South Asian Literature discussion

What makes a good translation? I struggle with reading translated works - sometimes to the extent that I don't enjoy them unless the conversion is well done. I wonder whether I should just deal with it or if its up to the translator to do a good job capturing the author's original words, as well as his/her voice.

A translation I liked: The Idiot
A translation I disliked: Fireflies in the Mist

What do you guys think? Do you have favorites?

I guess it depends on the translator and on the language of the original work. For example I don't think I'd ever want to read a translation of a novel by Joyce or Virgina Woolf. I remember trying Hemingway and Gordimer but I got fed up. It simply doesn't work with many but those comfort novels like Little House on the Prairie series or L.M. Montgomery novels. I find them ok.

Do you think that means simpler (for lack of a better word) works are better suited to translation? I feel like complicated plots and themes can be misconstrued or flattened out.

The exception to that is, of course, Fyodor Dostoyevsky's The Idiot -- like I mentioned before -- but I guess something like that is always bound to be the case.

I hate reading translated poetry, there is usually so much meaning behind every word chosen (in the original language) that I'm always doubting the word of the translator. I do believe that the 'simpler' the work the easier it lends itself to translation.

I have tried translating myself (from Bengali to English) and it is *extremely* difficult. I was so insecure about my own translation I insisted on sitting with the author and going back and forth on the verbiage until we both were in agreement. I'm not going to be doing that again, anytime soon!

Amina wrote: "Do you think that means simpler (for lack of a better word) works are better suited to translation? I feel like complicated plots and themes can be misconstrued or flattened out.

The exception to..."

It's really not the words, more the techniques I guess. Stream of consciousness is not something I enjoy in translations. I remember trying Gordimer's "July's People" and hating it then I tried the original and it was good. I feel even the writers such as Oscar Wilde or Jane Austen don't work either. Their tones of satire or irony does work well in translated versions.

As for Mahrin's idea of translated poetry, I wouldn't even bother.

I agree, i hate translated poetry too.

So you guys don't like Rumi poetry in English?

No, I do like it, but I would say that's more the exception. It's also been translated so many times over by so many people, it's easier to accept its accuracy.

Mahrin wrote: "No, I do like it, but I would say that's more the exception. It's also been translated so many times over by so many people, it's easier to accept its accuracy."

The interesting and sometimes contentious thing about being translated many times is that it might be interpreted differently by each translator. You see this come up a lot in talks about texts like the Quran. But that begs the question -- how do you know WHICH translation to read?

Amina wrote: "You see this come up a lot in talks about texts like the Quran. But that begs the question -- how do you know WHICH translation to read? "

I think that's a great question and it's a question I've thought about a bunch as well. I like to approach this from a scientific perspective:

Drawing from Darwin's theory of evolution (which manifests itself in various other academic fields - economics, being one), I believe competition where only the strong survive answers that question. Look for the oldest translation that is still published/commonly used and treat that as the standard. All other - weaker - translations are discontinued over time and thus never heard from again.

From my pov, it depends on particular book we talk about. Some books are so profoundly associated with socio cultural background in which the story unfolds and therefore very hard to translate. Sometimes some phrases used in the book might have different implied meanings in the social context and the plot, where literal translation is obviously insufficient. But there are many books which deals with exclusively universal themes in very general manner and therefore can be successfully translated. Sometimes when i read a good book in Sinhala and gets overwhelmed, i often end up thinking how any sort of translator would ever do a successful translation of this to English so that universal audience can enjoy it. I think footnotes are a very good way in which translators can enhance the accuracy and reliability of complex translations. And translators also has to take their work more seriously as sometimes translations can be more tedious and demanding work than original work depending on circumstances.

I do find problems mainly with Russian Sinhala translations because the story has already being translated twice so if the English translator is not good (usually if they are not P/V translations...) then it's a huge mess, hardly readable. So now I'm sticking to English translations of the Russian writings for now as for others my ideas are given earlier.

I know this is an old thread, but I just finished translating my book from English to Urdu, just wanted to share that it's doable, even though there may be elements that are lost in translation. I agree with the above posts about translators interpreting differently, and for that reason, when possible, I think it's good for the author to do the translation himself/ herself. It's not very exciting to do, because its not creative, but it does broaden the readership, and if authors do it themselves, they are more likely to preserve the essence without obsessing over literally translating each word. If the original is too complicated, or the story is too culture-specific, it may be harder to translate. A translation needs the same diligence with proofing and editing as the original, which means I have more work to do. Would be interested to know what are the greatest translating challenges for authors here, and what are the most 'lost' elements from readers' perspectives?

I had one of my stories translated from English to Malayalam, and although the translator, a friend of mine, insisted he hadn't changed anything, a review of the story suggested to me that he had followed an interpretation that altered the story.

A colleague in Bengali studies found that Radindranath Tagore wrote two books called Gitanjali, one in English and one in Bengali, and although the poems appear to be identical, in title and theme, many of them are in fact different. He used English/Western imagery in the English poems and Indian imagery in the Bengali poems. No one else seemed to have noticed this by the 1970s, because people tended to read one version or the other. Tagore seems to suggest that you can't really translate from one language to another, that you have to recreate the idea of the poem in the new language.