Resource Translation Lessons for Translators & Editors

i agree with you... the "ba" at the end always bothers me so much. although as a chinese person (from the mainlands heLLO) i use it in my chinese, reading it in translation throws me off all the time. same thing for when translators translate "滚“ literally. almost feels like a hate crime sometimes /j

ooohhhh this is interesting! as a translator ive always thought i should try to stick to the essence and the original flesh of the novel. but i really like this take on it- ive felt like my translations were always off but maybe this could be why...

 

Literal translations don't make for a very good read imo. The trick is to maintain the original essence of the work but it also make it flow good in English. Obv if you're translating from a language like Chinese to English, the sense structure is going to be very different and sometimes to maintain the same mood/tone/atmosphere that was present in the original work, you may need to be a little liberal with the English. And if something truly is not translatable but it takes too much out of the original work if you remove it, provide footnotes. At least thats what makes it better in my experience, but there's really a balance to maintain with this.

 

I've already made a liar out of myself once, so I won't definitively say this is it, but the ultimate goal if there ever was one wasn't to say translators are horrible and need to stop literally translating, but to identify exactly why it happens. And it was only on this last pass of the translation section that I feel I finally identified and addressed the crux of the issue.

@riririn mentioned liking to see past renditions, so I looked into if we could get a hold of thread history and the short answer is I don't know, so this is a good time to at least summarize the major edits and their reasoning as best as I can remember.

The translation section was originally one section called Literal Translating that mainly touched on translators needing to have more faith in their editors, but I never liked how much of an affront to translators it was, even if I tried not to be directly critical. There's no way not to be really, but I did steer in a different direction eventually. Bashing someone unnecessarily doesn't help them understand your viewpoint. Eventually, it turned into the essence of the work, and then in the last major edit, Translation I & II. That's where I finally touched on the two different viewpoints of translating a story versus retelling an author's intentions. And that to me identified the real issue of why we literally translate and can uncouple ourselves from that viewpoint now that it's been identified.

Text Reconstruction was a new section added after I started editing a new novel the last few months called Juliet. I ended up doing a lot of what I mentioned in there that I never had before, and it made the flow of events a lot more natural and understandable.

Text Condensing was originally just Contractions & Sentence Condensing back before the previous section was added. That was first changed into Rewriting I & II, then into Text Condensing I & II. That was because sometime around January I read an article about pronouns that triggered the thought that I never touched on repetitive details & names which I'd always meant to, so I took out sentence condensing and turned it into the Text Reconstruction section.

The last section is still primarily the same. The idea in it of actively changing sentence length came from an article about writing music rather than words.

There are a ton of minor edits and sentence rewriting, but those are the big structural changes. Although I did have one example before that was from a manga I'm working on, I changed all examples into self made since, despite the fact that I use original & changed as if I did take them from somewhere.

 

Dang, this is super cool to see :0000 Thank you for adding it even though it was more work for you to remember things ;w; I really like this thread and it's cool to see someone else's perspective/approach to translating, plus there's lots of tips I can take from it too!

 

Almost three months, sure enough this wasn't it. Had some ideas that led to another complete overhaul. Added a whole lot more instruction on things I felt ought to have been there and re-added some things I wrote over along the way that I felt still needed to be said. In keeping with what Riririn mentioned with old renditions, here are the old sections:

Spoiler

Translating I: Redefining Translation

If you stop and really think about it, can you actually translate a story? I argue you can’t. What you’re really doing is translating an author’s intentions through your own retelling, meaning you may not be translating what you think. And that view of subpar but faithful wording rather than retelling the story as well as you can becomes an issue. Is writing subpar doing right by the author? Compared to anime & manga that have the luxury of music and art to draw readers in, novels don't. Thus, good writing is critical. Literal translating limits word choice while storytelling takes imagination. To that end, it behooves us to take on a more liberal, yet restrained approach. So be bold with words, because while there is a line to be crossed in translation accuracy, it's crossed in the essence of the writing.

Translating II: Essence of the Writing

The essence of the writing goes back to to the new definition of translating. It has nothing to do with the written and everything to do with the unwritten. So long as the author's intent comes across, does wording even matter? Other than differing wording, nothing more is said of context in the first conversation here than the second. Except to me, the second has more character that might've been lost:

Example:
Original: *Smack* "You hit me!" "I did." "Why?" "I don't know."
Edited: *Smack* "Ow!" "..." "Got nothin' to say?" "..."

Spoiler

Text Reconstruction

As established earlier, we’re writing on behalf of the author. What that doesn’t mean is we’re writing exactly how the author structured things. Text restructuring can completely change how well readers can follow a story. Sentences can be conjoined, even if they've been separated by the author but still match content wise. Or perhaps mix-and-matching different sentences in two different paragraphs reads better and are easier to understand after they've been rewritten; a good editing job goes a lot deeper than simple rewording.

 

I get so excited to read about people's perspectives on translations, so thank you for updating this thread yet again! Also, I thought I would link some other posts I've saved about this as food for thought for anyone else who loves thinking about this:
Translation tips by J: https://jtranslationscn.wordpress.com/2021/04/04/translation-tips/
Twitter thread by Fanyiyi about idea of foreignization vs domesticating in translation studies: https://twitter.com/fanyiyi33/status/1300393824842211329

 

Holy cow, thank you so much for all your work @Galooza, this is amazing

Yes! I also love hearing other people's translation thoughts. And your links are super interesting~ Some links I have found lately:
I wish there was the raws but examples of how differently things can be translated https://chaleuria.com/an-ode-to-translating-faster-and-its-inconsistencies/
How not translating literally improves the reading experience: https://etvolare.com/flashes-of-brilliance/

 

The more I think about it the more I'm convinced that literal translations are just bad. The primary goal of a translation is to make a book readable to people who don't know the original language. And literal translations don't do this. More specifically, they don't care about readability and that can really really suck. A prime example of this is with Japanese dialogue. Often large exchanges of dialogue will go by without a single pronoun. It works okay in Japanese* but it looks awful in English and it can be very tough to parse. I find that these literal translations can suck the fun out of the reading experience and that's the opposite of what should be happening.

* I don't know if this is considered an acceptable practice in Japanese literature, or is it considered crass writing?

 

Languages like Chinese are "impressionistic" by nature. With very supple grammar, sentences are basically a bunch of words thrown together for the mind to "project".

As such, it really makes zero sense to try to retain the syntax.

In any good translation, it's the first thing that has to go. One reason why MTL's are generally garbage.

 

What exactly do you mean by this? I don't know what "supple" grammar means.

But Chinese certainly does have grammar and rules of syntax that must be adhered to. Lacking grammatical inflections, word order is crucial in determining the relationship between words. Subject always goes before verb, modifiers always go before the word being modified, statements of time as in the dates go before the verb (In the third year I studied English....), while time as in duration go after the verb (I studied English for three years...), etc.

In Chinese, you have to say "Tomorrow I'm going to the bank." You can't say "I'm going to the bank tomorrow." That would be ungrammatical.

Now of course, when translating to English we can change it so that tomorrow is at the end. But in Chinese, you can't construct a sentence that way, so I don't know in what way you mean Chinese to be "impressionistic".

 

Well, you are wrong. And here's why:

If you really want to retain the English syntax then,

1. "Tomorrow I'm going to the bank" would be "明天我去银行“
2. "I'm going to the bank tomorrow" would be "我去银行明天"

Both are equally bad Chinese. An example of a sentence someone may actually say to convey the meaning of either "Tomorrow I'm going to the bank" or "I'm going to the bank tomorrow" would be "我明天去银行“ which, if you insist syntax can be directly transcribed, would be "I, tomorrow, am going to the bank".

This should at least prove to you that using English syntax to illustrate the limitations to Chinese syntax makes zero sense. And, conversely, that trying to retain the Chinese syntax while translating is also bad (which was my original point).

It may perhaps also point out that there is more brain gymnastics going on than just putting the words in the right order when you go from one language to the other. More so because the correct English syntax to your first sentence should be "Tomorrow, I'm going to the bank". (The comma matters, because Eats, Shoots & Leaves, and because I can use the same "sleight of syntax" to do "我要走一趟银行，明天去" ).

As for what I mean by impressionistic, consider this:

满纸荒唐言，一把辛酸泪。
言荒唐满纸, 泪辛酸一把。

Besides the fact that nominal sentences are way more common in Chinese than in English, can you really say that either of the above examples is incorrect?

You wouldn't. Because statements like "modifier always going before the word" is simply wrong outside of, perhaps, Chinese grammar for HSK and "business Chinese". A Chinese kid never learns that.

As for subject always going before the verb: 笑一笑,十年少

Don't you agree?

Are there grammar rules in Chinese? Sure. But it is my observation that they are comparatively more supple. Which isn't a criticism btw. It's partly the consequence of the writing system imo. Logographic units (characters) generally contain more information than the typical word spelt out using the alphabet, so it allows for more room to switch things up.

Consider 花落知多少 for example.

In five signs you get the impression of vegetation with the repeat of the 艹 key. And then the variation between the many and the few in the numbers of strokes of 多 and 少.

A graphic, impressionistic dimension that doesn't exist in a language like English.

Stopping my rant here because I could go on for way too long.

 

(I guess a lesson here for translators is to study Chinese grammar... I am taking notes )

 

Hi! I'm a newly graduated generic english to french translator.

(generic translator, as in I'm not qualified for legal or scientifical/medical documents, you need a specialist degree for those in France.)

I've only subtitled 2 movies so far, but I'm looking to continue "training" myself by giving a hand here if I can. I know English to French is not helpful with the Korean and Chinese based novels here, but maybe I can help out in some other fashion?

Like editing and proof reading english MTL's?

If one could help me with the MTL process, (I've only come recently to the Korean novel genre, so I'm just learning about all this), I'd gladly help out any team that requires it on my down time.

It will help me practice and keep up with my translating skills !

My english is Canadian based btw. My French from France (where I live!)

Have a great day everyone! Hope to hear from you guys soon!

 

Hope this doesn't get buried. This is a valuable resource material.

 

1. In my line of job, Localization (l10n) is a requirement though, some of the documents require the equivalent l10n. And as a result, when manga and novel publisher hire a professional translator, you get "dad jokes", which rarely conform with the joke from original untranslated works. this include character name, places, etc. The evil form of l10n is the requirement to meet the targeted language cultural standard, I always hate this kind of l10n. Want to see example? When CBA (Chinese Basketball Association) player got localized into NBA player. I really hope, no translator here do this kind of thing. Localization is not a requirement for your translated works to be popular! As they already understood the material they are reading!
Most of translator here are doing translation not professionally, so you guys don't need to do this, your boss are not a company boss that need a document to be 'dumb'ified' so they can understand. So just do literal translation.


2. Now for another one of the problem that I see on Manhua/Manhwa and Novel translation, is Transliteration, if the original says "Zhou", it is incorrect to transliterate it to "Chou" and god forbid "Chew", Just for the sake of Westerner spelling. This also happen on Korean Name, like "Ju" thanks to westernized spelling it became "Joo", and god forbid "Chu". Transliteration is not a requirement for your translator works! As you are not a language teacher to your reader!

There are many more things I want to say, but these 2 are what bother me the most about Manga and Novel translation.

 

Well, liberal translations aren’t standard because it’s basically a rewrite. It may be more “readable” to the general public, but is basically a slap in the face to the original writer and are almost always considered as inferior.

I agree that many webnovels are “padded” because of the nature of their original monetization (minimum or per character), but I general veer towards trying to not resort to entire rewrites as much as possible (just removing redundant sentences and maybe adapt a few idiom that have close English equivalencies, and adding notes for context if allowed). For one, it isn’t good practice in a professional sense, and two, that’s too much work.

Generally, if you’re to work as an editor for an official publisher, you will be INSTRUCTED to not take things too far, and will be provided a style guide/template, etc. to strictly adhere to. Veering off the beaten path will get you reprimanded and eventually fired. TLing or Editing in a professional position will always require a certain standard of work and will put fidelity to the original text as paramount. Being too “liberal”, even in fictitious works, will inevitably breed bad habits and may lead to career suicide.

For many fan translation works, many are unpaid or paid very little, and many are done by MTL, MTL-assisted, or Amateur TLs, wherein for such works, the issue becomes ACCURACY over flair ~_~ Killing yourself over getting everything spick and span for something that may not even be used when it is eventually taken down through DMCA, etc. etc. anyways, my point being, the payoff isn’t worth the effort if these are your circumstances. PLUS, it is generally accepted for unofficial releases to be kinda “shitty” or you might run the risk of usurping official releases, which will tank its numbers, which will then deter further official releases. It isn’t good for the industry in the long run.

In any case, MY FIRST RULE to would-be EDITORS is: YOU ARE NOT THE WRITER! Don’t pretend you are.

 

Ahh so much good input, thank you, I'll keep in mind everyone's opinions.

It makes a lot of sense, when I was a newer translator, I would be scared to change too much while translating Chinese novels. But it's been 5 years now and I can say for sure, just adding a dose of your own 'liberalness' really makes the story flow better