Translation issues

[Koa]

I need some help with some words and expression. For an exam I have to translate the first chapter of an awful book written by a madwoman who moved to Italy from the USA... I will spare you from what I think of the book, which I didnt even manage to read beyond the 4th chapter... Anyway I thought I'd ask for help of natives so that I get some explanations of some words or expression so that I get to understand them well enough to find a valid way to translate them.

I also wanted to open a discussion about translation: how do you feel about it, what's your experience? I've always been aware of it being somehow a betrayal of the real text and a couple of years ago I adopted the rule of reading in original langauge everything I can possibly read in original. Anyway, one of my possible thoughts of future job was the translator-stuff. But this course I did at Uni discouraged me completely, making me realise how it is even harder than I expected, and how much it modifies the original text...it's terrible. And I'm experimenting it in 2 languages, English and Italian, that are relatively similar in some aspect, I mean what does it feel like to translate, let's say, from Chinese to Hungarian? From swahili to Bulgarian? From Korean to Albanian? It really freaks me out if I think about it too much.
Moreover, this book I am working on is extremely abstract so not really easy as a first try of serious translation (my previous experience of translation is songs, and a few of my own poems when I wanted to post them here). Honestly, it doesnt make sense...some sentences dont seem to make sense, it doesnt depend on my English, they just don't work. All the people in my course have serious doubts about the IQ of this writer (which btw we met...you don't wanna know).

You can find the book at your local bookstore anyway If you're American, that is...it took ages to get it shipped here, and it wasnt particularly cheap.

-------------------------------------------------------
I had a list of stuff to ask, anyway let's start with some:

what the hell means Ho-gauge? I googled it and it seemed related to stuff like toy trains... but I didnt really understand.

Do you have another word for enabler? Would you explain me this sentence? She's talking of her dog saying that "She has a round of eternal feeders [...] The worst enabler from our vantage point is Mrs..." The enabler and the vantage point are driving me mad, I need to be more sure of what this all means to put it in Italian.

Is there a difference between curious and searching, used as an adjective?
And between chisel and carve?
What's the diffirence between fade and wash out?

I also found the phone receiver referred to as the grey receiver. Is it some sort of fixed espression? That grey there doesnt make much sense to me, telephones can have different colours...

[Koa]

is "to keep to the straight and narrow" a fixed expression, or do I really have to struggle in making a sort of literal translation of it???

[Jay]

Not a native speaker... but you know that

to keep to the straight and narrow: socially approved way to live: the orthodox and law-abiding way to live life (informal)

vantage point: personal standpoint: a personal point of view

enabler: one that enables another to achieve an end; especially one who enables another to persist in self-destructive behavior (as substance abuse) by providing excuses or by helping that individual avoid the consequences of such behavior

HO gauge: a model railroad gauge of 5/8 in. (16 mm).
(gauge being the distance between rails, so imho HO gauge means that the rails of the model are 16 mm wide)

she has a round of eternal feeders: I'd translate it into 'English' as in there's always someone who'd give her some food

curious vs searching:
curious: synonyms inquisitive, nosy (or nosey), prying, snoopy
searching: as in... in my dict they list deep, inquisitory, speculative, observant kinda

chisel vs carve: guessing you mean verb kinda difference, right?
to chisel: to carve, cut, or work wood or stone using a chisel
to carve: to cut and shape a material such as wood or stone in order to make an object or design
so imho they are synonymous

fade vs wash out: again, guessing it's verb related
to fade: if it helps any... doubt it though, fade is mostly intransitive while wash out is alway transitive
disappear slowly: to die away or vanish gradually
to wash out:
exhaust somebody: to make somebody exhausted (informal)
end something: to bring something to an end (informal)

re the grey receiver thingy, I don't think it matters too much if the receiver is white, grey or pink as long as the context doesn't hint for some negative connotation

lol, so I'm insomniac at times

[Koa]

Well thanks, you shed some light on a couple of things (my dictionary didnt have that 'keep to the straight and narrow expression'...well now I'm sure of the meaning but the problem of translating remains...), but for some, like curious VS searching, I want to know if a native would perceive any significant difference or not. The point is, I looked it all up myself and have an opinion but I want to know a native's subtle and unconscious perception on those.

The grey receiver...what's the need of calling it the grey receiver? why didnt she write 'the receiver'? Sometimes to see if I'm following a good mental pattern when i translate I try to see if there were some words she could have used instead that would change the meaning slightly...probably futile as there might be words I dont know and it's probably not even a good method I guess...

The eternal feeders thing was clear, I just gave the whole sentence to put a context... I dont have a damn word for enabler in my language, at least not one that fits there.

Word of the day:
slick
What I found on dictionaries doesnt work in this contest, which is about the cat being taken on a plane journey, sitting in her box 'miserable and slick'. Maybe some American meaning?

--------------------
Still waiting for a discussion on translation in general.

[Koa]

fade vs wash out: again, guessing it's verb related
to fade: if it helps any... doubt it though, fade is mostly intransitive while wash out is alway transitive
disappear slowly: to die away or vanish gradually
to wash out:
exhaust somebody: to make somebody exhausted (informal)
end something: to bring something to an end (informal)

Of course, I forgot to add the TO

I thought they were quite similar...like colours fade as they go clearer with time and washing, and the colours wash out as they...uhm, they go clearer, but even more than when they fade. Now I dont remember exactly but there was somewhere where the word fade was used and I want to translate it in way that the dictionary gives as wash out but I dont want to change the meaning....
Oh wait, I found it, it was the opposite:
My life as a writer washed out into an undefined isolation
Would have made sense if it had been My life...faded into...?
What's the difference?

It's weird - but good for my vanity - when I realise that my English is not as good as I think when I get into these doubts...I dont perceive any major difference there, which means I havent developed enough sensibility to the language...It's a damn long process and probably it will never be perfect unless I live some years in England I guess...

That's why translation in general makes me go mad... It's all a question of perception and language has really little consciousness and lots of instinct, unless when you WANT to think about it and then gets doubt on everything (which btw I have also in my native language sometimes so it's not only and always a question of acquisition...)