Alleged online spoilers add to global Harry Potter frenzy

Last Updated: Wednesday, July 18, 2007 | 11:39 AM ET

CBC Arts

As the release of the final Harry Potter novel approaches, the growing frenzy around the title is being fuelled in part by a host of internet spoilers that allegedly reveal the fate of the teen wizard.

Buzz continues to build for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, the final book in J.K. Rowling's seven-title series. The book is officially set for release Saturday.
(Raincoast)

Several file-sharing websites have posted the purported ending of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, the final instalment of British author J.K. Rowling's supremely successful seven-title series.

The book is set for release at 12:01 a.m. on Saturday.

One website has posted meticulous digital photographs of what seems to be every single page of the 36-chapter novel — complete with a hand holding down each page — while another offers what appears to be a table of contents and an epilogue. Others have simply posted what site owners claim are the relevant plot points.

Several people have also reported being able to download the full text online.

Publishers of the highly anticipated book — including Canada's Raincoast Books, Scholastic in the U.S. and Bloomsbury in the U.K. — have engaged in a rigorous campaign to keep the ending a secret, including ordering websites to take spoilers offline, regardless of whether the material is authentic or not.

'The only authentic way to know for sure what transpires … is to read the actual, physical, printed book.'

—Jamie Broadhurst, Raincoast Books 

"We're receiving conflicting reports of the online content," Jamie Broadhurst, Raincoast's vice-president of marketing, told CBC News.

"The only way to know for sure, the only authentic way to know for sure what transpires in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows is to read the actual, physical, printed book."

As with the past Harry Potter titles, stores carrying the book have signed contracts promising not to start selling Deathly Hallows before the official release date and time. Some stores have even reported employing security guards around their shipments 24 hours a day.

Rowling herself has begged the public not to reveal the ending to her final Harry Potter book, in which she previously said two characters would die. Her revelation sparked speculation among the legion of Harry Potter fans worldwide that the titular teen wizard could die in battle against his evil nemesis, Voldemort.

Potter controversies

Aside from the online spoilers, other controversies have arisen surrounding Saturday's release.

In the U.K. this week, British supermarket chain Asda was engaged in a brief row with Bloomsbury, criticizing the U.K. publisher for having raised the price of the final book.

The chain, a British unit of the Wal-Mart retail giant, apologized Tuesday, after Bloomsbury threatened to cancel Asda's order for Deathly Hallows.

In Israel, a group of ultra-Orthodox Jewish lawmakers are protesting against bookstores that plan to open and sell Deathly Hallows at the appointed, early morning hour on Saturday — which falls on the Jewish Sabbath.

An international phenomenon, the books have also spawned a successful film series that has turned actor Daniel Radcliffe, who plays the titular teen wizard, into a star.
(Murray Close/Warner Bros. Pictures/Associated Press)

"Israeli law forbids businesses to force their employees to work on the Sabbath, and that applies in this case as well. [Industry and Trade Minister Eli Yishai] will fine and prosecute any businesses which violate the law," said Roei Lachmanovich, a spokesman for the minister.

In the U.S., federal prosecutors in Brooklyn, N.Y., charged 14 people this week for smuggling drugs into the country, including ecstasy tablets emblazoned with a Harry Potter logo.

Since their release about a decade ago, Rowling's Harry Potter books have become an international hit and one of the world's most successful publishing phenomena.

To date, the first six books have sold more than 325 million copies around the globe, set numerous publishing industry records, been translated into more than 60 different languages and spawned an equally popular film series.

Rowling, who was a single mother on welfare when she began writing the novels, has become a multimillionaire and one of the most recognizable names in the literary world.