Questions of translation

I am quite conflicted on the whole translation thing.

One the one hand, sharing texts/concepts/ideas with people/cultures who otherwise never would've been exposed to them is awesome and important (imagine life with no Dante, no Confucius, no Aristotle etc.).

On the other hand, things undoubtedly "get lost in translation," the original is always better (imagine Shakespeare not in English - it wouldn't be the same - I know for a fact it isn't) and this concept from the Italian traddure = tradire (to translate = to betray).

Recently I wrote an essay comparing the French and Italian translations of Harry Potter to the English.

The Italian translation was pretty bad and when I asked my cousin in Italy if she'd read Harry Potter she said no, which I found astounding, but after reading the translation I can sort of understand why. It's just not the same. Granted, word choice isn't exactly Rowling's forte her creativity and wit regarding names is and that wit and creativity sometimes can't be translated. If you think about how much word play goes on in Harry Potter in particular, some of that just can't be translated. Especially considering how much exposure there is to Harry Potter in other countries thanks to the movies, somethings you can't change, and some translations don't change names and the like.

How do you get the same feel and meaning of (or lack thereof) of names or words like Hogwarts or Whomping Willow?
It's hard, if not impossible, and requires a lot more creativity than I think translators think they need, after all translation is just copying right, imitation? All you need to translate is be bilingual, right? How hard is it to exchange one word in one language for the same word in another language?

The best translators are writers themselves in their native language, because they understand writing in general, but particularly how it works in their native language. But why translate another's work when you can write your own?

Sure, translating literature (especially poetry/songs) is at the top end of the "most difficult things ever" scale and translating political thought, ideologies, technical/scientific advances is easier as it's the meaning that's important, not so much the form. For example, MLK's "I have a dream" speech gets the idea across in Italian and if you watched the video with Italian subtitles you'd be able to feel his whole awesomeness thing (the same way, even though you don't understand German, Hitler's speeches sound really compelling - probably because you can't understand the subject matter).

Studying interpreting and translating is bringing up more philosophical and ethical questions than I would've thought.

Define me this

How do you define "best friend"?

Is it the person you've known the longest?
Talk to the most?
See the most?
Have the most in common with?
Spend the most time with?

Is it the person you tell those silly little random thoughts to? You know those ones like, "I saw a number plate that said PEN15 today" (because I basically have the maturity of a 13 year old boy tbh).
Or is it the person you don't have to see or speak to for weeks but when you do catch up again everything falls back into place like no time has passed at all?

Because, with a few exceptions, the answer to every one of those questions are different people for me.

Or is at any and all of those things at varying times throughout a friendship and life?

I think "best friend" is a pretty abstract and ephemeral concept. It's fluid but the whole "BFF/BFFL" concept threw us off a little bit, at least it did me. If someone doesn't stay my best friend forever/for life, does that mean they never were my best friend at all? Merely a close, but not best, friend?

I have had best friends that at one point in my life I thought I would love and be close to for the rest of my life. I could never have imagined not being ridiculously close with that person. Yet, at one point or another, we drifted apart. Sometimes we drifted back together again, and sometimes we didn't. Does that negate the fact that we were once "best friends"? Because we aren't anymore? Like, if you say you love someone and then in future you break up, or realise you don't, does that mean you never did? Because if you had truly loved someone then you never would've stopped. Or are there just different types of love? Different types of "best friend"?

I don't think so. At one point, someone can mean the world to you and you can't imagine what your life would be without them but just because it doesn't stay that way forever doesn't mean it wasn't the case in that moment. I don't think that because I don't love you anymore, or because you aren't my best friend anymore, that I never did or that you never were. It's not like you cease to exist in my memory as an important person because you no longer are. Present feelings don't affect the memory of the past.

These are just the things I think about sometimes (read: a lot).

Polyglot Problems #5

After listening to the advanced interpreters do their thing today I think I've come to the conclusion that I don't love Italian the way I love French.

Maybe it's because I haven't reached that point in Italian where it all makes sense. That culminating point where everything's solidified, I know enough words to get my point across, conjugating verbs is second nature,  forming sentences that are grammatically correct isn't so impossible and, lastly, confidence. 

Maybe it's because I haven't been to Italy. 

France is such a massive part of French to me, Paris, the Eiffel Tower, Versailles, croissants, all of these things that I love about French. And while I was still nervous about speaking in France, despite my host family being wonderfully patient, when I came home I felt 100 times better and more confident. 

French is just something I sort of...fell into (and don't all the best things happen that way? By accident?). I wanted to learn Italian and French was the next best thing. And I loved it. I was good at it, it was challenging in all its foreigness yet also simple - memorise everything. 

French sucked me in and Madame is the most amazing teacher I've ever had. I worked hard for it too and my hard work paid off. 

On the other hand Italian was always just something I wanted to understand because I've been surrounded by it all my life. Half-Italian, half-English conversations, half understood requests and "secret" conversations. 

I think that I wanted it so long that I've just kept on wanting it and forgotten why. 

Maybe it's just this interpreting thing has got me burnt out. 

I need a holiday. 

 

Horoscopes

So, don't laugh but sometimes I wonder about astrology... 

I always read the astrology things in the paper for fun. And sometimes they are just seriously accurate, 100% that Taurus bit is me, completely. 

Sometimes they're so irrelevant I can't even connect to half of it.

I always find it just that little bit ridiculous though. 

But just sometimes I wonder if it's all sort of legit... Sometimes it's so right it's seriously uncanny. Then I think of the "Weird Al" Yankovich parody.... 


"Now you may find it inconceivable or at the very least a bit unlikely

that the relative position of the planets and the stars could have

a special deep significance or meaning that exclusively applies to only you, but let me give you my assurance that these forecasts and predictions are all based on solid, scientific, documented evidence, so you would have to be some kind of moron not to realize that every single one of them is absolutely true."

Write it all down, let it all out

Writing things down really is therapeutic. It's cathartic. 

I write letters. 

I write hate letters, I write whining letters, I write love letters and friendship letters. I write letters where I rage, I write letters where I laugh, I write letters where I cry. 

I write them to myself, to my friends and family, to people I've never even met.

No one ever sees them of course but, like this blog, just the act of writing it all down, or typing it out, helps me get it out of my head, my version of Dumbeldore's pensive I suppose. Of course it doesn't quite work as well as Dumbeldore's pensive (nothing ever does in the muggle world) and sometimes I write letter after letter, a whole series of them, spanning weeks, months or even years, tucked away all just for one person. 

Sometimes it helps to just say what I want to say, what I know I can't, or shouldn't, say out loud in real life, to have a record of it somewhere outside of my head that, even though it's highly unlikely the person to whom it pertains will ever find out, still exists. 

Sometimes it does the exact opposite of help, that it's seemingly so easy for me to say what I want to say on paper, in a letter, just makes it that much worse when I can't say it in real life. 

Sometimes I pour my hopes and dreams through ink (or lead, I am a fan of the pencil) on to paper, making them something real, something concrete, and it's awful when those hopes and dreams come to nothing or crash and burn at my feet. 

Sometimes, I think I'll look back at these letters, all the highs and lows, and see how much has changed and say that I need not have worried so much, all turned out well.

Sometimes I wonder if I'll share the letters with their owners, the people I wrote them to. To show them how they made me happy or made me sad or proud or angry.