23 British Authors Whose Books Were Renamed for American Readers

Sometimes, messages can get lost in translation (or in the Pond). This is perhaps never more true than in the world of literature, where books - especially those that sell internationally - contain cultural elements or word choices with which some readers may not be familiar. In these not-so-rare instances, publishers will sometimes rework a title, or even edit the main body of the book, in order to appeal to a particular country’s readership.

This, of course, is true of both Britain and the United States, who - given their shared language - have a generally broad admiration for the other’s literary works.

As you will see from the list below, there are one or two British authors whose works were frequently retitled for American readers, most notably those of Agatha Christie and P. G. Wodehouse (famous for the Jeeves and Wooster novels). In many instances, it is difficult to see why such alterations were made, while in the case of titles such as Christie’s Ten Little Niggers, it is starkly obvious. 

For other books, however, such as Philip Pullman’s Northern Lights (re-titled in the U.S. as The Golden Compass), alterations can be made based on a publisher’s mere interpretation of the front cover (Knof, the U.S. publisher of The Golden Compass, mistakenly thought their new title successfully referred to Lyra’s alethiometer. Even after Pullman had changed the trilogy name to His Dark Materials, Knof - so taken by the name - opted to leave The Golden Compass as the name of the first book).

Sometimes, and this is the case with Ted Hughes’ The Iron Man (retitled as The Iron Giant in the United States), books are renamed to avoid potential copyright infringement or general confusion between existing titles of the same name (Iron Man is, of course, a prominent member of the Marvel Universe).

In all there are hundreds of books - including the 83 listed below - that were renamed for an American readership. From Roald Dahl to J. K. Rowling, Aldous Huxley to Stephen Fry, here are 23 British authors whose books were retitled for American readers.

AUTHOR	UK TITLE	US TITLE
AGATHA CHRISTIE	4.50 from Paddington	What Mrs. MacGillicuddy Saw! as well as Murder, She Said
AGATHA CHRISTIE	After the Funeral	Funerals are Fatal
AGATHA CHRISTIE	Death in the Clouds	Death in the Air
AGATHA CHRISTIE	Destination Unknown	So Many Steps to Death
AGATHA CHRISTIE	Dumb Witness	Poirot Loses a Client
AGATHA CHRISTIE	Five Little Pigs	Murder in Retrospect
AGATHA CHRISTIE	Hickory Dickory Dock	Hickory Dickory Death
AGATHA CHRISTIE	Hercule Poirot's Christmas	Murder for Christmas, as well as A Holiday for Murder
AGATHA CHRISTIE	The Hollow	Murder After Hours
AGATHA CHRISTIE	Lord Edgeware Dies	Thirteen at Dinner
AGATHA CHRISTIE	The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side	The Mirror Crack'd
AGATHA CHRISTIE	The Moving Finger	The Case of the Moving Finger
AGATHA CHRISTIE	Mrs McGinty's Dead	Blood Will Tell
AGATHA CHRISTIE	Murder is Easy	Easy to Kill
AGATHA CHRISTIE	One, Two, Buckle My Shoe	An Overdose of Death as well as The Patriotic Murders.
AGATHA CHRISTIE	The Sittaford Mystery	The Murder at Hazelmoor
AGATHA CHRISTIE	Sparkling Cyanide	Remembered Death
AGATHA CHRISTIE	Taken at the Flood	There is a Tide
AGATHA CHRISTIE	They Do It With Mirrors	Murder With Mirrors
AGATHA CHRISTIE	Three Act Tragedy	Murder in Three Acts
AGATHA CHRISTIE	Why Didn't They Ask Evans?	The Boomerang Clue
AGATHA CHRISTIE	Murder on the Orient Express	Murder in the Calais Coach
AGATHA CHRISTIE	Ten Little Niggers	And Then There Were None
ALDOUS HUXLEY	Little Mexican	Young Archimedes
ANGELA CARTER	The Infernal Desire Machines of Doctor Hoffman	The War of Dreams
ANGELA CARTER	Shadow Dance	Honeybuzzard
ANNE FINE	Madame Doubtfire	Alias Madame Doubtfire
ANNE FINE	The More the Merrier	The True Story of Winter
DIANA WYNNE-JONES	Black Maria	Aunt Maria
DIANA WYNNE-JONES	Wilkins' Tooth	Witch's Business
ENID BLYTON	The Island of Adventure	Mystery Island
GRAHAM GREENE	Stamboul Train	Orient Express
IAN SERRAILLIER	The Silver Sword	Escape from Warsaw
J.K. ROWLING	Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone	Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
JENNY NIMMO	The Blue Boa	Charlie Bone and the Invisible Boy
JENNY NIMMO	The Castle of Mirrors	Charlie Bone and the Castle of Mirrors
JENNY NIMMO	Charlie Bone and the Shadow of Badlock	Charlie Bone and the Shadow
JENNY NIMMO	Charlie Bone and the Wilderness Wolf	Charlie Bone and the Beast
JENNY NIMMO	Emlyn's Moon	Orchard of the Crescent Moon
JENNY NIMMO	The Time Twister	Charlie Bone and the Time Twister
JOHN GARDNER	COLD	Cold Fall
LAURIE LEE	Cider With Rosie	Edge of Da
LEN DEIGHTON	Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Spy	Catch a Falling Spy
MARTIN HANDFORD	Where's Wally?	Where's Waldo?
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Over Seventy	America, I Like You
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Performing Flea	Author! Author!
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Blandings Castle and Elsewhere	Blandings Castle
P.G. WODEHOUSE	The Clicking of Cuthbert	Golf Without Tears
P.G. WODEHOUSE	The Heart of a Goof	Divots
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Lord Emsworth and Others	Crime Wave at Blandings
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Ukridge	He Rather Enjoyed It
P.G. WODEHOUSE	The Adventures of Sally	Mostly Sally
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Aunts Aren't Gentlemen	The Cat-nappers
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Barmy in Wonderland	Angel Cake
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Company for Henry	The Purloined Paperweight
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Frozen Assets	Biffen's Millions
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Galahad at Blandings	The Brinkmanship of Galahad Threepwood
P.G. WODEHOUSE	A Gentleman of Leisure	The Intrusion of Jimmy
P.G. WODEHOUSE	The Girl on the Boat	Three Men and a Maid
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Ice in the Bedroom	The Ice in the Bedroom
P.G. WODEHOUSE	The Inimitable Jeeves	Jeeves
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit	Bertie Wooster Sees It Through
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Jeeves in the Offing	How Right You Are, Jeeves
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Jill the Reckless	The Little Warrior
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Much Obliged, Jeeves	Jeeves and the Tie That Binds
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Pearls, Girls and Monty Bodkin	The Plot That Thickened
P.G. WODEHOUSE	A Pelican at Blandings	No Nudes is Good Nudes
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Right Ho, Jeeves	Brinkley Manor
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Ring for Jeeves	The Return of Jeeves
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Sam the Sudden	Sam in the Suburbs
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Something Fishy	The Butler Did It
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Something Fresh	Something New
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Summer Lightning	Fish Preferred
P.G. WODEHOUSE	The Coming of Bill	Their Mutual Child
P.G. WODEHOUSE	Joy in the Morning	Jeeves in the Morning
PETER GEORGE	Two Hours to Doom	Red Alert
PHILIP ARDAGH	Awful End	A House Called Awful End
PHILIP PULLMAN	Northern Lights	The Golden Compass
ROALD DAHL	The Great Automatic Grammatizator	The Umbrella Man and Other Stories
ROBERT GRAVES	The Golden Fleece	Hercules, My Shipmate
DICK KING-SMITH	Daggie Dogfoot	Pigs Might Fly
DICK KING-SMITH	The Sheep-Pig	Babe The Gallant Pig
STEPHEN FRY	The Stars' Tennis Balls	Revenge
TED HUGHES	The Iron Man	The Iron Giant

Laurence is a British expat living in Indianapolis, Indiana. He is a contributor for BBC America and writes a weekly column for Anglotopia. Having graduated from Lancaster University with a degree in English Language and Creative Writing, Laurence runs this blog, Lost In The Pond, charting the endless cultural and linguistic differences between Britain and The United States. 

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