The "Harry Potter" books have long outgrown the realm of children's literature, and their language is far from simple; there are relatively few readers in Russia able to tackle the English-language original. For the seventh and last book, "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows," most will have to wait until December, when Sergei Ilyin and Maya Lakhuti will have translated it for Rosmen publishing house, the lucky holder of the rights to the "Harry Potter" books in Russia. But there are other ways to get hold of it.

Less than 24 hours after the book's release, major chunks of some chapters appeared on Russian-language web sites. These were the result of so-called "distributed translation," when a text is divided between a large group of people. Both the quality and consistency of such translations can, of course, be criticized.

The trendsetter for Russian translations of the saga was Marina Litvinova, a professor of English at Moscow Linguistic University. After complaints about the first book's translation, Rosmen hired her to translate books two through four. Litvinova's attempts were verbose and didactic, and for the fifth installment the publishers employed a star team of the very best translators -- Viktor Golyshev, Vladimir Babkov and Leonid Motylyov. It was much better, but for some reason the sixth book was again translated by a different team, Ilyin and Lakhuti. All five translators of the last three books had to follow Litvinova's terminology and strict editorial control.

Several "Harry Potter" books were translated by mathematician Maria Spivak. She did it for fun and for her friends, but the texts soon found their way on to the Internet. Vivid and personal translations, they were considered by many fans to be the best. They were hunted down by Rowling's attorneys, but for Spivak it was a career-changing opportunity -- she is now working for major publishing houses.

In London, lines of fans camped by major downtown bookstores long before midnight last Friday, when the new book went on sale. Rowling hosted a mammoth reading at the Natural History Museum, and "Harry Potter" became the first book in a long time to reclaim the concept of "opening night" from the theater and movie world.

At 3:01 a.m., exactly the same time as in London, the central Moscow bookstore Moskva opened its doors to Russian readers who couldn't wait. Some celebrities were spotted, among them the prolific author Dmitry Bykov, who promised he would write a follow-up to the saga. The book sold for 1,001 rubles, more than double the price in London.