Harry Potter in Cambodia

May 5, 2009
By Nicholas Kristof
New York Times

I’ve written occasionally about Bernard Krisher’s work in Cambodia, building schools and keeping girls in school through American Assistance for Cambodia. Bernie is a former journalist who developed a passion for Cambodia and has devoted his life to raising living standards there. Late last year, my own family visited Cambodia to see the opening of a school that we donated through Bernie.

One of the frustrations in trying to teach kids to read there is that, frankly, there aren’t a lot of great books to teach with. And exciting stories that might entice young people to read often aren’t translated into Khmer, the Cambodian language. So a few years ago, Bernie convinced J.K. Rowling to donate the rights to the first book so that a low-priced Khmer version could be published, so as to hook young people into reading. Now J.K. Rowling has agreed to donate the rights to the second book in the series, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, so that it can be published in Khmer as well. The upshot will be another cheap page-turner to get young Cambodians to read more — and kids in huts around the country will be starry-eyed about broomsticks and owls and Harry’s adventures. So, thank you, J.K. Rowling and Bernie Krisher!