Harry Potter is about the best first novel you can pick in almost any language you're learning. It exists in around 85 translations with audiobooks in many of them, it runs to a million words, and you already know the plot. Knowing the story is the scaffolding that gets you through a book you can't fully read yet.
The Rosetta Stone might be one of the most famous stones of all time. Right up there with the Rolling and kidney varieties. Most people know, more or less, what the Rosetta Stone did or why it's important, but probably only the basics.
What the Rosetta Stone actually did
The stone was (re)discovered in 1799 and was already around 2000 years old then. It was used as a piece of construction material, but spread quickly via copies and casts since it was the first major bilingual text that included Ancient Egyptian.
The stone was actually an official decree written, and this is the important part, in 2 different languages and 3 different scripts. It was in Ancient Egyptian using hieroglyphs, Ancient Egyptian using the Demotic script (not as famous as the hieroglyphs, but also a very cool script) and the final language was Ancient Greek using the already known Greek script.
Since Ancient Greek was already relatively well known and easy to translate, this meant that Ancient Egyptian could now be reconstructed and hieroglyphs deciphered thanks to the Greek part of the Rosetta Stone.
It was still very difficult, since there isn't actually that much text on the Rosetta Stone and the fact that there's no one you can ask for help. No native speakers, no one who was there who can explain the nuance of one word over another. Not even a recording so that scholars could associate sounds with the written words.
Harry Potter is today's Rosetta Stone
If you're trying to learn a second language, a modernly used one, you have far more tools available to you! Dozens of apps, courses and methods. Hundreds of YouTube videos, podcast episodes and TV shows.
But there is still an immense amount of value in being able to read a familiar text in that new language.
If you're trying to learn another language, you should be making use of today's Rosetta Stone: Harry Potter.
Not only does Harry Potter exist in FAR more languages than the Rosetta Stone had (there are around 85 different language versions of Harry Potter using nearly a dozen unique scripts), but many of those languages also have audiobook versions. And the whole Harry Potter series is roughly 1 million words compared to a single broken slab of stone.
Since it's one of the most famous and best selling book series of all time, it's also fairly likely that you've read it (or at least have seen the movies). Not so much the case for Ptolemy V Epiphanes' royal decree.
The Rosetta Stone
Harry Potter
Languages
2
around 85
Scripts
3
roughly a dozen
Length
one broken slab
roughly 1 million words
Audio
none
audiobooks in most major languages
Do you know the story?
no
probably
Why do you need a Rosetta Stone?
Reading a novel in a language you're learning is very difficult. Being honest, most language learners never do it. Many never even try. But reading is one of the absolute best ways to improve your language learning.
It trains vocabulary knowledge and grammar understanding in context, it improves processing speed and memory of the language and is much much more engaging than doing flashcards or sitting in a classroom, drilling conjugations.
But it's HARD. Reading your first novel in your target language can feel impossible. When you open the first page, it's just a mass of words, swimming around on the page. Most of which you hardly even recognize. How on earth do I expect you to read a book???
By starting with your Rosetta Stone! The stone was useful to 19th century linguists because they were already pretty familiar with Greek, so they could break down what the text was about. They also were able to find important names in the Greek text, then locate them in the other texts and thus figure out, more or less, the pronunciation of the symbols.
Assuming you already know the story of Harry Potter, even if roughly, you can do the same! Many translations use identical (or similar) character names. So if you see:
Harry miró a Hermione y dijo...
Harry miró a Hermione y dijo…
you don't need to know much Spanish in order to figure out who's being talked about! And just with the words miró and dijo (which mean "looked" and "said"), you can pretty easily figure out that it means Harry looked at Hermione and said...
You just read a sentence in Spanish!
That's the core value of reading a story you already know in your new language. It gives you scaffolding and allows you to get through a real novel without being thrown into the deep end with no help.
Names are not always this easy, mind you. Translators rebuilt a great deal of Rowling's invented vocabulary from scratch, and ten of those rebuilds are worth seeing before you start. If you're learning Chinese, where nothing can be left in the Latin alphabet, the Mandarin translation had to rebuild almost everything.
Plus you have audio
Even if you know the story, it's still not easy to make it through the first book. Your eyes aren't used to moving over words in the language, your inner voice doesn't process the words instantly as sound inside your head and you haven't seen thousands upon thousands of sentences.
So try reading along with the audio! My friend calls this "scuba reading" since the audio sorta acts like a scuba tank and allows you to breathe underwater (or stay submerged in the text) for longer than you could normally. The analogy is a little awkward, but once you try it, I think you'll see why it does fit rather well.
When I started learning Czech, I downloaded the book + audiobook and started reading along. I'd hardly been learning for 3 weeks, at that point, but just focused on the few words I could recognize, the character names and listening to the audio. And I made it through! The first book was very hard, the second pretty hard, but by the time I got to the seventh book, I understood pretty much everything!
I firmly believe that you can do the same with a little bit of dedication.
The same trick works on audio you aren't reading along with, which is what intensive listening is for.
But there's still more you can do!
The final tip I have for you if you want to read Harry Potter in your target language:
LEARN VOCABULARY. Ideally, learn the specific vocabulary that is going to be helpful for reading Harry Potter.
I don't mean wizard, wand or witch or even nitwit, oddment, blubber or tweak! There are only a few dozen of those words and you'll pick them up by reading. Most of them are pretty clear in the stories.
What I mean are the actual common "glue" words (or content words) that make up 90% of all books. These are just normal words like grab or yell or table. Little grammar words like it, the and we are also super common, but those are pretty easy to pick up while reading since they're so plentiful.
But the nouns, verbs and adjectives that make up everything else are very useful to learn. Especially if you tailor them toward the book you want to read.
There are a few ways to go about this (and being fully honest, one of them is a product we make and sell, but there are alternatives).
Download a premade option from Ankiweb or some other free source. The quality of these can be very hit or miss, but they often do the job
Use a program or AI coding agent to process the text for you and create vocab lists or Anki decks for you (this is getting easier and better every day!)
???
Check out our premade Anki decks specifically tailored to help you read Harry Potter as quickly as possible
Our decks include only the most important words you need to know to be able to survive your first read through. Each word has an example sentence, audio, and most have an image to help you "see" the meaning. The decks themselves are excellent language practice in and of themselves, but prepare you to do something you've never done before: read an actual book in German (or French or Spanish or Italian or English... whichever language you're learning).
The words are sorted so that you learn them in the "optimal" order, about a day or two before you come across them in the text. That way, you're more likely to recognize and understand them!
Click your target language below to learn more about the decks!
Start reading Harry Potter in your target language
Our starter bundles teach you the vocabulary of the first book before you read it. You study the words, then you open the real book and actually understand what you're reading. Most people are surprised by how much of that first chapter they can actually follow.
No. Refold Languages Inc is an independent language-learning company. This deck is a vocabulary study aid built from our own analysis of the book, and it is not endorsed by, affiliated with, sponsored by, or approved by Warner Bros., J.K. Rowling, or any rights holder. We reference the book title only to identify the source text the vocabulary is drawn from. All trademarks and copyrights belong to their respective owners.
Frequently asked questions
Is Harry Potter good for learning a language?
It's one of the best choices for a first novel. The writing is aimed at children and gets harder book by book, which matches how your reading ability grows. It has been translated into around 85 languages, most of them with an audiobook. And because you probably already know the story, you can follow the plot through pages you can't fully read yet.
What level do you need to read Harry Potter in another language?
Lower than you think, if you use the audiobook and accept that you won't understand everything. The usual advice is to wait until you're comfortable, which in practice means waiting forever. Start early, use the audio, learn a few hundred common words first, and let yourself be confused. That works better than waiting.
How do I read a book in a language I barely know?
Read along with the audiobook so you can't stall on a single page, aim to finish rather than to understand, and use a digital copy so you can look up words without losing your place. Look up the words that keep reappearing, not every word you don't recognize.
Should I look up every word I don't know?
No. Looking up every word turns reading into decoding and you'll quit. Look up a word when it has come up several times and is clearly load-bearing for the scene, and let the rest go. You'll meet most of them again.
Can I get Harry Potter in the language I'm learning?
Almost certainly. The series has been licensed in around 85 languages, across roughly a dozen writing systems, including Latin and Ancient Greek. Audiobooks exist for many of them. If your language has a publishing industry, there's a good chance Harry Potter is in it.
Is it better to read Harry Potter or listen to the audiobook?
Both at once. Reading and listening together keeps you moving at the narrator's pace instead of stalling on a hard sentence, and it ties the written word to its sound, which reading on its own never does.
Should I learn vocabulary before reading Harry Potter?
It helps a lot, and the useful words are not the wizarding ones. Learning wand and broomstick does almost nothing; learning the ordinary nouns, verbs and adjectives that make up the bulk of any novel is what makes the first chapters readable.
Sources
Rosetta Stone, Wikipedia (discovery in 1799, the two languages and three scripts, and the decipherment)
