Why Literal Translations Fail

Discussion in 'Novel General' started by Wujigege, Jan 19, 2022.

  1. Wujigege

    Wujigege *Christian*SIMP*Comedian

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    Turns out you don't even need to know to language to spot a literal translation catastrophe.
    Years ago, I was reading Sevens and "Lyle felt high tension".

    I had to take a double-take, then a triple take and the nth take and was still dumbfounded about what the hell I was reading. Long story short, I no longer read Japanese translated novels. Novels are supposed to be a form of relaxation. I am not interested in mental gymnastics inorder to figure out what is being said.

    The same way I only buy sliced bread. I feel it's stupid to buy a bread that you need to cut.
    You shouldn't need a language dictionary to read a translation either

    I was able to resolve my confusion and found and bookmarked this page which I am sure you will enjoy



    https://injapan.gaijinpot.com/uncategorized/2013/05/21/high-tension/
    【Hai Tenshon ハイテンション】
    In Japan they often say “high tension” or “the tension is high” to mean elation or excitement. This is a Japanese-made phrase made up of English words.

    “Tension” in English means tenseness, anxiety, stress, or voltage, so if you translate “kyou wa tension ga takai” literally and say “I’m high tension” to someone in the English-speaking world, it will be taken to mean, “I am feeling very tense.”
    @Anra7777 @otaku31

    As someone said, " You are not respecting the language by leaving so much untranslated, you are just a shitty translator"

    Don't shoot the messenger

    @ludagad Happy New Year pengyou

    I get your point and bet you can't easily dismiss it this time
    https://forum.novelupdates.com/thre...and-why-does-he-have-a-gong-and-a-wang.58780/
    Hey everyone, I just posted my inaugural post on random translation musings, in which I share some thoughts on possible best practices and reflections after two years of webnovel translations. Of course, these are my opinions and preferences only, take ‘em with a boulder sized grain of pink salt! And this scandalous Ben fellow certainly has a party going on!

    “Wangye, nubi apologizes for the slight to da furen! Nucai’s zhuzi wanted to bring erye’s gift into the wangfu, but er furen once told san taitai that she’s allergic to flowers so xiaode used the chaos of wansuiye’s arrival to put erye’s gift into the dafang!”

    Today I’d like to address a pet peeve that’s creeped in over the years—leaving pinyin in novel translations.
     
    Last edited: Jan 20, 2022
  2. Anra7777

    Anra7777 All powerful magic grammar hamster queen pirate.

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    To be fair, I never read these kind of things in NU Japanese novels. Maybe you’re reading the wrong ones? XD
     
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  3. Baldingere

    Baldingere Roseau pensant

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    I don't really care as that kind of detail doesn't break my immersion. When I started reading as a kid, I didn't grasp all the words but context got me through and same thing when I started reading in different languages. It's like reading pinyin words in CN translation, at the beginning you're confused and then you get used to it and from novel to novel you recognise them easier.
    The downside is that I read too quickly to enjoy the sentences and think deeper about them before jumping to the next one and some writing style subtleties get lost.
     
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  4. otaku31

    otaku31 Well-Known Member

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    Tension can also denote excitement though that is quite an uncommon use of the word and not preferable when better alternatives can be availed of. And in some rare instances, literal (as opposed to poor or half-hearted) translations can help preserve nuances (as a result of higher faithfulness to the source) better than translations based on particular interpretations (the eternal debate on verse vs prose translations of Homer's epics comes to mind). But there are really no excuses for lazy literal translations.
     
    Last edited: Jan 20, 2022
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  5. sjmcc13

    sjmcc13 Well-Known Member

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    I have, but it varies. Seems like the better the translator understands both the source and target language, the less it happens.

    Unfortunately there are a lot of translations by people who understand at most 1 of those 2 languages, or are weak in both. sometimes it is acceptable (translator is trying to learn both languages better and listens to (not troll) feedback) other times you can tell it is someone doing a half-A job to try and get money from ad and/or commission $$$ (I do not know if he still works with Wujigege, but on one of the series I use ot read on his site I kept getting turned off by a constant mistranslation the translator kept making as every time I saw it I immediately thought the translator had weak English skills)

    I do, but where I grew up/my parents live the only place really selling non-sliced bread worth a damn is selling FRESH bread (still warm from the oven fresh), and fresh is so much better then sliced (but while it is still fresh).
    Though I also have a bread maker for fresh bread, but that stores is just better. Might just be that I am use to it though.
    I also sometimes find pre-sliced bread slices to thing, and prefer a bit thicker then what I can buy in the store.
     
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  6. OneeChanKyun

    OneeChanKyun Well-Known Member

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    I am so used to bad translations that I can understand stupid language now~
    Also thanks to Sevens novel for being a headache while reading it~
     
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  7. Wujigege

    Wujigege *Christian*SIMP*Comedian

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    I get your point and bet you can't easily dismiss it this time
    https://forum.novelupdates.com/thre...and-why-does-he-have-a-gong-and-a-wang.58780/
    Hey everyone, I just posted my inaugural post on random translation musings, in which I share some thoughts on possible best practices and reflections after two years of webnovel translations. Of course, these are my opinions and preferences only, take ‘em with a boulder sized grain of pink salt! And this scandalous Ben fellow certainly has a party going on!

    “Wangye, nubi apologizes for the slight to da furen! Nucai’s zhuzi wanted to bring erye’s gift into the wangfu, but er furen once told san taitai that she’s allergic to flowers so xiaode used the chaos of wansuiye’s arrival to put erye’s gift into the dafang!”

    Today I’d like to address a pet peeve that’s creeped in over the years—leaving pinyin in novel translations.

    I recall in Baltimore, you buy Stroeman sliced bread off the oven. So I beg to differ

    I cannot deny it. My first set of translators were pretty bad.
    The issue is that since I only knew English I couldn't really vet them. That's no longer an issue now thankfully
     
  8. Baldingere

    Baldingere Roseau pensant

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    Oh yeah I saw that thread, that's an over the top pinyin translation lol, I can't get through it to the point I'd rather read mtl. I read a lot of mtl actually, and that's literal translation to the point of absurdness and quite funny sometimes, but very confusing. Whether one can enjoy mtl probably depends on what one values in the reading experience. I don't read mtl for action scenes generally, because the tension doesn't come across. However for romance: the off sentences don't bother me from smiling at the PDA.
    But I don't recall having a problem reading Sevens, it might not have been smooth, but it was understandable
     
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  9. Wujigege

    Wujigege *Christian*SIMP*Comedian

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    I didn't drop Sevens because of the translations, I got tired of the story.
    Other Japanese novels are worse.
    Eg I said Make My Ability Average, where readers said thank you translations but their eyes were bleeding.

    Translator admits he is bad at Japanese.
    Editor admits he is bad at English.

    It was pretty ridiculous
     
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  10. Anra7777

    Anra7777 All powerful magic grammar hamster queen pirate.

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    Reminds me of that guy a few years back who asked to be hired as an editor here on NUF, but his introduction was incredibly bad grammatically and he kept fighting everyone who told him he needed to proofread his English first.
     
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  11. sjmcc13

    sjmcc13 Well-Known Member

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    Isn't that translation a 1 man show? by someone who is very non-serious?

    Also, avoid it's anime.
     
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  12. Wujigege

    Wujigege *Christian*SIMP*Comedian

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    Haha, it's like a blind man trying to lead another blind man. It's ridiculous.

    Good editors cost more than translators

    I think different people join the group. The original owner is good but the rest are very bad
     
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  13. Asf

    Asf 《《The aria of souls》》

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    Japanese has the worst relation with MTL compared to CN and KR. With KR being the best one.
    Well.. MTL with editing is where you get litteral translation from.
    As someone who is okay reading MTL I dont really mind the shitty quality as long as I get the gist of things
    My english is horrible so I can understand broken english more. Lol
     
  14. Nightow1

    Nightow1 Well-Known Member

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    I believe I shot you once over this before when you ranted on your translators. You're hardly in a position to complain about pingyin when you are using the user name of "Wuji *GEGE*". If you are really interested in 100% translations with no Pingyin, change your user name to Brother Wuji first. Otherwise you are just playing double standards, one for you and another for your translators.
     
  15. Wujigege

    Wujigege *Christian*SIMP*Comedian

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    Your ad hominem attacks are pathetic. I remembered why you were on my ignore list.

    It is like saying a journalist cannot report on medical malpractice because he is not a medical professional.

    Etvolare is a translator who made the post you quoted, so your point has no ground to stand on.

    You are blinded by your hubris.
    I am adding you back to my ignore list since you have nothing meaningful to say.
    According to your ilk, translators are infallible and gods who should never be questioned. What a joke.

    Personally, I feel sorry for you. People like you hold the translation community back.

    The point is to share translations to as many people as possible instead of basically using " code"
     
  16. Nightow1

    Nightow1 Well-Known Member

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    No, I believe YOU were the one that made the thread, not Etvolare and while you complain about "ad hominem", the truth is you would not be the target of the so called ad hominem "attacks" if you did not do something so obvious as ranting on your translators for using Pingyin WHILE YOUR NAME IS PINGYIN. It's called double standards and "The Emperor has no clothes" is not an ad hominem, it's a visible statement of fact. You are the only translation site I boycott because of that, which is really ironic considering your "goal" was "sharing translations". Your results are the exact opposite of that. Not to mention that you don't even translate or know the other languages, so at best you are criticizing your translators without even knowing if it was justified other than "feeling this is wrong" rather than "this is wrong". There is a big difference between feeling something is wrong and something being actually wrong.

    A man is best known by his enemies. Being on your ignore list is a mark of honor I'll treasure. Not to mention that now when I make snarky remarks about you, people might be laughing behind your backs and you won't know it. lol. Enjoy the suspense of wondering if everyone else is laughing at you or not.
     
  17. asriu

    asriu fu~ fu~ fu~

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    well this cat never expect pro level from "fans translation"~ now about literal, trans or totally new term which relate to localization.... its a choice depend on translator, the target of audience and the payer if such thing exist or just a style~

    low bar on fans translation come from most of reader cannot understand original language~ personal low bar will be different cuz each reader have different skill or influent no affinity? no what the word called again? forget it, competence on language medium that translator use at their translation thus you get chan, anpanman~ not to mention grammar, diction, etc~ is it better literal, trans, new term or totally reconstruct which one is better? well.... it depend.... no no no this cat not being lazy it just that what actually happen~
    take a look at niubi stuff, there nuance here if we try put it there need reconstruction on sentence
    Wangye (who is that? your majesty?), nubi (this servant? I? this slave?) apologizes for the slight to da furen(who da hell? her majesty the queen? was it the grandma?)! Nucai’s zhuzi(lil slave below this slave?) wanted to bring erye’s gift into the wangfu, but er furen once told san taitai that she’s allergic to flowers so xiaode used the chaos of wansuiye’s arrival to put erye’s gift into the dafang!......

    anyway... while technically it is possible to rearrange stuff it sound bothersome..... you do it....
    @otaku31 yeah common book is bad enuf, literature is different league at it own.... the problem langue tie with history, culture and such may make stuff lost in translation
     
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  18. Dahna

    Dahna (-, – )…zzzZZZ

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    In some cases, leaving pinyin is a better choice than translating them to another language because many things or terms Western don't have and are required to borrow pinyin to describe it. The most particular example is "qi" in wuxia, xianxia, or the name of genres themselves.

    But, overusing pinyin for Chinese words that can translate straight to English will give readers real headaches.
     
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  19. Asf

    Asf 《《The aria of souls》》

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    This reminds me of that novel world of cultivation. The pinyin made it such a pain to read. More so for the non chinese speaker.
     
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  20. Wujigege

    Wujigege *Christian*SIMP*Comedian

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    The issue is that you have some translators and a group of their supporters with a god complex.

    They think translators are infallible gods. You point this out and you are called ungrateful or told to learn the language.

    I own a translation website, so I find it even more ridiculous that they think I have no right to express my views.

    Then again, such people are not reasonable.

    It is like those who say journalists cannot report on medical malpractice because they do not have medical training.
    Or that patients cannot complain of pain after surgery because they are not medical doctors.

    It's asinine.