Chapter 13: The Very Secret Diary

 

(For the romanisation of Chinese and Japanese, see Transliteration. To understand the writing systems of CJV, see Writing Systems. For word order notes, see Word Order)

Where a Vietnamese word has been borrowed from Chinese, the original Chinese character is shown in parentheses.

 

Chinese (Mainland)	绝密日记 Juémì rìjì	绝密 juémì = 'top-secret'. 日记 rìjì = 'diary'.	The top-secret diary
Chinese (Taiwan)	絕密日記 Juémì rìjì	絕密 jué-mì = 'top-secret'. 日記 rìjì = 'diary'.	The top-secret diary
Japanese	重大秘密の日記 Jūdai-himitsu no nikki	重大 jūdai = 'major/important' 秘密 himitsu = 'secret'. の no = connecting particle 日記 nikki = 'diary'	The diary of important secrets
Vietnamese	Cuốn nhật ký cực kỳ bí mật	cuốn (卷) = counter for books. nhật ký (日記) = 'diary'. cực kỳ (極其) = 'extremely, utterly, very'. bí mật (秘密) = 'secret'.	The extremely secret diary

A straightforward translation.

Very Secret

To express the concept of 'very secret', the two Chinese versions use the snappy compound 絕密 / 绝密 juémì ('absolute-secret').

Japanese and Vietnamese use the word 'secret' (秘密 himitsu in Japanese, bí mật in Vietnamese). In the Japanese translation, this is qualified with the word 重大 jūdai, which means 'important', 'major', or 'grave'. Vietnamese uses cực kỳ meaning 'extremely, utterly'.

Note: In the page headers in the individual instalment, the Vietnamese translation uses the title Cuốn nhật ký bí ẩn, where bí ẩn means 'secret, covered, veiled'. Etymologically, bí ẩn is 秘隱 in Chinese characters.

Diary

All four translations use the same etymologically related word for 'diary': 日記 / 日记 rìjì in Chinese, 日記 nikki in Japanese, nhật ký in Vietnamese.

(A summary of this chapter can be found at Harry Potter Facts. Detailed notes on the chapter can be found at Harry Potter Lexicon)

Chapter 12

Chapter 14