The first Icelandic edition of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone is one of the most iconic books for Harry Potter translation collectors. The cover artwork produced by Guðjón Ketilsson shows Harry in front of the Hogwarts Express in a similar view to the one depicted by Thomas Taylor for the first English edition. Ketilsson used his son, Hrafnkell Örn Guðjónsson “Keli”, as the model for Harry Potter depicted in the image.

The decision to publish Harry Potter in Icelandic was made by Snæbjörn Arngrimsson, the owner of Bjartur Publishing House (Reykjavik), who first read about Harry Potter in The Bookseller—an English book industry magazine. The first printing was published on 13 November 1999 and came out precisely at 13:11—a marketing stunt. Bjartur were very cautious and only printed 1,500 for the first print run as they didn’t expect it to be a big bestseller in Iceland—the book went on to sell over 12,000 in its first year

There was an unfortunate error on the cover of the first printing which has now become famous among collectors. Snæbjörn Arngrimsson mistakenly misspelled the authors name as “Joanna” Rowling, rather than “Joanne” which appears at the top of the front cover. This error was immediately spotted when the book returned from the printed and corrected to J. K. Rowling for the second printing, which also consisted of 1,500 copies. Despite the error the publishers continued to sell through their copies of the “Joanna” book as it was due to be out on 13 November 1999 and it was already late coming from the printers so nothing could be done to change it. After the second printing, at the request of Rowling’s agent, the original cover for the Icelandic editions was replaced by the Mary GrandPré artwork. After the error made to the cover the publishers didn’t want to dispute the change.

Copies of the first printing (the “Joanna” book) are the most sought after for collectors and in like new condition are valued around £500-700. Copies of the second printing (the “J. K.” book) are valued around £100-150.