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Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban |
Chapter 17: Cat, Rat and Dog
(For the romanisation of Chinese and Japanese, see Transliteration. To understand the writing systems of CJV, see Writing Systems. For word order notes, see Word Order)
Where a Vietnamese word has been borrowed from Chinese, the original Chinese character is shown in parentheses.
| Chinese (Mainland) | 猫、耗子和狗 Māo, hàozi hé gǒu |
猫
māo
= 'cat'. 耗子 hàozi = 'rat, mouse' (northern dialect). 和 hé = 'and'. 狗 gǒu = 'dog'. |
Cat, rat and dog |
| Chinese (Taiwan) | 貓、鼠、狗 Māo, shǔ, gǒu |
貓
māo
= 'cat'. 鼠 shǔ = 'rat/mouse'. 狗 gǒu = 'dog'. |
Cat, rat, dog |
| Japanese | 猫、ネズミ、犬 Neko, nezumi, inu |
猫
neko = 'cat'. ネズミ nezumi = 'rat/mouse'. 犬 inu = 'dog'. |
Cat, rat, dog |
| Vietnamese | Mèo, chuột và chó | mèo
= 'cat'. chuột = 'rat/mouse'. và = 'and'. chó = 'dog'. |
Cat, rat and dog |
The standard spoken word for 'rat/mouse' in Chinese is 老鼠 lǎoshǔ ('old rat'). Neither of the Chinese translators use this word. The word for 'rat/mouse' used in the Mainland Chinese edition, 耗子 hàozi, is a colloquial north Chinese word. The Taiwanese translation uses the written expression for 'rat/mouse', which is 鼠 shǔ. By omitting the word 和 hé 'and', the Taiwanese translator comes up with a simple, succinct title in a classical style, whereas the Mainland version is modern and colloquial in feel.
The Japanese translator writes 'cat' and 'dog' in Chinese characters while writing 'rat/mouse' in katakana as ネズミ. This is in line with standard usage: the character for nezumi (鼠) is not included in the list of characters for normal use (the 'jōyō kanji') and is usually written in katakana as it is the name of a type of animal.
(A summary of this chapter can be found at Harry Potter Facts. Detailed notes on the chapter can be found at Harry Potter Lexicon)
 Chapter 16 |
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