When Harry met Gili

You have to take your hat off to her. Gili Bar-Hillel is the translator of the Harry Potter books into Hebrew. I still find it hard to get my head around – the language of the Torah and Prophets in Hogwart’s Academy. It is a real case of the sublime describing the ridiculous.

Bar-Hillel comes from a line of intellectual heavyweights. Her grandfather was a Viennese Philosopher, her parent’s lectured at the Hebrew University in Psychology. She has three degrees herself, including one from Harvard.

Evidently she has had huge translation challenges and is bombarded with letters from the kids reading the Hebrew version. One complained that Harry ate bacon (she wrote back explaining the difference in cultures). Then she has to figure out what words to use for “wand” or “prefect”, both of which are unknown concepts in Hebrew culture.

Good luck. I bet she’s glad that Ms Rowling has hung up her broomstick!