Subject
Re: Translation: some proposals (fwd)
Date
Body
>From: Galya Diment <galya@u.washington.edu>
>
>Peter Kartsev wrote: "[Marshak's] Burns may well be better than Burns'
>Burns.">
>And, as we all know, "To be or not to be" sounds even better in German!...
---------
Well, sometimes (not very often) a reproduction does surpass the original.
When I read the debate about translation I find myself agreeing with both
sides. It is a great pleasure to read one of the rare translations (such as
Scott-Montcrieff's Proust or Lattimore's Homer) that provides a direct
experience of great literature, i.e., that does not read like a
translation. But such works tend to take annoying liberties with the
author's meaning. Doubly annoying perhaps if you are the author, redoubled
if you are Nabokov.
Here are three proposals--in order of preference. They seem to me obvious
ways of dealing with the inevitable problem of translation.
There are volumes in which the original and the translated versions appear
on facing pages. Suppose you have a three column arrangement with the
original, a literal translation, and a free translation. The literal
translation in such an arrangement might even preserve more or less the
word order of the original. (One might add a fourth column giving the
original in the Cyrillic alphabet.)
Alternatively, one could present a free translation with extensive
footnotes, or preferably sidenotes.
Alternatively, one might present a literal translation a la VN, but with
occasional tastes of the original rhyme and meter. Louis Armstrong's
autobiography has a section or sections in which his ghostwriter stops
converting the transcript of Armstrong's oral narrative into formal English
prose, and gives us a pure taste of Satchmo's language. The effect is
delightful, and it provides with great clarity and economy insight into the
method and structure of the book.
____________
Further: Nobokov was enlightened and generous in his appraisal of Kubrick's
Lolita, a "translation," like all films, from the novel. Nabokov's attitude
was especially commendable, given the circumstances: on first viewing the
film he, as I recall, was expecting to watch a rendering of his own
screenplay, and what he found himself watching was a film in which the
author's ideas had time and again been translated into a form more
cinematic.
Of course in an absolute sense, there is no such thing as a literal
translation of a novel into a film, or of description into pictures. But
there are examples and possibilities more and less literal. Kubrick
consistently used free invention in his translation--opening rather than
concluding with Quilty's murder (or am I wrong about this being Kubrick's
idea?) or at any rate the ping pong game in that scene, for example--one
among countless examples. The result was a brilliant film that was closer
to the spirit of the novel than the author's own script. Nabokov to his
credit recognized the film's merits. But is there an inconsistency here?
Walter Miale
>
>Peter Kartsev wrote: "[Marshak's] Burns may well be better than Burns'
>Burns.">
>And, as we all know, "To be or not to be" sounds even better in German!...
---------
Well, sometimes (not very often) a reproduction does surpass the original.
When I read the debate about translation I find myself agreeing with both
sides. It is a great pleasure to read one of the rare translations (such as
Scott-Montcrieff's Proust or Lattimore's Homer) that provides a direct
experience of great literature, i.e., that does not read like a
translation. But such works tend to take annoying liberties with the
author's meaning. Doubly annoying perhaps if you are the author, redoubled
if you are Nabokov.
Here are three proposals--in order of preference. They seem to me obvious
ways of dealing with the inevitable problem of translation.
There are volumes in which the original and the translated versions appear
on facing pages. Suppose you have a three column arrangement with the
original, a literal translation, and a free translation. The literal
translation in such an arrangement might even preserve more or less the
word order of the original. (One might add a fourth column giving the
original in the Cyrillic alphabet.)
Alternatively, one could present a free translation with extensive
footnotes, or preferably sidenotes.
Alternatively, one might present a literal translation a la VN, but with
occasional tastes of the original rhyme and meter. Louis Armstrong's
autobiography has a section or sections in which his ghostwriter stops
converting the transcript of Armstrong's oral narrative into formal English
prose, and gives us a pure taste of Satchmo's language. The effect is
delightful, and it provides with great clarity and economy insight into the
method and structure of the book.
____________
Further: Nobokov was enlightened and generous in his appraisal of Kubrick's
Lolita, a "translation," like all films, from the novel. Nabokov's attitude
was especially commendable, given the circumstances: on first viewing the
film he, as I recall, was expecting to watch a rendering of his own
screenplay, and what he found himself watching was a film in which the
author's ideas had time and again been translated into a form more
cinematic.
Of course in an absolute sense, there is no such thing as a literal
translation of a novel into a film, or of description into pictures. But
there are examples and possibilities more and less literal. Kubrick
consistently used free invention in his translation--opening rather than
concluding with Quilty's murder (or am I wrong about this being Kubrick's
idea?) or at any rate the ping pong game in that scene, for example--one
among countless examples. The result was a brilliant film that was closer
to the spirit of the novel than the author's own script. Nabokov to his
credit recognized the film's merits. But is there an inconsistency here?
Walter Miale