Hi fellow translators, how do you strike a balance between preserving the style of the original text and changing it (be it simply rearranging the sentence structure or substituting certain words with something else close in meaning but which is still different) in order to improve the flow? Just to put things in perspective, when translating a text from Chinese to English, there are certain phrases that do not exist in the English dictionary e.g. the idiom "玉树临风". Would you choose to translate it literally (jade tree in the wind) and footnote it to keep the style/poetical beauty of the text, or would you simply substitute it with say "handsome/refined/elegant" so as to ensure a smoother flow that is more readable? Personally I always struggle between the two. I tend to try and preserve the original meaning but I've noticed that it can lead to disjointed sentences, but at the same time the reason why I'm not keen on substitution is that it takes away the beauty of the text. I guess my question is, how do you decide when to use substitution and when to preserve the text as it is? Thank you!!
Great question, Personally I try to maintain the original meaning as much as possible. For idioms/flowery language, I try to find a similar idiom in english as much as possible and if not, I will change the words to the meaning of the idiom. Translating it literally and making a footnote to explain it should be the last resort. Translating should be for the reader's understanding of the meaning behind the text, we convey the information. If we translate literally for flowery languages and idioms whats the difference between us and MTL? (no offense to people who do mtl or translate literally). EX: -To Each Of Their Own /萝卜青菜，各有所爱 -Can't Judge A Book By Its Cover/人不可貌相 <-- Verses "Can't Judge a Person By their Looks" (Then again, depends on context) Punctuation and order should be changed accordingly for translation as well. Just due to the grammar rules between English and Chinese, punctuation and sentencing can be disconnected/connected/separated if needed. EX: -恰遇南燕国连年灾荒... / Coincidently, Southern Yan Kingdom was suffering from a series of droughts... Personally, thats my preferences, but each TL has their own style. My mission is to help readers understand the content of the novel while sticking to the style of the author as much as possible. I think translators should also know basics on restructuring their texts to make reading flow better. Constantly ask: Would I enjoy reading this? Does this make sense as a reader? I hope this helps!
While the goal, first and foremost, is to emulate the style of the author, it's also important to look at the target audience and type of novel. In romance novels aimed for a female readership, flowery words and poetic writing is natural. On the other hand, imagine saying "His/Her hair blew like a jade tree in the wind as he/she sent blood flying with a swing of a blade." It's just completely out of place. Nothing wrong with translating it, it's just more about whether it fits the context and readership. In these cultivation novels, a lot of the flowery writing that's left feels completely weird to read from an English reader's perspective.
I think as the targeted audience is English speaking, ot makes more sense to make it flow in English. Just keep it close to the original but do make it flow. Replace the repeating words, rewrite the sentence if it doesn't fit with the rest etc.
You're not going to be successful at preserving the original style anyways so why not just make the prose flow smoothly. It's just way more important for the text to feel good in English. The only time where it'd make more sense to be more literal is when translating poetry and songs. These aren't supposed to look like regular prose so it matters less if they don't flow well.
Thank you everyone for your responses, you've all been very helpful!! I think I better understand the role of the translator now (it's not merely about preserving the author's style but also ensuring readability) @FreeAvocados I was struck by what you said about literal translation being no different from MTL, it really made sense and I agree wholeheartedly. @Galooza it's also true that the type of novel and context matters as well. I'll keep in mind all these advice the next time I begin translating hehe
In my experience, preserving the flow is more important. But it's a slippery road sometimes. If the novel is already complete, it's better to read the whole thing before translating it. That way you'll be sure not to butcher anything. Imagine you're reading an Italian or German novel and the translator keeps using Italian/German idioms and expressions that you don't understand. It'll just be a pain to read. You have to understand that most readers don't necessarily have the same passion for languages as some of us. They just want to read a novel, and that's all that should matter. So, my advice is, always prioritize the reading experience. But don't go too far with it, especially if you don't know where the novel is heading.
No one will give you an award for perfectly preserving the original sentence structure, words, flow etc, if the end result needs a dozen re-reads to comprehend it. You always go the literary route, not the literal. Of course, you shouldn't sacrifice the original meaning and intention of the sentence. If you're not a professional translator (I mean you studied this in college), it'll be harder to find the perfect balance, and that's understandable. But always go for an end result that makes sense to English readers. For example, Japanese authors tend to use lots of passive, while it's frowned upon in English literature (for reasons that I'm too lazy to list, but I'm sure there are websites that explain it). So if you translated a sentence like "I'm being hated" from Japanese, it'd be better to rewrite it as "They hate me" for the English readers. So what I mean to say is, you can sacrifice anything but the original intention for the sake of readability. Be brave. On another note, it's fine to have a bunch of footnotes at the end of the text, where you go over the originally used idioms (that you substituted with more fitting idioms or descriptions in your translation). That way, you let people who enjoy learning more about the Chinese language know about those idioms, while you don't throw in strange and unknown idioms in the text that might not be appreciated by everyone. Same for the thousand words of familial relations, seniority, respect, and so on that Chinese has. You lose the meaning between, for example, cousin from the mother's side or cousin from the father's side, but it's better to just use cousin. In professional translations, words like brother, cousin, etc aren't even used, and they opt for using first names instead, since that's how you talk or refer to your family in the US. And one more thing. Just do it as it's comfortable to you. If you prefer to throw in words like 'ge', 'biaomei', 'wangye' and so on, just do it. I reckon you're not getting paid to go through the trouble >_>. But still, try to keep the sentence structure readable, and split it in however many parts you need to. No one appreciates run-on sentences.
The first quote I think I might be closer to what was literally said in the Japanese. Despite not being a professional or even amateur translator, I don't see the second quote losing the both spirit and letter of the literal translation. One thing that is beautiful about many anime/manga series is that at times they have a character line applies so much to real life. While this is an anime line example, the same idea applies for manga and light/web novels. a. A wise fictional ninja (Kakashi of "Naruto") said that "in the shinobi world, those that break the written and unwritten rules are deemed trash... but be that as it may... Those that would disregard their comrades so easily are even worse than trash. And those who don't have the decency to respect the memories of their comrades are the worst." b. amazon.com/gp/video/detail/B01MTCUOCD… @9:19 of episode 11 of the above "Naruto Shippuden" link, "Something To Fill the Hole" (Eng. dub), a wise ninja named Kakashi said a quote that was based off of what his friend Obito said. It was "in the shinobi world, those who break the rules are scum. That's true, but those who abandon their friends are worse than scum and those who don't cherish their comrades' memory are even worse scum than that." I am open to any translator to tell me if there was an "lost in translation"-type issues between the 2 quotes.