WRITTEN TRANSCRIPTION OF THE PODCAST:

Hello and welcome to My Podcast My Life and Other Funny Stories. My name is Dagmar Tomášková, I am an English tutor and I created this podcast for students at intermediate and upper intermediate levels of English who want to get better in their oral comprehension. As always you can find the transcription of this episode, comprehension quiz, and vocabulary list in the notes of the podcast.

Today we will come back to the topic from last week and we will finish fun facts about Harry Potter. Today I prepared for you the remaining six that I promised last week- so if you didn’t listen to last week’s episode, definitely do it first because you would miss a lot of interesting info! Also, I didn’t mention last time, that I created a visual mind map of Harry Potter vocabulary that I discussed in the last episode, so if you want to check it out, it will be all in the same article with the transcription and comprehension quiz and so on. So look there.

 Let me know if you like this type of podcast because I can definitely make more episodes like this in the future.

Without further ado, let’s jump and continue with number six.

Number six: The majority of the story of Harry Potter takes place from 1991 to 1998. The final battle of Hogwarts in the last part took place in 1998 which was the same year that the first Harry Potter book in the real world was published. Before I continue let me just explain two words: first is „quote„: quote is a sentence that you saw somewhere written and you repeat it in the exact same words. So, for example, a quote from a book: Shakespeare’s quote is: „to be or not to be“ and the second is Harry Potter vocabulary word which is „golden snitch„. Golden Snitch is the little golden ball that Harry is trying to catch during every Quidditch so you know the little golden ball that is flying very fast everywhere. Okay so bear that in mind and I continue.

 JK Rowling commented on this with a quote: „I open at the close“ which was also a quote on a golden snitch that Harry opened in the last movie where the little black stone was hidden. By that, she means that the story in the book was finished in the same year that the story was published for the world. Which is quite poetic, if I say so myself.

Number seven: In the books, Harry’s eyes are bright green but in the movies, Daniel Radcliffe, the actor who played Harry, has blue eyes. He tried wearing green contact lenses – those are the small things you put into your eyes to change your eye color, but he had a bad reaction to them and he couldn’t wear them. Of course, there are so many differences between the books and the movies but you can find them all on the internet if you are interested. So that is only one of them.

Number eight: The actress who played Moaning Myrtle (do you remember who Moaning Myrtle is from the last episode?), her name was Shirley Henderson, was 36 years old when she played her. Isn’t it crazy? She looked so young.

Number nine: The original Harry Potter manuscript (the original version, the original text) was turned down (which means refused) by 12 publishers before the publisher called Bloomsbury, which is the original publisher of Harry Potter, finally accepted it. So it was refused by 12 publishing houses before finally, someone wanted to print it.

That brings me to note, that if you have an idea and it is not accepted, eight times, nine times, ten times, don’t give up, maybe the next person will accept it and then you will be very rich. I think that JK Rowling is definitely one of the richest women, maybe even the richest woman, and she is a billionaire now. So never let anyone tell you you cannot achieve something! Right?

Number ten: Harry’s parents were only 21 years old when they died. 21. I know it might sound strange because in the movies they were played by older actors and also Severus Snape who was their classmate (so he was supposed to be the same age as Harry’s parents) was played by Alan Rickman who was 54 when he played in the first movie. But in the books, they are all very young. 

Harry’s parents had him shortly after they finished school and they died when he was one, so they died when they were 21. This means that Severus Snape should be around 32 years old when Harry started his first year in Hogwarts and the same goes for Sirius Black and Remus Lupin. But because they were all played by much older actors, it changes the way we think about them.

And last one, number eleven: Harry Potter’s name is mentioned 18 156 times in the series. That is a lot. Of course, it depends on the edition that you have. But I have to say that I found this fact on the internet, I didn’t count it myself. But you can fact-check it yourself. Fact check means that you can go and find on your own if I am telling the truth or not. So, feel free to go, open every book and count how many times Harry Potter’s name is mentioned. If you don’t believe me. Because you should never believe things you read on the internet or hear on the podcast. So… you can prove me wrong if you want. 

Alright, that was the last fact.

Thank you so much for listening to this episode and if you liked it, don’t forget to give it five stars on the platform you are listening to me right now. I know it was a little bit of a shorter episode, but I hope you don’t mind.

Also, let me know if you like this type of podcast or if you prefer the ones with the stories. You can always write me a message on Instagram where I am @dajinka73 or write me an email which you will find in the notes of the podcast.

If you want to check your comprehension or if you didn’t understand some phrases you can check out the transcription and the vocabulary list in the description. Right.

Have a lovely week and I will talk to you very soon, bye!