Translators holding novels for ransom, or rarely ever updates them unless you donate?

Tell me about it, it's difficult to find something similar. I have a lot of their books, but the one I want the most is The Yang Family (2 volumes). One went missing, the other actually eaten by a dog (no joke). I actually asked around and the publisher had died of cancer a few years ago.

But if you're in Singapore I believe their books are available in Singaporean libraries, at least that's what I know from googling. Had a few friends walk around Bishan (?) and they found me some in acceptable quality.

 

or you could pay a teacher and learn the language instead.
a much more productive endeavour if you ask me.

 

I'm permanently situated in canada atm, so I'm screwed, wwwwww. Oh, trust me, I tried to look for it with no luck, even at the used book stores (went as far as checking out the 'book street' in HK in mongkok, only volume 2 and 3 were available). When I was still healthy and had a sizeable disposable income, I shipped ~$400 worth of books for friends and relatives (that's the shipping price, the actual costs were waayyy higher, wwww) when I happened to dropped by the city not long after the company first went under. Hell, I've had booksellers asking me to sell them my books :\

It's not like they can contact printers in TW to get it too, since it's literally out of print, wwww (I got the entire set of city hunter that way). This is one of those cases where we don't know its value until it's gone, sigh :< My old 'chinese teacher' (we get free language classes for spanish, cantonese, mandarin and some other languages here, not to be confused with 'old chinese' teacher from hk xP) were definitely a fan of their work after I introduced her to the weird tales of Lao Ziao (or something like that, can't remember the actual series).

Well, I guess it isn't that hard to find the original sources nowadays, but getting full access to them is still a problem. :\

 

Oh but if you're looking for straight up Chinese versions from China I think they are available on Taobao. They sell entire sets of the books (I forgot what's the term for such traditional comic strips) and are the source of those English translations. The Canfonian ones only cherry pick some of the stories and not the entire series.

Eg: for 'Yue Fei' https://world.taobao.com/item/526363285592.htm?fromSite=main

English ones... ehhh I can't find any still selling them. To this day I regret postponing my purchases, thinking I could get them later because there were so many copies on display.

 

Yeah tbh, the whole thing irks me already, especially when a new translator that popped out of nowhere setup a donation goal with plausibly good TLs but shit english quality. But it kinda gets justified when the TLer loves what he's doing and is sincerely doing it out of love for the novel which you can kinda see or prove with the translations they're putting out.

So yeah, it only becomes reasonable when they do it out of love (and is maybe unable to support their endeavor) rather than seeing it as a cash cow.

 

Yeah, no one realized the demand for the bilingual version until the "3rd/4th gens" expat started growing up, now you can't find it unless you know someone, and it's usually quite pricey.

Hmm.... $60 + shipping... gonna see if I can convince someone to try and pick up it when they head to tongheng, but I would be competing against hollow-fibre yarns... I think I'd lose T.T (~0.50c per meter here, that's a ridiculous price for yarn, waaaaaaay cheaper in china).

Money, money ruins everything, and the solution to everything, but still ruination.

 

Perhaps there are other versions, just like those Canfonian books. I just googled that.

 

If they want money, they could just charge $1 for every 10 chapters on Amazon. Who owns the copyright anyway?

The biggest irk is how the original authors are forgotten while the translator gets all the "donations." A real world translator gives royalties to the author. Imagine if I get donations translating Harry Potter into Chinese. (Bad analogy)

 

I don't agree with this you have not taken in account country and currency difference for most US and European people a dollar or pound maybe be nothing but changed in most asian currency it gives a lot more than cash register job for sure at least if one is getting 200$ per week and most of the people tling are from asian countries not all ofc.

 

Well... I am paid 7$ per hospital shift a day.
So if someone give me 14$ a day, I might stop working and translate instead (not a chance in happening)

 

Translating is business. Some do it to contribute to the scene, but there are also some who do it for the money. I don't blame the latter one, money runs the world after all

 

Ah..........How do you eat?

No one, that I know of... Who gives a damn about free stuff on the internet being shared around?
Also, some authors get a shit tonne of money.........well good ones. Like I Eat Tomatoes.

 

Food only cost about 120-150$ a month (for the whole family) if you buy in bulk and cook yourself.
A sack of rice: 50$ is enough for about 40-60 days eating... Instant Noodles is cheap 1$ could buy 5 pieces... 5$ could buy enough vegetables to fill my fridge... Meat? 2-3$ could buy entire chicken. 8-10$ for 1 kilogram beef... But my family is not a heavy meat eater (my mother hate beef), most of our protein came from fish and bean (that's very cheap) and we eat lot of fresh vegetables.
And I a a cheapskate who prefer to eat porridge (0.5$ for a heartful portion) or noddles (1$) rather than fancy cuisine (even if I am a doctor ), in most cases, I just bring a bento from home....

 

wut $7/day only enough for 1 burger a day how can you lived??

 

In most Asian country, you can live normally even if your income is less than 1$...

 

Where do you live? I aspire to become as frugal as you.

 

Indonesia... Just brought 10,000$ to here, and you can live like a gangsta... I mean in luxury.... at least for 1 full year...

 

O.O
I wonder how many patents you get a day....

 

$10,000 to live as a playboy, maybe I should retire.

 

It's common in our neck of the neighbourhood, except for Singapore. They're bloody expensive. BTW, I live in Malaysia, not Indonesia like @Yukkuri Oniisan . They have cheaper stuff I think, but still, you already know how much an average meal and burger price in my country is like.

Even my 50-ish ex boyfriend was a Canadian who semi-retired here. He had another girlfriend back when he was with me, but I never met her myself.