Subject: Re: waddayamean
From: Louise Z. Brooks (invertedforest@angelfire.com)
Date: Mon Mar 06 2000 - 20:44:32 EST
I'm also equivocal about the whole thing. Given our recent discussions over the word `Buddy', it's easy to realise just how difficult it could be to convey the exact thrust of this word in another language. Try even replacing it in the story with `Pal' or `Buster' or even `Man', and it changes things completely. I believe that the choice of word has that much impact on the overall effect of a story - Jim's simile of a black and white photo of a colour painting is a good one, yet to me it's also like Courbet's `The Stonebreakers'. I'll never know what colour it was, because it no longer exists as anything other than a black and white photo.
I was once fortunate enough to attend a festival of writers from all over the world whose works were translated into English for them, with varying levels of success. There was a lot of difference between a scholarly and an artistic translation, and several examplesof those words whose selection irrevocably changed some aspect of the story or simply had no English equivalents.
--- Louise Z. Brooks "Invention my dear friends is 93% perspiration, 6% electricity, 4% evaporation and 2% butterscotch ripple." - Willy WonkaOn Mon, 6 Mar 2000 07:50:54 AntiUtopia wrote: >In a message dated 3/6/00 2:58:35 AM Eastern Standard Time, rbowman@indigo.ie >writes: > ><< The 'meaning' of the Catcher is this young chap > in flight from Pencey High in New York in 1949 (?). > It has no connection with a young chap in flight > from Newtown to Dublin in 1953 - or a young > aristo getting out of Eton for London in 1910, > or a young Bantu escaping the kraal to Jo'burg > in 1934. > > Scottie B. >> > >No, Scottie, that's the content of the narrative. It's not the "meaning" of >the narrative. The "meaning" of the narrative has to do with >disillusionment, with a certain attitude toward hypocrisy and "phoniness," >and with coming to some kind of resolution with the world. > >I think these attitudes are translatable to at least some other languages. >It's possible, I suppose, that there are langauges and cultures to which >Holden's struggle would be completely foreign. But I doubt that Holden's >struggle would be completely foreign to the German, the English, the >French...who all would be thinking of their own counterparts to Holden, of >course. > >You quoted Virgil, Scottie...sure you got it right? Come on, translated >literature is so prominent a landscape in the thought of us English speaking >people that honesty requires we admit Some faith in the possibility of >meaningful translations. Because we do have it, even if we can't work out a >full exposition. > >My experience with reading translated literature in English, and then in the >original language, has been the feeling that I was seeing a two dimensional >portrait in black and white vs. a color painting. The lines are all the >same, it's still a picture of the same thing, but not nearly as rich. > >Jim >- >* Unsubscribing? Mail majordomo@roughdraft.org with the message >* UNSUBSCRIBE BANANAFISH >
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