Issues with some Methods of Translation

[bIGwIRE]

While I wish I had the time and resources to learn new languages, reality insists that I rely on translators to provide me with access to many great works of literature. I am fully aware that many things, especially the rhythm, metres, and so on, do not translate well from one language to another, but this is something I must live with. Most of the time doing so is fine, and I make the concession without even realising what I'm probably missing.

My issue is this;
When reading poetry, poetic prose, or plays in my own language, I am always disappointed when a translator attempts to stay true to the style, while sacrificing the content of the piece. I recently purchased the Oresteia trilogy by Aeschylus, plays I've read before and absolutely loved, but in this edition, the translator, who I won't name, insisted on preserving the rhythm and style of the original Greek, and, in my humble opinion, butchered this amazing work. This happened to me once before this with an edition of Pushkins poetry. It was unreadable.

So, what do you think? Is it more important for a piece of poetry to rhyme in the same places in English as it did in the original Russian, Greek, ect? Or is it more important to preserve the content, or message? Can a translator do both, and still be successful?

I was really excited to receive my new edition of Aeschylus and read it with my wife, but, in my opinion, it is unreadable gibberish, pompous, and insulting.

My name is bigwire, and that is why I'm pissed.

[kiki1982]

Now you have landed with the right person. My husband and I make a living from professional translation. There is someone else on here, Finnish who was studying translation. It has been a while since I've seen her around, but maybe she'll pay us a visit.

I believe, when translating a text (any text, but here it's lit), you have 4 options:

1. leave everything as it is and in poetry copy the number of syllables, the rhythm, the rhyme etc. exactly. Mostly that is impossible, because of the nature of the language.
2. decide to make a prose translation of a poem, retaining the message, the imagery, etc. but leaving the truly poetic bit out, as it is not possible to retain it together with everyting else. This mostly OK for normal texts.
3. decide to do blank verse, no rhyme, but rhythm.
4. do an in-beteenie form: maybe changing the rhyme pattern, the number of lines or whatever, but retaining the message, imagery, etc. only in a different shape.

I far prefer the last. If you make a prose translation, you take away the poetry of a work. In later times (not talking Greek, back then there was nothing but poetry to write things almost), if an author like Pushkin decided to write Jevgeny Onegin in epic form, then it has a reason. If you take away the message, you might as well not have translated anything. Pointless. It happens a lot though. As a literary translator, you don't only have to be creative (for poetry more so, that's why on principle, I refuse to do poetry, I'm sh*te at it), but you need to have your eyes and your ears open. Anything, the smallest word, can have a significance, double meaning, and if you miss it you deprive your readers of that. As far as I can see, in the translation community, there is very little feeling of that. They have a feeling for style, but not for deeper things (or most, anyway; not to judge them all). It's a bit sad.

Ideally, translating a literary work, you should have someone who is an adept reader in that language/culture, to read along with you and tell you where the snags are. Words can have a meaning in one culture or to one writer. A translator might not know that.

Indeed, the butchery that went on in several translations of Cyrano de Bergerac is quite sad.Certainly if you realise its writer got the Légion d'Nonneur for it...

[Charles Darnay]

I got into a debate over Vergil's Aeneid regarding the prose translations: actually, I have had several of these debates. Certain academics seem vehemently opposed to the prose translation - saying that if you take away the poetry you are destroying the text, and are in no position to do any analytic work on it. While I agree that there is no true (from an academic standpoint) substitute for the original language, I cannot stand the people who would rather see everything else butchered in the name of keeping the text in verse because that's how it was written.

Latin verse does not translate all that well: the lines become so shifted and the rhythm has to be completely altered to force Latin sentence structure into English.

Furthermore, when dealing with Ancient Greek and Latin works - many of them were oral, or written in the oral tradition. So the rhythm was mainly there to serve a cue for the speaker - a way to ground his memory. The rhythm and meter of Homer and Vergil is not the same as the meter or rhythm of Shakespeare or Milton - or anyone following.

When it comes to the four categories listed above, I think that you would have to apply them to each text specifically. In the case of ancient texts - I would go for number 2.

[PeterL]

I think that it is often a mistake to translate poetry, because it is impossible to put everything in to the new language; either style or content has to be greatly altered. The only successful job of translating poetry into a different that I know of was Fitzgerald's translation of the Rubyyat of Omar Khayyám, which I understand is regarded by some as superior to the original.

There are many problems with translations, and some people who do translations shouldn't.

[Pierre Menard]

In regards to poetry, I think it's important to read a text in multiple translations if you have them at your disposal. I find the more translations I read of a poet, the easier it can be to grasp certain constant characteristics of the author that are there across the board and which characteristics seem to be personal to the translator.

As for translators, I think it'd have to depend on the text. Some texts are driven more stylistically and you'd want to be able to bring that across on some level. The same applies to tone and mood I feel. If you take a poet like Baudelaire for example, knowing what I know about what's said of his poetry in French, when translated into English, you'd want the translator to be able to give you that atmospheric sensuousness that is so regarded in his own language.

But then, there are other texts that lend themselves to a more literal translator.

As a reader, you'd probably want a balance, but the balance can sway depending on the text.

[bIGwIRE]

Now you have landed with the right person. My husband and I make a living from professional translation. There is someone else on here, Finnish who was studying translation. It has been a while since I've seen her around, but maybe she'll pay us a visit.

I believe, when translating a text (any text, but here it's lit), you have 4 options:

1. leave everything as it is and in poetry copy the number of syllables, the rhythm, the rhyme etc. exactly. Mostly that is impossible, because of the nature of the language.
2. decide to make a prose translation of a poem, retaining the message, the imagery, etc. but leaving the truly poetic bit out, as it is not possible to retain it together with everyting else. This mostly OK for normal texts.
3. decide to do blank verse, no rhyme, but rhythm.
4. do an in-beteenie form: maybe changing the rhyme pattern, the number of lines or whatever, but retaining the message, imagery, etc. only in a different shape.

I far prefer the last. If you make a prose translation, you take away the poetry of a work. In later times (not talking Greek, back then there was nothing but poetry to write things almost), if an author like Pushkin decided to write Jevgeny Onegin in epic form, then it has a reason. If you take away the message, you might as well not have translated anything. Pointless. It happens a lot though. As a literary translator, you don't only have to be creative (for poetry more so, that's why on principle, I refuse to do poetry, I'm sh*te at it), but you need to have your eyes and your ears open. Anything, the smallest word, can have a significance, double meaning, and if you miss it you deprive your readers of that. As far as I can see, in the translation community, there is very little feeling of that. They have a feeling for style, but not for deeper things (or most, anyway; not to judge them all). It's a bit sad.

Ideally, translating a literary work, you should have someone who is an adept reader in that language/culture, to read along with you and tell you where the snags are. Words can have a meaning in one culture or to one writer. A translator might not know that.

Indeed, the butchery that went on in several translations of Cyrano de Bergerac is quite sad.Certainly if you realise its writer got the Légion d'Nonneur for it...

Thank you for your reply, Kiki.
I can only imagine the amount of work it takes to learn a language well enough to translate it, and not only the language, but the customs, history, ect... When reading translations like the one that prompted this thread, it seems as if some translators combine all that work and talent with a sense of entitlement, or even arrogance. He seemed more concerned with his own work than being faithful to the original author, or me, the reader. A stance like that makes me wonder why he didn't just write his own works?

Thank you for being the kind of translator that takes her responsibility seriously, and with humility.

[bIGwIRE]

I think that it is often a mistake to translate poetry, because it is impossible to put everything in to the new language; either style or content has to be greatly altered. The only successful job of translating poetry into a different that I know of was Fitzgerald's translation of the Rubyyat of Omar Khayyám, which I understand is regarded by some as superior to the original.

There are many problems with translations, and some people who do translations shouldn't.

I'm not sure if it is a mistake, Peter, because readers, like me, still need it to be done for us. To call it successful? Yeah I agree, it isn't really the same work at all outside the original tounge. If one has to be altered, Style or Content, to make it readable in my language, then I greatly preffer the style to be altered. This isn't because I put one over the other, but because I find it easier to imagine what the original style must have been like, than to imagine what the original content must have been, if that makes sense.

[PeterL]

I'm not sure if it is a mistake, Peter, because readers, like me, still need it to be done for us. To call it successful? Yeah I agree, it isn't really the same work at all outside the original tounge. If one has to be altered, Style or Content, to make it readable in my language, then I greatly preffer the style to be altered. This isn't because I put one over the other, but because I find it easier to imagine what the original style must have been like, than to imagine what the original content must have been, if that makes sense.

If all essential elements of the original can be put into another language, then the work can be translated, but in cases where some essential part of the original can't be translated, then a new and different work will exist in the second language. II have read such things, and they can be good, but readers should be warned that such incomplete translations are significantly different from the original. Generally, there are no warnings about the quality of the translations, but there should be.