From the Eugene [Oregon] Register-Guard and the Associated Press:
SALEM, Mass. - Hundreds of Harry Potter fanatics turned this historic seaport, best known for its witches and their trials, into a makeshift college campus fit for a young wizard.
In hotel ballrooms, professors from real-world universities led panel discussions with titles such as ''Bucolic Bullionism: Economics in the Wizarding World,'' ''Christianity and Harry Potter'' and ''Introduction to Spell Writing.''
On the city's common, students braved rain showers for a muddy game of Quidditch - minus the floating broomsticks.
Fans dressed as Lord Voldemort, Draco Malfoy and, of course, Harry Potter drew stares from tourists as they wandered through the streets of Salem's historic district.
The ''Witching Hour,'' a serious-minded five-day symposium on all things Potter that ended last week, suggests that adults may get as much from J.K. Rowling's series of novels as the young people who line up at midnight whenever a new book hits stores.
The Potter books chronicle the life of Potter and his cohorts as they attend Hogwarts, a magical boarding school.
''Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince,'' the most recent volume, had sold 11 million copies in the United States as of September. Potter books have now been translated into 63 languages, most recently Farsi. Worldwide sales top $300 million.
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