse of my auto and drove it home. By this stage the series was so enormous that I was nearly alarmed to be in physical possession of it.
My three children and woman were all enormous suckers themselves so I could n’t say anything to them. I shoved it under the bed. I had another typescript sitting there … so I stuck (the) top four runners of David Guterson’s East of the Mountains on the top and also stayed up all night reading it, which my woman did find a bit odd.”
The Half- Blood Prince
9. To try to insure thickness within the books, and keep track of characters, spells, and the suchlike, Bloomsbury had to produce an in- house train known as the HP bible.
10. Correspondence between Rowling and Matthewson makes it clear that Rowling reworked the morning of Harry Potter and the Half- Blood Prince. “ I do suppose that revised opening is a masterstroke,” Matthewson wrote Rowling. “ What I suppose is awful about this book is that for the first time compendiums will really and truly begin to appreciate the breadth of the vision you have.”
The Deathly Hallows
11. In an attempt to keep Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows a secret, early attestations were named Edinburgh Potmakers. “ This wasn't the only spurious title given to the novel,” noted Errington. “ Another printout of the textbook in the editorial lines at Bloomsbury is entitled The Life and Times of Clara Rose Lovett with the thrilling cutline‘An grand novel covering numerous generations.’”
12. Arthur Levine had 71 questions for Rowling after reading early performances of Hallows “ I wish we could convey adequately our feeling that all of these detail questions are simply a result of the absolutely phenomenal position of detail in Harry’s saga.” Errington refocused out that as always, “ American and English diction was, formerly again, an issue of editorial discussion. Correspondence in the Bloomsbury lines includes the note‘If you mean underpants and not trousers then, can we spell out‘underpants’for theU.S., so compendiums understand completely how disturbing this is for Ron?” This request was annotated “ OK (U.S. only).”