Translation as an Original Work

No matter how, we tried to get away from this question, the "Strict literal translation vs. free translation" continued popping into my head last night. There was no avoiding it. Until we can agree on what qualifies as a translation, and what are the inherent goals of translation, we can't really say anything concrete about the semantics of the word. Even the OED leaves it open to our interpretation. Should we even bother attempting to define this? I would like to try in order to garner the class' opinions, and get them in a centralized location. I will attempt to make an argument for both sides of the issue.

Literal translation. The ideal is to take two languages and stick an equals sign between the two relating to a piece of writing. A supposedly impossible task, considering that as much as one word seems to equate to another, the entire history of the word gives it a slightly different contextual meaning. As we saw last week, in the OED, even the word "translate" originally has a different primary meaning than is used today. "To bear, convey, or remove from one person, place or condition to another; to transfer, transport" (from dictionary.oed.com). Where as in another language there may not be the same semiotic history. En français, la définition est "transposer un discours, un texte, l'exprimer dans une langue différente" (from larousse.com). Perhaps a better comparison to make would be between these words: Canis, Cane, Chien, Hund, Собака, Perro, 犬 (Inu), הונט, Dog, and even Dawg. These words all come from different idioms and have different histories, some of the words in the list are similar to each other, leading to up to "dawg" which has completely evolved into a different meaning as I am sure Ella will talk about in her final project. Even though it is impossible to make deux égal dos, we can come close enough to make simple sentences nearly equal. As semantics in idioms get more complex the ideas become harder to communicate. This is where the term "literal translation" enters the equation. Literalists would say, when the ideas become complex and thus incommunicable via an one to one translation, continue translation as if it were still possible to translate one to one, and then just create footnotes to explain the strange phrasings of passages; the object being to bring the reader to the foreign-ness of a piece and attempt to emulate the feeling of the foreign language. The benefits of this method are a near perfect faithfulness to the original, making the translator as invisible as possible. The deficit, however, is the piece becomes confusing and inaccessible to its target audience, as the "skyscrapers of footnotes" overwhelm, and the odd phrasings alienate said audience.

On the other hand, we have "free translation." This method attempts to preserve the meaning, but potentially sacrifices the foreign-ness and the inherent uniqueness of that idiom in the process. This is not always the case. In some cases (none jump to mind, but I am sure they exist), the foreign feeling of the original is transmitted through a free translation, but often as not, free translations take away from, or betray the original. The question now, is whether a free translation can still be called a translation at all. If I were to ask the OED, one of its definitions of translate is: To interpret, explain; to expound the significance of (conduct, gestures, etc.); also, to express (one thing) in terms of another. This seems to fit well with the idea of free translation. When the free translation comes under attack, some authors or critics defend the work being prosecuted by asking the criticizers to consider the work in question as something separate from the original, to evaluate the piece on it's own without comparing it to its predecessor. Although this may artificially increase the quality or value of the free translation, it no longer fits the definition of any translation. I would call this a "free" or a "not worth the time to read, because it's plagiarism." The point being that free translations seem to run away a bit with the first part of the term, and can even forget about the second part.

Ideally, a translation would fall somewhere between these two extremes, being faithful to the original, word for word, as much as possible, and at the same time, changing words in order to keep the meaning, and context accurate. Does this succeed as a translation? No. But like many have said before, we must keep trying.

amour, amor, amore, something, something, something and fish eggs.

I want Amour Trilingue.

But that is beside the point.

I find it impossible to read theory without a pen. There are so many thoughts that come to mind and connections to be made. There are also words and themes that are quite difficult to comprehend at first read.

There are two theories that have intrigued me.

One: translation that separates language and culture.

Two: things that are not translatable.

My feeling is that language and culture cannot be separated. I also believe that there are some things that cannot be translated.

In Language and Words, there is a passage that represents the idea that language and culture cannot be separated. [This is an we didn’t have to read…yet?] “We will never grasp the spirit of the foreign language if we first translate each word into our tongue and then associated it with is conceptual affinity in the language—which does not always correspond to the concepts of the source language” (Theories-Schopenhauer, 33). There are just times when one has to think in the foreign language. And in order to do that, they must know a bit about the culture. I supposed I feel strongly about this because there are a lot of things in Japanese that cannot be translated. For instance, the word ‘えんりょう’literally translates to extreme politeness in English. But it’s a cultural thing as well. Someone who is ‘えんりょう‘　is someone who goes out of their way for other people, or often holds back their feelings in order to please other people. Often my Japanese friends will tell me えんりょうなくで。。。which means ‘don’t worry about being so extremely polite. However, even as I write this, I know that I am not fully explaining the idea behind enryou. It’s just something that I accept in the Japanese language and culture．Perhaps someone can give me an instance where it is ok. But even with Spanish in America and the multiple cognates, it is impossible to completely learn the language without learning about the culture and being able to use it properly without knowing the culture.

We’ve also seen in many of our readings, such as Nabokov or Suh, that in order to understand translations of older pieces, one should know the historical background of the source text. Translating those pieces and then trying to understand them would be impossible without the cultural references and knowledge.

I think I am glad that culture and language cannot be separated in my mind. I feel that it would take away so much from the learner. However, I also see why learning a language is not as popular as I would think. One has to put in a lot of time and effort and has to, at times, let go of their home culture, which can be scary for people’s identities, and transfer their energy to another ‘culture’. Do they feel a sense of betrayal to the home culture? I’ve talked with Shiloh about having a different personality in different languages. I don’t mind it, but I can see why people would be uncomfortable with the idea or actual time in which they ‘switch cultures’. What do you all think?

As we’ve read “The answer to the question, “can one translate a poem?” is of course no” (Theories: Bonnefoy, 187). Poems are probably the number one thing that just cannot be translated. And I’m speaking separate from the theory that you needd the culture. Which I think might be contradicting myself. Because if I stand by my above argument, then nothing can ever be translated…..

Okay. Nothing can ever be accurately translated. But the definition of accurate is a fine line. The word love can be translated into any culture without culture backgr…..actually no. It holds weight in different languages/cultures, that cannot ‘accurately’ represent the word. Especially in English now, where ‘I love you, ya, u and luv u’ are all synonymous.

This is upsetting me.

So I will continue it later. But I want responses!!! what am I trying to get across......かなあああああ。

Translation can be something beautiful?

When I was reading the Article "Translation in a Global Market" I noted on the side the thought of losing the 'beauty of translation.' If we were to become this transnational monoculture there would be no need for translations. This thought made me kind of sad and I wondered at the idea of translations themselves being an art form (kind of what we talked about in some of the earlier articles where translations are creative works of their own). Maybe there is even something beautiful about a "bad" translation. I am the sort of person who likes "bad" movies because of how bad they are. Every halloween we watch a horrible scary movie like "Teeth" or "Cheerleader Massacre" because of how terrible the plots are and how awkward the acting is. There's something that is absolutely wonderful about watching these and I wonder if even bad translations have a sort of beauty to them. Maybe the beauty is the clumsy attempt at bridging two worlds. It is almost what makes us human. Human beings are social creatures and translations are an attempt to be social.
I really feel that in the imperfect translations between people there can be something gained or learned. It is what makes us human, the mistakes or misunderstandings that we have. If there were just machines that could translate everything absolutely perfectly there would be no mistakes or misunderstandings and the human part of it, the part of it that separates us from other creatures or things would be obsolete and then what would be the point in being human?
Not to mention almost all the plot lines for creative writers would be taken away. So many stories rely on misunderstandings between people. What if these translating machines not only translated perfectly from other languages, but just from one person to the next? Then there would be no misunderstandings ever.

Other topics of discussion – 10/20/10

Discussion today was fantastic, by the way. Here are the topics from the agenda we maybe didn't get to go really in-depth with, and my explanation of a couple of them below.

Translating Japanese
• Agency: Emphasis on verbs and adjectives rather than subjects. p 145.

Global Market
• "Diplomat" electronic translation, p 8-10
• Homogeneity and translation: Mass culture, colonial/neocolonial capitalism
• "Transnationally translatable monoculture", p 3
• Babel stories, p 7-9
• Summary, p 11-12
• Formation of a mass cultural object [think too of the "mass culture" described later on in Just a Couple of Days!]

Fake Farsi
• Riffing and diggability
• Linguistic determinism, p 44
• Relationship to Grammar Games p 94
• Stopping all language but poetry [link to Q'uranic recitation, if applicable: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H6ZNPSHnqGk ]
• What does Shiloh think?
• Exile and cultural identity p 139; politics of choosing a language in Global Market, p 5

Clockwork Orange
• Discernability of words
• What's the point of slang?
• Why Russian?


What does Shiloh think about the Fake Farsi article?
Well, this wasn't the sole article that made me want to teach this class; reading A Clockwork Orange over the summer actually made me completely and utterly thrilled about the potential that playing with language has in both a creative context and with linguistic implications—like why Anthony Burgess chose to use anglicized Russian as the slang counterpart to the youth subculture, and what that might say about the culture. Do I know for sure? No, not at all, but it's fun to speculate, and I'd love to see or hear thoughts along those lines [especially for those of you who might know something about Soviet culture in 1962 when the book had its first copyright]. I think the Fake Farsi article has valid points—you can fool someone who doesn't know the language well by mimicking the sound contours of a language, and for a concrete example, babies do this when they start to babble. They have spent their lives up to that point listening to the particular sounds, both phonemic and prosodic, of their native language, and when they begin to babble, they like to play with sounds that they have heard, possibly in an effort to open more lines of communication. It's clearly not the language and some would argue that it isn't a language at all, but it's the beginnings of one.

In addition to that, the Fake Farsi continues with the point that we've spent a lot of time discussing, that of the question of culture and language being related. Sometimes it helps to look at things from a lot of different angles.

Possibly my favorite article dealing with topics of translation is to be read next week, the one with Queer Caribbean Localities in its title. It was one of those that really brought home some of the realities of translating and some of the real difficulties in doing so, in particular building a character with particular traits [as it were]. As always, open-ended speculation is always welcome.


Some of the words in Clockwork Orange [first two pages] appropriated from Russian, with their meanings intact:
• horrorshow: хорошо, khorosho, good
• glazzies: глаз, glaz, eye
• rot: рот, rot, mouth
• moloko: молоко, moloko, milk
• droog: друг, droog, friend
• mesto: место, mesto, place
• skorry: скоро, skora, quickly
• starry: старый, staryih, old
• rassoodock[s]: рассудок, rassudok; reason, mind
• raz: раз, raz, time
• veshch: вещь, veshch, thing
• Bog: бог, bog, God
• mozg: мозг, mozg, brain
• peet[ing]: петь, peet', to sing
• deng: денг, deng, money
• vidd[y/ing]: видеть, videt', to see
• veck: человек, chyelovek, man
• ptitsa: птица, ptitsa, bird [i.e., girl]
• tolchok: толчок, tolchok; hit, impact
• kartoffel: картофель, kartofel', potato
• smeck[ing/ed]: смех, smekh, laugh
• rooker: рук, ruk, hand
• litso: лицо, litso, face
• litsa: лица, litsa, person
• pletcho: плечо, plecho, shoulder

For the most part, they've just been phonetically rendered and made to sound vaguely English in the same [or similar] meanings to what they have in Russian, even if they're used in the slangy kind of way; for instance, the usage of "ptitsa" isn't in the idea of flying birds but is in the English slang of "bird" meaning "girl". Other slang you might see is rhyming slang [see "appy polly loggys" for apologies, for instance]. The main point of reading this chapter from Clockwork Orange was to see how untranslated language could be manipulated in a creative way and what effect it would have on the literature in question—this could also be applied to novels with, say, Spanish sprinkled throughout. Thoughts?

A link to a dictionary of the slang used in Clockwork Orange: http://www.soomka.com/nadsat.html

Quotes from "The Culture Industry"

Emily Apter's article begins with a reference to Adorno and Horkheimer's "The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception". Most of the chapter is available online at: http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/adorno/1944/culture-industry.htm

Here are a few quotes of interest:
"The ruthless unity in the culture industry is evidence of what will happen in politics. Marked differentiations such as those of A and B films, or of stories in magazines in different price ranges, depend not so much on subject matter as on classifying, organising, and labelling consumers. Something is provided for all so that none may escape; the distinctions are emphasised and extended. The public is catered for with a hierarchical range of mass-produced products of varying quality, thus advancing the rule of complete quantification. Everybody must behave (as if spontaneously) in accordance with his previously determined and indexed level, and choose the category of mass product turned out for his type. Consumers appear as statistics on research organisation charts, and are divided by income groups into red, green, and blue areas; the technique is that used for any type of propaganda."

"How formalised the procedure is can be seen when the mechanically differentiated products prove to be all alike in the end. That the difference between the Chrysler range and General Motors products is basically illusory strikes every child with a keen interest in varieties. What connoisseurs discuss as good or bad points serve only to perpetuate the semblance of competition and range of choice. The same applies to the Warner Brothers and Metro Goldwyn Mayer productions. But even the differences between the more expensive and cheaper models put out by the same firm steadily diminish: for automobiles, there are such differences as the number of cylinders, cubic capacity, details of patented gadgets; and for films there are the number of stars, the extravagant use of technology, labor, and equipment, and the introduction of the latest psychological formulas. The universal criterion of merit is the amount of “conspicuous production,” of blatant cash investment. The varying budgets in the culture industry do not bear the slightest relation to factual values, to the meaning of the products themselves."

"The connoisseur and the expert are despised for their pretentious claim to know better than the others, even though culture is democratic and distributes its privileges to all. In view of the ideological truce, the conformism of the buyers and the effrontery of the producers who supply them prevail. The result is a constant reproduction of the same thing."

And, this long section on language:
"By the language he speaks, he makes his own contribution to culture as publicity. The more completely language is lost in the announcement, the more words are debased as substantial vehicles of meaning and become signs devoid of quality; the more purely and transparently words communicate what is intended, the more impenetrable they become.

The demythologisation of language, taken as an element of the whole process of enlightenment, is a relapse into magic. Word and essential content were distinct yet inseparable from one another. Concepts like melancholy and history, even life, were recognised in the word, which separated them out and preserved them. Its form simultaneously constituted and reflected them. The absolute separation, which makes the moving accidental and its relation to the object arbitrary, puts an end to the superstitious fusion of word and thing.

Anything in a determined literal sequence which goes beyond the correlation to the event is rejected as unclear and as verbal metaphysics. But the result is that the word, which can now be only a sign without any meaning, becomes so fixed to the thing that it is just a petrified formula. This affects language and object alike. Instead of making the object experiential, the purified word treats it as an abstract instance, and everything else (now excluded by the demand for ruthless clarity from expression – itself now banished) fades away in reality. A left-half at football, a black-shirt, a member of the Hitler Youth, and so on, are no more than names. If before its rationalisation the word had given rise to lies as well as to longing, now, after its rationalisation, it is a straitjacket for longing more even than for lies.

The blindness and dumbness of the data to which positivism reduces the world pass over into language itself, which restricts itself to recording those data. Terms themselves become impenetrable; they obtain a striking force, a power of adhesion and repulsion which makes them like their extreme opposite, incantations. They come to be a kind of trick, because the name of the prima donna is cooked up in the studio on a statistical basis, or because a welfare state is anathematised by using taboo terms such as “bureaucrats” or “intellectuals,” or because base practice uses the name of the country as a charm.

In general, the name – to which magic most easily attaches – is undergoing a chemical change: a metamorphosis into capricious, manipulable designations, whose effect is admittedly now calculable, but which for that very reason is just as despotic as that of the archaic name. First names, those archaic remnants, have been brought up to date either by stylisation as advertising trade-marks (film stars’ surnames have become first names), or by collective standardisation."

And, the last line: "The triumph of advertising in the culture industry is that consumers feel compelled to buy and use its products even though they see through them."

Notes from our class discussion on mapping ideas

General Observations:
1. Challenges of reading theory; usefulness of concrete examples of translations to help illustrate theoretical problems.
2. Utopian Theorists of Translation and mystical notions of language: Benjamin; Gasset y Ortega
3. Anthropological views of language; cultural influences in languages (how do we link study of culture and study of language/translation?)
4. What is and isn't translateable? Meaning of words; emotional content
5. What gets translated is the 'gaps': see Benjamin 756 'underneath language are intentions' and 'pure language comes from harmony of various modes of intention'); Ortega & Gasset 104 'translating silences' and the secrets of those silences.
6. Translation across cultures: "Treacherous Translation" (Suh, 172) and Benjamin (81)
7. Purpose of language: Paz 157; Rabassa 4; Ortega y Gasset 101; Innis 110
8. 'Spirit' vs Literal translation... which is more important? Benjamin 71; Ortega y Gasset 110; Bonnefoy 188; Sheer 239 and footnote on 243;Xuanmin 47; Nabakov 127 and 134-5
9. Can everything be translated? Paz 155; Ortega y Gasset 102; Benjamin 72; Derrida 178; Innis 113; Bonnefoy 186
10. Translation as cultural change: Xuomain and Suh
11. Purpose of Translation: Benjamin 80; Paz 158
12. Things to consider: Nabokov 137; Rabassa 10; Wang 410; Felstiner 100
13. Deficiencies of language: Rabassa 2-3; OyG 103; Innis
14. Translation is possible and desireable: OyG 108; Schleiermacher 52 vs Translation is not possible: Schogt 194
15. French is a terrible language: OyG 112
16. Good translation warps the target language.
17. Analyzing Understanding through not understanding (radical translation and interpretation (Chinese authors); unspeakable or unsaid; concrete ideas v abstract
18. Cultural lens of translation (examples from reading: Merchant of Venice, Korean play into Japanese; translating phrases from Craft)
19. Shiloh's themes: General Translation; spriritual transl; philosophy of transl; linguistics in transl.
20. Big picture themes: Purpose of transl; culture and transl;
21. Understanding transl through examples that we don't really understand
22. Failures or deficiencies of language.


Specific Authors:

Vigorito: How much would this book be different if these words weren't used?; Can the mind alter language, does language alter the mind (101); people learning slang terms; slang terms becoming commonplace and falling into general use by everyone (208)

Pinsky

Schleiermacher

Derrida

Luo

Scherr (on Gasparov): Balance or dichotomy between literal and figurative language; index of exactness and index of freedom (245)

Benjamin: page 756 'underneath language are intentions' and 'pure language comes from harmony of various modes of intention'; Translation across cultures (81); What is translation for? (71); quote from Pannwitz, "The basic error of the translator is that he preserves the state in which his own language happens to be instead of allowing his language to be powerfully affected by the foreign tongue."; "Rather, all suprahistorical kinship of languages rests as a whole -- an intention, however, which no single lanugage can attain by itself but which is realized only by the totalit of their intentions, supplementing each otehr: pure language" (75); who is translation for? (71;

Ortega y Gasset: Translating silences (104); We think in a certain language O&G 107; Stretching target and original languages O&G 108, 112; Diggability/creative style creates problems in translation OyG 96

Paz

Felstiner

Nabokov

Bonnefoy

Rabassa: Dog does not equal Cobaka or Cane or perro or chien

Innis: quote from Gadamer on page 112; Translation as a moving horizon 112

Wang & Zhang;

Suh: Translation across cultures (172);

Jakobson: Language and culture (144)

Schogt

Tokowicz & Kroll

Shira's Response to Jakobson and Schogt (comments and crit welcome!)

Both Jakobson and Schogt use semiotic concepts to talk about translation; Schogt takes it a step further by exploring the applicability of “semantic theory” to translation. Semiotics studies language as a system of signs. The lexicon of which consists of signifier, signified, and sign (the union of the two). Signs are arbitrary because there is no fixed relationship between signifier and signified. The signified more or less remains the same; ringo and “apple” denote the same thing (though this example is a little arbitrary given they may translate differently as cultural symbols). The trouble is with the communication of signs and signifiers.

Jakobson outlines this problem in his initial example of “cheese.” One doesn’t need a nonlinguistic relationship with the object or lexical code of English to understand a word. Only signs can communicate other signs: “An array of linguistic signs is needed to introduce an unfamiliar word … … the meaning of any linguistic sign is its translation into some further, alternative sign” (145). In other words, the only possible way I can explain the word “cheese” as a class of objects produced by pressed curds is by use of other signs. The word “cheese” is not the real thing but part of a system of signs. To use one of Jakobson’s previous statements: nobody has ever tasted the meaning of a word.

Thus, languages are like codes and translation “involves two equivalent messages in two different codes” (146) because there are no equivalencies between individual code units; the whole system of signs must replace the other system. That is why translation encounters problems with languages that have different components (like language 1 has A and B modes of expression while language 2 has only B (200)). Russian must convey gender: “Languages differ essentially in what they must convey and not in what they may convey” (149).

Schogt does something different with semiotics (or semantics, but discussion of Saussure leads me to believe he means the same thing) in two ways. First, he creates a relationship between translation and semantics (they aren’t close but they’re still related). Semiotics makes the translator’s job harder rather than easier because it exposes the fragility of the connection between the signified and signifier. Prieto’s example shows how the signified can be transmitted innumerable ways: “Prieto starts with the signified, assuming optimistically that people want to say something before they start to speak. How they say what they want to convey depends on a number of factors, the first and most obvious one being the language that is used” (198). If I want to express intense excitement, even within my own language, there are many different ways: “I feel like a kid in a candy shop,” “I could explode, I’m so hyped up,” “there are butterflies in my stomach.” The second thing Schogt does with semantics is assert its limitations: “For texts where cognitive meaning prevails and formal expression of that meaning has no other function than expressing that meaning, the semantic theories are helpful and are adequate for describing the double process of encoding and decoding. For literary texts, it is precisely the literariness that falls outside the domain of semantics” (201). Semantics is only useful in so far as it decodes language with one or few layers of meaning. Literary language uses “the complexities of intention and innuendo” to create new signs (or change old ones) and therefore a semiotic analyst couldn’t rely on their system of interpretation. There are candles as in sticks of wax that burn and there is the candle as in the one that burns out the precise moment Anna Karenina dies.

Thoughts on Why and How We Learn Languages

In 7th grade, when I had to choose between learning Spanish and French, I chose Spanish on that basis that, living in California, I would be able to use it more than I would French. It was a purely utilitarian reason- I wanted to be able to communicate with the largest amount of people (maybe more later on my recent thoughts about communication vs. language.) However, as my focus for what I want to do after college becomes sharper, I’m beginning to realize that Spanish may not be enough; at least a working knowledge of two or more Latin American indigenous languages (ex: Zapotec, Nahuatl, Quechua) will probably be necessary. Which, along with some browsing of the Matador Network while I had nothing else to do at work, brought me to a host of different thoughts.

When I asked myself why do I wanted to learn these indigenous languages the first answer that came to mind was “so that I can communicate with more people, with those who only speak that language and not Spanish.” However, going deeper, I realized that even for those indigenous peoples who do speak both Spanish and an indigenous language, I would prefer to speak with them in their native, cultural tongue. To me, there’s something about speaking to someone in their native language that fosters a deeper connection. There’s an appreciation on the other person’s behalf that you care enough to look and sound awkward so that they can feel more comfortable, and a new level of trust. It’s a way for you to say that you aren’t like those who came before and demanded that everyone learn their language, that you want to learn from them as much as you want to teach them.

So, with that established, how do you go about learning a new language, more specifically, how do I best learn a new language, especially one that, even though it’s spoken by millions of people, is hardly ever formally taught anywhere? I came across a page detailing the 5 ways we learn a language (the link’s at the end), and decided that I need a mix of three of them: Grammar based, Communicative, and Immersion, in that order. Give me a base in the grammar and vocabulary, give me some practice actually using the language with other people, and then throw me out there and let me use what I’ve got to figure the rest out.

So, how about you guys, how do you think you want to go about learning a new language?

Also, some interesting articles from Matador Network that tie into what we were talking about last night with getting the gist of what someone is trying to say even if you don’t understand every word completely and about getting a feel for connotations and the “feeling” of word even if you don’t get the exact meaning.

http://matadornetwork.com/abroad/follow-your-intuition-to-fluency/

http://matadornetwork.com/abroad/latin-americas-indigenous-languages/

http://matadornetwork.com/abroad/the-5-ways-we-learn-languages-and-which-style-is-right-for-you/

Mexican Slang

Inspired by Nabassa's mention of the Spanish slang word "cabrón." I find it amazing that all of these words have both very negative and very positive uses.



P.S. In case you can't see a link above, here's the address so you can cut and paste.

http://matadornetwork.com/abroad/a-quick-and-dirty-phrasebook-of-mexican-slang/

I have set up an account on stumbleupon.com for this class. Stumbleupon is a website that can take you to other websites based on your interests. For this class, the only interest available to our area of study was linguistics, but there have already been some great sites. Feel free to check out the favorites or stumble for yourself. Stumble continues to reevaluate interests, so if you see a site that is right on target with the class, "thumbs up" and share it in the favorites. If it is completely unrelated to the class, please "thumbs down" it so we can focus our account to provide the best information possible. Here is the account information.

User name: Johnstontranslat
Password: bosquewald

P.S. Be careful, this is addicting.

Nabokov's Contradiction

It is interesting to me to look at the contradiction to one of previous articles we've read, that Nabokov makes. This being the degradation of the idea of "free translation." Which I've taken to mean: A translation that keeps more the meaning than the text in mind. This brings back the question of being able to call a free translation anything other than an adaption. "The clumsiest literal translation is a thousand times more useful than the prettiest paraphrase." Then, at the end of the essay, he asks for the "skyscrapers" of footnotes that someone else that I don't remember the name of wanted to forego, for instead a looser, more "free translation," in order to convey the feeling and meaning more than the strict literal translation. The last sentence seems to indicate that Nabokov will never finish translating Onegin because it is impossible to translate, and to do it imperfectly would ultimately serve no one ever again. And over and over and over, amen. I am unclear whether Nabokov decides it is impossible to translate all poetry, or if he just means Russian to English/French poetry, or what...

Theme & discussion questions

I know this week we've got some difficult articles going, so I'm going to try to help out a bit here.

This week's thematic arrangement is philosophy; some articles are on the general philosophy of translating and more ethical dilemmas of translating, and some are leaning more toward the philosophy of language and meaning. Look for tidbits that might be pertinent for translation and read through that lens, and it might be less of a burden.

I will say this again next week when dealing with a more scientific article, but don't get bogged down in the numbers and statistics unless you really want to and can interpret them; otherwise it's a lot more work than necessary. Nabokov's article, I know, has a section of analytical poetry jargon, so don't worry too much about that unless you're able to understand what he's talking about with terms like iambic tetrameter and trochaic feet [among others]. The important parts are those about translation.

Good luck! Questions are below. They're only for a guide; you don't have to use them if you don't want to.

• How does language affect our perception of concepts? For instance, what differs between the connotations between "jungle" and "rainforest", and between "bread", "Brot", "pain", "pan", and "pane"? Alternately, how does translation expand the repertoire of symbols that we understand?
• What is the "silence" in language that Ortega y Gasset references?
• Would Gasparov have approved of Nabokov's method of translation?
• Nabokov's translation of Onegin is not popular. Why might that be?
• "The person who desires to turn a literary masterpiece into another language has only one duty to perform, and this is to reproduce with absolute exactitude the whole text, and nothing but the text. The term 'literal translation' is tautological since anything but that is not truly a translation but an imitation, an adaptation, or a parody." DISCUSS.
• Why might Bonnefoy say that a word that is "everyday speech used without special care and not charged with meaning" is difficult to translate? Compare to Rabassa's feelings on epithets and names [Craft, p. 3-5].
• "[D]o we have to have knowledge about these related elements [meaning of words, behaviour, intentions, beliefs] in order to have a satisfactory theory of interpretation?" DISCUSS.
• What do you perceive are the differences between Wang & Zhang's idea of interpretation versus the idea of translation?
• "Everything conceivable can at least be hinted at in words; but the inevitable residue of what we want to and cannot accomplish with them is the degree of ineffability that we can never escape, and perhaps do not want to escape." DISCUSS.
• "All thinking is by signs; and the brutes use signs. But perhaps they rarely think of them as signs. To do so is manifestly a second step in the use of language." DISCUSS.
• Can something—an idea, a concept, a word—ever translate so well across cultures that no cultural background is necessary to understand it? Is it ever possible, on the other hand, to not transplant cultures when translating?
• Should audiences somehow be aware of the cultural implications present in some pieces [i.e., those in the play Ch'unhyangjon]?
• Did the translation of Ch'unhyangjon cross the line into an adaptation or into an original work?
• "[T]ranslation is not symmetrically reciprocal between two languages. [...] [S]ymmetrical reciprocity does not take into account the unlimited responsibility imposed on the self toward the other." DISCUSS.
• Even if interest in a translated piece is more of a critical nature than of a positive one, wouldn't that still strike a blow for the continuance of literary tradition and survival of a literary piece?