Your assessments - how well does ASOIAF translate?

[The Boar of Gore]

I must say it pleases me that people don't find it easy to translate ASoIaF. I had German and Korean friends who used to complain about not being able to say this or that in English. And they would spring random questions on me expecting me to come up with an English expression, then act like it was a deficiency in the language if I couldn't think of anything at that moment. Maybe I should have told them to go read some good books...

[Buckwheat]

I wish to try translating poetry some day too ...

Regarding names, I think that every translator should take into account the nature of their native language. In German or Italian, for example, it would be easier to keep close to the sounding of the name and preserve the slightly off tune. Bulgarian, though, although a language with great possibilities where structure of sentences and synonyms are concerned, is somewhat restricted in the way transcripiton and transliteration are related. Regarding vowels and many of the consonants, we pronounce what we read, so the only way to show the fact that an author has an alternate spelling is to resort to a different spelling that will lead to a different pronunciation.

I see what you mean. Slovene language is similar in that we usually pronounce things like they are spelled. I would probably understand any decision the translator made, it must be even harder to translate/transliterate in languages with different writing systems.

I disagree. I think you may be a little bit too influenced by the "swastika syndrome". For example, there is a peak, called Eagle's nest in Bulgaria, which is the site of an important historic battle from our Liberation war.

Well, it is maybe just a connection I made up in my head, and it does not make me uncomfortable while reading or anything. Most people probably do not even make the connection because it is not like everybody even knows about that Hitler's house. I just think there would probably be ways to completely avoid the connection, like by changing "orlovo" to "sokolovo" like the Serbian translator did or whatever.

Iona, thanks for the kind words. I have to elaborate, though, that the brilliant idea wasn't mine - it was well known in certain circles and one of the greatest poets we've had for a long time used it in his works. To have it rejected because it would sound too posh to some readers really upset me because I truly felt that it reflected a sentiment and fact of life that was true for the majority of Europeans during the Renaissance. Not to us, though, our history is different. And the most annoying thing is, the editor and the colleague we contacted all felt that I was right about it but not having readers accusing us of being stupid and going word for word came first.

I must say, if both translator and editor feel something is right, and it is a very good phrase to use that exists in the language, I do not find the idea to avoid using it because some readers might not understand it a good idea. It is not neccessary to make it so easy for the reader, the reader can easily look it up before angrily contacting the publishing house and learn something new.

[Iona]

I must say it pleases me that people don't find it easy to translate ASoIaF. I had German and Korean friends who used to complain about not being able to say this or that in English. And they would spring random questions on me expecting me to come up with an English expression, then act like it was a deficiency in the language if I couldn't think of anything at that moment. Maybe I should have told them to go read some good books...

I know! I have the utmost respect to interpreters and how they can come up with a translation in a matter of seconds under sometimes really stressful situations. We had to try a little bit of that in the university even if we weren't all that inclined to pursue a career in interpreting, and boy I hated it. I'm the kind of person that likes to weigh every word carefully when I translate and try out different options, but when there were people expecting me to react immediately I felt really anxious.

I must say, if both translator and editor feel something is right, and it is a very good phrase to use that exists in the language, I do not find the idea to avoid using it because some readers might not understand it a good idea. It is not neccessary to make it so easy for the reader, the reader can easily look it up before angrily contacting the publishing house and learn something new.

Unfortunately sometimes the art needs to make way for the ignorant. You'd be surprised to know how many readers think it's their responsibility to look up a translators phone number and let them know how they were not happy with something the translator did, instead of sitting down and thinking if there might have been a reason behind the solutions that were used.

The sad thing is that in Anath's case there could be an X amount of people who will recognize that a better translation of that phrase would exist, and they might think the translator was ignorant for not recognizing it. Sometimes there's no win-win for the translator. :(

[Buckwheat]

Unfortunately sometimes the art needs to make way for the ignorant. You'd be surprised to know how many readers think it's their responsibility to look up a translators phone number and let them know how they were not happy with something the translator did, instead of sitting down and thinking if there might have been a reason behind the solutions that were used.

The sad thing is that in Anath's case there could be an X amount of people who will recognize that a better translation of that phrase would exist, and they might think the translator was ignorant for not recognizing it. Sometimes there's no win-win for the translator. :(

I understand that, and it is kind of sad that people would rather get angry over it and contact the translator who did their best job than just look up a phrase in a dictionary, which is probably easier to do and learn something new by it. :(

[Iona]

I understand that, and it is kind of sad that people would rather get angry over it and contact the translator who did their best job than just look up a phrase in a dictionary, which is probably easier to do and learn something new by it. :(

Basic human behaviour - it's easier to think someone else made a mistake than to admit you're stupid. I'd be willing to say we can sometimes witness it on this forum as well... :P

[Buckwheat]

Basic human behaviour - it's easier to think someone else made a mistake than to admit you're stupid. I'd be willing to say we can sometimes witness it on this forum as well... :P

Oh, there is no doubt we do. ;)

[Ygrain]

I wish to try translating poetry some day too ...

Don't be shy and go for it. I signed for a translation of poetry course at uni and it turned out a remarkably interesting and rewarding experience. It does require good analytic skills but those can be trained - what helps a lot is taking a look at several translations of one piece and comparing them with the original as well as among themselves, and eventually giving it a try yourself.

[Iona]

Heh, I started re-reading tPatQ yesterday trying to translate it in my mind as I read. And I swear by the Old gods and the New, it was hard! The biggest problem I had was the fact that sometimes there were so many characters included in very compact sentences that I had to split them in two to make sense. Finnish is a beautifully non-discriminating language in the sense that we only have one third person pronoun to refer to he/she, but when you can't differentiate between feminine and masculine, you need to sometimes use names or titles to make it clear who you are referring to. Another one was conjugating names that end with -s. It's a nightmare since you can do it in two ways, with neither one of them sounding very fluent.

[Anath]

Iona, since tPatQ reads a little like a legend, old-fashioned style and all, I think the best translator for it would be someone who specialies in old languages - old forms of languages. I might be wrong but it's my impression that those are the people who catch the "poetics" of such a style. We have an amazing series of adapted legends for children and they read so smoothly, style preserved and all - but they were translated by the professor who worked over 30 years to translate The Song of the Nibelungs from Middle High German - an amazing work, as far as I can say. The best translation of Hamlet I've seen in Bulgarian (we have three Hamlets here and they are all impressive, mind you) came from the head of the English Phililogy Department, The Jew from Malta was brilliantly handled by another professor who has specialized in this period.

I think Ygrain is onto something - these are people who, for the last 30 or so years have done nothing but train their skills. When you well acquainted with both languages, when you have a broad general knowledge, when you have the chance to keep bettering yourself, even your poetic skills can get better, as long as you have the core.

An anecdote from a few years ago: in about half an hour, I had the four lines of Edna Vincent Millay's First Fig tackled. Not bad, right? And then, there was this old doctor, my mom's former classmate who gave the English lines one look and immediately came up with his translation - and it was just as good as mine.

Back to tPatQ: I think that as a text, it's quite different from the main series. Not quite like a real legend but not a novella like Dunk and Egg either. You'll have to call your inner "prosaic poet" to the rescue.

[Iona]

Anath, I'm by no means a philologist, but during my studies I sort of specialized a little bit into the translation of old-fashioned texts. I did my Bachelor's thesis on the formation of kennings in the Finnish translation of Beowulf, and intended to do my Master's thesis on translating archaisms. Lately we've had a lot of studies on re-translating books into more modern language, but research on the translation of texts that need to preserve the feeling of "days gone by" is something that is hard to come by. I've struggled with my Master's mainly because there's not a lot of theory available and practically none for Finnish translations, so I'd need to do some groundbreaking here.

I'm currently thinking of either going back to the library or heading to a bookshop to get a copy of one of ASOIAF books to see if the translator preserved and/or compensated on the archaisms that we see in Martin's writing. Using ASOIAF as the material for my thesis might be just the kick I need to finally get it done, but I dread reading the Finnish translation for the reasons mentioned in the OP. But if there are no archaisms in the translation I'll be really disappointed.

[Anath]

Great minds think alike! My own Master's thesis was on translating fantasy. At one point, I had to go through the history of fantasy translations in Bulgaria and of course, ASOIAF was included. In fact, the hardest part of the thesis was clarifying my own ideas of what a fantasy translation should look like. I thought I had it all in my head. And I did. It was only that my head and my hand refused to cooperate, so I can fully sympathize with your predicament. It's hard, especially when there isn't too much material to go through. But hey, this way you know you won't miss anything important!

The second half was explaining the reasoning behind my own translation of the book I included (that was easier because it was a book I was working on for a publishing house already). That was easy.

And Iona... since you're still at the university, don't give up and decide that you suck. The beginning, it is not easy for everyone. But that doesn't mean you have to give up. My mother is an English teacher, with broad knowledge, an avid reader - a woman who's supposed to be natural where translation is concerned. She wasn't, we saw that when she tried to work on one of my texts. She was actually terrible at it. But such were the times that she had lots of time - a very rare occasion with her - and somewhere in the middle of the book I realized that she was getting better. I think she'll never become a good translator, simply because she wants to be a teacher. But even so, she managed to better herself. If this is your chosen field, go for it. Give it a try. And then a second try. And a third one. Only then will you know that it is not your occupation.

Back to the thesis, and I hope I am not meddling: if you really can't find enough Finnish translations, give it up. You can expand on something that is there but if it isn't, you cannot invent it. Been there, done that. Didn't work out.

P.P. Going back through the thread, I realized that caught up in this or that discussion, I never actually stated my own position: I have no problems with the solutions our translator came up with because they are solutions. It's genuine mistakes that stand out to me. When I decide to translate a phrase or sentence in a certain way, it is my decision and it can be a good or not so good one. But it's a decision. When I get an auto part wrong, it is a clear mistake. It's obvious that no one decides to make a mistake!

[Annara Snow]

:lol: I love how even the native speakers of any of those languages cannot tell if they are one language or two different ones! (I cannot tell them apart, I admit.)

Everyone knows it's the same language. People just pretend it's not for political reasons. :) There is a problem with how to call it. It used to be Serbocroation once upon a time; now it's Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian, Montenegrin, and in the Hague tribunal it's called BCS (Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian).

I think most precise translation for the Hound would actually be "dzukela", but I think that would be too much...

I generally think Serbian translators did great job in translating geographical names. They make sense, and I generally liked them better than Croatians. We also have to understand that some names have to be translated due to "characterization by name", especially with bastards - Snow (Snezni), Flowers (Cvetni), Rivers (Recni) etc. I have to say that I dislike the translation of Tully (Tuli) and I think I will never get accustomed to it. Although, they made a misstep with Kettleblacks. They should have also been translated according to "characterization by name", but somehow they are not. Also, I hate reading Kejtlin, and I think they should have translated it as Ketlin.

I agree with you Annara, especially regarding "the late lord Frey" situation

The only trouble now, that with translations, I am simply unable to participate in any national forums. I am complete ignorant in Serbian ASOIAF :)

Also, Annara, do you hate (genitiv imenice Dorna - Dornea)? It always bugged me...

"Dzukela" isn't really the appropriate translation of "the hound" either... it's either an offensive or comical word for a dog, or a person compared to one, or it specifically - and comically - refers to mongrel dogs/stray dogs (similar to "dzukac")... while the hound refers to a hunting dog: breeds their masters use to hunt other animals with. It's therefore the exact opposite of the primary meaning of the Hound nickname. Sandor only became a stray dog after Blackwater. ;)

Also, it doesn't solve the gender problem, since it's feminine (though dzukac is masculine, but, again, doesn't fit the meaning of 'the Hound').

When you look at how 'the hound' is used in literature in, for instance, "The Hound of Baskervilles", it's to denote a large, scary dog - which I imagine was the idea behind Sandor's nickname, too, rather than an offensive/comical reference to a mongrel/stray dog that you get with "dzukac" or "dzukela".

BTW, how did they translate "Shaggydog"?

I didn't know how "Dorne" was translated. "Dorne"- really?! Why not "Dorn"?

Some of the names had really strange transliterations, like "Tywin" - Tivin, or "Clegane" - Klegani (?!). I understand that they did not know how "Catelyn" or "Jaime" was pronounced, by these are really not how I would ever read "Tywin" or "Clegane" if I saw those names on paper!

Yup! I forgot about verbs! I simply went pseto, pseta, psetu, pseto... and said, hey, it's almost the same! :dunce:

Hmmm, I'd have to check, but I imagine the book used masculine. It would be natural, wouldn't it? Or not. Pseto je došao, sounds OK, to me at least, if you keep in mind it's a man. But Moj Pseto je došao, is all kinds of crazy. Yeah. I don't know. :dunno:

Maybe the books alternated between Pas and Pseto where appropriate? I should really ch.. che... check it out, wha...wha...what's it all about.

I am curious about it, but I'm guessing that they probably always used the masculine, since it would sound more natural than the alternative. That's what people usually do when they refer to women by their profession, if there is no feminine form of the word - though it does sound awkward, which is why there are attempts to create feminine forms of those words. Still, the alternative of referring to women in masculine would be much weirder, so semantics usually take precedence, though it is a tricky issue.

I assume they did the same with 'the Mountain' - in that case, there is no masculine word to translate the nickname with. I can only think of "Planina" and "Gora" and both are feminine - and it would certainly be weird to refer to Gregor Clegane in feminine! Come to think of it, the same is true of "The Red Viper". Fortunately, "wolf" and "lion" present no such problems, since they both have masculine and feminine forms. "Dragon" can be translated with the masculine "zmaj" or feminine "azdaja".

The lack of grammatical gender, and gender-neutrality in general, is one of the reasons I love the English language. It makes so many things simpler. :)

[Ygrain]

Anath, I'm by no means a philologist, but during my studies I sort of specialized a little bit into the translation of old-fashioned texts. I did my Bachelor's thesis on the formation of kennings in the Finnish translation of Beowulf, and intended to do my Master's thesis on translating archaisms. Lately we've had a lot of studies on re-translating books into more modern language, but research on the translation of texts that need to preserve the feeling of "days gone by" is something that is hard to come by. I've struggled with my Master's mainly because there's not a lot of theory available and practically none for Finnish translations, so I'd need to do some groundbreaking here.

I'm currently thinking of either going back to the library or heading to a bookshop to get a copy of one of ASOIAF books to see if the translator preserved and/or compensated on the archaisms that we see in Martin's writing. Using ASOIAF as the material for my thesis might be just the kick I need to finally get it done, but I dread reading the Finnish translation for the reasons mentioned in the OP. But if there are no archaisms in the translation I'll be really disappointed.

Heh. I went for something that sounded like a pretty interesting topic, ambiguity in the translation of poetry (the lecturers put up topics here, or at least they did when I studied), only to find out that there is very little literature concerning ambiguity in translation at all, and that majority of what little I could find was basically just unclear grammatical reference, and that even if there was some ambiguity of other kind, imagery or such, it was invariably lost with rhymed translations. So, I had wasted a lot of time reading and looking for translations of rhymed poetry first, then even more time looking for some free verse translations, and trying to use what I found for establishing at least some theoretical basis. It was terribly stressful and I was worried the whole time that I wouldn't manage to finish it before the deadline. - I did - I handed it in a full hour before the deadline expired.

Concerning good translating skills: I think it also helps if one handles well writing in the target language. It is again something that can be practiced (and I dare to disagree with GRRM that one should stay away from fanfiction, it is definitely a great tool to grasp an author's style or the correct register for characterisation).

[Mladen]

Everyone knows it's the same language. People just pretend it's not for political reasons. :) There is a problem with how to call it. It used to be Serbocroation once upon a time; now it's Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian, Montenegrin, and in the Hague tribunal it's called BCS (Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian).

BTW, how did they translate "Shaggydog"?

I didn't know how "Dorne" was translated. "Dorne"- really?! Why not "Dorn"?

Some of the names had really strange transliterations, like "Tywin" - Tivin, or "Clegane" - Klegani (?!). I understand that they did not know how "Catelyn" or "Jaime" was pronounced, by these are really not how I would ever read "Tywin" or "Clegane" if I saw those names on paper!

I am half-Montenegrin, and I say that is not a language

You are right about "dzukela"

As for Shaggydog, it is "Cupavko"

In Croatian, it is "Dorne", in Serbian "Dorna"

And I agree regarding Tivin, Klegani, Tuli...

[Mr Fixit]

BTW, how did they translate "Shaggydog"?

Čupavko, a cute name a little boy could very well give.

I didn't know how "Dorne" was translated. "Dorne"- really?! Why not "Dorn"?

Nope, it's Dorna.

Some of the names had really strange transliterations, like "Tywin" - Tivin, or "Clegane" - Klegani (?!). I understand that they did not know how "Catelyn" or "Jaime" was pronounced, by these are really not how I would ever read "Tywin" or "Clegane" if I saw those names on paper!

Actually, it's a common technique I noticed in quite a few translations, namely to try and "de-English" :cool4: the names. Yeah, it should obviously be Klegejn and Tajvin, but translators seem to try to avoid foreign-sounding combinations of letters. Whether it's a good choice is up for debate, but there it is.

EDIT: Ninja'd

[Buckwheat]

The lack of grammatical gender, and gender-neutrality in general, is one of the reasons I love the English language. It makes so many things simpler. :)

For me it is the other way round - I love the more differentiated languages because I can express myself more clearly and more detailed in them. ;)

As for Shaggydog, it is "Cupavko"

This one is gold. :lol:

[Mladen]

Actually, it's a common technique I noticed in quite a few translations, namely to try and "de-English" :cool4: the names. Yeah, it should obviously be Klegejn and Tajvin, but translators seem to try to avoid foreign-sounding combinations of letters. Whether it's a good choice is up for debate, but there it is.

There was also a huge debate when Euro-guinti (publisher from Belgrade) translated Deathly hallows and instead of "Grendzer" they used "Grejndzer". I am not sure, but as much as I think Tajvin and Klegejn are possibly better, I preferred Grendzer back then

[Anath]

For me it is the other way round - I love the more differentiated languages because I can express myself more clearly and more detailed in them. ;)

Same here. Plus, the lack of grammatical gender is a nightmare when you're dealing with a text where it isn't clear who is doing what and how many people are taking part in something. Somehow, you have to figure it out and do it the right way in a languare where grammatical gender is very much existing.

About ASOIAF: I am trying to find a solution about Dany's 'three mounts' and keep coming up empty-handed. In Bulgarian, we don't have a word for an animal that is to be mounted and with the structure of the prophecy, going for two or three words aiming for accuracy is not defensible. So, we have "three horses" instead but that is not accurate when it comes down to meaning. There is no win-win on this one.

[Iona]

Concerning good translating skills: I think it also helps if one handles well writing in the target language. It is again something that can be practiced (and I dare to disagree with GRRM that one should stay away from fanfiction, it is definitely a great tool to grasp an author's style or the correct register for characterisation).

This is an excellent point. Many people think translating is just replacing one word with another, but a good translator needs to be a good writer as well. We were encouraged to take part in creative writing courses and they were one of the best writing experiences I've ever had. I had fun writing and the stories the other participants came up with were sometimes mind-blowing.

[Woman of War]

The most difficult thing in translation is the difference in basic cultures. In any (good) book there's always allusions to commonly known movies, fairy tales, children books, typical characters, historical persons etc.etc., which is a platform for unspoken things like humor. It's very difficult to make these subtle ideas understandable to any reader unfamiliar with the basics of this particular culture.

However there're also things like technical errors. I remember some time ago Harry Potter books were translated so that the translations of the same name were different in the books, and even in the parts of a same book (the result of a team translation).

That's why I prefer reading English books in English. Trying to learn German too, so if someone can suggest me good German-language writers I'd be appreciated.

About wonderful German books

very special, highly creative fantasy:

WALTER MOERS, "Die Stadt der träumenden Bücher". Suspense, funny, heartbreaking and sophisticated, full of in-jokes at the expense of writers. And probably impossible to translate, enjoy in German