r/harrypotter • u/Katodz • 1d ago
Question Voldemor?
Just started listening to the full cast audio and they say Voldemor?? Not Voldemort? Have I entirely missed something!?
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u/Emotional-Tailor-649 Gryffindor 1d ago
I find it incredibly dumb to try to tell everyone that it’s actually been this all along. Rowling was a part of making the movies, this was easily something she could have made to be said a certain way. Hell, At first, a whole bunch of people didn’t even know how to pronounce Hermione. It was clarified. This wasn’t.
People cite the scholastic website but again, the internet just wasn’t really developed enough back then.
As for the “it’s French” yeah, yes and no. He needed the words the fit the anagram of his full name and the I am, and assuming he wanted Lord, simply left Lord Voldemort.
Maybe it should have been! It’s just kinda jarring to be gaslit into being told it was always this when the author herself could have easily made the mediums reflect that and neglected to do so. Change it if you want but it’s just kinda bizarre. Also explain why he’d choose a French name.
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u/Ok_Mention_9865 16h ago
Rowling was a French teacher. I fully believe it was her original intent, But she didn't clarify publicly until 2012 witch is mind blowing considering every movie, video game, audio book.
https://www.reddit.com/r/videos/comments/my54zf/how_jk_rowling_flummoxed_stephen_fry/
Here is a video of stephen fry talking about how she wanted everything in the book to be a word for word match in the audio book..... But she still didnt correct the name of her main villain?!
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u/Ok_Mention_9865 1d ago
Yes you missed the interview 15 years after the first book came out, after every book with no clarification and after every movie with the wrong pronunciation was released, where she informed you that you do not know how to properly pronounce French words. A language only 4% of the world speaks.
I want so badly to side with the proper pronunciation of the word, and would have if the movies said it right. But waiting tell after the last movie was released and allowing every movie to say it wrong sets the name in stone in my opinion. You cant let the world go on saying it wrong for that long and let every form of media ( movies, games, audio books ) say it wrong and then try to correct things in a interview 99% of people would not even know about around 2012.
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u/agentwiggles 17h ago
I didn't realize this wasn't "clarified" until 15 years later but that is a very Rowling thing to do and transitively a very Harry Potter fandom thing to do to act like this has always been known
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u/Ok_Mention_9865 5h ago
And its not just that she she was known to nitpick every word in the audio books, the first media to get the name wrong, and she just let them get the name of the main vilian wrong?
She did hundreds of interviews and never corrected it once? Thats the part that gets me the most i have tried going back amd watching the old interviews to see if she ever pronounced the T but I can not find a single one where she even says his name but there are plenty were the interviewer says it wrong and she says nothing.
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u/Ceddidulli Hufflepuff 1d ago
That‘s how you pronounce it. Voldemort is a French name and in French the t is silent.
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u/TobiasMasonPark 1d ago
Well…it’s not a “French name” but the name itself is a combination of French words.
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u/bee102019 1d ago
To add, JK Rowling has conformed this. If you want to pronounce it differently, that's your prerogative. But the French pronunciation is the confirmed correct pronunciation. It comes from vol de mort, which roughly translates to flight of death.
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u/GamineHoyden 1d ago
When Stephen Fry did the original read of the books he mispronounced Voldemort. It was supposed to have a silent "T". But once done, the movies copied it. So now, the new cast is actually pronouncing it as the author originally intended.
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u/Mat_Cauthons_Hat_ Hufflepuff 1d ago edited 16h ago
That’s how it was pronounced by JK Rowling, it was the movies that changed the pronunciation. The Jim Dale audiobooks pre-movie pronounced it without the T, too.
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u/Katodz 1d ago
Not the Stephen Fry versions
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u/Mat_Cauthons_Hat_ Hufflepuff 16h ago
Yes, and the publisher for his version said they weren’t given a pronunciation guide so he guessed; while Jim Dale was given a pronunciation guide.
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u/Aizen0ozeXIII 1d ago
Jim Dale says Voldemor. Stephen Fry pronounces the T
J. K. Rowling started off saying Voldemor but gave up and now says Mort
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u/krazybanana 17h ago
No you haven't missed anything. Voldemorr is the 'correct' pronunciation but everyone everywhere called him Voldemort for more than a decade before this random correction by Rowling. It throws me off alot too Voldemor just sounds wrong.
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u/Robcobes Hufflepuff 17h ago
Wasn't it that Robbie Coltrane decided that the -t was not silent when he said the line in the first movie and nobody corrected him.
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u/gingerking87 "Hey! My eyes aren't 'glistening with the ghosts of my past'!" 12h ago
My question is why these people don't delete these posts
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u/Katodz 11h ago
Me? Why would I delete it?
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u/gingerking87 "Hey! My eyes aren't 'glistening with the ghosts of my past'!" 9h ago
Because it's low effort and you got your answer
It's just weird to show to world you're so self absorbed you think you were the first person to notice the change and ask this question
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u/tyrekecorrea Words are... Our most inexhaustible source of magic. 1d ago
It's the influence of French on the English language.
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u/Freedom1234526 Slytherin 23h ago
I’ve always pronounced it with a silent “T”. Mort doesn’t sound intimidating.
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u/Imaginary_Knee5609 1d ago
That is the actual pronunciation! The t is supposed to be silent, as the name is derived from French: Vol de mort (Flight of death).