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[a_t_rain]

Chapter 14 of Mordant is up at Schnoogle. Wherein Sirius punches Snape across his office. (Come on, you know you want to see it.)

First week of classes went OK -- I still haven't learned any of the kids' names properly, and when I made them read the first half of Agamemnon for Thursday, several of them came in looking like Aeschylus had personally clubbed them over the head. (And frankly, with the translation we're using, I can't entirely blame them. Somebody needed to tell Richmond Lattimore that "I ask the gods some respite from the weariness / of this watchtime measured by years I lie awake / elbowed upon the Atreidae's roof dogwise to mark / the grand processionals of all the stars at night / burdened with winter and again with heat for men, / dynasties in their shining blazoned on the air, / these stars, upon their wane and when the rest arise" is not a parseable sentence in English, whatever it may be in Greek.)

On the other hand, teaching the second half of freshman English during the first semester is beyond cool. Granted, I have two sophomores who either started at the lowest level or failed one of their comp classes the first time around, but the rest are either sophomore and junior transfer students, or freshmen who are well ahead of their peers. They pay attention! They ask intelligent questions! One of them e-mailed me to tell me how much she loves writing and was looking forward to the class! I can't believe it took me five years to figure this out.

Comments

[mafdet.livejournal.com]

That translation is rather, erm, impenetrable. Does Sirius Black do things "dogwise?" Or is that "doggy style?" ;)

[a-t-rain.livejournal.com]

Heh. Well, another translator (Ted Hughes, whom I adore about as much as it is ever reasonable to adore a dead guy whose wives kept topping themselves) renders this bit as "Tethered on the roof of this palace / Like a dog," which clarifies things immensely.

You shouldn't have to use a translation to understand your translation. It's just not right.

[snorkackcatcher]

You shouldn't have to use a translation to understand your translation. It's just not right.

::snort:: When we did the prologue to the Canterbury Tales in English at school (starting at age 14, oy) we had to get another book which had a translation into modern English in order to understand it, despite the fact that theoretically it's the same language. Except, of course, it's right at the edge of comprehensibility given the changes in spelling, vocabulary etc over the past six centuries.

I've had a paperback copy of the whole Tales on my bookshelf for a while (picked up out of curiosity at one of those discount stores, but never actually looked at before). From a glance through, frankly it's not that much easier to read now. There are passages which are readable as they stand, but also lots of marginal notes at the end of the lines explaining the meanings of various words, plus many footnotes giving translations of whole lines which are just plain opaque to the modern reader.

Oh well. Reading the introductory notes just gave me a possible throwaway joke to use if I ever get around to my vaguely imagined HP-fic-stretching-over-eight-centuries-of-wizarding-history, so that's somewthing. :)

[a-t-rain.livejournal.com]

We had translation quizzes the last time I took a Chaucer course -- in grad school. (Granted, the entire class thought it was idiotic, since most of us were medieval or Renaissance specialists who could do it in our sleep, and I suspect the professor was trying to fill time, but still -- arguably, it is a different language.)

Rant!

[dolorous-ett.livejournal.com]

You shouldn't have to use a translation to understand your translation. It's just not right.

Speaking as a working translator, I completely agree with you.

However, there are acclaimed writers in the field of Translation Studies who think that forcing the source text to conform to the stylisitic conventions of the target language is actually a form of cultural imperialism and as such A Bad Thing. Their idea is that we should abandon the bourgeois and outdated notions of comprehensibility readability and try to bring the reader closer to a more immediate experience of the style of the target language.

While I admit that it's sometimes nice to appreciate the form of the source text in a more immediate way, these theorists have completely overlooked the fact that translators take a pride in the standard of prose they produce - so attempts to make their texts read like they were written by a high-intermeditate student of English as a second language in a hurry are always going to be resisted.

They've even devised a barbaric term for it: "foreignisation". It causes me headaches in my translation seminars from time to time: "I'm not writing lousy English, I have adopted a stragtegy of foreignisation..."

Not in my class, you don't.

[/rant] Sorry about that. Don't know what came over me.

I'm looking forward to more Mordant!

Re: Rant!

[a-t-rain.livejournal.com]

To be fair, in this case there probably IS genuine scholarly value in sticking as close to the source text as possible, it's just that this is really not the right text for an introductory drama class designed for undergraduates who aren't majoring in either English or classics. (And I can't imagine it would be a useful text for performance, either, which is sort of the point of a play. Ah well.)

Re: Rant!

[dolorous-ett.livejournal.com]

That's scholars for you - assuming that texts are there to be studied, not used. And certainly not spoken aloud - a big gripe of mine with poetry translations, which suffer particularly in that respect.

[moonys-autumn.livejournal.com]

Chapter 14 was worth the wait :) I really enjoyed it. You do uncalm!Remus well.

[a-t-rain.livejournal.com]

Uncalm!Remus is great fun to write :)

[chocolatepot.livejournal.com]

That was the best chapter EVAR! (I think I've said that the last three times, but oh well.) The best parts:

Snape in the beginning, marking papers. Stabbing papers. :) Whether they are used for murdering or curing people, or just for getting high. *snerk*

I like the way Snape obsesses over Sirius's aristocraticness (aristocracy?).

I love Sirius's temper, even if it makes me furious because he would be so much more productive if he didn't go off. And I'm glad he hit Snape, even if it was a stupid gibe to let get at him, because Snape desperately needed a punching in that book. *defiance against Snape apologists* If Minerva found out that he had grabbed one of her cherished Gryffindors hard enough to leave bruises and thrown a glass jar of cockroaches at his head – -- I wish she would, he'd deserve it.

I really, really like the way you qualified the Pensieve incident (I think "qualified" fits there} -- I know there's got to be more to that than we saw. I hope Jo addresses that in Book VII -- she's got to have more Sirius, she said we weren't done with him yet!

Brilliant Remus-Sirius interaction. If I tried to tell you what was best, I'd just quote the whole scene.

Wow, that's depressing. Every chapter you make me feel worse and worse about Sirius in GP.

Yessss! Sirius got to go outside again! Now I feel better. And I also love the Remus-Linus interaction.

Oooh, creepy ending. :) Next installment, please! *shouldn't be talking*

[a-t-rain.livejournal.com]

Ooh, gushy review! Thanks!

I like the way Snape obsesses over Sirius's aristocraticness (aristocracy?).

I'm proud of having called that one correctly. (That whole scene was written before HBP, apart from a couple of minor edits -- "upper-class pureblood drones" for "upper-class drones" and "Narcissa" for "Bellatrix" -- and it turned out to be eerily on the mark.)

Brilliant Remus-Sirius interaction. If I tried to tell you what was best, I'd just quote the whole scene.

They are SUCH fun to write together. I am beginning to understand why so many people ship them :) When they first started to take over the story, I worried that I was just going to end up rehashing everything fernwithy did in Shifts, and not doing it as well, but I simply couldn't resist.

Next installment shouldn't be too far behind -- I've just had the glorious realization that there are only three more scenes that I have to finish writing, and then I'll be DONE except for last-minute edits. Woo hoo!

[(Anonymous)]

You have a good point about Remus-Sirius being fun to write together. Actually, that's a thought I've had about many of the fics I've read where they're romantically involved. Many of them seem to enjoy the 'togetherness' far more than the romance, which seems as if it were tacked on because why would two single, amusing and not-unattractive men spend all their time together? (There are relationship stories that are, well, relationshippy, but the 'they banter so they must go to bed' issue strikes me a lot.)

I should probably introduce myself - I'm a sometimes Potter fan and journaler who's been more-or-less offline for the better part of a year, and has just discovered your stories (I can't remember how.) Anyway, I very much enjoy reading what you've written, and hopefully I'll be able to comment more intelligently in the future.

Oh, and on translations - after some of what I ploughed through for my thesis last year, I'm highly likely to kiss the feet of anyone who disregards authenticity and makes Theodor Adorno readable. Alas, I speak German and have noted that the incomprehensibility is present in the original too :(

[australienne.livejournal.com]

You have a good point about Remus-Sirius being fun to write together. Actually, that's a thought I've had about many of the fics I've read where they're romantically involved. Many of them seem to enjoy the 'togetherness' far more than the romance, which seems as if it were tacked on because why would two single, amusing and not-unattractive men spend all their time together? (There are relationship stories that are, well, relationshippy, but the 'they banter so they must go to bed' issue strikes me a lot.)

I should probably introduce myself - I'm a sometimes Potter fan and journaler who's been more-or-less offline for the better part of a year, and has just discovered your stories (I can't remember how.) Anyway, I very much enjoy reading what you've written, and hopefully I'll be able to comment more intelligently in the future.

Oh, and on translations - after some of what I ploughed through for my thesis last year, I'm highly likely to kiss the feet of anyone who disregards authenticity and makes Theodor Adorno readable. Alas, I speak German and have noted that the incomprehensibility is present in the original too :(

Sorry!!

[australienne.livejournal.com]

That's me above - I've no idea why it posted anonymously and twice.

[a-t-rain.livejournal.com]

Hey there, nice to meet you, and glad you're enjoying the stories!

Oh, and on translations - after some of what I ploughed through for my thesis last year, I'm highly likely to kiss the feet of anyone who disregards authenticity and makes Theodor Adorno readable. Alas, I speak German and have noted that the incomprehensibility is present in the original too :(

Heh. I took a cultural studies class as an undergrad, and I don't think I've ever felt so lost in my life.

[lengua-demorada.livejournal.com]

New Chapter! yesss!!!!! I`ve been waiting for a while because: 1) I love your stories and 2) is one of the few stories I can follow that is -mainly- spoilers free... yeah, I still haven´t read book 6 (I live in the 3º world and can´t afford to buy the english edition: I`ll have to wait untill it´s translated into spanish, acquired by my local library and borrow it:)so my ffiction quota has been drastically reduced.