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blatherskiteThis panel focused initially on the really bad economics of translation. Unless you're fortunate enough to be dealing with bestsellers, fiction isn't the world's most lucrative business to begin with, and the economics get even worse when you have to pay a translator as well as the author. James and Kathy Morrow, for instance, put together a really solid anthology of translated European science fiction and fantasy stories (The SFWA European Hall of Fame) that I loved, but talking to James Morrow later, I seem to have been the only one. Perhaps that's a bit harsh, but the more important point is that it didn't sell particularly well.
Part of the problem may have been the lame-ass title—North American publishers treat their authors like morons and assume that the publisher always knows better when it comes to titles and cover art, and as it turns out, the publishers are wrong at least as often as they're right. (For an example, look no further than the change from Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone to Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone. Don't Americans own a dictionary? Don't they have access to this newfangled Google thing?) This seems to be more of a control freak issue than a true attempt to work with the author to choose a title that works for both the author and the publisher. I've listened to enough science fiction and fantasy editors (and their bosses) speak at conventions that I have significant respect for their brains and their dedication to what they're publishing—but far less respect for their egos, which often achieve Space Opera proportions. Even the best seem to have acquired an "I know better than you, you're just an author" attitude. Sadly, few authors have much bargaining power when it comes to working with a publisher, so that's the situation we're stuck with.
Jetse de Vries, a Dutch translator, had some interesting things to say about writing in a second language, which seem to me to be true whether you're translating or whether you're trying to write your story in that second language right from the start—which many authors do because the global English market is so much larger than that in any other language. He observed that as you start out in a second language, you tend to be overly literal in an effort to be true to the source language's syntax. As you get better, you tend to master the linguistic clichés and catch phrases used in a language. At some point, you develop your own voice and style that attains the difficult balance between expressing yourself in the new language and remaining true to the original language.
Even the best translators have trouble getting it right, or at least have trouble coming up with a solution that satisfies everyone. For example, it's easy to translate simple and literal descriptions of events, but things like style and wordplay and cultural references often translate badly. Science fiction and fantasy translators have an easier task, at least in theory, because you have the option of retaining enough of the original language structure and style to make the text seem deliberately a bit "alien". Not all readers appreciate this, but at least it's an option. The alternative is to carefully ask yourself whether the idiomatic cultural style or content will achieve the same effect in translation, or must be replaced with something wholly new that achieves the same effect. For example, Dumas (he of The Three Musketeers fame) is a delightfully rich and textured writer—but wordy and convoluted and verbose if you don't like his style. Steven Brust perpetrated a thoroughly lovely hommage to this style in his The Phoenix Guards sort-of trilogy, but it's not clear to me whether these books sold as well as his more accessible writing.
The flip side is that some stories lean heavily on an understanding of cultural references you may simply not get if you're not fluent in that culture. Consider, for example, a tale set in China where a male and female character are holding hands as they walk down the street. In China, that would be significantly transgressive behavior because it's too much of a public display of affection. Yet two male characters (or two female characters) could holds hands without attracting much attention—though you might have to perform a bit of authorial gymnastics to make this clearly not a homosexual relationship. The transgression of heterosexual handholding would be somewhat unusual for an older couple, but less surprising (though still an act of rebellion) in a university-age couple. In translating that aspect of the story, there are layers of complexity to capture. Most simply, how can you communicate whether the behavior is transgressive but unexpected (the older couple) or transgressive but expected (the university couple)? This may be a subtle point in the original Chinese text, yet one that resonates to a Chinese reader. It would take a bit of thought to achieve the same effect for a North American reader in the English version without overtly drawing attention to something the author intended to be subtle.
A good translator must be both fluent in the source and target languages and a good writer who can capture at least some aspects of the original author's style and achieve some of that author's goals for the fiction. The latter point is particularly important, since my philosophy as a translator is that the author's goals are paramount; if you want to write your own story, write your own story and leave the original-language version alone. Although you can assume you understand what the author was striving for, it's not a safe assumption. Better by far to sit down with the author (even if only by e-mail) and discuss what you're both hoping to achieve until you come up with some kind of consensus.
Part of the problem may have been the lame-ass title—North American publishers treat their authors like morons and assume that the publisher always knows better when it comes to titles and cover art, and as it turns out, the publishers are wrong at least as often as they're right. (For an example, look no further than the change from Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone to Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone. Don't Americans own a dictionary? Don't they have access to this newfangled Google thing?) This seems to be more of a control freak issue than a true attempt to work with the author to choose a title that works for both the author and the publisher. I've listened to enough science fiction and fantasy editors (and their bosses) speak at conventions that I have significant respect for their brains and their dedication to what they're publishing—but far less respect for their egos, which often achieve Space Opera proportions. Even the best seem to have acquired an "I know better than you, you're just an author" attitude. Sadly, few authors have much bargaining power when it comes to working with a publisher, so that's the situation we're stuck with.
Jetse de Vries, a Dutch translator, had some interesting things to say about writing in a second language, which seem to me to be true whether you're translating or whether you're trying to write your story in that second language right from the start—which many authors do because the global English market is so much larger than that in any other language. He observed that as you start out in a second language, you tend to be overly literal in an effort to be true to the source language's syntax. As you get better, you tend to master the linguistic clichés and catch phrases used in a language. At some point, you develop your own voice and style that attains the difficult balance between expressing yourself in the new language and remaining true to the original language.
Even the best translators have trouble getting it right, or at least have trouble coming up with a solution that satisfies everyone. For example, it's easy to translate simple and literal descriptions of events, but things like style and wordplay and cultural references often translate badly. Science fiction and fantasy translators have an easier task, at least in theory, because you have the option of retaining enough of the original language structure and style to make the text seem deliberately a bit "alien". Not all readers appreciate this, but at least it's an option. The alternative is to carefully ask yourself whether the idiomatic cultural style or content will achieve the same effect in translation, or must be replaced with something wholly new that achieves the same effect. For example, Dumas (he of The Three Musketeers fame) is a delightfully rich and textured writer—but wordy and convoluted and verbose if you don't like his style. Steven Brust perpetrated a thoroughly lovely hommage to this style in his The Phoenix Guards sort-of trilogy, but it's not clear to me whether these books sold as well as his more accessible writing.
The flip side is that some stories lean heavily on an understanding of cultural references you may simply not get if you're not fluent in that culture. Consider, for example, a tale set in China where a male and female character are holding hands as they walk down the street. In China, that would be significantly transgressive behavior because it's too much of a public display of affection. Yet two male characters (or two female characters) could holds hands without attracting much attention—though you might have to perform a bit of authorial gymnastics to make this clearly not a homosexual relationship. The transgression of heterosexual handholding would be somewhat unusual for an older couple, but less surprising (though still an act of rebellion) in a university-age couple. In translating that aspect of the story, there are layers of complexity to capture. Most simply, how can you communicate whether the behavior is transgressive but unexpected (the older couple) or transgressive but expected (the university couple)? This may be a subtle point in the original Chinese text, yet one that resonates to a Chinese reader. It would take a bit of thought to achieve the same effect for a North American reader in the English version without overtly drawing attention to something the author intended to be subtle.
A good translator must be both fluent in the source and target languages and a good writer who can capture at least some aspects of the original author's style and achieve some of that author's goals for the fiction. The latter point is particularly important, since my philosophy as a translator is that the author's goals are paramount; if you want to write your own story, write your own story and leave the original-language version alone. Although you can assume you understand what the author was striving for, it's not a safe assumption. Better by far to sit down with the author (even if only by e-mail) and discuss what you're both hoping to achieve until you come up with some kind of consensus.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-18 03:44 pm (UTC)As a professional translator of books since 1983, translation is to me rather like musical interpretation.
If you listen to Chopin played by Michelangeli and Horowitz, it does not sound at all the same. And yet, the written notes on paper are the same.
A published translation is a printed version of one possible reading among many (possibly an infinity). The reader's own sensitivity and experience interfere with the original text - there is no cure for that -, and no two translators will make the same choices. Though they may agree on "the author's intention", they will render it differently, in their own words, the words that, to them, express it best. It's all very subjective.
To make things worse, the words and syntax used by the author may also go beyond his/her conscious intentions - say things not consciously intended that remain there no matter what. Readers and translator(s) alike will interpret what they perceive - whether consciously intended or not by the author.
Translation is also Mission Impossible. A bizarre mix of humility and arrogance. Humility because we aim at making ourselves invisible, at serving the author and letting him/her speak. For this, we aim at understanding the original text completely and in all its depth. Which is mighty arrogant, for there is no way anyone can pretend to understand what another means that fully. We are not the author, we do not share his/her subjectivity. The meaning of words has blurry edges, zones of connotations born of our experience (subjective). They do not overlap (or rarely do) from one person to the next.
Say the word "cat" to a dozen people and ask them to describe what they see in their mind, you'll end up with as many cats - black, tabby and white, long haired, short haired, Persian and Siamese.
When my author writes "cat", chances are we don't see the same cat. And each reader will have his own image.
What goes for cat goes for the rest. In fact, we all translate as we read. The author's words, we make our own. And we modify them in the process. Putting them into another language is a variation on this theme, with the additional complication of what the structure of the other language allows.
I'll leave this here for the time being, I could go on forever...
Not anonymous Dan
To be found here in French:
http://danakame.wordpress.com/
And here, in English:
http://my.opera.com/danawinds/blog/
Translations
Date: 2009-09-18 08:29 pm (UTC)Re: Translations
Date: 2009-09-19 02:06 pm (UTC)As to why anyone ever dares to translate… It's no worse than recording the complete Beethoven piano sonatas or playing in concert, really.
Lots of people can't read music. Without interpreters, they'd never hear any of it. Same goes for books. Lots of people would know nothing of world literature - high or low - without translators.
In both cases, the rendering might be slightly warped but, from my point of view, it is still better than nothing.
A bit of arrogance, a dash of recklessness, the need to share and a passion for language does it.
Plus, it's a job, not a bad one at that. At least I enjoy it. I like a good challenge!
Danièle