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11.30am BST
Harry Potter breaks 400m in sales

The sales figures for the Harry Potter series have long dwarfed that of most other books, excepting of course the Bible, but with news that JK Rowling's magical tales have topped 400m worldwide, it seems possible that the boy wizard might be catching up.

According to Rowling's agent, Christopher Little, the seven Harry Potter books have so far been translated into 67 languages, amassing the 400m figure since the publication of the first book in the series, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, in 1997.

Despite the furious pace of sales, Harry Potter will still have his work cut out to catch the Bible, which, according to the Guinness Book of Records, has sold 2.5bn copies since 1815, and has been translated into 2,233 languages or dialects.

Rowling would be more likely to catch Mao Zedong's Little Red Book, which has reportedly sold 900m copies, but its sales are slowing down.

The final book in the series, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, was published in Europe and the US in July, its first American edition receiving a record-breaking print run of 12m copies.

It is to be published in Japan later this month, with a first edition print run of 2m, and a second edition already in preparation. The paperback will be published in Europe and the US on July 10 by Bloomsbury.

Rowling was also personally responsible for adding one more sale to the 400m-plus worldwide total, after she penned and sold for charity a short, 800-word prequel, raising £25,000 for Dyslexia Action and English PEN at auction last month.

This article was first published on guardian.co.uk on Wednesday June 18 2008. It was last updated at 11:43 on June 18 2008.

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