Translations -- validity Re: Great Works

I understand what you are saying about children's literature. It is difficult to do anything else as a child's scope is not so great as an adult's should be. That said, I do not believe in full domestication for adults. Some things are difficult and it is not possible to retain them. But for others there is no reason to domesticate.

For example, a simple thing in German:

'Herr Lasemann', simple: 'Herr Lasemann' in English. I would not opt for 'Herr' to be translated into 'Mr' as that would become too English. We are still in a German village.

'Herr Doctor/Wirt' is still possible in English: 'Herr Doctor/Innkeeper'. It brings something German into the text which you have kind of lost by translating it into English.

But 'die Herren Lasemann sind im Haus' is not easy anymore. You cannot translate into 'The Herrs Lasemann are in the house', nor 'Herren Lasemann...' So you need to go with 'gentlemen', but that's kind of sad, because it takes a little away from the form of address.

But I do not believe that translating names and forms of address is at all helpful. Unless it really cannot work in the target language as above because it is gramatically wrong.

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Originally Posted by kiki1982

For example, a simple thing in German:

'Herr Lasemann', simple: 'Herr Lasemann' in English. I would not opt for 'Herr' to be translated into 'Mr' as that would become too English. We are still in a German village.

'Herr Doctor/Wirt' is still possible in English: 'Herr Doctor/Innkeeper'. It brings something German into the text which you have kind of lost by translating it into English.

But 'die Herren Lasemann sind im Haus' is not easy anymore. You cannot translate into 'The Herrs Lasemann are in the house', nor 'Herren Lasemann...' So you need to go with 'gentlemen', but that's kind of sad, because it takes a little away from the form of address.

But I do not believe that translating names and forms of address is at all helpful. Unless it really cannot work in the target language as above because it is gramatically wrong.

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Addressing people is a tricky part. Why should not Herr be translated into "mister", as it means the same thing, if Doktor becomes "doctor"? (I don't know German, but isn't it written with a K in German instead of a C like in English?) It is a word, after all, and the same kind of addressing is used in English too. Why should this one word of German be preserved while the rest are translated?

With Finnish it's a bit more complicated. Sure you can translated Mr or Herr into "herra", which means the same thing, but the end result is a bit clumsy, as Finns avoid addressing each other as much as possible. In translating classics it's easier, as in old days Finns (at least the nobility) used polite forms of address. In modern literature, however, it just doesn't sound believable apart from very formal occasions if a speaker addresses people a lot. Partly this of course brings in the foreign culture, but in some cases it's really going to get only distracting and irritating. Often the compromise is to keep the address in certain situations and leave it out when it's not necessary. Of course that "necessary" is the word everyone has their own interpretation of...

P.S. Rest assured, full domestication for adults is a very rarely used method indeed in contemporary literature :)

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Originally Posted by Annamariah

.....A great portion of L. M. Montgomery's books that have been translated into Finnish are shorter and in some cases even cencored versions, which is a pity.....

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L M Montgomery censored? Why? :shocked:

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Originally Posted by kasie

L M Montgomery censored? Why? :shocked:

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I don't really know. In the translation of Emily of New Moon many of the impertinent comments she makes to and about her relatives have been left out, some parts have been made milder and so on. The other books are abridged ones, sure, but the overall feeling of the books is pretty much the same in Finnish than it is in English. Finnish Emilia is however much lamer person than the original Emily... Perhaps they didn't want Finnish children to take example of her :p It was translated in the 1920's.

Ah, I see, thank you - can't have children learning to be impertinent. :biggrin5:

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Originally Posted by Captain Pike

I am reading Dostoevsky's "The Idiot". I am really enjoying reading this old book published by Random House under their "THE MODERN LIBRARY", collection.
It says the book was translated from the Russian by Constance Garnett. The book reads well and I assumed that Random House would employ only the best of translators.

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i can't tell how i am supposed to react to this. if you're being serious, i'm about as sad as i am pissed off, if you're trolling - this is brilliant.

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Originally Posted by Annamariah

Addressing people is a tricky part. Why should not Herr be translated into "mister", as it means the same thing, if Doktor becomes "doctor"? (I don't know German, but isn't it written with a K in German instead of a C like in English?) It is a word, after all, and the same kind of addressing is used in English too. Why should this one word of German be preserved while the rest are translated?

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You are right about 'Doktor'. Thinking in English there ;).

I take your point about Finnish and formal and informal address. Still, in books with stories that play in an older period, it wouldn't go amiss. For modern books, that isn't possible though as that relies on modern culture and for the Fins that is a culture without address at all.

But I do not agree about translating the form of address in itself if at all possible. Indeed 'Mr'/'Mister' and 'Herr' do mean the same, but such things can always be understood by any public and if translated they take away the foreign feel of a work. Those particular things, together with currencies and other particulars that are unique to the original culture, are the only things left in a translation to give a feel of the original. If that goes, the whole cultural thing is gone.

A Frenchman addressing his public or someone in particular with 'Monsieur' or 'Madame' can easily also do that in a translation. You cannot call 'Monsieur' the brother of the French king 'Mister' as the role doesn't exist, but more to the point, 'Mrs Bovary' wouldn't sound very well. Or well-known figures as 'Mme de Montespan' could not be called 'Mrs de Montespan'. What should one do with the 'de' anyway? 'Of' is not an option because there is no English county or whatever area called Montespan and then she is also not a Lady per se. 'Mademoiselle' is also such a problem. Those French terms evoke a certain respect and a certain cultural thing in France that you cannot put into English.

Not to mention for example the term 'gentilhomme' in the musketeer-books. You could put 'gentleman' but it is not really that. It is a class of people of low nobility who are the honour of France and who went to fight for their country as officers. There is not such a class in Britain: nobility that was actually sometimes an equivlent of low middle class and sometimes even working class farmers, but with the honour of nobility; they were considered to take their own decisions idenpendently from the king.

I do not believe in domestication that way because, as I said, to me it is impossible to domesticate entirely as the book is still written in a certain culture and is preoccupied with certain things unique to that culture. Or one has to make it flat but then the whole point goes. It is even difficult to translate something into a modern version sometimes without taking away some content.

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Originally Posted by Captain Pike

I could only imagine that a learned fellow like Dostoevsky would be well-traveled and probably well-versed in several languages and would, in my opinion appropriately, pen his meanings in the languages that said them best.

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I'm not sure about this. From what (little) I've read I get the impression that *all* Russians of his class, learned or not, picked up French with their (gold label) Mother's milk. So Dostoevsky is not trying to 'look clever and well travelled' by using French, he is simply reflecting the speech patterns that his characters would use, and that he used while growing up in upper crust Russian society. Note, also, that French would not have been translated in a footnote, Dostoevsky and and Tolstoy just assumed that their original readers would understand French.

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Originally Posted by kiki1982

I understand what you are saying about children's literature. It is difficult to do anything else as a child's scope is not so great as an adult's should be. That said, I do not believe in full domestication for adults. Some things are difficult and it is not possible to retain them. But for others there is no reason to domesticate.

For example, a simple thing in German:

'Herr Lasemann', simple: 'Herr Lasemann' in English. I would not opt for 'Herr' to be translated into 'Mr' as that would become too English. We are still in a German village.

'Herr Doctor/Wirt' is still possible in English: 'Herr Doctor/Innkeeper'. It brings something German into the text which you have kind of lost by translating it into English.

But 'die Herren Lasemann sind im Haus' is not easy anymore. You cannot translate into 'The Herrs Lasemann are in the house', nor 'Herren Lasemann...' So you need to go with 'gentlemen', but that's kind of sad, because it takes a little away from the form of address.

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You can't use 'gentlemen' explicitly here. You can only say 'The Lasemanns are in the house'. I would translate Herr into English. You could drop the Mr in many circumstances, that would might retain some of the formality. For instance, English public school boys often refer to each other by surname, so 'Lasemann is in the house' retains some of the formality.

You could retain the formality in the plural by using mild irony 'The brothers Lasseman are in the house', or even mild insult 'the Lasseman big wigs are in the house' - if they are German scientists and the bar tender is English (and witty) you could imagine him saying, in an ironic tone, 'The Herr Professor Lassemans are in the house'. But then bar tender is probably German, so better not do that,... Blimey, I'm glad I'm not a translator...

This make me think that good translators must be totally bi-cultural, or that there should be two translators, one fluent in each languages - and they need to be very good at talking to each other!

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Originally Posted by mal4mac

This make me think that good translators must be totally bi-cultural, or that there should be two translators, one fluent in each languages - and they need to be very good at talking to each other!

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see: richard pevear and larissa volokhonsky

fak

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Originally Posted by kiki1982

I take your point about Finnish and formal and informal address. Still, in books with stories that play in an older period, it wouldn't go amiss. For modern books, that isn't possible though as that relies on modern culture and for the Fins that is a culture without address at all.

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Sure, as I said earlier, addressing people works in Finnish if the story doesn't happen in modern times. For example Jane Austen's characters can call each other "herra" (Mr), "rouva" (Mrs) and "neiti" (Miss) all they want without sounding strange.

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Originally Posted by kiki1982

But I do not agree about translating the form of address in itself if at all possible. Indeed 'Mr'/'Mister' and 'Herr' do mean the same, but such things can always be understood by any public and if translated they take away the foreign feel of a work. Those particular things, together with currencies and other particulars that are unique to the original culture, are the only things left in a translation to give a feel of the original. If that goes, the whole cultural thing is gone.

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I'm not sure I understand why "Herr" shouldn't be translated as "Mr", as the meaning is the same. I mean, the names of places and currencies are also translated to fit the target language, if there is an established domesticated name. Or are you saying that they shoud write Deutschland instead of Germany in an English translation of a German book?

I think culture is about so much more than the specific word used in the form of address. It's not just the way people talk, but also the way they act and think, it's all the customs and things specific and unique to one culture.

There are always some realia in texts (culture-bound elements and concepts, which pose particular translation problems in some situations), like Finnish "sauna" (a well-known one worldwide), or "jälkiuunileipä" (a certain kind of 100% rye bread, literally "after oven bread"), and those always add that that feeling of the original text and emphasize the source culture.

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Originally Posted by kiki1982

A Frenchman addressing his public or someone in particular with 'Monsieur' or 'Madame' can easily also do that in a translation. You cannot call 'Monsieur' the brother of the French king 'Mister' as the role doesn't exist, but more to the point, 'Mrs Bovary' wouldn't sound very well. Or well-known figures as 'Mme de Montespan' could not be called 'Mrs de Montespan'. What should one do with the 'de' anyway? 'Of' is not an option because there is no English county or whatever area called Montespan and then she is also not a Lady per se. 'Mademoiselle' is also such a problem. Those French terms evoke a certain respect and a certain cultural thing in France that you cannot put into English.

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This example of "Monsieur" when it is an established role in one culture and not in another is an example of realia, and should be treated as one. It still doesn't mean that in other situations "Monsieur" couldn't be translated as "mister".

I haven't read Madame Bovary, and I can't comment on whether Mrs. Bovary would be better or worse or the same as Madame Bovary. In Finnish the book is however called "Rouva Bovary". Often 'de', 'von', or 'van' or such are considered parts of the name, and left be while the translating the form of address. For example in Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca there are "herra ja rouva de Winter", "Mr. and Mrs. de Winter". I've seen this used a lot and it doesn't seem like a problem to me :)

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Originally Posted by kiki1982

Not to mention for example the term 'gentilhomme' in the musketeer-books. You could put 'gentleman' but it is not really that. It is a class of people of low nobility who are the honour of France and who went to fight for their country as officers. There is not such a class in Britain: nobility that was actually sometimes an equivlent of low middle class and sometimes even working class farmers, but with the honour of nobility; they were considered to take their own decisions idenpendently from the king.

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This is again realia, which can be translated in several ways. Sometimes the realia is just left out, sometimes it is used in exactly the same form as it appears in the source text, sometimes the orthography is domesticated, sometimes the word is explicated or replaced with a hypernym - the possibilities are numerous.

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Originally Posted by kiki1982

I do not believe in domestication that way because, as I said, to me it is impossible to domesticate entirely as the book is still written in a certain culture and is preoccupied with certain things unique to that culture. Or one has to make it flat but then the whole point goes. It is even difficult to translate something into a modern version sometimes without taking away some content.

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Full domestication of course isn't possible, and usually not desirable anyway, but still think that there is rarely a translation without some degree of domestication in it. Without any domestication a translation could easily become incomprehensible, especially if the source and target cultures differ greatly.

I find the translation of forms of address like 'Herr' or 'Monsieur' (except of course the realia) unnecessary and foremost, taking the cultural reference away. But obviously, there are certain precedents in certain languages. believe that Madame Bovary stays the same in English where obviously it is translated in Finnish.

No, I am not suggestion that 'Deutschland' should be kept that. But Berlin should stay Berlin or Brussels should stay Brussels.

Not sure whether this deserves my attention at all, but...

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Originally Posted by ktr

i can't tell how i am supposed to react to this. if you're being serious, i'm about as sad as i am pissed off, if you're trolling - this is brilliant.

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seems completely non sequitur. I don't expect any "reaction" to my opening the conversation about translation by simply telling the truth about my enjoyment of this work.
I'm not very well read and I'd like to improve upon this. At the same time, I happen to enjoy the experience. This book that I have came from my parents shelves. It has that nice dusty smell of the library; its pages are slightly yellowed and fragile. The binding is worn. It's a nice feeling for me to read through a book my parents enjoyed many years ago.

Trolling?! WTF? I'm a 50-year-old married guy in a wheelchair -- what's to troll? I don't even get your point.

I am glad to see that it is interesting topic, with lots of tangential musings. As our technological world grows, it has the effect of drawing our cultures together, in some ways. These are great times to be a student of life.
I think many of us are interested in the experiences and insight that made up a guy like Dostoyevsky. We are wanting to understand as best as possible, how he intended to portray this, humble and inquisitive, "mouse that roared". I nurture the "Idiot" in me.

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Originally Posted by Captain Pike

I think many of us are interested in the experiences and insight that made up a guy like Dostoyevsky. We are wanting to understand as best as possible, how he intended to portray this, humble and inquisitive, "mouse that roared". I nurture the "Idiot" in me.

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I'll skip the rest of your post and reply to this - constance garnett is the biggest joke when it comes to serious literature and translation. if you like her translations of Dostoevsky and Tolstoy, chances are - you like HER prose, not their prose. she routinely skips over entire passages that gave her too much trouble to translate, sometimes substituting her own. One can not read a her translation and claim to like the supposed author, they are not reading anything but her half-***, overproducing, word-garbage.

i apologize if i sound angry but the topic infuriates me, so many people just don't know what the deal is.

quick google search

http://www.newyorker.com/archive/200...a_fact_remnick

Waw, now that was an interesting article for me. It makes me even more determined to surpass the stage of Kak-vy-pozhivaetye-ya-pozhivayu-khorosho!

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Originally Posted by ktr

constance garnett is the biggest joke when it comes to serious literature and translation....

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Now that's trolling :)

The Oxford Guide to English Literature in Translation takes Constance Garnett very seriously: "Garnett's translations read easily... and the basic meaning of the Russian text is accurately rendered on the whole.... her fluent renderings allow Dostoevsky's current to pass over into English."

What more can you ask for?