in re de stijl’s comment about translation yesterday.
I’ve done some short, non-fiction translations. Mostly short documents, both Spanish to English and English to Spanish. It is totally interpretation, even for non-fiction. With some gambling guides I worked on, it was easy to convey the meaning. Conveying the detached, formal, precise style was a bit harder.
I believe anything that can be expressed in one language, can be conveyed in any other language. But sometimes a word doesn’t have an exact equivalent. Consider the Spanish term “despensa.” The literal meaning is pantry, which seems simple enough. However, as used in the document I translated, it means “a small collection of packaged and canned foods, maybe along with some personal hygiene items.” Despensas is one means through which governments distribute aid.
I couldn’t think of an equivalent term in English. After some searching in online dictionaries and a discussion with the boss*, we went with “grocery baskets.” This term itself being further defined elsewhere in the document.
Translating wordplay is harder, and often impossible. It can be explained, but not conveyed as wordplay. Poetry is even worse. Pretty much to convey meaning, rhyme, and scan, requires coming up with a different poem that conveys the same feel and overall meaning. I know better than to even try.
Seems like a good time for an Adolph joke. Alas, it’s one I’ve told before.
One fine day at a generic Minimum Security Child Internment Center in Florida, the Guard asked her inmates, “Who can give me an example of the word “tragedy” used in a sentence?”
Inmate 4321 offers, “If I were to lose my keys, that would be a tragedy.”
The Guard says, “No 4321. That would merely be loss. Anyone else?”
Inmate 1234 says “If I were to fall and twist my ankle, that would be a tragedy.”
“No 1234, that would merely be misfortune.”
So, Inmate 5619 says “If El Generalisimo President For Life and Supreme Leader Kim Jung Adolph trump were to die, that would be a tragedy.”
Very good, 5619. It would be indeed a tragedy if El Generalisimo President For Life and Supreme Leader Kim Jung Adolph trump. How did you figure this out?
“Well, explains 5619, “it wouldn’t be loss or misfortune.”
I’ve done some short, non-fiction translations. Mostly short documents, both Spanish to English and English to Spanish.
The hardest thing I ever succeeded (?) at was to translate the libretto of Fauré’s Cantique de Jean Racine into an English setting that could still be sung. I smugly thought it wouldn’t be that big a deal… it was short, and the French was pretty straightforward… oof.
I’ve seen some news stories lately about how ‘Americans are sleepwalking to autocracy” or some version thereof. Here’s my thought. We’ve been talking and yelling about what a shite f’ing moral monster tfg is since the beginning. Where was the press to start. These same people gave him every benefit of the doubt and every excuse in the world, and only now this occurred to you. And these same people are now self congratulating themselves as if they’ve discovered some new threat when the shitshow has been evident all along. I wanna say, fuck those people. And welcome aboard.
A teacher once challenged the class to translate Joan Manuel Serrat’s “Mediterraneo” to English. I got a good grade on it, but the translation sucked.
Here’s the beginning of the original:
Quizás porque mi niñez
Sigue jugando en tu playa
Y escondido tras las cañas
Duerme mi primer amor
Llevo tu luz y tu olor
Por dondequiera que vaya
Now my feeble attempt:
Perhaps because my childhood
keeps playing on your shores
Hidden behind the reeds
Sleeps my first love
I carry your light and scent
Wherever it is I go.
I think I can convey the literal meaning, but not the passion Serrat feels for the ocean he grew up with.
@Kathy: A lot of my favorite books are translations. And some are different translations of the same work (Robert Fagles and Emily Wilson have radically different translations of Homer’s The Odyssey — same plot, but so much else is different).
I am in awe of the translation of Stanislaw Lem’s The Cyberiad as it is chock full of wordplay and puns that were either adapted, replaced or just plain added (I can’t read the original, so how would I know?)
In 2014(!) it was discovered that the Icelandic translation of Bram Stoker’s Dracula was radically different from the original to the point where it’s almost a different book.
It’s not easy or simple. I am in awe of the translators who work through the headphones in UN meetings. Not only do they have to be very careful, they have to do it while the person is still speaking…and mistakes could be serious.
For your entertainment, the latest UK YouGov polling:
Lab 45%
Con 22% INJECT ME!
Tent pegs, I tells ‘ee. LOL
The Lodestone aggregator by constituency indicates that even where I live (Bromsgrove) is a possible Labour gain, for the first time in decades.
I might just ask about doing some helping out with the local party, so long as they don’t expect me to join.
I’m not much of a joiner, LOL.
And there we go about the problems of translation. 😉
IIRC his registered birth name was Adolfus.
Corresponding to Old English Eadelwulf, if my OE memory serves.
Cue loads of Ængle-Seaxe wanting to smack Hitlers’ sorry ass.
La traducción es traición; translation is treason.
I think this was originally in French, but it works in Italian and probably in all Romance (or Romance influenced) languages. I just checked, and it works in Romanian.
@Kathy: It is currently settled copyright law that a translation is a derivative work of the original language work and thus a copyright infringement. It is also settled copyright law that copyright applies only to specific expressions and not the underlying ideas. Which makes it a lot less clear that someone who is taking the fundamental ideas of a work in one language and expresses it in completely different words in another is really creating a derivative (infringing) work.
Although the author dismisses some of these measures, he lays the facts out clearly.
TL;DR, launching rockets from mountaintops does help, but would be too expensive and logistically challenging. Launching closer to the equator does help a lot, but not enough for NASA to switch from Florida to a more southern location. It would help Russia a lot more (as illustrated with launches of Russian boosters from French Guiana).
Oh dear…talk about a neighbor from hell…
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/bc-lawyer-pseudolegal-lawsuit-1.7025394
When I saw the piece was from Canadian news I was certain they were talking about the US.
in re de stijl’s comment about translation yesterday.
I’ve done some short, non-fiction translations. Mostly short documents, both Spanish to English and English to Spanish. It is totally interpretation, even for non-fiction. With some gambling guides I worked on, it was easy to convey the meaning. Conveying the detached, formal, precise style was a bit harder.
I believe anything that can be expressed in one language, can be conveyed in any other language. But sometimes a word doesn’t have an exact equivalent. Consider the Spanish term “despensa.” The literal meaning is pantry, which seems simple enough. However, as used in the document I translated, it means “a small collection of packaged and canned foods, maybe along with some personal hygiene items.” Despensas is one means through which governments distribute aid.
I couldn’t think of an equivalent term in English. After some searching in online dictionaries and a discussion with the boss*, we went with “grocery baskets.” This term itself being further defined elsewhere in the document.
Translating wordplay is harder, and often impossible. It can be explained, but not conveyed as wordplay. Poetry is even worse. Pretty much to convey meaning, rhyme, and scan, requires coming up with a different poem that conveys the same feel and overall meaning. I know better than to even try.
@Kathy: Maybe “Care package”?
Plato, pilates and pubs: has an Irish town found the secret to the good life?
And thus begins the ruination of Skerries, Co Dublin, Ireland.
@OzarkHillbilly:
Me too. But it could be worse … She could be our neighbor, eh?
@Flat Earth Luddite: I am very fortunate in the neighbors I have. All 3 of them. MYOB is our motto.
On the good news side of the balance sheet, today marks 4,418 days since my cancer diagnosis. Whoo Hoo!
@OzarkHillbilly:
That’s pretty much the way New England is. Happily.
Seems like a good time for an Adolph joke. Alas, it’s one I’ve told before.
One fine day at a generic Minimum Security Child Internment Center in Florida, the Guard asked her inmates, “Who can give me an example of the word “tragedy” used in a sentence?”
Inmate 4321 offers, “If I were to lose my keys, that would be a tragedy.”
The Guard says, “No 4321. That would merely be loss. Anyone else?”
Inmate 1234 says “If I were to fall and twist my ankle, that would be a tragedy.”
“No 1234, that would merely be misfortune.”
So, Inmate 5619 says “If El Generalisimo President For Life and Supreme Leader Kim Jung Adolph trump were to die, that would be a tragedy.”
Very good, 5619. It would be indeed a tragedy if El Generalisimo President For Life and Supreme Leader Kim Jung Adolph trump. How did you figure this out?
“Well, explains 5619, “it wouldn’t be loss or misfortune.”
@Kathy:
Didn’t Hitler spell his first name “Adolf”?
@Kathy:
The hardest thing I ever succeeded (?) at was to translate the libretto of Fauré’s Cantique de Jean Racine into an English setting that could still be sung. I smugly thought it wouldn’t be that big a deal… it was short, and the French was pretty straightforward… oof.
I’ve seen some news stories lately about how ‘Americans are sleepwalking to autocracy” or some version thereof. Here’s my thought. We’ve been talking and yelling about what a shite f’ing moral monster tfg is since the beginning. Where was the press to start. These same people gave him every benefit of the doubt and every excuse in the world, and only now this occurred to you. And these same people are now self congratulating themselves as if they’ve discovered some new threat when the shitshow has been evident all along. I wanna say, fuck those people. And welcome aboard.
@DrDaveT:
A teacher once challenged the class to translate Joan Manuel Serrat’s “Mediterraneo” to English. I got a good grade on it, but the translation sucked.
Here’s the beginning of the original:
Quizás porque mi niñez
Sigue jugando en tu playa
Y escondido tras las cañas
Duerme mi primer amor
Llevo tu luz y tu olor
Por dondequiera que vaya
Now my feeble attempt:
Perhaps because my childhood
keeps playing on your shores
Hidden behind the reeds
Sleeps my first love
I carry your light and scent
Wherever it is I go.
I think I can convey the literal meaning, but not the passion Serrat feels for the ocean he grew up with.
@clarkontheweekend: Come and sit next to me.
@Kathy: A lot of my favorite books are translations. And some are different translations of the same work (Robert Fagles and Emily Wilson have radically different translations of Homer’s The Odyssey — same plot, but so much else is different).
I am in awe of the translation of Stanislaw Lem’s The Cyberiad as it is chock full of wordplay and puns that were either adapted, replaced or just plain added (I can’t read the original, so how would I know?)
In 2014(!) it was discovered that the Icelandic translation of Bram Stoker’s Dracula was radically different from the original to the point where it’s almost a different book.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Powers_of_Darkness_(Iceland)
The Icelandic translation has since been translated into English.
@Kathy:
Su translacion es muy, muy bueno.
@Kathy:
It’s not easy or simple. I am in awe of the translators who work through the headphones in UN meetings. Not only do they have to be very careful, they have to do it while the person is still speaking…and mistakes could be serious.
@Flat Earth Luddite:
Congrats. I’m over 5,000 days since being diagnosed Stage IV.
@CSK:
Also, Old England.
“Do what thou wilt, but keep the bloody noise down.”
For your entertainment, the latest UK YouGov polling:
Lab 45%
Con 22%
INJECT ME!
Tent pegs, I tells ‘ee. LOL
The Lodestone aggregator by constituency indicates that even where I live (Bromsgrove) is a possible Labour gain, for the first time in decades.
I might just ask about doing some helping out with the local party, so long as they don’t expect me to join.
I’m not much of a joiner, LOL.
@CSK:
And there we go about the problems of translation. 😉
IIRC his registered birth name was Adolfus.
Corresponding to Old English Eadelwulf, if my OE memory serves.
Cue loads of Ængle-Seaxe wanting to smack Hitlers’ sorry ass.
@CSK:
traducción 🙂
@Kathy:
Muchas gracias.
La traducción es traición; translation is treason.
I think this was originally in French, but it works in Italian and probably in all Romance (or Romance influenced) languages. I just checked, and it works in Romanian.
@Kathy: It is currently settled copyright law that a translation is a derivative work of the original language work and thus a copyright infringement. It is also settled copyright law that copyright applies only to specific expressions and not the underlying ideas. Which makes it a lot less clear that someone who is taking the fundamental ideas of a work in one language and expresses it in completely different words in another is really creating a derivative (infringing) work.
@Gustopher:
It would be hard to learn several languages in order to read some books in their original version.
@dazedandconfused:
Yeah, that looks hard and stressful.
A rather good video about ways to ameliorate the first mile problem in space launches.
Although the author dismisses some of these measures, he lays the facts out clearly.
TL;DR, launching rockets from mountaintops does help, but would be too expensive and logistically challenging. Launching closer to the equator does help a lot, but not enough for NASA to switch from Florida to a more southern location. It would help Russia a lot more (as illustrated with launches of Russian boosters from French Guiana).