Originally Posted by Ivan The Mouse Here comes the trouble when translating any freaking language. Translations are like spouses: They can either be faithful or good-looking. In other words, there's always a conflict between transparency, or how natural it looks like and sounds like to the reader, and fidelity, or how much is it faithful to the source material. Now, it's always going to be a balance of these two quantities else an absolute "faithful" translation will be like typing the source material into Google's translating widget. You know the results of this. On the other hand, an absolute transparent or "idiomatic" one will be the headache of people who know the language well, with cries of "That's not how you translate it, you goddamn idiot!" Well, to be honest, there's no such thing as an objective gauge for how good, faithful and clear-sounding translations are, because of the eternal and epic strife between the forces of transparency and fidelity. Some want the former, others the latter. And to be honest, I don't think the war will end soon, because you guys will argue over anything. Especially here in BL. The thing is, this is not a question of accuracy as you are either literally not translating at all or trying to take over grammatical structures that do not exist in the target language. Any German to English translator would think you are a moron for trying get across the nuance of a sentence where a person uses the dative case to construct a sentence which should have used genitive case in proper German. You simply can not just try to take over grammatical structures in translation. The only reason we kind of do this is because we're used to it because as mentioned earlier fan translators are in 99% of the cases not good translators. Originally Posted by Vigilantia The problem is some things can't be translated word for word so it has to be put into the translated language or worked around. Schadenfreude is a good example. Luckily, since this is Fanfiction we're talking about we can actually write, describe, or explain the intent instead of having to write down the untranslated word. I'm okay with putting words that have no equivalent like species of animals, dishes and sometimes concepts in a translation in their native language. What I am strongly against is this idea that by partially taking over a grammatical convention you are somehow managing to carry over more nuance while all you really do is take a big steaming shit in the middle of your translation. The honorific carries meaning but so does the verb form, verb choice in general and use of particles.
Originally Posted by I3uster A good translator can work around subtext. A bad translator leaves things untranslated. Most fantranslators are the latter. Its bad form, plain and simple, and while I can at least understand the motives behind putting it in a translation, if you write them into a work of your own that is originally English there is simply no way around calling that weaboo as there is no nuance lost. A translator has to work around the intricacies of a language, Japanese is not the singular exception here. Not to mention that the decision on what is translated and what is not is mostly completely arbitrary and made just for the sake of letting the reader /feel/ like they are provided additional nuance through the honorifixs while the pronouns and verb forms are lost. The problem is some things can't be translated word for word so it has to be put into the translated language or worked around. Schadenfreude is a good example. Luckily, since this is Fanfiction we're talking about we can actually write, describe, or explain the intent instead of having to write down the untranslated word.
Originally Posted by I3uster A translator has to work around the intricacies of a language, Japanese is not the singular exception here. Here comes the trouble when translating any freaking language. Translations are like spouses: They can either be faithful or good-looking. In other words, there's always a conflict between transparency, or how natural it looks like and sounds like to the reader, and fidelity, or how much is it faithful to the source material. Now, it's always going to be a balance of these two quantities else an absolute "faithful" translation will be like typing the source material into Google's translating widget. You know the results of this. On the other hand, an absolute transparent or "idiomatic" one will be the headache of people who know the language well, with cries of "That's not how you translate it, you goddamn idiot!" Well, to be honest, there's no such thing as an objective gauge for how good, faithful and clear-sounding translations are, because of the eternal and epic strife between the forces of transparency and fidelity. Some want the former, others the latter. And to be honest, I don't think the war will end soon, because you guys will argue over anything. Especially here in BL.
A good translator can work around subtext. A bad translator leaves things untranslated. Most fantranslators are the latter. Its bad form, plain and simple, and while I can at least understand the motives behind putting it in a translation, if you write them into a work of your own that is originally English there is simply no way around calling that weaboo as there is no nuance lost. A translator has to work around the intricacies of a language, Japanese is not the singular exception here. Not to mention that the decision on what is translated and what is not is mostly completely arbitrary and made just for the sake of letting the reader /feel/ like they are provided additional nuance through the honorifixs while the pronouns and verb forms are lost.
In that vein, I feel that completely brushing aside all of the specific-to-Japanese-media terminology is wrong. I’m fine if people are just like, “I’m not comfortable writing that way.” Fine. I’ve seen arguments on this forum though that state “using any of it is weaboo and stupid.” Sorry, but the person in me that struggles to figure out equivalents between the two languages when I’m chatting with a Japanese person, plus the English student in me that knows what an abomination the English language is, hates that view. When I think about the class-long discussions I’ve had in Japanese about how the phraseshoganai (as in, Shirou saying to Kiritsugu, “It can’t be helped…so I’ll do it for you…”) is indicative to how the culture functions, I can’t write off leaving in some of the untranslated Japanese for meaning purposes. All the way up from the complexities of how the characters speak in keigo down to the use of –kun or –chan to show affection that a lot of non-Asian cultures just don’t have in their language. Trying to explain the importance to Sakura calling Shirou or Shiki calling Ciel “senpai” just isn’t covered in replacing it with their name, or awkwardly shoving in “senior” or “upperclassman” or whatnot. Trying to explain the devastating way that Illya goes from calling Shirou cutesy onii-chan to saying she’s actually the one that’ll be responsible for them isn’t covered merely by saying “big bro” and “older sister.” It depends on your background and the nature of the fanfic you're writing, but there's a limit to how much a writer can care about another language. Sure, it's important to have some context of the meaning behind the words, but like you said above, honorificas can vary depending on who you're addressing and what you think of the person you're addressing and yourself. As a person that enjoys writing as purely a past time event, I really don't feel like taking several university courses to learn all the ins and outs of the Japanese language. I do what I can but I personally find going any further than basic parts from anime (senpai/onii-chan/-kun or -san/sensei) starts to become harder for readers and very clunky. You can express deep respect, resentment, sarcasm or other honorifica through English writing. There's no need to inject half a language into your fic for that.
Subtext. The bane of lazy writers like myself. For the ability to understand it, I kinda envy you.
Yeah. There whole subtext that gets lost in translation. Shereshoy bal aay'han
Well we've already had first hand experience with you equating events with your exes to romantic (the back and forth in the thread with Koto and the Sakura-like one was priceless)scenes in your fics, and while I will probably never write lemons, this was informative. With this and Elf's thread, hopefully we can lessen the amount of bad lemons. I lol'd at segueing this with erotic roleplay. No need to feel embarrassed, if you get brilliant ideas out of it, its a double win.
Originally Posted by LJ3 Matt Stover is really that beloved by Star Wars fandom? Yeah. IIRC, Traitor is one of the best-selling NJO books and all too.
Well his Revenge of the Sith novelization turned what most people agreed was a weak movie into probably the most interesting character story in the sextology.
Matt Stover is really that beloved by Star Wars fandom?
Got some good insights here, even if it's a little text-wall-y. Thanks for sharing.
I hate this borrowed chair, it is nothing like my own desk chair. Is it an eyesore, Arashi? Regardless of how bad it is, remember that chair of yours and never give up!
Hope things get worked smoothly in the end for you.
Originally Posted by RadiantBeam Really, DP? I don't think that's unreasonable. Obviously, though, not much I can do but sit and wait. Like everyone. This ain't Arashi's fault; he's been busy.
Man, you got a lot of life thrown at you. Glad to see you were able to make it through everything without being too much worse for wear.
Really, DP?
Originally Posted by Elf Man, the dude's been through the wringer and you're complaining about the judges. He's got spotty internet, he's said it himself. Just give him some time to settle and then he can crack the whip if he so chooses. Plus the Judges may have had stuff happen IRL that's kept them away from their judging duties. Sure asking to be patent is probably redundant at this point, but this post reinforces the saying, "Shit happens." He's not judging, Elf. Lianru/Techlology/Eddyak are. Unless he actually is judging and I don't know it. If he is, obviously, he's excused, but what about them? I can understand delays, but we handed in our entries a month ago, and none of them were particularly long ones.
Man, the dude's been through the wringer and you're complaining about the judges. He's got spotty internet, he's said it himself. Just give him some time to settle and then he can crack the whip if he so chooses. Plus the Judges may have had stuff happen IRL that's kept them away from their judging duties. Sure asking to be patent is probably redundant at this point, but this post reinforces the saying, "Shit happens." Also, I know what it's like to miss one's chair.
Originally Posted by Arashi_Leonhart Fanfic contest people, I still have the prizes in a box next to me right now. Whenever it is decided who wins, it may take me until next month to get them sent, but they'll get to you one way or another. This would require the judges to actually do their jobs and start judging.
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