# Is "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban" by J. K. Rowling a First Edition?

> **Quick answer.** A first edition of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J. K. Rowling (Bloomsbury, 1999) is identified by: UK Bloomsbury, 1999 (published 8 July 1999). UK Bloomsbury is the true first, ahead of the US Scholastic edition (also 1999).

**Checklist — a true first has these:**
- UK Bloomsbury, 1999 (published 8 July 1999)
- The first state requires three points together on/near the copyright page:
- the full number line '10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1'
- the copyright credited to 'Joanne Rowling' rather than 'J. K. Rowling'; and
- the page-7 text fault — in the passage on Wendelin the Weird, the sentence '...enjoyed being burnt so much that she allowed herself to be caught no less than forty-seven times...' is broken by an unintended line break (introduced when an editor changed the American 'burned' to British 'burnt')
- Printer line reads 'Clays Ltd, St Ives plc', and the copyright page should show only 'Bloomsbury' and '1999'
- Publisher imprint reads Bloomsbury

| | |
|---|---|
| Author | J. K. Rowling |
| Publisher | Bloomsbury |
| Year | 1999 |
| True first | UK edition |
| Format | Children's / illustrated |
| Key point | UK Bloomsbury, 1999 (published 8 July 1999) |
| Book-club edition exists? | — |

## Points of issue
UK Bloomsbury, 1999 (published 8 July 1999). The first state requires three points together on/near the copyright page: (1) the full number line '10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1'; (2) the copyright credited to 'Joanne Rowling' rather than 'J. K. Rowling'; and (3) the page-7 text fault — in the passage on Wendelin the Weird, the sentence '...enjoyed being burnt so much that she allowed herself to be caught no less than forty-seven times...' is broken by an unintended line break (introduced when an editor changed the American 'burned' to British 'burnt'). Printer line reads 'Clays Ltd, St Ives plc', and the copyright page should show only 'Bloomsbury' and '1999'. Bibliographer Philip Errington records a first impression of about 5,150 copies, of which roughly 2,500 are first state — genuinely scarce.

## Is this the true first?
UK Bloomsbury is the true first, ahead of the US Scholastic edition (also 1999). The decisive first-state points are the 'Joanne Rowling' copyright credit, the page 7 dropped line, and the complete 10-to-1 number line. Bibliographer Philip Errington records about 5,150 first-impression copies, of which roughly 2,500 are first state.

## Telling it from reprints & book-club editions
Second state corrects the credit to 'J. K. Rowling' and repairs the page-7 line; a later (third) state also removes the 'Clays Ltd, St Ives plc' printer line and adds two pages of black-and-white advertisements for the first two books at the rear. Gift/club printings carrying a 'Ted Smart' / 'This edition produced for The Book People Ltd' line are not the trade first. A copy lacking the 'Joanne Rowling' credit and the page-7 fault is not first state regardless of its number line.

## Source
New Mexico Literacy Project — Is *Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban* by J. K. Rowling a first edition? https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/first-edition/harry-potter-and-the-prisoner-of-azkaban
CC BY 4.0. Part of the Canonical First-Edition Points of Issue dataset (https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/api/first-edition-titles.json). Last reviewed 2026-07-04.