As discussed in this previous thread. I just went out at lunchtime and picked it up. So now I’m the proud owner of
ΆΡΕΙΟΣ ΠΟΤΗΡ και ή του φιλοσοφου λιθος.
As soon as I finish my exams on Friday I’ll dig out my dictionary and see how much I’m able to read.
I have the Latin one. I would get the Greek but, at this point, it’s getting a bit boring to read the same bits again in different languages! If they came out with the Chamber of Secrets in Greek, though…
Grats on the interesting addition to your library!
How does the Ancient Greek version differ from the Modern Greek? Can a Modern Greek read Ancient Greek?
Cool.
Generally speaking: no. I’m approaching ‘decent’ in ancient greek, and while (I think) I can phoenetically read modern greek, I can’t understand it.
I want that book…
Not really. I showed the Ancient Greek translation to a Greek-speaking woman in my office yesterday. She could sound out the words (as **NinjaChick ** said) and even recognised a few of them too. She couldn’t really understand the text though.
Goodness gracious, how many are there of us who can read Greek around here? I had no idea you were learning, NinjaChick!
An IMHO thread brews in my mind…
I have 3/4 of a degree in Ancient Greek and Latin. At one point, I spoke fairly decent modern Greek, and was good enough in Ancient Greek to get through most of the Iliad. That was 15 years ago, though, and I’ve forgotten just about all the Ancient, and most of the Modern.
Very cool!
I want to get the Latin version, I’m trying to teach myself Latin and that’s my goal.
Kewel!! I took one semester of ancient greek in college [size=-1]mumble-mumble[size] years ago and it nearly did me in - one of two D’s in college - but I remembered enough to figure out which HP book you got. Glad they didn’t change the title to the Americanized version (It’s a philosopher’s stone, dammit).
That is now on my Amazon.com wish list. I did two semester of ancient Greek in college my senior year. With the combination of my Greek text which will give me any constructions I might have forgotten, a dictionary for words I don’t know, and my English (well American) copy of HP: Year One I think I can handle this.
By “Ancient Greek” did the translator really try to render Harry Potter in an Attic style? Does it read more like a Hellenistic novel? Or is it just koine?
Enquiring minds want to know.
I was never that proficient, but my Greek knowledge is gone, too.
How do those people who remember a language fifty years later do it?
I can’t answer for fifty, but I got my degree in classics five years ago and do not work in the field.
I practice.
It’s all greek to me. :smack: 
<hijack>
And how many Dopers out there own the Latin translation of Winnie the Pooh?
</hijack>
I have it in Esperanto. Does that count?
No, but I’ve got The Giving Tree and How the Grinch Stole Christmas.
And Harrius Potter et Philosophi Lapis.
I’ve looked at it only briefly so far. I’m preparing for a Taxation Law exam tomorrow morning and I don’t need to be distracted. But from the quick glance I have had, it looks Attic in style.