UPDATED: Breaking the anagram: What J.K. Rowling said about Newt Scamander

by · October 7, 2014

We have all experienced that amazing awesomeness that is J.K. Rowling FINALLY embracing Twitter. She is tweeting up a storm these days, replying to fans questions, voicing her political opinion. We couldn’t be happier. The recent hysteria that Jo is penning a new Potter novel… well, it all started with a tweet.

 

Then a reply…


 

However, of course, she couldn’t leave it at that! She loves to present challenges to us – and we love to play them.

 

Since that tweet, the Internet has EXPLODED with websites tripping over themselves to try to figure out what the tweet means. It is, as Jo herself confirmed, an anagram. She even gave us a hint as to what the anagram relates to.

 

This one, RT’d by Jo from a Twitter user, gets us close.


 

We at MuggleNet have been pondering these tweets ourselves, and while we have yet to figure it out exactly, we have some great theories.

Eliza, from our content team, suggested, “the sentence structure seems so weird to me. I got ‘Newt Scamander’s New York Fairy Tales’ out of it but that leaves ‘fo u o r My wan to th none.’ Now my brain hurts.”

Yes, Eliza, so does ours.

I decided to see if I could gather some electronic help. I am good with words, but anagrams are not my strong suit. After removing the letters for “Newt Scamander” and “New York” – I assume those are in the final sentence – I was left with “yfouunFaawrMyaontolertthisnos.” I found an excellent website that when those letters were punched in, it spit out over 10,000 options. I have yet had time to read through them all, but here are a few of my (very ridiculous) favorites.

Newt Scamander hunts runaway ‘iron fly’ tomatoes of New York.

New York saloon hits fan fury; you matter now, Newt Scamander!

Oats town, New York, Nuthouse Fairy Farm – only Newt Scamander.

Let’s hope Jo reveals the answer soon because… well… clearly, we need help. We are guessing that one of the words is a new word, something she has made up – a new fantastic beast, perhaps? – thus making the anagram unsolvable.

One thing we DO know – this tweet refers specifically to Newt’s tale and not Harry’s.

 

UPDATE: Team StarKid actor Joe Moses might have it figured out, at least in part:

NEWS FROM AFAR TO NY! CUARON TO HEAD MY NEWT’S TALES! IN NEW YORK! Well @jk_rowling ??? @TheHPAlliance @tessanetting #harrypotter

— Joe Moses (@thejoemoses) October 7, 2014

Since a mention of who’s directing would definitely be a way to set the scene, it seems like Alfonso Cuarón might just be involved in the film, after all.

Do you have a theory on what the anagram says? Think you’ve figured it out? Share your thoughts below!

 

UPDATE (TWO):

And the anagram is finally solved! It took all evening, and plenty of tweets from Jo, but we finally got there. Here’s what happened:

Firstly, Jo followed her initial hint with another one:

As well as enlightening us all with what the anagram DIDN’T say:

In the frenzy of all the tweeting, Jo also realized that she had made a rather crucial typo:

Another tweet from a fan gave us another clue from Jo:

Jo also made it clear that all the words in the sentence were real words:

And then she gave us the third word of the sentence:

That gave us enough over here at MuggleNet to start getting closer to the real answer, and after many false starts, we got there and were quick to post it on Twitter:

Plenty of other people got there too, just as Jo tweeted a final clue:

By now, Newt was trending in the UK and the US. And then, it was all over:

Phew! What an evening. Before signing off, Jo teased a little bit more about Newt, and asked whether anyone wanted another riddle…

And on that note, it seems like we’re going to have to wait until the movie for anything else about Newt… Until then, we’ll just be here waiting for the next anagram!

Did you get there in the end? Let us know!

Kat Miller

I am a 40-something Ravenclaw/Slytherin from Massachusetts. I've been lucky in life and can attribute a lot of that to Harry Potter. Without it, I wouldn't have at least 80% of the things I do today, including my career & closest friends. I truly despise Sirius Black.