Brain Pain discussion

This thread is for discussing the pluses, minuses, and perils of reading literature in translation. We can also use this thread to ask for translation recommendations, as well as recommending and commenting on translations we've read.

I would love to read more American novels in English, please ;)

Ian wrote: "I would love to read more American novels in English, please ;)"

I thought your books were in 'Australian' Ian? Errr...

Oh hey. There's a thread for this now. Awesome. I hope all the people discussing translation in the 'Suggestions for "The Spine 2013"' board see this.

Ian wrote: "I would love to read more American novels in English, please ;)"

Good one!

While we're at it, how many "englishes" would you say there are in the world?

Aubrey wrote: "Oh hey. There's a thread for this now. Awesome. I hope all the people discussing translation in the 'Suggestions for "The Spine 2013"' board see this."

cacoethes scribendi!

Haaze wrote: "Aubrey wrote: "Oh hey. There's a thread for this now. Awesome. I hope all the people discussing translation in the 'Suggestions for "The Spine 2013"' board see this."

cacoethes scribendi!"

Is there a latinist in the house?

Jim wrote: "Haaze wrote: "Aubrey wrote: "Oh hey. There's a thread for this now. Awesome. I hope all the people discussing translation in the 'Suggestions for "The Spine 2013"' board see this."

cacoethes scrib..."

I wouldn't claim that title, but it interests me greatly! :)

Jim wrote: "While we're at it, how many "englishes" would you say there are in the world?"

Two nations separated by a common language.

The meaning of 'cacoethes scribendi' reminds me of hypergraphia, although one would hope that the former doesn't devolve into meaningless garble as often as the latter.

Aubrey wrote: "The meaning of 'cacoethes scribendi' reminds me of hypergraphia, although one would hope that the former doesn't devolve into meaningless garble as often as the latter."

Hmm, I just read that it appears that van Gogh, Dostoevsky and Lewis Carrol suffered from hypergraphia. According to wiki the latter wrote 98,000 letters in his lifetime (backwards, rebus and in patterns!!!). I wonder how hypergraphia translates in terms of the use of keyboards?

On a different note - do you think that modern translators are affected by using the computer as a tool? Would this new era of digital support provide improved translations? Why or why not?

Aubrey wrote: "The meaning of 'cacoethes scribendi' reminds me of hypergraphia, although one would hope that the former doesn't devolve into meaningless garble as often as the latter."

The phrase reminds me of prostitutes because in French 'cocotte' (whose pronunciation is quite similar to that of 'cacoethes') is a prostitute so my mind instantly goes 'what? the prostitution of writing?' and only then realizes that it's something a bit less interesting. Although Baudelaire did say that art (among a number of other things) is a form of prostitution so perhaps I'm not too far off completely. Btw, it would be quite cool to read some Baudelaire.

BUT on the topic of poetry in translation, I can't remember who was it that said that while the English pride themselves in having Shakespeare, the French pride themselves having very many Shakespeares because they produce a new one every few decades as his work is constantly retranslated into French. I think it wouldn't be too bad if people took towards modern translations the same attitude they have towards Bible translations, for example. King James is by very far not the most accurate English translation of the Bible, but it's still praised as the best and very widely read.

Anndreea, every job is a prostitution since prostitution is basically the activity of trading the usefulness or utility of your body to another human being for money.

Aubrey, hypergraphia like graphomania? I don't quite get what you want to link between it and keyboards. Some writers say they can't even write outside the computer, I prefer to write by hand since it produces a more tangible escriture, which you can later on add there and here, with different colors and shapes, over the other words, below them (without obeying any sort of linearity), and it really is a documentary and sendimentary approach. Computers seem to help find more formal grammatical mistakes. But then I think the digital era really helps translation for the best, with a wide variety of online data and huge digital dictionaries and as I said before programms that help find grammatical mistakes.

Andreea wrote: "King James is by very far not the most accurate English translation of the Bible, but it's still praised as the best ..."

"Best"? By whom and for what purposes? Within what domains of usage? All of the books? Against what criteria?

(Personally, I was trained to compare multiple [English] translations and paraphrases for purposes of study and meditation. [I personally can't read the texts in the languages of what are considered the most ancient extant sources, although I do sometimes turn to those who can.] Each translation I have encountered has its strengths and its weaknesses. Paraphrases are another whole conversation, probably not relevant here.)

Jim wrote: "While we're at it, how many "englishes" would you say there are in the world?"

From Wiki on the English language: "English is a pluricentric language, without a central language authority like France's Académie française; and therefore no one variety is considered 'correct' or 'incorrect' except in terms of the expectations of the particular audience to which the language is directed."

This link suggests some of the many dialects of English, but does not deal with the varieties of English that are no longer spoken, but still exist in our literature, from the days of Beowulf onward.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_...

Lily wrote: "Jim wrote: "While we're at it, how many "englishes" would you say there are in the world?"

From Wiki on the English language: "English is a pluricentric language, without a central language author..."

Dang! An amazing list of dialects!

Thanks for sharing!

RE: King James bible - When I ask about bible versions, most GR members refer to KJV as "The most beautiful version from a literary perspective" and "A work of literature unto itself"

BTW, Lily, I once had a class in early english lit at Rutgers. The professor did her doctorate on 'Wulf and Eadwacer'

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wulf_and...

A serious Brain Pain poem if I've ever seen one...

Jim wrote: "BTW, Lily, I once had a class in early english lit at Rutgers. The professor did her doctorate on 'Wulf and Eadwacer'

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wulf_and...

A serious Brain Pain poem if ..."

LOL! Sounds like taking one of Dr. Duffey's Physical Chemistry courses! Hope she was a good teacher. (Dr. Duffey was!)

Jim wrote: "King James bible - When I ask about bible versions, most GR members refer to KJV as "The most beautiful version from a literary perspective" and "A work of literature unto itself" ..."

I wouldn't bother disagreeing with that assessment, although apparently some books (I can't tell you which ones) are especially well rendered in the English Standard Version (ESV). For the first books, the Jewish Tanakh (New JPS) has a high reputation for its scholarship and its language. Other major translations, such as the NIV and the NRSV (usually my personal backbone choice) to name only a couple, reflect varying issues of scholarship, accuracy, literacy, and theological considerations. A good introduction to various versions is A User's Guide to Bible Translations: Making the Most of Different Versions by David Dewey. He includes comments on what version for what purpose. There are several other authors who appear to have similar comparisons. The Literary Study Bible authored by Leland Ryken uses the ESV.

I never have figured out whether Milton relied on the KJV or the earlier Geneva Bible when he was writing Paradise Lost.

Lily wrote: "I never have figured out whether Milton relied on the KJV or the earlier Geneva Bible when he was writing Paradise Lost..."

Now that's a really good question! I think KJV was being put together just before Paradise Lost.

Any Milton scholars out there? Please weigh in if you know...

Milton read Latin, Greek and Hebrew so although he was acquainted with English translations of the Bible he did not rely on them for the interpretation of the Biblical text. There's an interesting essay about how Milton read the Bible in the Cambridge Companion to John Milton, you can read parts of it on GoogleBooks.

Lily wrote: ""Best"? By whom and for what purposes? Within what domains of usage? All of the books? Against what criteria?"

The best as in the most accurate, important and beautiful Bible, the one that you simply have to be acquainted with if you're serious about reading the Bible in English, even if you don't read it in its entity.

Andreea wrote: "Milton read Latin, Greek and Hebrew so although he was acquainted with English translations of the Bible he did not rely on them for the interpretation of the Biblical text. There's an interesting ..."

Andreea -- Thank you! Should have guessed that! I have looked for this several times, but not with concentrated research. It always intrigued me that the KJV was published while Milton was probably writing.

I knew he also used the apocryphal Book of Enoch.

Filipe wrote: "Aubrey, hypergraphia like graphomania? I don't quite get what you want to link between it and keyboards. "

Oh, I wasn't linking it to keyboards. But since you ask, I guess it depends on which desire the mania enlarges, the one for the tactile feeling of writing instrument against paper, or for the mental feeling of exorcising words to the real world. And hm, graphomania is the better word for it, since it has the negative connotation that I was referring to.

Andreea wrote: "The best as in the most accurate, important and beautiful Bible, the one that you simply have to be acquainted with if you're serious about reading the Bible in English, even if you don't read it in its entity. ..."

But you wrote in Msg 12 "for example. King James is by very far not the most accurate English translation of the Bible"? (To the best of my knowledge, that is an appropriate assessment.)

Aubrey, wouldn't it be funny if prolific writers were only graphomaniacs trying to cope with their mental disease?! I never thought about fixation with tactile feelings of writing instruments and their subsequent sounds and images, but since we are talking about mania if the person can do something the person can be maniac at it. Exorcize is a very good verb for it, the writer would be the one who exorcize ideas, feelings, memories, figments of imagination with words, the graphomaniac would be the one who writes to exorcize the words themselves from his mind without any interest in making sense (maybe some, especially if he already suspects of his condition/situation and even in his mania he is trying to understand/talk about it as a call for help or therapy).

Filipe wrote: "Aubrey, wouldn't it be funny if prolific writers were only graphomaniacs trying to cope with their mental disease?! I never thought about fixation with tactile feelings of writing instruments and t..."

It's true that I've run into many quotes of writers talking about how their writing is almost an affliction, it's so compulsive. Maybe there are varying levels of graphomania, from a daily urge that can be controlled and developed as a skill, to an incessant obsession that demands so much that cohesive narrative is nigh impossible. Authors can be prolific without descending into meaningless garble reminiscent of, say,
Mein Kampf. If that isn't a prime example of graphomania at its worst, I don't know what is.

I think all art is compulsive in a way. You need to write. You need to sing. You need to paint. You need to design a cathedral. You think about it all the time -- it's obsessive. I don't think this is OCD -- but I don't know what other words to use.

And yet for writers there's also the pain of dragging yourself to the computer, looking at the blank screen, wondering where the inspiration went. You had some talent yesterday -- and where did it go today? OMG -- did you throw it out with the trash, leave at Starbucks when you were getting some coffee, or...even in a bookstore? Did you leave at your girlfriend's place with those new resumes? Did you leave at your boyfriend's place with the earrings? Where IS it?

It's a little like love that way. When you're in love...well, you know. :-)

i wish that the book ramona could also be in english

Aditi wrote: "i wish that the book ramona could also be in english"

Is this the book you mean? Or something else?

Ramona

Here's an interesting story related to translation

http://www.cnn.com/2012/01/12/world/a...

Mentioned in the story - the official language of the new nation of South Sudan will be English!