Re: [TIED] Digest Number 72

From: missmel1:First missmel1:Last
Message: 2651
Date: 2000-06-16

You are correct, Dennis, on the use of "to be" in your instant example: "it
was intended that this character "be" preserved............" I'm interested
in this conversation concerning translations.......................

Melody

----- Original Message -----
From: <cybalist@egroups.com>
To: <cybalist@egroups.com>
Sent: Friday, June 16, 2000 6:50 AM
Subject: [TIED] Digest Number 72


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> There are 3 messages in this issue.
>
> Topics in this digest:
>
> 1. In Defensione Translatorum
> From: "Dennis Poulter" <dpoulter@...>
> 2. Re: Beekes' Translation English.
> From: "Mark Odegard" <markodegard@...>
> 3. Re: O tempora, o translatores!
> From: "Piotr Gasiorowski" <gpiotr@...>
>
>
> ________________________________________________________________________
> ________________________________________________________________________
>
> Message: 1
> Date: Thu, 15 Jun 2000 22:11:23 +0800
> From: "Dennis Poulter" <dpoulter@...>
> Subject: In Defensione Translatorum
>
> I agree with what you say about the decline in standards of translation. I
used to be a professional translator in the early 70's, and at that time
enormous care was taken to ensure not only an accurate translation of the
source material, but also a correct rendition in the target language. This
entailed working in teams, with native speakers of the languages concerned
and wherever possible, experts in the subject matter. This was followed by
careful proof reading, and close liaison with the publishers or typesetters.
> However, the economic crisis of the late seventies, forced companies to
cut back on costs, and translation was one of the first areas to suffer. So
whereas once one could make a living working for translation companies, now
translators are freelancers, working alone, accepting whatever commissions
they can get, no matter what the subject matter, often not translating into
their mother tongue, accepting more work than they can comfortably handle in
order to make a living, and probably setting themselves impossible
deadlines.
> The fault also is not all with the translator. Things like incorrect
capitalisation is rather a matter for the publisher's or typesetter's
proof-readers. Again, economics has forced reductions in this area.
> So, I think the problem doesn't lie so much with the translators, who I
think usually try to be conscientious in their work, but with the cutting of
corners to keep down production costs.
> BTW are those hyphens in "everyday-dutch" really there and if so, why?
> Also, as an ex-professional translator, I'm not happy with the grammar of
"it was intended that this character _is_ preserved...". I would prefer
"should be" or "be" .
> Cheers
> Dennis
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Piotr Gasiorowski
> To: cybalist@egroups.com
> Sent: Wednesday, 14 June, 2000 11:25 PM
> Subject: [TIED] De translatoribus
>
>
> This is what Oswald Szemerényi (a very lucid writer, by the way, and
equally at home in Hungarian, German or English) wrote in "Recent
Developments in Indo-European Linguistics" (Transactions of the Philological
Society 1985. Oxford: Blackwell):
>
> ... But this deficiency in linguistic knowledge [resulting from the
decline of classical education -- PG] is often combined with a certain lack
of care, of conscientiousness. Thus, e.g., German has a verb weiss 'know'
and an adjective weiss 'white'. I got a real shock when I first saw in a
passage of my Einführung the verb translated into Italian as albo; since
then I have found the same mistake in a translation into another Romance
language. In both cases I have managed to eliminate the culprit -- not to
say criminal -- but both show that the translator -- who nowadays tends to
be less and less familiar with the subject matter -- is often unable to
understand the text to be translated but he translates regardless, just for
the filthy lucre.
>
> ... A number or real gems are collected in the latest number of
Indogermanische Chronik (IC 30a (1984) no. 118), from which I gratefully
cull the following. The IE root *ok- 'consider, think over' is translated in
German as überlegen. Unfortunately, the German word can also be an adjective
meaning 'superior'. The result is that *ok- taken from a German source now
appears as 'lofty'. When the IE root *pezd- ['fart discreetly' -- PG]
appears as 'cause a wind to blow softly' one merely shakes one's head at the
awkwardness of the expression; but what should one think of the Latin verbal
derivative pe:do: appearing with the translation 'foot, furnish with feet',
a fruit of ignorance matched by equally phenomenal cheek.
>
>
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>
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> ________________________________________________________________________
> ________________________________________________________________________
>
> Message: 2
> Date: Thu, 15 Jun 2000 20:14:57 -0500
> From: "Mark Odegard" <markodegard@...>
> Subject: Re: Beekes' Translation English.
>
>
> From: Piotr Gasiorowski
> I wonder what Mark thinks of Szemerényi's Introduction.
> Sz reads better than RSPB. The one thing about Sz is the massive number of
bibliographic notes he gives; it easily represents half of the text.
>
> Beekes denies the existance of PIE [a]. Szemerényi says all the laryngeals
are nothing more and nothing less than aitch. I gather that just about
everyone says both of them are wrong.
>
> I'm at the point where I'm beginning to understand what must be understood
if you are to understand the inner workings of PIE, and and how these inner
workings are reflected in the daughter languages. In that I'm essentially
self-taught in the necessary associated disciplines, it's a painful process.
>
> Mark.
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> ________________________________________________________________________
> ________________________________________________________________________
>
> Message: 3
> Date: Fri, 16 Jun 2000 09:21:37 +0200
> From: "Piotr Gasiorowski" <gpiotr@...>
> Subject: Re: O tempora, o translatores!
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Dennis Poulter
> To: cybalist@egroups.com
> Sent: Thursday, June 15, 2000 4:11 PM
> Subject: [TIED] In Defensione Translatorum
>
> Dear Dennis,
>
> I've done some translation for a publishing house specialising in
popular-science books, so I know what you mean, and I fully sympathise with
what you say in defence of the profession. The hardest part of the job I did
was having to repair the damage done by poor proofreading and typesetting in
the original -- e.g. innumerable misquoted forms and distorted
transcriptions presented as samples of exotic (or even not-so-exotic)
languages in a linguistic atlas of the world (a nice book, by the way, but
another victim of low production costs and murderous deadlines). I did it --
though it wasn't really my responsibility and the need to do some extra
research kept slowing down my work -- because I realised the publishers had
no linguistic expert to go through that exotic stuff again; and as my name
was on the title page, I didn't wish to be associated with someone else's
botched job. Yes, the blame must be justly distributed. Where are those
ruthless editors of yore?
>
> Piotr
>
>
> Dennis wrote:
> I agree with what you say about the decline in standards of translation.
I used to be a professional translator in the early 70's, and at that time
enormous care was taken to ensure not only an accurate translation of the
source material, but also a correct rendition in the target language. This
entailed working in teams, with native speakers of the languages concerned
and wherever possible, experts in the subject matter. This was followed by
careful proof reading, and close liaison with the publishers or typesetters.
> However, the economic crisis of the late seventies, forced companies to
cut back on costs, and translation was one of the first areas to suffer. So
whereas once one could make a living working for translation companies, now
translators are freelancers, working alone, accepting whatever commissions
they can get, no matter what the subject matter, often not translating into
their mother tongue, accepting more work than they can comfortably handle in
order to make a living, and probably setting themselves impossible
deadlines.
> The fault also is not all with the translator. Things like incorrect
capitalisation is rather a matter for the publisher's or typesetter's
proof-readers. Again, economics has forced reductions in this area.
> So, I think the problem doesn't lie so much with the translators, who I
think usually try to be conscientious in their work, but with the cutting of
corners to keep down production costs.
> BTW are those hyphens in "everyday-dutch" really there and if so, why?
> Also, as an ex-professional translator, I'm not happy with the grammar
of "it was intended that this character _is_ preserved...". I would prefer
"should be" or "be" .
> Cheers
>
>
> [This message contained attachments]
>
>
>
> ________________________________________________________________________
> ________________________________________________________________________
>
>
>
>