Purchasing rights was really something new for Chinese publishers at that time, as China had just joined the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works in 1995. Not knowing how to contact the copyright owner, they sought help from overseas literary agents to finally contact Bloomsbury, Potter books' British publisher. After much scrutiny, the go ahead to make an offer came from Bloomsbury after two months waiting on tenterhooks.

A market miracle

Ye's press bought the single copyright of the version in simplified Chinese, for world distribution, of three titles -- Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, and Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. Though it was normal for children 's titles to have a print run of 10,000 copies at most in China, Ye and his management decided to go for broke by printing 200,000 copies for each of the Potter books. The market response was beyond Ye's wildest imagination ---- the books flew off the shelves in big cities and pirated prints soon appeared to fill the vacuum in remote areas.

The market is huge and readers hungry. Ye's publishing house was running red hot while other presses looked on green with envy. After the fourth book, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, People's Literature Publishing House bought the rights soon after Rowling finished writing, going for a print run of 400,000 copies and doubling this to 800,000 copies for the fifth book, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix and sixth book Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince respectively. It's a publishing miracle, said Ye, declining to reveal the earnings the books have brought in.

Translating wizardry a challenge

The world of wizardry is something completely foreign in China and translating the Potter books, which feature extensive references to wizard culture, is something of a challenge to a fiction editor and vital to the books' success.

An experienced publisher devoted to publishing Chinese and foreign literary classics for more than 50 years, People's Literature Publishing House has provided generations of Chinese readers with the works of nearly all the Western classic writers such as Victor-Marie Hugo, Thomas Hardy, Virginia Woolf, O.Henry (William Sydney Porter), Franz Kafka, Hans Anderson and so forth. A legion of good translators have worked for the press. Five translators were involved in the work of the previous six volumes of Harry Potter. Correctly translating the original, keeping the storytelling style, while enabling it to be fully understood by Chinese readers is a hard job. Ye said translating some of the special terms, and especially the curses, would often take days of discussion, before eventually finding a satisfactory Chinese equivalent.

"The six translated Potter books are wonderful for their coherence in episode, names and expressions. The editorial work is very professional, " commented Shen Xiaoxi, an interpreter with a travel agency in Beijing and also a Potter fan.

Ye explained that the story in the first six volumes is so long and the episodes so complicated that coherence was a big challenge.

His team have now compiled a glossary book of names of people, places, events and special terms used in the books, which functions as a dictionary. "We do not think the translation is perfect and there must have had some mistakes based on misunderstanding of the original," said Ye. However he had received positive feedback from the English publisher, which had made regular checks of the translated version.

Embracing all things new

The publication of the Harry Potter series of books in China is a milestone, from which the publishing industry has begun to sense a changing readership which is extremely open-minded, curious and has an insatiable appetite for imported children's titles.

Li Xiao said, "I even like to use the terms and expressions of Potter books in my English written papers to make my writing style fashionable."

Tang Dongdong (14), a middle-school student, said he has grown up with the six Potter books published each year in the past six years. "I am enthralled by the story ever since I read the first volume. I've never thought the story alien and I regard Harry as one of us."

"This is a new generation with a different view of the world," said Ye. "They have breakfast in McDonald's, watch Hollywood movies and know every NBA star. It's a generation to whom surfing the Internet is as natural as breathing, and to whom the entire world is their backyard.

Whatever best-selling titles from the world market we import, we are confident the new wave of Chinese youth will embrace them,"said Ye.

That may be the reason why Ye and his publishing house are rubbing their hands together in anticipation of sales from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. "The market of the final book will far surpass the fifth and sixth because everyone is eager to know the final installment of the Harry Potter saga," said Ye said. The marketing approach will see several changes in order to avoid the avalanche of pirated copies, something that is no doubt bound to follow.

It is generally accepted that the Potter impact on Chinese is huge. "Harry Potter is like an injection for the Chinese publishing industry and those producing children's book particularly." said Ye. He fully expects more foreign titles like this will be imported by Chinese publishers, who are now mature in international operation and cooperation and have a brighter view of the book market inside and outside China. Western fairy tales and stories of fantasy are now part of the Chinese youth mindset, thanks to the boy wizard, Harry Potter, said Ye.