Meeting at YSU: "In the Hogwarts Bookstore or Around the World’s Libraries"
On May 14, 2025, at 2:30 p.m., YSU Sarkis and Marie Izmirlian Library will host a meeting under the title "In the Hogwarts Bookstore or Around the World’s Libraries." The meeting will be led by Alvard Jivanyan, a fairy tale scholar, translator, linguist, Doctor of Philological Sciences, and Professor at YSU.
The event will focus on the "library" theme in the world of Harry Potter: bookstores and otherworldly libraries, forbidden and enchanted books.
In addition to the main topic, the discussion will address the following questions:
Who is the intended audience of the Harry Potter series? What is its genre—philosophical, fantastical, political, or something else?
What challenges and difficulties arose in translating the book into Armenian? Was the offer to translate such an internationally popular and voluminous work a challenge?
What kinds of "peculiar" words and expressions appear in J.K. Rowling's works that initially seemed untranslatable? What interesting solutions were found?
Many Potter fans had grown accustomed to the character names known and circulated through the Russian translations. How was the attempt to render those same names in Armenian received?
What is "intertextuality"—a term often used when discussing fairy tales and other genres of the fantastic?
