february 2003 volume xxxii number 2 the chroniclechronicle · 2016. 4. 9. · by paulo rónai,...
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ChronicleChronicleA Publication of
the American
Translators
Association
February 2003
Volume XXXII
Number 2
TheThe
in this issueLiterary Translation
Translating & InterpretingAn ATA Professional Development SeminarRenaissance Biscayne Bay HotelMiami, FloridaSaturday, March 22, 2003
Full day of in-depth sessionsContinental breakfastNetworking session immediately following the final presentationAll sessions submitted for Continuing Education Credit in the
States of California and WashingtonSpecial rate ($99) for hotel reservations made by February 28Call the Renaissance Biscayne Bay at 305.374.0000
(1601 Biscayne Boulevard, Miami, Florida 33132)Be sure to mention you are attending the seminar!
Log onto atanet.org/medical for detailed information or callATA Headquarters at 703.683.6100
Space is limited — Register early!See page 59 for more informaton and registration form.
Medical
American Translators Association225 Reinekers Lane • Suite 590 • Alexandria Virginia 22314 • 703.683.6100
in this issue February 2003
Volume XXXII
Number 2
Features
16 The Best Secrets Are Those Well Kept—Or Are They?By Robin R. Randolph and Roslyn C. FamousA program where small classes, intensive faculty/student interaction both inside and outsidethe classroom, and a sense of team spirit and community keeps students on their toes.
18 On Publishing the Literary Short Story: Some Advice and ReflectionsBy C.M. MayoBeginning writers often imagine that publishing their short story will be a glamorousevent, but for most writers, it’s an experience on par with, say, folding laundry.
22 One, If by Land, and, Two, If by Sea: Translators and LiteratureEncyclopediasBy Marilyn Gaddis RoseThere are potentially disturbing issues behind the anecdotes of ATA members who tookon assignments for literature encyclopedias. Are U.K. critics uneasy about U.S.English? Are libraries, archives, or reading rooms? Do retranslations matter? And caneditors control literary history?
26 Translating an A-Grammatical Contemporary German Poet into EnglishBy Ronnie Apter and Mark HermanIn the 20th century, some poets began employing an extreme form of word play,breaking the usage norms of the language itself. The resultant poetry is difficult evenfor source-language readers and hearers to construe.
30 Navigating Literary Translation Choices: The Case of the Polyphonic TextBy Cynthia T. HahnAn overview of some polyphonic literary text shows how such material presents distinctchallenges to the translator in terms of establishing consistency in both form and content.
A Publication of
the American
Translators
Association
Display Advertising IndexFrom the PresidentFrom the Executive Director Conferences and EventsInternational Certification StudyThe OnionskinDictionary Reviews The Translation InquirerHumor and Translation New Active and Corresponding MembersMarketplace
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American Translators Association225 Reinekers Lane, Suite 590 • Alexandria VA 22314Tel: (703) 683-6100 • Fax (703) 683-6122E-mail: [email protected] • Website: www.atanet.org
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Maggie Rowe
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The ATA Chronicle | February 20034
2003 ChronicleEditorial Calendar
An Easy Reference To ATA Member BenefitsYour ATA membership has never been more valuable. Take advantage of the discounted programs and services available to you as an ATA member. Be sure to tell these companies you are an ATA member andrefer to any codes provided below.
We’ve done everything possible toensure that your address is correct. Butsometimes errors do occur. If you findthat the information on the mailing labelis inaccurate or out of date, please let usknow. Send updates to:The ATA Chronicle • 225 ReinekersLane, Suite 590 • Alexandria, VA 22314Fax (703) 683-6122 •[email protected]
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Business Owners InsuranceNational Professional Group(888) 219-8122www.ata-ins.com
Collection Services/ReceivablesManagementDun & BradstreetMike Horoski(800) 333-6497 ext. 7226(484) [email protected]
Credit Card AcceptanceProgram/Professional Services AccountNOVA Information SystemsReference Code: HCDA(888) 545-2207 • (770) 649-5700
MasterCardMBNA AmericaReference Code: IFKV(800) 847-7378 • (302) 457-2165
Medical, Life, and Disability InsuranceMutual of Omaha(800) 223-6927 • (402) 342-7600www.atanet.org/mutual.htm
Overnight Delivery/Express Package ServiceUPSReference Code: C0000700415(800) 325-7000www.ups.com
Professional Liability InsuranceNational Professional Group(888) 219-8122www.ata-ins.com
Retirement ProgramsWashington Pension Center(888) 817-7877 • (301) 941-9179
Website DevelopmentTwo Rad [email protected]/radtown
...And, of course, as an ATA member you receive discounts on the Annual Conference registration fees and ATA publi-cations, and you are eligible to join ATA Divisions, participate in the online Translation Services Directory, and muchmore. For more information, contact ATA (703) 683-6100; fax (703) 683-6122; and e-mail: [email protected].
The ATA Chronicle Submission GuidelinesThe ATA Chronicle enthusiastically encourages members to submit articles of interest to the fields oftranslation and interpretation.1. Articles (see length specifications below) are due the first of the month, two months prior to the
month of publication (i.e., June 1 for August issue).2. Articles should not exceed 3,500 words. Articles containing words or phrases in non-European
writing systems (e.g., Japanese, Arabic) should be submitted by mail and fax.3. Include your fax, phone, e-mail, and mailing address on the first page.4. Include a brief abstract (two sentences maximum) emphasizing the most salient points of your
article. The abstract will be included in the table of contents.5. Include a brief biography (three sentences maximum) along with a picture (color or B/W). Please
be sure to specify if you would like your photo returned. Do not send irreplaceable photos.6. In addition to a hard copy version of the article, please submit an electronic version either on
disk or via e-mail ([email protected]).7. Texts should be formatted for Word or Wordperfect 8.0. 8. All articles are subject to editing for grammar, style, punctuation, and space limitations.9. A proof will be sent to you for review prior to publication.
Standard Length Letters to the editor: 350 words; Opinion/Editorial: 300-600 words; Feature Articles: 750-3,500words; Column: 400-1,000 words
ChronicleThe
JanuaryFocus: Social SciencesSubmission Deadline:
November 15
FebruaryFocus: Literary Translation Submission Deadline: December 1
MarchFocus: Marketing Submission Deadline: January 1
AprilFocus: Client EducationSubmission Deadline: February 1
MayFocus: Professional
Development/OutreachSubmission Deadline: March 1
JuneFocus: Agencies, Bureaus,
and CompaniesSubmission Deadline: April 1
JulyFocus: Science and TechnologySubmission Deadline: May 1
AugustFocus: Medical Translating
and InterpretingSubmission Deadline: June 1
SeptemberFocus: InterpretingSubmission Deadline: July 1
OctoberFocus: Legal
Translating/InterpretingSubmission Deadline: August 1
November/DecemberFocus: Training and PedagogySubmission Deadline:
September 1
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 5
33 Cultural Tensions in Multilingual Fiction: Examples from African andCaribbean Francophone NovelsBy Carrol F. CoatesAn exploration of the multilingual discourse in Haitian Jacques Stephen Alexis’s novel,L’espace d’un cillement (1958) and Ivoirian Ahmadou Kourouma’s En attendant le votedes bêtes sauvages (1998).
37 The Languages I Didn’t LearnBy Paulo Rónai, translated by Tom MooreThe late translator, linguist, and lexicographer Paulo Rónai (1907-1992) describes theimpedimenta which prevented him from adding even more languages to his stock-in-trade.
40 Current Issues in English Bible Translation By Peter J. SilzerAfter 2,000 years of Bible translation, there is still controversy about what makes atranslation good. Recent discussions about “gender-neutral” or “gender-accurate”English translations provide an example of these current debates.
The ATA Chronicle (ISSN1078-6457) is publishedmonthly, except bi-monthlyin November/December,by the AmericanTranslators Association.
Reprint Permission:
Requests for permission toreprint articles should besent to the Chronicle editorat [email protected].
The subscription rate for a member is $43 (included inthe dues payment). The U.S.subscription rate for a non-member is $50. Subscribersin Canada and Mexico add$25; all other non-U.S. sub-scribers add $45. Singlecopies are available for $5per issue. Second-classPostage rates paid atAlexandria, Virginia, andadditional mailing offices.
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Changes of addressshould be sent to The ATAChronicle, 225 ReinekersLane, Suite 590,Alexandria, VA 22314. TheAmerican TranslatorsAssociation (ATA) wasestablished in 1959 as anot-for-profit professionalsociety to advance thestandards of translationand to promote the intel-lectual and material inter-ests of translators andinterpreters in the UnitedStates. The statementsmade in The ATAChronicle do not neces-sarily reflect the opinionor judgment of the ATA,its editor, or its officers ordirectors and are strictlythose of the authors.
Display Advertising Index
2 Almi Internationalwww.almiinternational.com
31 Clear Sonic Manufacturingwww.clearsonic.com
46 Cybertec USA, Inc.www.cybertecusa.biz
13 GMTwww.gmt-ils.it
15 Maurice [email protected]
49 National Security Agencywww.nsa.gov
63 TRADOS Corporationwww.trados.com
39 University of Arizonahttp://nci.arizona.edu
Survey on Understanding Emerging Work Arrangements
Baruch College is conducting a study of translators and interpreters to increase our knowledge ofwhy people choose different work arrangements. Professionals in the T&I industry exemplify the mod-ern “knowledge worker,” and understanding the factors that influence their lives and careers will helpus understand how they affect people working in the “new economy.”
Packets containing questionnaires were given or mailed to all ATA conference registrants. We wishto include people engaged in all aspects of the T&I profession: employees of all types of organizations(private, government, nonprofit, etc.), freelancers, managers, agency owners, etc. The results will serveas a basis for articles in the academic and practitioner press (and will be shared with participants).
We thank the many people who have already responded. If you attended the Atlanta conference andhave the questionnaire, we hope you will complete it and mail it in. If you don’t have a questionnaire, pleasee-mail [email protected] and one will be sent by e-mail or regular mail as you prefer.
David ProttasTel: (646) 312 3666 • [email protected]
The ATA Chronicle | February 20036
About Our Authors... Ronnie Apter, a professorof English at CentralMichigan University, is apublished poet, a trans-lator of poetry, and arecipient of New York
University’s Thomas Wolfe Poetry Award.She is the author of Digging for theTreasure, a critically acclaimed book onEzra Pound’s contribution to the transla-tion of poetry into English, and of ABilingual Edition of the Love Songs ofBernart de Ventadorn in Occitan andEnglish: Sugar and Salt, which, togetherwith its accompanying compact audiodisk,includes literal, poetic, and singable trans-lations of the extant work of this impor-tant 12th-century troubadour. Contact:[email protected].
Carrol F. Coates is a pro-fessor of French and com-parative literature atBinghamton University-SUNY. He has collaboratedwith Edwidge Danticat on
the recently published translation ofJacques Stephen Alexis’s L’Espace D’UnCillement (In the Flicker of an Eyelid). Healso published (2001) a translation ofAhmadou Kourouma’s En Attendant LeVote Des Betes Sauvages (Waiting for theVote of the Wild Animals). He is serieseditor of Caraf Books (University ofVirginia Press) and associate editor ofCallaloo (The Johns Hopkins UniversityPress). Contact: [email protected].
Cynthia T. Hahn is asso-ciate dean of the facultyand associate professor ofFrench at Lake ForestCollege in Illinois, whereshe has been teaching
French language, literature, culture, andtranslation for the past 12 years. She hastranslated two novels and poetry for publi-cation, and is currently secretary for theChicago Area Translators and InterpretersAssociation. Contact: [email protected].
Mark Herman is a literaryand technical translator,chemical engineer, play-wright, poet, lyricist,musician, and actor. Incollaboration with Ronnie
Apter, he has written 19 opera translationswhich have received numerous produc-tions in the U.S., Canada, and England.Contact: [email protected].
Roslyn C. Famous moved to Puerto Ricoin 1998 to study translation, and graduatedfrom the Graduate Program in Translationat the University of Puerto Rico in 2001.She works at Atabex TranslationSpecialists, where she began as an intern.Contact: [email protected].
C.M. Mayo was educatedas an economist at theUniversity of Chicago. Shepreviously worked at aMexico City investmentbank and at the Instituto
Tecnologico Autonomo de Mexico, a pri-vate university, where she taught interna-tional and development finance in both theundergraduate and MBA programs. Shehas authored many stories, essays, andpoems which have appeared in numerousU.S. literary magazines, including Chelsea,Fourth Genre, The Paris Review,Southwest Review, Tin House, andWitness, as well as the Los Angeles Timesand Wall Street Journal. In 1999, shefounded Tameme, the annual bilingualjournal of new writing from NorthAmerica, Canada, the U.S., and Mexico.Contact: [email protected].
Tom Moore has been fas-cinated by the languageand culture of Brazil since1994. In addition toPortuguese, he translatesfrom Spanish, French,
Italian, and German. He is themusic/media librarian at The College ofNew Jersey. Contact:[email protected].
Robin R. Randolph is currently a thesisstudent in the Graduate Program inTranslation at the University of PuertoRico. She also works as a freelance trans-lator and manuscript editor. Contact:[email protected].
Marilyn Gaddis Rose,1988 Gode medallist, wasthe founding editor of theATA Series. After 31 yearsin translation pedagogy atthe State University of
New York at Binghamton, she is refo-cusing her attention on literary translation.Contact: [email protected].
Peter Silzer holds a Ph.D. in linguisticsfrom the Australian National University.Since 1972, he has been involved in linguis-tics and translation with SIL Inc., a nonprofithumanitarian organization focusing on thelanguage needs of lesser-known languagesaround the world. He has taught applied lin-guistics and translation at Biola University inLa Mirada, California, for the past 10 years.His language specialty is Bahasa Indonesia.He is currently developing teaching mate-rials on the relationship of culture and lan-guage, the ethics of speech, and thelinguistic features of Classical Hebrew andKoine Greek. Contact: [email protected] orhttp://people.biola.edu/faculty/petes.
It pays ...
to keep your listingsupdated in ATA’s online Directory of Translationand Interpreting Services and Directory of LanguageServices Companies
(www.atanet.org)
You may renew online in the Members Only section of the ATA website: atanet.org/membersonlyIf you have not received your membership notice, please contact Maggie Rowe at [email protected] or703.683.6100. Don’t miss a day of your benefits! Thank you for supporting ATA.
Renew your ATA membership today!
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 7
From the PresidentDemystifying ATA Conference Site Selection
Thomas L. West [email protected]
S ite selection for the ATAAnnual Conference regularlyyields many comments from
the membership. Here is my take ondemystifying, if you will, the siteselection for the conference.
I just returned from Phoenix,Arizona, where I participated in theplanning meeting for ATA’s 44thAnnual Conference, November 5-8,2003 at the Pointe South MountainResort Hotel. (ATA President-electand Conference Organizer ScottBrennan and ATA Executive DirectorWalter Bacak were also there.) Thiswas my fourth such meeting, so Ihave learned a great deal about theassociation meeting business. I knowthat past presidents and presidents-elect have addressed this issue, but Iwant to share my thoughts with youas well.
Working with Professionals. ATAcontracts with Conferon Inc., the
largest, and probably most influential,meetings management firm in theUnited States. As translators we stressthe importance of using professionalsto our clients; therefore, as an associa-tion, we do the same when it comes tomanaging our largest event. Conferonassists us from the beginning—selecting a suitable hotel—to negoti-ating hotel rates and assisting the ATAHeadquarters staff onsite at the confer-ence. Conferon also helps us contractfor audiovisual, security, temporarystaffing, and other vendors for the con-ference.
Site Selection. The philosophy ofthe ATA Board has been to rotate theconference around the country…andinto Canada in 2004. Currently, welimit the selection to hotels that canhouse the entire conference—meetingrooms and sleeping rooms under oneroof. In addition, the hotels have tohave a lot of meeting space. In Atlanta,
which was typical of our spacerequirements, we needed 12 meetingrooms to hold 50-200 people; a ball-room to hold at least 600; an exhibitarea; a room for the Job Exchange;and a handful of smaller rooms forvarious meetings. In addition, weneeded around 550 guest rooms.
Once we know the hotel can holdus, we look at room rates. This is thenumber one item that either makes orbreaks the selection of a hotel. Frommember feedback, we know that thehotel room rate tends to be the mostcost-sensitive item (versus airfare,meals, conference registration fee,etc.). Expensive room rates—over$225 a night plus tax—have kept usfrom returning to Boston, New York,or San Francisco. (We actually shyaway from anything over $200.) Afterroom rates, the Board considers easeof air transportation to and from the
Continued on p.57
FOR LONG-TERM PLANNERSFuture Annual Conference Sites and Dates
2003Phoenix, Arizona
November 5-8
2004Toronto, Canada
October 13-16
2005Seattle, Washington
November 9-12
2006New Orleans, Louisianna
November 2-5
◆ ◆
Legal Translation Conference
Hyatt Regency Jersey City, New Jersey
May 2-4, 2003
See page 55 for details andregistration form.
The ATA Chronicle | February 20038
From the Executive DirectorWhat’s New
A TA continues to be active onmany fronts. Here is an updateon what’s new.
Medical Division [being estab-lished]. The Board approved theestablishment of the new MedicalDivision [being established]. MD,you have to smile over the abbrevia-tion, is ATA’s 13th division. The divi-sion administrator is Martine Dougéand Marla O’Neill is the assistantadministrator. If you are interested inknowing more about the MedicalDivision, join MD’s discussion grouponline at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ATA_MedDiv. Volunteers toassist getting the division off theground are welcome! MD already has300 members. Please contact Martineat [email protected].
Translator and InterpreterCompensation Survey. The second edi-tion of the Translator and Interpreter
Compensaton Survey has been pub-lished. The information contained in thisreport represents the most complete,accurate, and up-to-date income and payrate data on the translation and inter-preting professions. New to this year’sreport is a section detailing hourly ratesand rates per word for translation andinterpreting services. This section pro-vides average and median figures for 28common language combinations. Over1,800 industry professionals participatedin this survey. An executive summary ofthe survey will be published in anupcoming issue of the ATA Chronicle.To order the Translator and InterpreterCompensation Survey, please see theATA website or contact ATAHeadquarters at (703) 683-6100 [email protected].
Medical Translation and Inter-preting Seminar. ATA’s next profes-sional development seminar is set:Medical Translation and Interpreting,
March 22 in Miami. (This seminar willoffer different medical-related materialfrom the one held last spring inChicago.) In conjunction, the FloridaChapter of ATA will be holding a med-ical seminar the following day. To seethe abstracts and to register, please goto www.atanet.org/medical2003.
Request for ATA Annual Confer-ence Presentation Proposals. Want toshare your expertise with your col-leagues? Submit a proposal to make apresentation at ATA’s 44th AnnualConference, November 5-8, 2003 inPhoenix. Conference presentations area great way to get exposure for youand your company. You may completethe Presentation Proposal Form onlineat www.atanet.org/conference2003/abstract.htm. The deadline for submit-ting a proposal is March 14.
Walter Bacak, [email protected]
Proposals are invited on topics in all areas of translation and interpreting, including the following:
Agencies, Bureaus, and Companies; Financial Translation and Interpreting; Independent Contractors; Interpreting;Language-Specific Sessions; Legal Translation and Interpreting; Literary; Medical Translation and Interpreting;Scientific and Technology; Social Sciences; Terminology; Training and Pedagogy; Translators and Computers.
Suggestions for additional topics are welcome. Proposals for sessions must be submitted on the ConferencePresentation Proposal Form by March 14, 2003 to: Conference Organizer, ATA Headquarters, 225 Reinekers Lane, Suite590, Alexandria, VA 22314; Fax: (703) 683-6122. All proposals for sessions must be in English.
There’s no time like the present! Download a Conference Presentation Proposal Form at www.atanet.org/abstract.htm.
Call for Papers44th Annual Conference of the American Translators AssociationPhoenix, Arizona • Pointe South Mountain Resort • November 5-8, 2003
Continued on p.57
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 9
American Foundation for Translation and Interpretation
JTG Scholarship in Scientific and TechnicalTranslation or InterpretationDescription of Award
This is a $2,500 nonrenewablescholarship for the 2003-2004 aca-demic year for students enrolled orplanning to enroll in a degree pro-gram in scientific and technical trans-lation or in interpreter training.
Eligibility1. Applicants must be graduate or
undergraduate students enrolled orplanning to enroll in a programleading to a degree in scientificand technical translation or ininterpretation at an accredited U.S.college or university.
2. Applicants must be full-time stu-dents who have completed at leastone year of college or universitystudies.
3. Generally, an applicant shouldpresent a minimum GPA of 3.00overall and a 3.50 in translation-and interpretation-related courses.
4. Applicants should have at least oneyear of study remaining in their pro-gram; however, in certain circum-stances, one residual semester maybe accepted.
5. Applicants must be U.S. citizens.
Selection Criteria1. Demonstrated achievement in
translation and interpretation.2. Academic record.3. Three letters of recommendation by
faculty or nonacademic supervisor.4. A 300-500-word essay outlining
the applicant’s interests and goalsas they relate to the field of trans-lation or interpretation.
Application Process1. Application forms may be
obtained by contacting theAmerican Translators Associationby mail at 225 Reinekers Lane,Suite 590, Alexandria, VA 22314.
2. Completed applications must bereceived by AFTI by May 1, 2003.
3. A completed application consists of:a) Application cover sheet;b) Three letters of recommenda-
tion in a sealed envelope withrecommender’s signature overthe envelope flap;
c) An essay; andd) A copy of the applicant’s aca-
demic record with a copy of themajor/minor or other programform or a departmental statementof admission to the translation orinterpretation program.
AwardA national award committee will
announce the name of the scholarshipaward winner by the end of June 2003.The committee’s decision is final.Disbursement of award will occur atthe beginning of the 2003 fall semester.
Conferences and EventsWashington, DCTranslators Discussion Group Borders Books and Music18th & L Streets, NW
Meets the second Wednesday of eachmonth from 6:30-8:00 pm at Borders. Formore information, please contact Bordersat (202) 466-2152.
Weston, MassachusettsNew England Translators Association 7th Annual Conference & ExhibitionHenderson House, Northeastern UniversityMay 3, 2003
This annual event provides a forum fortranslators, interpreters, localization agen-cies, publishers, and other language-related organizations. Keynote speakerEllen Elias-Bursac will discuss “TheWartime Service of Translation.” For more information and a registration form, seehttp://netaweb.org/fair03.htm or contactJudy Lyons at [email protected].
Dublin, Ireland14th International Japanese/EnglishTranslation Conference IJET-14 May 17-18, 2003
The 14th annual IJET conference in Dublinwill mark the first time that IJET has met inIreland, and promises to provide an excit-ing and charming experience for all atten-dees. This venue was proposed in the hopesof not only providing a thoroughly enjoyableconference, but also to expand the horizonsof IJET attendees. Just as translations serveto bring Japanese- and English-speakingcultures closer together, IJET conferencesprovide an opportunity for first-hand expo-sure to the languages and cultures. It ishoped that IJET-14 will be a learning experi-ence, as well as a good time, for all partici-pants. More information will be availablesoon at http://ijet.org/ijet-14/.
Halifax, Nova ScotiaCanadian Association for TranslationStudies16th Annual ConferenceTheme: “Translation and Globalization”May 29-31, 2003Dalhousie UniversityHalifax, Nova Scotia
Information: Dr. Louise Brunette (organiz-er): [email protected];Marc Charron: [email protected];Anne Malena: [email protected];Marco Fiola: [email protected];Dr. Anne Malena (Program Committee Chair)Modern Languages & Cultural Studies200 Arts Building University of AlbertaEdmonton, Alberta, Canada T6G 2E6. E-mail: [email protected]; Tel: (780) 492-1187; Fax: (780) 492-2106. www.uottawa.ca/associations/act-cats/.
The ATA Chronicle | February 200310
CIMCE# Credit Hours Session Title1152 12 I-1 “Home Alone 3”: Building a Cooperative Network of Support Among Interpreters
(Friday, 10:00-11:30 am)
1319 1.5 TP-2: From Consecutive and Simultaneous to Dialogue InterpretingTP-3: An Adventure in Online Learning: Introduction to Medical Interpreting
1320 1.5 I-3: Interpreting is Like Solving a Cr _ _ _ w _ _ d P _ _ _ le: Parallel Strategies and TechniquesI-16: Coming to Terms
1321 1.5 P-4: No Longer Camões’ Portuguese: Syntactic, Lexical, Grammatical, and Stylistic Traps to Trip Upthe Intrepid Translator of Brazilian, European, and African PortugueseP-5: Portuguese in Metamorphosis: The Shak-Ess-Pey-Are-Eih Effect
1322 3.0 S-5: Cultural Differences in Ethical Issues Regarding U.S. Models of Contracts, Codes of Conduct,and Similar in Latin AmericaS-14: How to Translate for the Healthcare Consumer
1323 1.5 I-11: The Third Interlocutor: The Visible Language Interpreter in a Healthcare Setting
1324 1.5 I-15: Teach Your Client (How to Work With an Interpreter)
1325 1.5 I-12: Nuts and Bolts on Different Types of Interpreting
1326 3.0 Seminar P: The Art of Medical Interpretation: An Inclusive Approach to Teaching
1327 6.0 Seminar A: Strategies for Sight Translation, Consecutive Interpretation, and Note Taking
1328 1.5 I-1: The Time Factor in Interpreter TrainingI-2: Consecutive Interpretation: The Mysterious Interplay Between Notation and Memory
1329 1.5 I-6: The Use of Portable Equipment in Conference Interpreting: When and When NotI-10: Telephone Interpreting: Everything You Wanted to Know
1330 1.5 LAW-1: The Concept of Equivalence in Court Interpreting
1331 1.5 MED-3: Programs, Politics, and Perseverance: What’s New in Healthcare Interpreting in the U.S.
1332 1.5 SL-3: U.S. Legal Terms: How to Say It in Russian and Ukrainian
1333 1.5 S-12: Topics in Spanish Lexical Dialectology: La ciudad y los fueros
1334 1.5 I-13: What Can Interpreters Learn from Aristotle and Stanislavsky?I-17: A Comparative Analysis of the Professionalization of Community Interpreting in Europe and the U.S.
1335 1.5 A-1: The Challenge of Decoding, Encoding, and Understanding the Message: A National Security ChallengeA-2: Part I—How Do I Learn to Translate Arabic?; Part II—The Current State of Arab Dictionaries:Great Riches Amidst Poverty; Part III—Software Translation of Arabic Text
1336 1.5 H-1: Hebrew Language Workshop
1337 1.5 G-8: Translating German Legalese: Contract Law and Related Aspects of the Law of Obligations
1338 1.5 G-3: Workshop: Translation of Personal Documents into German
1339 1.5 I-8: A Quality Assurance Model: Update on a Process for Identifying, Training, and Testing TelephoneInterpreters
1340 1.5 S-3: Elementos conceptuales y terminológicos de los textos jurídicos en españolS-4: Enseñanza de traducción jurídica
For more information, please contact Teresa Kelly at (703) 683-6100 or [email protected].
American Translators Association
ConferenceAnnualForty-Third
November 6 – 9, 2002Atlanta, Georgia
Sessions Approved by theJudicial Council of California Administrative Office of the CourtsContinuing Education Activity for Court Interpreter Minimum Continuing Education Credit (CIMCE)
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 11
T he situation in Mexico has a cer-tain similarity to that ofGermany, which we examined in
the last issue, because certification inMexico is administered for the mostpart by state and local governments.While certification on the federal levelalso exists, there is no uniform creden-tial comparable to that of Spain orArgentina. Mexico has twice as manystates as Germany (32 to be exact), butunlike in Germany, only a few of themoffer certification for translators orinterpreters. Another striking differ-ence is that while there is abundantinformation available online con-cerning the certification of translatorsand interpreters in Germany, informa-tion about certification in Mexico israther scarce. Much of the informationbelow relies on personal interviewsand correspondence with Mexicantranslators and interpreters. These indi-viduals more than compensated for thelack of online information, and theirresponse to our request to provideguidance has been overwhelming.
It is important to note that the cer-tification process for translators andinterpreters in Mexico is in flux at themoment, and significant changes arehappening even as this article is beingwritten. Another notable fact is thatwhile we focus on Spanish here, thereare 62 indigenous languages inMexico, ranging from Náhuatl, withmore than 2.5 million speakers, toTeco, with only about 50 speakers.Mexico is second only to India interms of the number of living lan-guages within a single country, yetthese are going largely unnoticed bythe translation and interpretation com-munity. Some successful efforts in thisarea were made recently by EstebanCadena, president of the OrganizaciónMexicana de Traductores (OMT).However, it remains to be seen whatthe future will bring for the Mexican
Indians in the area of language recog-nition and preservation.
I would like to thank the followingindividuals in particular for con-tributing to this article:
• Esteban Cadena([email protected]): pres-ident of the OMT, a “perito”translator, and ATA member.
• Leticia Damm de Gorostieta([email protected]):English↔Spanish “perito” trans-lator (1969) and interpreter(1973), and member and foundingchairperson of the Asociación deTraductores e Intérpretes deMonterrey, A.C. (ATIMAC).
• Dixie Davis (dixie@ spanishlink.org): ATA member(accredited Spanish→English).
• Lucila Llausás ([email protected]): member of OMT andthe Colegio Mexicano deIntérpretes de Conferencias, a“Perito en traducción e inter-pretación” authorized by theSuperior Court of Justice of theFederal District, and a “Perito entraducción para el 2º. Circuito”authorized by the FederalJudiciary Council.
• Luis López Rodríguez([email protected]):member of OMT and ATA (accred-ited English→Spanish), instructorof the OMT “Diplomado,” and a
member of the UniversidadAutónoma de GuadalajaraMaster’s in Translation &Interpretation faculty.
• Fernando Orea ([email protected]), “perito” translator,certified by the Federal JudiciaryBoard.
• Cecilia Saba ([email protected]): associate memberof ATA and the NationalAssociation of JudiciaryInterpreters (NAJIT), and a“Perito en traducción e inter-pretación” authorized by theSuperior Court of Justice of theFederal District and the FederalJudiciary Council.
• Rishona Chaya Shiffman([email protected]):associate member of ATA, activemember of ATIMAC,English→Spanish translator, andteacher of English to executives.
• Georganne Weller ([email protected]): active member ofATA, NAJIT, and theInternational Association ofConference Interpreters (AIIC),and a founding and activemember of the Colegio Mexicanode Intérpretes de Conferenciasand the OMT.
• Patricia Yáñez ([email protected]): ATA member andpresident of the Colegio Mexicanode Intérpretes de Conferencias(1993-95 and current).
Among other translators whooffered assistance were Philip Dale,Jan Kñakal, and Salvador Virgen.Translation of the Mexican legisla-tion in this article was generouslyprovided by Michele Feingold andHenry Gonzalez, Spanish translationstudents in the University ofPittsburgh Professional TranslationCertificate Program.
International Certification Study: Mexico
By Jiri Stejskal
“…While certification onthe federal level alsoexists, Mexico has no
uniform credentialcomparable to that ofSpain or Argentina…”
➡
The ATA Chronicle | February 200312
International Certification Study: Mexico Continued
Certification for TranslatorsIn Mexico, the only principle rele-
vant to certified translation that isaccepted or recognized by theMexican legal system is certified legaltranslation. This means that a certifiedpublic translator, a concept we haveencountered, for example, inScandinavia and which is comparableto the concept of a certified publicaccountant, does not exist in Mexico.Thus, we cannot talk about a “certifi-cation” for peritos traductores, orofficial translators in general. Theonly credential currently offered inMexico is an appointment or commis-sion by the various governmentbodies—municipal, state, or federal—who publish lists of experts (peritos).“Official translators” are included insuch lists, but only some states’Superior Court of Justice include per-itos traductores (Jalisco, Nuevo León,Mexico, Aguascalientes, BajaCalifornia Sur, and Mexico City). Notall of them call official translatorsperitos, yet all of the states recognizethe concept of “aid in the administra-tion of justice” where the translatorsare usually included.
Thus, legal translators can be certi-fied: by a state superior court (appli-cable only in some states); by agovernmental agency, such as theattorney general’s office or the stateoffice of justice; by a federal body; andeven, in some cases, by a legal depart-ment of a municipal government.However, this whole system mightchange soon, because at the last Saint-Jerome’s Day (International Trans-lators’ Day) event held in Mexico, thechief justice in charge of superior courtexpert translators publicly requestedthat OMT promote an initiative cre-ating the legal concept of certifiedpublic translation. This request wasmade in September 2002, and OMT, itsWestern Chapter in particular, has been
working in this area ever since in aneffort to design a specific program forthe certification of translators. OMT iscurrently conducting a search in orderto establish what the actual situation isin every state of Mexico. OMT mem-bers also interviewed several statehouse members, who expressed someinterest. OMT’s Western Chapter ispresently working on a bill for the Stateof Jalisco to certify peritos traductores,and is planning to hold a Diplomado enTraducción Jurídica (a 120-hour coursein English→Spanish legal translation)to train candidates for the exam. If thiseffort proves successful and OMT’sinitiative is approved in the state ofJalisco (where its headquarters islocated), OMT will continue at the fed-eral level. In addition, OMT also offersa 120-hour course in translation(English→Spanish) leading to aDiplomado en Traducción, which hasbeen held for three years now. In 2003,the French→Spanish combination willalso be offered.
What about Interpreters?Currently, there is no certification
program for interpreters in Mexico,but the Colegio Mexicano deIntérpretes de Conferencias isworking on it. CONOSER is theorganization in Mexico that is incharge of certification programs ingeneral. The Colegio is currentlyholding discussions with CONOSERin order to find out what would be thebest procedure to follow. One of themany stumbling blocks is the fact thatinterpreting as a profession is not rec-ognized by some official authoritiesin Mexico. The Ministry of PublicEducation (Secretaría de EducaciónPública) acknowledges the existenceof translators and interpreters, but theMinistry of Finances (Secretaría deHacienda y Crédito Público) does not.Thus, the Colegio’s President,
Patricia Yáñez, is recognized by thisMinistry as a “professional in lan-guages” rather than an “interpreter.”
In 1996, the last time an examina-tion for translators was held by theSuperior Court of Justice of theFederal District, the Court summonedcandidates for an examination tobecome “authorized interpreters.”Apparently, this was the sole occur-rence of such an examination inMexico, and successful candidates,such as Lucila Llausás, were certifiedas “authorized translators and inter-preters” (perito traductor eintérprete) by the Superior Court ofJustice of the Federal District. InNovember 2001, the Court sum-moned the certificants for recertifica-tion exams, but as of November 2002,no such examination had been held.
Eligibility RequirementsAs was mentioned earlier, to be
certified as a sworn translator inMexico it is necessary to complywith the requirements each govern-mental entity sets forth. For example,in Mexico City, to be a sworn trans-lator before the Superior Court ofJustice for the Federal District, thecandidate is required to:
• Be a Mexican citizen;• Submit an affidavit stating that the
applicant has a clean criminalrecord;
• Submit a certified copy of anydiploma or degree in translation orinterpretation, not necessarily auniversity degree;
• Submit certified copies of mem-berships in professional organiza-tions in the field of translation orinterpretation;
• Submit a current resume; and• File an application requesting
examination in a specific languagepair (always into Spanish).
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 13
These documents and an applicationfor inclusion in the list of sworn trans-lators must be filed every year.
On the federal level, the eligibilityrequirements are set forth in the sum-mons issued every year by Mexico’sFederal Judiciary Council to assign“experts” or to certify translators. TheLocal Superior Court of Justice(Federal District) has been issuingsummons every five years. The Courtrequires official documentation,including a certificate of studies andproven expertise, and also examinescandidates. The document does notaddress the need for “translators” inparticular, but rather for the “creationof a register of individuals who mayserve as experts before the FederalJudicial Branch.” The following is anexcerpt from said Notification, issuedby the Judicial Branch of the FederalJudiciary Board (translated fromSpanish by Michele Feingold andHenry Gonzalez).
NOTIFICATION of the creation ofa register of individuals who mayserve as experts before the FederalJudicial Branch for 2003.
The Judicial Studies Commission ofthe Federal Judiciary Board, pursuantto the provisions of Article 81, SectionXXIX of the Federal Judiciary Act;Article 61, Section XVII of Order48/1998, which governs the Organi-zation and Operation of the FederalJudiciary Board; and Article 6 of Order37/2001, which establishes the Pro-cedures for the Annual Creation of theRegister of Individuals who May Serveas Experts before the Federal JudicialBranch, the Formal Process for theirNomination, as well as their Rights andObligations, issues the following:
NOTIFICATIONTo all those individuals who are
qualified to prepare expert opinions
in any professional area of science,technology, or the arts necessary toassist in the administration of justice,and who fulfill the requirements thatare set forth in the “Conditions” sec-tion of this notice.
The list of individuals who mayserve as experts before the courts andentities of the Federal Judicial Branchfor the year 2003 shall be establishedin accordance with the following:
Conditions1. PARTICIPANTS—Participants may
include any individuals who have adegree in the fields of the arts, sci-ences, or technology, in which areasthey may provide expert opinions, inthe event that these fields are regu-lated by law; or who have knowl-edge of the specific areas of arts,sciences, or technology, in the eventthat they are not regulated by law.
2. REQUIREMENTS—The interestedparties must fulfill the followingrequirements:I. Have a degree in the field of art,
science, or technology, aboutwhich expert testimony must begiven, in the event that thesefields are regulated by law.
II. Have general knowledge ofthe respective art, science, ortechnology field, if not regu-lated by law.
III. Have a minimum of five yearsof professional experience,except in the case of a recentlydeveloped field, in which casethe minimum shall be equal tothe time since the inception ofsaid field;
IV. Maintain good conduct and beof known moral character;
V. Have no prior convictions forany felony, theft, or fraud,obstruction of justice, orcrimes committed with maliceaforethought; and,
VI. If the individual has been acivil servant, he/she must haveno record of having been sanc-tioned by a Federal or StateJudicial Entity, or any Federalor State Government Office,for the commission of any actof gross negligence.
The following documents are thenrequired to accompany the applicationof those who wish to be included in thelist of individuals who may act asexperts before Federal Judiciary Courts:
I. Current CV, including: completename, date of birth, citizenship,marital status, tax identificationnumber, residence, telephone,and studies completed; ➡
The ATA Chronicle | February 200314
International Certification Study: Mexico Continued
II. Affidavit stating:a) that the applicant has never
been convicted of any felony,theft or fraud, obstruction ofjustice, or crimes committedwith malice aforethought;
b) that the applicant, if he has helda public service position, hasnever been penalized by Federalor State Judiciary courts, or anyBranch of Federal or State CivilService, for the commission ofany act of gross negligence.
c) the subject areas, fields, art, orspecialty for which the appli-cant is qualified to provideexpert opinion, and wishes tobe registered; and
d) the reasons for which the appli-cant wishes to be included onthe list;
III. Two letters from individuals whoknow the applicant and can vouchfor his/her conduct and moral char-acter. These letters must includepersonal identifying information;
IV. If applicable, a copy of the lastthree opinions that the applicanthas presented before any Courtor public institution;
V. A certified copy of any relevantdegree or professional creden-tial; and,
VI. A certified copy of any certificatethat the applicant may have inhis/her possession documentingareas of expertise in the field inquestion, in those cases wherethe art, science, or technologyfields are not regulated.
These documents should be initiallyfiled during the annual applicationperiod. After that, it is sufficient to file aletter requesting continued inclusion inthe list. Applicants for the perito appoint-ment need to submit a certificate ordiploma attesting to their knowledge ofa given foreign language, along with
recommendation letters and an applica-tion form. For candidates who hold uni-versity degrees, the Supreme Courtrequires them to submit the diplomawhich certifies their expertise in a givenarea, together with a proof of profes-sional experience (resume), a list ofcompanies they have worked for, proj-ects they have participated in, other cer-tificates, etc. The list of approvedcandidates is published once a year inthe Official Gazette of the Federationand in the leading newspapers.
Only a few states require continuededucation in some technical areas, suchas medicine, graphology, engineering,etc. However, this is not required forthe perito traductor. In some cases, thestate authority establishes a certainamount of hours in training to renewthe appointment. Reportedly, NuevoLeón requires that “peritos” submitcertifications of ongoing studies foreach renewal in translation.
Case StudyCecilia Saba is a certified trans-
lator. She has a federal and local(Mexico City, Federal District) certi-fication, and holds a bachelor’sdegree in interpretation. She was firstcertified locally in 1989. At that time,the Superior Court of Justice of theFederal District was the only entitythat certified translators not workingin-house. The attorney general’soffice only certified translatorsworking in-house, and they could actas certified translators only for thatbody. Back then, the requirements tobecome certified by the SuperiorCourt of Justice included submittingcertified copies of official documen-tation proving that the candidate hada degree in translation, interpretation,linguistics, or any other relatedcareer. In addition, candidates had tosupply evidence of experience, suchas a copy of the last five projects
completed, references, and evidenceof knowledge of the language.Cecilia had to renew the certificationevery year by submitting the sametype of certified documents.
In 1994, a new president of theSuperior Court of Justice reportedlydecided that there were too manyexpert translators and interpreters onthe list, and decided to cut it randomly.As can be expected, many profes-sional translators and interpreters whowere left out without reason took legalaction. In 1996, the Superior Court ofJustice decided to create a new list andissued a summons requesting more orless the same documentation, butadding an examination for candidates.Cecilia took the test and was certifiedagain in 1997. (The test consisted ofa written translation where the use ofdictionaries was not allowed.)Around 1998, a law was passed tocreate the Consejo de la JudicaturaFederal (Federal Judiciary Council),and in 1999 the Council issued thefirst summons to certify experts indifferent fields, including translationand interpretation. Reportedly, theCouncil has been quite meticulous inthe issuance of summons and listsevery year. Cecilia received a letterfrom the Council in the summer of2002, in which she was assigned an“expert number.” Regarding the localcertification, it is supposed to beeffective for five years. A summonswas issued in December 2001, but nodate or time for the English→Spanishtranslation exam was assigned as ofNovember 2002.
T&I OrganizationsThe Organización Mexicana de
Traductores, A.C. covers most of theMexican Republic and is divided intofour chapters: Central, East, West, andSouth. Each chapter has its own presi-dent, and the national presidency goes
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 15
to one of the regions biannually. OMT, amember of the International Federationof Translators, was established inMexico City in 1992, and as of Nov-ember 2002, there were 106 members.OMT’s website, available in Spanishonly, is www.traductores-omt.org.mx.
The Colegio Mexicano de Intér-pretes de Conferencias, A.C., wasfounded in 1982 and currently hasabout 100 members, all interpreters (butmost of them also act as translators).The Colegio is the only association inMexico exclusively for interpreters. Inorder to be accepted as a member, thecandidate has to file papers proving thathe or she has worked as an interpreterfor a certain amount of days (200 daysto become an active member), and thiswork has to be certified by the signa-tures of five members of this associa-tion. The Colegio’s website iswww.cmicac.org and is available inSpanish, English, and French.
ATIMAC (Asociación de Traduc-tores e Intérpretes de Monterrey,A.C.) is among the oldest organizationof translators and interpreters withuninterrupted activity in Mexico (20+years). Based in Monterrey, ATIMAChas been very active for more than 20years, and has around 35 memberslocally. The association’s website iswww.atimac.org.mx. Reportedly, ATP(Asociación de Traductores Profes-ionales) in Mexico City was the first tobe founded in the country; however, ithas become inactive.
Academic InstitutionsThe following schools offer a degreein T&I:
• Universidad de Baja California,School of Languages, Mexicali,Baja California Norte;
• Instituto Superior de Intérpretes y
Traductores (ISIT), Mexico City;• Universidad Tecnológica
Americana, Mexico City;• Universidad Intercontinental,
Mexico City;• Tecnológico Monterrey (Tec),
Campus Monterrey;• Universidad Autónoma de
Guadalajara, Guadalajara;• Universidad de Colima, Colima;• Universidad Nacional Autónoma
de Mexico (UNAM), MexicoCity;
• Universidad Nacional Autónomade Nuevo León, Monterrey;
• Universidad Iberoamericana,Mexico City; and
• Colegio de México, Mexico City.
In addition to the institutionslisted above, there are educationalprograms for translators and inter-preters offered by private institutionssuch as Berlitz, which offers a one-year diploma program for translatorsand interpreters. There are also indi-vidual translation courses, such as the60-hour legal translation course givenby Javier Becerra every year at theEscuela Libre de Derecho (a presti-gious law school). The IFAL (FrenchInstitute in Mexico City) offers adiploma program in French andSpanish translation. Also, severaluniversities in Mexico have a licen-ciatura (B.A.) in foreign languageteaching or in linguistics (mainlyEnglish) with a branch in translation.However, none of these licenciaturasare fully devoted to translation orinterpretation.
The above-mentioned ISIT hasbeen offering a licenciatura in inter-pretation for the past 20 years. Theprogram is acknowledged by theSecretaría de Educación Pública, andis reportedly the only program inLatin America solely devoted tointerpreting.
With this article on Mexico, ourseries has completed coverage of theNorth American region (for articleson Canada, see the 2002 January andMarch issues). In the next issue, wewill revisit South America and reviewthe certification process in severalcountries there to complement thearticles on Brazil and Argentina, pub-lished in the July 2001 and the June2002 issues, respectively. As theeditor of this series, I encouragereaders to submit any relevant infor-mation concerning non-U.S. certifi-cation or similar programs, as well ascomments on the information pub-lished in this series, to my e-mailaddress at [email protected].
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The ATA Chronicle | February 200316
“H ey guys! I just gotaccepted to the Uni-versity of Puerto Rico’s
Graduate Program in Translation!”“You what?”“I’m going to get my master’s in
translation!”“You mean you have to study for
that?”(Sigh) “Of course!”“And you’re going where?”“To Puerto Rico.”“There’s a university down there?”
Many conversations like this plaguethose of us who “fell upon” one of thebest kept secrets of Puerto Rico: theGraduate Program in Translation at theUniversity of Puerto Rico. We say “fellupon” because it is one of the leastknown master’s degree programs inthe U.S. university system. This nearly30-year-old program, founded as anexperimental program by the late Dr.Ángel Casares, became officiallyincorporated into the university’sCollege of Humanities in 1974. It haslong been overlooked, despite havingturned out 300 fine graduates whowork around the world. But the timehas come for it to come out of theproverbial translation closet. So, weare going to take this opportunity to dowhat is rarely done, and tell the worldabout this enigma of a program.
Some of your family and friends,upon learning that you intend to“study” translation in Puerto Rico,might get the impression that what youare really after is an extended vacationin a Caribbean paradise. While thevacation part isn’t 100% correct, theGraduate Program in Translation at theRío Piedras Campus of the Universityof Puerto Rico just might be your ideaof paradise, if you’re serious about acareer in translation, that is. It’s wherestudents of various ages and back-grounds come together from places
such as Puerto Rico, North America,Latin America, and Europe for the pur-pose of sharing their diverse languageexperiences and to learn how tobecome better translators.
Upon their arrival, new studentsattend an orientation session in whichthey are warmly greeted by profes-sors, students, and the program’sdirector, Yvette Torres. During thistime, students sign up for classesbased on their individual programs ofstudy, the language pairs and subjectareas in which they wish to spe-
cialize, and the length of time theyplan to spend in the program. It is a45-credit master’s degree program,excluding the qualifying exam andthesis. So it is wise to plan out thesecredits as early as possible.
Typically, a first-year student’sschedule will consist of the requiredadvanced grammar and writingcourses, which should not be underesti-mated by any means. Students arerequired to take these courses in theirtarget language, and are stronglyencouraged to take them in their sourcelanguage. The advanced grammarcourse focuses on syntax and analyzingsentence structure, and the writingcourse allows students to practice manywriting styles while expanding theiractive and passive vocabulary.
In addition to the rigorous course-work in the general translation semi-nars, specialized seminars are offered
in business, medical, literary, legal,architectural, and environmentaltranslation. Translation is generallyfrom and into Spanish, English, andFrench. Courses in research, theory,and sight translation are also given inorder to fine-tune the students’ devel-oping skills, and these classes may betaken to fill the 12-credit electiverequirement. Also required are threecredits in semiotics or semantics.
Work in the classroom is enhancedthrough seminars, lectures, and work-shops in which prominent guestspeakers from the field of translationshare their experiences and give stu-dents insight as to what to expect in the“real world.” One of our most recentvisiting professors was Marian S.Greenfield, a freelance translator andtranslation industry consultant. She isalso a member of ATA’s Board ofDirectors, and chair of the association’sProfessional Development Committee.Marian came to the program in Octoberto give a Spanish→English commercialtranslation course. During her month-long stay in Puerto Rico, she also gavea financial translation workshop and avery informative lecture on how to getstarted as a freelancer. In November,Lawrence Venuti gave a three-day sem-inar entitled “Translating Literary andPragmatic Texts: Equivalence, Norms,and Ethics.” Other past guests includeValentín García Yebra, Rudy Heller,Eugene Nida, Gregory Rabassa,Alastair Reid, Douglas Robinson,Margaret Sayers Peden, and ATAPresident Tom West.
BenefitsWhat are some of the benefits to
having a master’s in translation fromthe Graduate Program in Translation,you ask? Well, besides the endlesscomments on your great tan, oneadvantage to this program is that it isrelatively small. With 6 full-time and 5
“…With 6 full-time and 5adjunct professors, and 90
active students, theprogram offers studentsthe chance to be morethan just a number…”
The Best Secrets Are Those Well Kept—Or Are They?By Robin R. Randolph and Roslyn C. Famous
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 17
adjunct professors, and 90 active stu-dents, the program offers students thechance to be more than just a number.The quality of work we produce inclass is quickly noticed. Many of ushave been recommended for translationjobs outside of the university based onthe high-quality work we produce inclass. These jobs are great not only forgaining excellent hands-on experience,but also for boosting our self-esteem!Students also have the opportunity tointern at Atabex Translation Specialists,which is run by Carmen Díaz, a pro-fessor in the program.
Another advantage to studying inthis program is that you instanta-neously become a member of a veryclose network of qualified translators.We’ve heard that the translationworld in New York is incestuous (afavorite expression of Marian’s).Well, take that tight network andimagine you live in a small townabout the size of Maybury. Since thisis the only translation program on theisland, nearly all of the top-notchworking translators here are gradu-ates. The member directory of theAsociación Profesional de Traduc-tores e Interpretes (APTI) here inPuerto Rico reads like the “who’swho” of the program’s alumni. Whenyou meet others who have graduatedfrom the program (and you will),there is an instant bond, because youknow that you share the same formi-dable training and can speak the samelanguage (no pun intended).
The advantage to being a part ofthis one-degree-of-separation net-work is that it keeps you on your toesas far as the quality of your work isconcerned. There is not much leewayfor shoddy work in or out of class:good news travels fast here, but badnews travels even faster.
Continued on p.25
A Visiting Professor’s Viewpoint: Marian S. Greenfield
Teaching in the Graduate Program in Translation at the University of Puerto Rico
was truly a unique pedagogical experience. The students’ level of commitment was
amazing. While many students combined a full course load with a full- or part-time job,
they still managed to carve out time to work diligently on my intensive course. Normally
taught in 2-hour sessions given once a week over 10-12 weeks, we completed the
course in 5 weeks by holding class 3 hours a day, 3 days a week, with 2-3 hours of
homework per day. Even with all their other commitments, the students did a great job
with their assignments. That is true dedication.
Adding to the experience were the cultural and social opportunities. During my first
weekend in town, one of the students invited me to a great salsa concert. Others accom-
panied me sightseeing around the island and to the movies, while my fellow faculty
members ensured that I had plenty to do on the weekends, including visiting the ecodes-
tination Las Cabezas de San Juan and many of San Juan’s best restaurants (and private
kitchens). Of course, a few trips to the beach were also in order.
Teaching in the program also offered the opportunity to review my Spanish gram-
mar and composition with one of the fine UPR professors. Students were a bit bemused
by my presence in class, but I think they enjoyed the repartee, while my fluency certainly
returned to levels not seen since the months I spent studying in Spain in the 1970s.
Yet the absolute best part of the experience was the unique opportunity for intimate
contact with the students. Since I was doing my freelance work out of an office set up
for me in the program classroom building, I was on campus all day. Most of the stu-
dents were also in the building all day, as the program has two computer labs with an
Internet connection. One of these labs is also an excellent translation resource center,
with an impressive collection of dictionaries and glossaries that students are free to use
(and they do). Having these facilities in the building gave me the opportunity to descend
from my office every hour or two to look over students’ shoulders (my students and oth-
ers in the program). Students would ask me questions, which I would then ask them to
resolve as a group with me guiding the discussion. I was also able to watch as students
surfed the Internet, and to give them suggestions to refine their searching techniques.
Having the opportunity to analyze how students solved translation puzzles and to help
them refine their problem-solving and Internet search skills, made my time in Puerto
Rico truly the best teaching experience I have ever had.
And by the way, the program is currently seeking a full-time professor to teach var-
ious into-English translation courses. Anyone interested in exploring the possibility
should contact Yvette Torres, director, Graduate Program in Translation, University of
Puerto Rico, [email protected], 787-764-0000 ext. 2047.
The ATA Chronicle | February 200318
Note: This article was first publishedin The Part-Times (Fall 2001), anewsletter of the M.A. in WritingProgram at The Johns Hopkins Uni-versity. Even though the following wasnot written expressly for translatorsbut for my creative writing students, Ihope it will be helpful for translatorswho would like to place short stories,creative nonfiction essays, and poetryin U.S. literary journals.
S o you’d like to try getting yourliterary short story published?Take heart: you can do it. And,
if your work is worthy—a questiononly you can answer—it merits theeffort. Like a boat, send it out whereit belongs, over the great wide sea.Let it find readers, whoever they maybe, on whatever strange shores. Someof your readers may not be born yet.It helps to keep that in mind.
Beginning writers often imaginethat publishing their short story will bea glamorous event, Hemingwayesquein a wear-your-sunglasses-and-knock-back-the-grappa-as-agents-ring-your-phone-off-the-hook kind of way. Butfor most writers, it’s an experienceon par with, say, folding laundry.Unless you make one of the “slicks”—Atlantic Monthly, Esquire, GQ,Harper’s, The New Yorker—mostlikely your payment will be twocopies of the magazine. These willarrive in your mailbox in a plainbrown envelope. Some editors jot athank-you note, but most don’t bother.Chances are, your friends and familywill not have heard of the magazine.Even the best literary journals oftenmanage only a modest circulation—500 to 5,000—and may not be avail-able for sale except in a handful ofwidely scattered offbeat independents.In short, if you want money, you’d dobetter to flip burgers, and if you wantattention, go fight bulls.
Why try? Because when yourstory is published it is no longer onecopy printed out from your printer,but 500 or more. Perhaps one is lyingon someone’s coffee table inPeterborough, New Hampshire, or ona poet’s broad oak desk overlookingthe beach at La Jolla, California.Maybe one sits on the shelves at theUniversity of Chicago’s RegensteinLibrary, or on a side table in thelobby at Yaddo. Perhaps a dentist willread your story, or a retired school-teacher from Winnetka. Perhaps oneday, a hundred years from now, ahigh school student will find it on ashelf in the basement of the Reno,Nevada, public library, and she will
sit down Indian-style on the coldlinoleum floor and read it, her eyeswide with wonder. Your story, oncepublished, lives its own life.Potentially forever.
And, of course, it is validating tohave your work published. It alsohelps to mention it in your cover let-ters when you try to get other workpublished, or apply for grants and fel-lowships, or to attract the attention ofan agent, and so on. Indeed, pub-lishing one’s stories in literary jour-nals is (with a very few notableexceptions) a prerequisite to securinga publisher for a collection.
If you can keep your focus on thestory and its merits—rather than thewarm and fuzzies for your ego—the
process will be easier. Expect yourego to take some punches.
First, RejectionsFrom a breezy foray through the
local mall’s bookstore, one might guessthat American readers care for littlebeyond brand-name bodice-rippers,shiny red foil paperbacks withnuclear warheads on their covers, orthose teensy gift “books” with angelsand cats on them displayed at thecash register alongside the chotchkesand chocolates.
Mais non! Secretly, millions ofAmericans are scribbling, andbravely (if often furtively) thousandsand thousands are sending their workto literary magazines. Yes, thousandsand thousands (and say that again,out loud, à la Carl Sagan). Accordingto the listings in the 2001 Directory ofLiterary Magazines, The Paris Reviewreceives 20,000 unsolicited submis-sions a year (including poetry), ofwhich it publishes 35; The NorthAmerican Review receives 3,000prose submissions and publishes 55-65. My own Tameme, an annual bilin-gual literary magazine with a merethree issues to date, has received hun-dreds of submissions. Most litmagspublish only 2-3% of the manuscriptsthey receive. As for the “slicks,” get-ting published in one of these, evenfor the most outstanding and recog-nized writers (yep, even NationalBook Award winners), is about aslikely as winning a lottery.
In short, you’ve got some competi-tion. So when you receive the unsignedphotocopied form rejection note thatsays “Sorry,” it could mean your storysucks and you should do yourself afavor and burn it, but it could mean thatit’s a fine story and they simply didn’thave room for it. Or they already had astory about a dying alcoholic grand-mother, the heartbreak of losing the
On Publishing the Literary Short Story: Some Advice and ReflectionsBy C.M. Mayo
“…Most litmags publishonly 2-3% of themanuscripts they
receive…. Expect your ego to take some
punches…”
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 19
family dairy farm, or for that matter, aflying monkey in a business suit (you’dbe amazed). Equally, it could mean it’sone of the best short stories everwritten—better than Chekov’s “TheLady with the Pet Dog,” better thanFlannery O’Connor’s “A Good Man isHard to Find,” better than A. ManetteAnsay’s “Read This and Tell Me What ItSays”—and the editor, or more likelysome flunkey/wannabe/slush pile-squeegee, is an aesthetically blind/dyspeptic/Philistine/pinhead who wasprobably hung over, or jealous. Whoknows? The point is that the littleunsigned photocopied rejection note isnot a Judgment From On High. Itmeans nothing except that this partic-ular magazine’s editor at this particulartime has chosen not to publish this par-ticular story.
Sometimes editors write personalnotes explaining why they didn’t takeyour story. Indeed, anything hand-written and/or signed by an editor canmean that a distinguished literarypersonage has taken an interest inyour work, and you should, grate-fully, with a zing in your heart andJell-O in your knees, interpret this asboth validation and an invitation tosend more. It can also mean that aninexperienced graduate student/assistant/whomever, as yet unac-quainted with the toughening rigorsof plowing down towering slush pilesof manuscripts, felt guilty saying noand was merely attempting, in a flakyand time-consuming way, to be nice.Who knows? I mean, do you reallyknow anything about this person?
Thus, it behooves you to do yourresearch about the litmags and editorsyou are sending your work to. A per-sonally signed rejection letter fromthe editor-in-chief of The ParisReview, for example, would make myday. On the other hand, even lengthyletters from an assistant of a minor
new litmag would no more impressme than the comments of a commuterrandomly collared at the bus stop(who might be a very perceptivefellow, but who knows? He could bea coke-addled lunkhead with the lit-erary taste of a slug). Keep in mindthat anyone—yes anyone, exceptmaybe that flying monkey—can starta litmag. Compared to, say, making afeature film, or casting bronze sculp-ture, publishing a litmag is dirt cheap.All of which is to say don’t take let-ters from editors too seriously. Forthat matter, don’t take editors them-selves too seriously.
So you send again and again. Andagain. She who spends for the mostpostage wins. As does she who doesher research.
Research, Research, ResearchThe most basic level of research is
to get an overall feel for the “market”for literary short fiction. You can usu-ally find a reasonably interestingselection at your local library.However, if you can afford it, I rec-ommend you go to a bookstore andbuy a bunch. At my local Barnes &Noble I’ve spotted Chelsea, Calyx,McSweenies, The Paris Review,Potomac Review, Southwest Review,Tin House, and Witness, all of whichwould be worth your while to read.Read all you can, and read the con-tributors’ notes. If you read a story by,say, Dan Doe, that you admire, andyou read in Dan Doe’s bio that he’salso published in Seattle Review,High Plains Review, and Double-Take—check ‘em out! Another goodway to spot worthy litmags is to pick upprize-winning short story collections—anything that wins the AssociatedWriting Programs (AWP), Bakeless,Iowa Prize, National Book Award,Flannery O’Connor, Pulitzer, etc.—andlook on the acknowledgments page to
see where stories have been previ-ously published. Ditto with themany fine collections that are pub-lished each year.
Then have a look at the web forguidelines. An excellent place to startyour search is the website of theCouncil of Literary Magazines andPresses (www.clmp.org), which hasinformation about, including links to,the webpages of dozens of out-standing journals. Those without awebsite will usually send guidelinesin exchange for a SASE (self-addressed stamped envelope).
Reference books such as TheDirectory of Literary Magazines, TheInternational Directory of LittleMagazines and Small Presses, andWriters Market can be helpful, butthere is no substitute for actuallyseeing—and carefully reading—amagazine and its guidelines beforeyou submit.
Guidelines not only give an idea ofthe types of writing the editors arelooking for, but a litmag’s readingperiods. Many editors of litmags onlyread material during the fall or winter.Some read September-May, and stillothers October-June. Oftentimes, lit-mags have special issues (e.g., “TheBody,” “Mothers and Daughters,”“Love in America,” “OvercomingLoss,” “Borderlands”). Your manu-script will have a better chance if youcan aim it at a special issue.
Calls for submissions are oftenlisted. Other good sources are AWPChronicle, Poets & Writers, TheWriter, and The Writer’s Carousel,which is the newsletter of theWashington, DC area’s Writer’s Center(www.writer.org), among others.
The Mechanics of SubmissionFirst, your cover letter. This should
have your name, address, telephonenumber, and e-mail. (Skip the ➡
The ATA Chronicle | February 200320
social security number, since it posesan unnecessary security risk for you.)Address the letter to a specific personif you can—“To the Fiction Editor” isa red flag that you don’t know themagazine.
Tell them what you’re submitting(e.g., “Please find enclosed for yourconsideration a short story, Down theWell). Do not explain the story (e.g.,“this is a story about a young girl whofalls down a well,” etc.). You are notselling a nonfiction article—the lit-erary short story is art, and you mustlet it speak for itself. Explaining astory is blather, and it annoys mosteditors (the experienced ones will skipover your manuscript and reach for thephotocopied rejection notes).
Editors are human, however, so ithelps—if you can do it honestly—tosay something generous about theirlitmag (e.g., “I bought a copy of ABCat the Bethesda Book Festival and Ireally admired the story by DanDoe.”). If you can’t say anything,don’t. Brief and business-like is fine.
Most, but not all, editors appre-ciate it if you include somethingabout yourself—a few sentences, aparagraph at the most, that could beused as your contributor’s note ifyour story is taken. I find these noteseasier to both write and read in thethird person (I put mine at the bottomof the page under the title “BriefBio”). This is your opportunity tosignal that you’re serious. Forexample, “Dan Doe’s stories havebeen published in Fence, St. Anne’sReview, and Zyzzyva,” or “Dan Doewas recently awarded a scholarship atthe Bread Loaf Writers Conferenceand is now in his second year at TheJohns Hopkins University MFAProgram.” If you don’t have big-gunliterary “credentials,” not to worry. Asimple note will do (e.g., “Dan Doe isa statistician who lives in Grand
Forks, North Dakota, with his wife,four children, and pack of seven Alpo-guzzling Huskies. He is at work onhis first novel.”). Anything more—your five-page resume, a previouslypublished poem, a newspaper articleabout your amazing recovery afterbeing simultaneously hit by a cementtruck and an estimated 3,976 volts oflightning—is clutter. The editor haslimited time and attention, so don’ttake it up with the nonessential. Endthe cover letter with a “thank you forconsidering my work” and sign it.
The manuscript itself should haveyour name, address, telephone number,and e-mail address in the upper lefthand corner. If you can, include a wordcount, preferably in the upper righthand corner (though some editorscouldn’t care less about that). Double-space the text (or else!). Fasten thewhole thing (manuscript, SASE, andcover letter) with a paper clip. (Do notstaple it, because if the editors do seri-ously consider your story, they mayneed to make photocopies for othereditorial readers.)
Finally—and crucially—enclose aSASE for the reply, because without ityou may not get one. Unless yourmanuscript is short enough to fit in the37¢ stamped envelope, expect them to(ahem) recycle it.
The Question of MultipleSubmissions
A dismaying number of distin-guished litmag editors say that theyeither do not accept multiple submis-sions, or that they insist on beinginformed if it is such. With the odds sostacked against writers, to expect one-at-a-time submissions is not onlyunfair, but about as realistic as insistingthat high school seniors apply only toone college. According to my owninformal poll, the majority of serious,already well-published short story
writers submit each work to multiplepublications, and without compunc-tion. Which means that much of thebest work in any given slush pile,regardless of the editors’ statedpolicy, is in fact being submitted tomultiple publications. Thus, if yousubmit your stories one at a time itmay take years—toe curling,shoulder sagging years—to findthem homes. Most reply within 2-4months; however, even the most dis-tinguished litmags can sometimestake as long as a year to reply.
Rather than get steamed aboutthat, keep in mind that litmag pub-lishing is not a profit-generating busi-ness, but a labor of love. Most editorsare not paid for their time, and if theyare, so badly paid that if you toted upall the hours, the money wouldamount to a fraction of the minimumwage. And they’re only human—theyhave to take the kids to the dentist,grade papers, water the lawn, walkthe dog, and write their own shortstories/poems/novels. In any case,their slush piles are very tall, andgrowing ever taller with all thosemultiple submissions!
If you have your story accepted,you should immediately inform all ofthe other editors that you are with-drawing your manuscript. A simplepostcard will do: “Dear Editor: This isto let you know that I am withdrawingmy story Down the Well. Sincerely,Dan Doe.” To do otherwise—to waitin hopes of a bigger bite from, say,The New Yorker—is both dishonor-able and unfair to the editor who hastaken your story.
I think submitting to two or fourlitmags or slicks is a good number tostart with. With each rejection, sendout another. If after three months youhaven’t received a reply from a givenjournal, this may mean your story isunder serious consideration, although,
On Publishing the Literary Short Story: Some Advice and Reflections Continued
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 21
it may mean your story is sitting in anunread stack behind some juniorassistant’s couch. Who knows? So it’sa tough call whether to withdraw themanuscript or not. All I can say is, gowith your gut.
Aside from the secretarial hassleand expense of postage, anotherreason not to send out more than avery few submissions of a given storyat a time is that, most likely, with afresh look a few months later, youwill want to revise it. You may even,with a bright red face, wish to hide itunder a rock (I speak from experi-ence). Again, go with your gut.
Keep Learning, Keep WritingI doubt that there are many serious
short story writers who don’t have abrick-thick file of rejections. It’s partof the game, so don’t let them flusteryou. Some of the best short storieshave 5, 8, even 15 rejections behindthem. One prize-winning story by amajor contemporary writer racked up48—that’s right, 48—rejectionsbefore it was taken. Some amazingstories are never published—untilthey show up in a collection.
A writer must continually work tobalance on the razor’s edge of arro-gance and humility. One does thatwith a dose of both: arrogance to con-tinue sending out work when it hasbeen rejected repeatedly; andhumility to recognize when oneneeds to rewrite, or re-envision, oreven (ah, well) to discard. Trying topublish can be a discouraging anddisorienting experience, like enteringa dark forest full of noise. The trickis, keep your chin up but your ego incheck, and stay focused on main-taining that balance, and making yourwriting the best you can.
When your story is accepted forpublication, let your ego, for a fewprivate minutes, tingle and shine.
When, some months, or perhaps morethan a year later, your two contributorscopies arrive in their plain brownenvelope, sit down and read one. Getto know the company your story is in.Write the editors a thank-you note. Begenerous, if you honestly can, withkind comments about the other con-tributors’ work. Update your resumeand bio. And then, plunk the thing ona shelf and wish your story a sweetbon voyage.
Any Advice for Literary Translators?Eli Flam, editor-in-chief, Potomac
Review: Since Potomac Review’stheme issue in spring 2003 is“Confessions of a Translator & OtherRevelations,” we continue to be on thelookout for translations in poetry andprose. Two non-theme-related poemsin the current issue (fall/winter—we’ve gone to twice yearly), byChinese exiles and translated by adetermined coeval in Australia, fallhandily in our regular “Crossroads”section. A Hungarian-American trans-lation of Hungary’s most celebratedpoet will land outside the “On Stage”theme of the upcoming spring/summernumber. Come next fall/winter, fortranslation aspirants, the theme will be“Beyond...” (i.e., where reach mayexceed grasp), and in spring/summer2004, we’ll be focusing “Within...” onepenumbra or the other. And overall, orunderlying all, isn’t that an essentialrole, a central and determining task forliterature, to translate what is withinthe poet or writer for the reader toabsorb or wrestle with? Let the wordgo forth: Better translate than never.
Our website is www.montgomerycollege.edu/potomacreview.
Martin Lammon, editor, Arts &Letters: We publish both originaltexts and translations on facing pages,so it’s important that translators pro-
vide us with both. Translators mustsecure rights for publication fromoriginal authors/publishers. Since weusually feature only one (sometimestwo) translations each issue in ourWorld Poetry Translation series, it’sbest if translators query me first to seeif we are interested. Translatorsshould know that we want their workto succeed aesthetically in English.We don’t want merely faithful render-ings of poetry that is beautiful in theoriginal language, but is not alsobeautiful in English.
C.M. Mayo, editor, Tameme:Ditto what Martin Lammon said—that translators should be sure to pro-vide the original and all permissions.I also appreciate a cover letter withboth the translator’s bio and theauthor’s bio. Tameme is not currentlyaccepting submissions. Guidelines(including theme and deadline) forthe next issue will be posted on thewebsite (www.tameme.org).
Barbara Lounsberry, nonfictioneditor, The North American Review:I have received several translations asnonfiction submissions. I treat themas standard submissions. If I am con-sidering publishing a translation, ofcourse, I carefully check the creden-tials of the translator. If possible, I aska colleague who speaks the languageto provide me with an opinion on thefidelity and quality of the translation.
Shevi Berlinger, managingeditor, Two Lines: Two Lines: AJournal of Translation seeks originaltranslations into English of writingfrom any genre. We publish primarilyliterary translations, including fic-tion, poetry, and nonfiction.However, we are also interested in
Continued on p.32
The ATA Chronicle | February 200322
T he title, borrowed fromLongfellow’s “Paul Revere’sRide,” comes from Tales of a
Wayside Inn (1863). It is one of thefew Americana poems Longfellowwrote while translating Dante’sDivine Comedy (1867-1870). If thatpatriotic poem, which has an ono-matopoeic meter and serendipitouslyrhymed conversational diction, werenot such a tour de force in itself, wemight surmise that Longfellow waslooking for relief from terza rimas.
Of course, the title is a case of mis-appropriation. (“One, if by land, andtwo, if by sea;/And I on the oppositeshore will be,/Ready to ride and spreadthe alarm"). The following discussionof my involvement with the prepara-tion of literary reference works, twoEnglish and one American, is by nomeans a call "to be up and to arm," butan appropriate peripheral tribute to oneof the most successful American lit-erary translators of the 19th century.By an appropriate coincidence, Long-fellow was being rehabilitated for thecause of multiculturalism by HarvardUniversity and The Johns HopkinsUniversity Press1 at the time work onthe literary references in question wasgetting underway: namely, The OxfordGuide to Literature in English (2000),edited by Peter France; The Encyclo-pedia of Literary Translation intoEnglish (Fitzroy-Dearborn, 2001),edited by Olive Classe; and GreatWorld Writers. Twentieth Century(Marshall-Cavendish, 2003), edited byThomas McCarthy (Refs. 1, 2, 3).2
These remarks are designed to put myintersubjective data on record.
First, I shall describe these refer-ences anecdotally. Second, I shall takeup the problems encountered, bothin pursuing the assigned task ofpreparing entries for these works andin their aftermath. I shall mention acase of translator erasure. This erasure
will lead me to my third and finaltopic, which deals with what theseassignments revealed aboutlibraries, readers, and translationsurvival—shelf life or afterlife.
Anecdotal DescriptionHow are entries assigned?
Personal contacts. These include directacquaintances, recommendations byother scholars, and published bibliogra-phies. Both Peter France and OliveClasse got started in the mid-1990s,
giving themselves more than five yearsfor their undertaking, and giving con-tributors deadlines that were just asunrealistic as what their publishershad given them. I had met ProfessorFrance in Australia in 1977, and hadkept up with him and his wife SianReynolds, a distinguished scholarlytranslator. He suggested I do Beckett,Proust, 20th-century French fiction,and 20th-century French thought.Since the two writers are part of myrepertoire, I agreed. Olive Classe gotin touch with me in my capacity asdirector of the Translation Researchand Instruction Program at the StateUniversity of New York atBinghamton. She sent a list of topicsand asked me to contribute, as well asto bring her request to the attention of
other possible contributors. I did so. Iwas careful to stay with authors onwhom I had published: Julian Green,Flaubert, Verne, Villiers de l’Isle-Adam. Carrol Coates and I splitBaudelaire’s corpus for Classe: hetook Les Fleurs du Mal and I tookeverything else. In late fall 2001, amutual friend told McCarthy I coulddo J. M. Synge. I demurred andoffered Proust, only to learn that theeditor-in-chief had vetoed Proust. Ieventually took assignments for Camusand Malraux and gave myself a three-month deadline. McCarthy asked mefor suggestions on some unassignedauthors. ATA members DeborahFolaron and Lorena Terando wereamong my recommendees who took onassignments. Despite some dissertationwriters who were eager to help out,McCarthy’s editor-in-chief insisted onfaculty rank or the equivalent.
What does each editor want?Accuracy, authority, readability, andobedience. Each editor had very spe-cific instructions as to content, length,and audience. Oxford and Fitzroy-Dearborn appear to have similar mar-keting targets: libraries with a concernabout translation availability andquality. Readers are expected to beeither in or to have completed highereducation. Marshall-Cavendish, whichis putting writers in English and writersavailable in translation in a singleseries, also has a library marketingtarget, but stipulates that the materialshould be accessible to high school stu-dents. (There is an earlier series onAmerican writers.) Translation qualityis far less important than themes, plots,and style. For example, if Proust hadnot been vetoed on the grounds thathigh school and college students do notread him, I still could not have reused asingle sentence from the Oxford Guide.Given their respective audiences, each
“…In the long run,retranslations of world
literature may matter moreto the academic
community, especially thetranslation studiescommunity, and to
bilingual readers than toany other audience…”
One, If by Land, and, Two, If by Sea: Translators and Literature EncyclopediasBy Marilyn Gaddis Rose
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 23
editor was open as to voice and per-sonal judgment. On formatting instruc-tions, each was very, very specific, anddid not use the same style sheets. OnlyMcCarthy wanted Modern LanguageAssociation Style. Regarding dead-lines, the editors were also very spe-cific, and they must have been quitefrustrated by their contributors’inability to meet them.
What help is available? None ofthe assignments could have been car-ried out without electronic and con-ventional bibliographies. For Oxfordand Fitzroy-Dearborn, I used theelectronic library catalogs of theState University of New York, espe-cially SUNY Buffalo (which has thepremiere French collection in thesystem), the City University of NewYork, and the California Universitysystem. For Marshall-Cavendish, Iadded the electronic catalogs of theLibrary of Congress and the NewYork Public Library, and havebecome dependent upon WorldCat.3
Per Marshall-Cavendish’s instruc-tions, I also explored and evaluatedwebsites. For Fitzroy-Dearborn,especially for 19th-century authors, Iused the printed catalogs of theBibliothèque nationale, the BritishMuseum, and the National UnionCatalog (Library of Congress). Icould not have carried out my assign-ments without immediate, nonvirtualaccess to a good research library.Furthermore, for queries back andforth, e-mail and fax were indispen-sable. Indeed, Marshall-Cavendishrefused to accept hard copy.
Were there shortcuts? No. Incomposition, despite the mandatedlengths, which encouraged concise-ness and selectivity, I found no way toavoid reviewing the entire corpus andsocio-literary history. The mandated
lengths required what I would callmiddle-range exposition, i.e., a levelof detail midway between summaryand depth. Explication, however, wasrequired. Otherwise, it would be up tothe reader to determine, for example,why one translation might be moresatisfactory than another, or why onework might be more autobiographicalthan another.
Problems Encountered The mandated length require-
ments imposed by the editors movesme on to problems encounteredduring this assignment. With France,there had to be agreement on thechoice of 20th-century Frenchthinkers and 20th-century French fic-tion, and I believe we reached such anagreement early on in the assignment.Twentieth-century thinkers remainedfixed after my insistence on HenriBergson (1859-1941), which was bal-anced by France’s insistence onFerdinand de Saussure (1857-1913).4
There also seemed to be agreement on20th-century French fiction. Yet, whenI saw the final proof of 20th-centuryFrench fiction, I found Julien Gracq(1910-) and Raymond Queneau(1903-1976) inserted. This was aneditorial prerogative, of course, but Ifelt fraudulent about the inclusion ofauthors whom I only knew throughone work each. Where I was horrifiedwas seeing that Barbara Wright wasidentified as the sole Queneau trans-lator, especially when MadeleineVelguth had just received the French-American Foundation Award for herQueneau translation. This led me totype in an emendation. (I also photo-copied the page proof for MadeleineVelguth.) The emendation nevermade it into print. This is the erasureI mentioned earlier.
In addition to giving me those twoinsertions, France also inserted an
error. In my discussion of L’Etrangerby Albert Camus, where I wasmaking a brief comparison betweenthe translations of Stuart Gilbert(Ref. 5 1942) and Matthew Ward(Ref. 6 1988), he inserted the name ofanother translator: Jack [SIC]Laredo. There were no examplesgiven. In spring 2002, after an exten-sive search for Jack, I wrote toFrance, who replied “Mea Culpa.”For the record, in 1982, JosephLaredo published The Outsider (Ref.7), a title used in Great Britain forsome editions of Gilbert’s translation,and Kate Griffith published TheStranger (Ref. 8).5 Something similarbut non-incriminating happened withFitzroy-Dearborn, where someoneapparently decided I needed anotherset of examples for Flaubert’s transla-tions and went to the trouble offinding some. They are good exam-ples, but I could not have added themwithout changing the mandatedlength, and if I had been free tochange the length, I would probablyhave chosen different examples.
Disturbing Issues But to return to France, he and I
exchanged some brief cordial e-mailson the subject of Laredo. He men-tioned that Laredo’s translation wouldbe the one usually used in the UnitedKingdom. Given the marketplace, thismeans undergraduates in the U.K. willbuy Laredo’s, while in the U.S., col-lege students will buy Ward’s.However, students who want to avoidthe purchase cost and instead use alibrary copy, will probably go homewith Gilbert’s. Libraries, especiallythose outside English-speaking coun-tries, may have collection constraintsthat make retranslations nearly irrele-vant. If the library availability of trans-lations of L’Etranger is an indication,library patrons will read ➡
The ATA Chronicle | February 200324
Gilbert’s. According to a WorldCat“snapshot” which I took May 13,2002, 3,229 libraries have Gilbert’stranslation and less than half as many(1,414) have Ward’s. (Only 125 hold-ings were listed for Joseph Laredo’sand 59 for Kate Griffith’s transla-tions.) In order for Ward’s translationto catch up, Gilbert’s will have to wearout and be replaced.
Yet, judging from my assign-ments, overuse and replacement willbe unlikely to happen soon wheretranslations of 20th-century Frenchnovels are concerned. In the researchlibraries I consulted, every translationwas always on the shelves.6 Theywere archived, not read; activity wasamong the French originals.Twentieth-century French thinkerswere another matter, but not quite thereverse. There was modest activityamong the French texts, and consid-erable in-and-out among the transla-tions. But for a research library,translations are present in multiplecopies anyway. What would I con-clude regarding library collectionstrategies, patron reading habits, andpublishing practices on the basis ofmy assignments? First, researchlibraries I know operate with anarchival mission that protects usersfrom the vagaries of academic andpopular taste. They will keep transla-tions on the shelves and will ordertranslations and retranslations as theyare published.7 They may eventuallydiscard multiple copies.
A translation will stay in print aslong as it sells and/or no one com-plains about it. Sometimes the com-plaints have a very obvious basis. Forexample, the first translation ofMonsieur Ouine (Refs. 9 & 10, 1943and 1946) by Georges Bernanos(1888-1948) was made from aseverely flawed printing at the timeof the author’s expatriation in Brazil
during World War II. However, itwasn’t until 2000 that a translationwas made from the definitive 1955edition.8 To take a more subtle type ofcomplaint, we can return toL’Etranger. By the late 1940s, it wasnoted that Gilbert’s eloquent transla-tion made Camus’s antihero some-what admirable, and hence moresubversive, than he is in the French,which makes Camus more antipa-thetic to a postcolonial reading thanhe deserves. This does not mean,however, that libraries with limitedfunds will purchase the newer transla-tions. For them, the older translationwill be read, or shelved, as long as itresponds to rebinding. In the long run,retranslations of world literature maymatter more to the academic commu-nity, especially the translation studiescommunity, and to bilingual readersthan to any other audience.
As for the encyclopedias, they maywell have the effect of makingteachers more aware of translationquality when they choose readings.These references are meant for librarypurchase. I know that Fitzroy-Dearborn had disappointing U.S.sales, because I had chosen the optionof cash over copy, and, with apolo-gies, they had to wait for more thanthree years of sales in order to paycontributors. Furthermore, the delayin publishing must have hurt sales.My own research library, after listingthe Fitzroy-Dearborn order “pending”for three years, decided that theOxford Guide preempted it. I havereason to believe that the OxfordGuide will do well, but I wish its ori-entation were more globally English.Research by Phyllis Zatlin hasrevealed serious gaps in the coverageof Hispanic literatures.9 I expectMarshall-Cavendish to do well. It fol-lows a successful attractive com-panion series. Its office in Tarrytown,
New York, a Revolutionary site, allowsme to reprise about its “Chasing thered-coats down the lane.”
(For myself, much as I com-plained during the compilation ofthese references, the scholarly expe-rience was, on balance, extraordi-narily rewarding, sending me intobyways I never would have exploredso thoroughly.)
Notes1. Longfellow was officially rehabili-
tated in 1994, with the founding ofthe Longfellow Institute of Amer-ican Languages and Literatures atHarvard and the series by the samename at The Johns Hopkins Uni-versity Press. The Institute, dedi-cated to non-English writings inthe U.S., describes Longfellow as“the polyglot nineteenth-centurypoet who, in his translations andacademic work, helped to developliterary study across linguisticboundaries.” (Announcement inThe Chronicle of Higher Education,July 5, 2002: B13.) According toThe New York Times, July 26, 2002,a fourth-generation Paul Reveredied July 24, 2002, in Braintree,Massachusetts. He celebrated hisbirthday on April 18 to be synchro-nized with Longfellow’s poem.
2. France is a professor of French atthe University of Edinburgh;Classe, a professional writer; andMcCarthy, a former professor ofEnglish at Broome CommunityCollege, now works full-timewith Marshall-Cavendish.
3. Libraries continually update theirsystems. To anyone trying to usemy researching methods, I recom-mend going to the most generalwebsite of the institution andscrolling where indicated.
One, If by Land, and, Two, If by Sea: Translators and Literary Encyclopedias Continued
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 25
The sense of belonging to a familyof like-minded people is one of thebest parts of the program. It’s an open,inviting feeling that you note theminute you arrive. It’s an atmospherethat makes you want to stay. Roslyn, agraduate of the program, can attest tothis. She had been at the university foronly two months when HurricaneGeorges struck and ravaged theisland. There she was with no runningwater, no electricity, and two of herthree new friends had left Puerto Ricodue to the disastrous conditions. Sheseriously contemplated followingsuit, but it was her translation“family” and the knowledge that she
would be missing out on great profes-sors, such as Marshall Morris, thatmade her stick it out. That, she says,and the great food.
Overall, the program offers a verynurturing atmosphere for students. Atany time of the day in the hallwaysyou can hear a student asking AndrewHurley or María C. Hernandez aboutgrammar, or another group holding adiscussion with Sara Irizarry orCharlotte Ward, or asking other pro-fessors about working with clients.And these open discussions are justas valuable to those asking the ques-tions as they are to those listening inon the conversation. It’s a great
feeling knowing that your professorsare there to impart their knowledgewhenever asked. Of course, theremay be times when they wish weweren’t so darn curious!
Spread the WordSo there you have it. We have just
“outted” the University of PuertoRico’s Graduate Program in Trans-lation, one of the best kept secrets ofthe island. Help us spread the word.Mention our program the next timesomeone asks you about getting agraduate degree in translation, orabout how to get a good tan.
4. Incidentally, both of these presentinteresting cases for translationstudies. Bergson, whose masterlyuse of French won him a seat inthe Académie Française, camefrom a bilingual home (hismother was Irish) and workedwith his English translator.Saussure’s work was compiled bystudents. The translation of someof his terminology is disputed.
5. Both Laredo and Griffith usuallyflatten the rhetoric Gilbert uses.
6. There was an apparent idiosyn-crasy in collection development atthe Binghamton UniversityLibrary that was established in1947. The absence of the transla-tions of novels of the late 1940s,coupled with their presence in thelocal public libraries, implies apolicy of relegating translations topopular reading.
7. At an institution where translationstudies is important, bibliographers
may well be the first to note andacquire these.
8. William S. Bush. 2002. “Intro-duction,” Monsieur Ouine. Lincoln:University of Nebraska, vii-xx. Histranslation is the first. WorldCat(July 11, 2002) lists it in 267libraries.
9. Report given at ATA 2002 con-ference session on “Translatorsand Literature Encyclopedias,”November 8, 2002.
References1. France, Peter, ed. 2000. The
Oxford Guide to Literature inEnglish. Oxford: OxfordUniversity Press.
2. Classe, Olive, ed. 2001. TheEncyclopedia of Literary Trans-lation into English. London:Fitzroy-Dearborn.
3. McCarthy, Thomas, senior ed.Forthcoming, 2003. Great World
Writers. Twentieth Century. Tarry-town, NY: Marshall-Cavendish.
4. Scudder, Horace E., ed. 1975. ThePoetical Works of Longfellow.Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
5. Gilbert, Stuart. 1946. The Stranger.New York: Alfred A. Knopf.
6. Ward, Matthew. 1946. The Stranger.New York: Alfred A. Knopf.
7. Laredo, Joseph. 1982. The Out-sider. London: Hamish Hamilton.
8. Griffith, Kate. 1982. TheStranger. Washington, DC: TheUniversity Press of America.
9. Bush, William S. 2000. MonsieurOuine. Lincoln, NE: University ofNebraska Press.
10. Bernanos, George. MonsieurOuine. Rio de Janeiro: AtlanticaEditora, 1943. Paris: Plon, 1946.
The Best Secrets Are Those Well Kept—Or Are They? Continued from p.17
(Note: The following was published inthe Proceedings of the 16th Inter-national Federation of TranslatorsWorld Congress [Vancouver, BritishColumbia, Canada, August 7-10,2002]. Fédération internationale destraducteurs, Montréal, Québec,Canada, 2002, pp. 8-11.)
P oets have always sought tocharge words with more thantheir lexical meanings through
the use of such devices as sound,rhythm, and word play. In the 20thcentury, some poets began employingan extreme form of word play,breaking the usage norms of the lan-guage itself. The resultant poetry isdifficult even for source-languagereaders and hearers to construe. Fortranslators, the problem is com-pounded, because merely breaking agrammatical norm in the target lan-guage is insufficient. Not only mustthe a-grammaticality of the source lan-guage be recreated, but also its effects.This is the problem facing translatorsof the poetry of Thomas Klees.
Thomas KleesThomas Klees was born in 1966,
grew up in Hannover, Germany, andnow lives in Kiel. After he passed his
secondary school exit examination,he attended drama school inHamburg, and has had numerousstage engagements in both Hannoverand Kiel. His first book of poetry,Spurlos werden, was published byDeutsche Verlags-Anstalt in 1999.
In the poems of Spurlos werden,Klees omits all capitalization andpunctuation. His usually short linesare frequently constructed so that agiven line has one meaning if read in
conjunction with the preceding line,and a different meaning if read in con-junction with the subsequent line. Theoverall effect is usually that of onelong run-on sentence, constructed ofoverlapping shorter sentences, themeaning of which shifts as it is read.Consider, for example, the poem “aufdem weg” (Klees 1999: 11), which is
given below next to a line-by-line,word-for-word translation. Wherethere is more than one literal meaning,they are given side-by-side, withinangled brackets and separated by aslash. The word-for-word translationhas been deliberately left unaltered,even where it is incomprehensible.
Note the shift of meaning of thephrase “in den wassern,” which, ifread in conjunction with the pre-ceding lines, means the place wherethe speaker is the fastest swimmer,and, if read in conjunction with thesubsequent lines, means the placefrom which the speaker sees the Rockof Gibraltar. There is no logicalreason why the water cannot be both,but the thoughts in this poem are notbeing expressed with declaratorylogic. There is no “and.” Also notethe word “regnerei,” with the “-erei”suffix indicating a place where theaction of a verb is carried out.Although the English cannot add anequivalent suffix, “-ery,” as easily asGerman can add “-erei” (the word“rainery” is meaningless), it doesemploy the equivalent suffix in thewords “bakery” and “distillery.”
Klees’ total lack of initial capitalsmeans that nouns are not differenti-ated by initial capitals from other
Thomas Klees: “auf dem weg”
The ATA Chronicle | February 200326
Translating an A-Grammatical ContemporaryGerman Poet into EnglishBy Ronnie Apter and Mark Herman
“…Translating a poem byKlees is like taking a
lesson in the similaritiesand differences between
English and Germansentence structure…”
auf dem weg
kaum warst du fortging es los mitder regnerei erwachteich andertags alsbewohner bewegten seelandesüber nacht schwimmkundigwie der schnellstein den wassern sehe ichjetzt schon diefelsen gibraltars
on <the/my> way
scarcely were you awaywent it (= subject postponer) free withthe rainery (= thing that rains, place where the rain is made) awakenedI on another day asinhabitant of <agitated/moved> sealandduring night swim-<expert/experienced>as the fastest in the waters I seealready now theRock of Gibraltar
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 27
words, as is usual in written German.(There are, of course, no capitals orany other punctuation in any spokenlanguage, but there are vocal andfacial expressions, and speech pauses,to make meanings clear.) Therefore,as the next example demonstrates,sometimes the reader of a Klees poemcan take a given word to be either anoun or a verb, and sometimes also anadjective or adverb as well. Thus,both the meaning and the part ofspeech of a given word or words maybecome unstable as the line proceeds.
Such instability occurs in thepoem “berliner tage” (Klees 1999:16), given below together with a lit-eral English translation:
In the poem below, consider thesequence “zum / anderen gebärdemich.” The phrase “zum anderen” isan idiom meaning “for the secondtime.” However, the two words aresplit between two lines. Therefore,perhaps the idiomatic meaning is notmeant, and the meaning is only that ofthe two words taken separately: “to
the” (“zum”) and “other” (“anderen”).Both meanings can logically followfrom the meaning of the precedingwords: “from one undesired place.”Now, assuming the separate mean-ings, “anderen” can be an adjectiveused as a noun, or it can be an ordi-nary adjective modifying the fol-lowing noun, “gebärde.” If it modifies“gebärde,” then “anderen gebärde” isa feminine singular dative or genitiveadjective-noun construction meaning“another <air/bearing/appearance/demeanor/gesture>.” But this can’t beright, despite the fact that “anderen”and “gebärde” are on the same line inthe adjective/noun position, becauseof “zum.” The word “zum” accept-ably requires the dative singular, butunacceptably requires that the fol-lowing noun be either masculine orneuter, even though “gebärde” is fem-inine. So, unless the poet is beingungrammatical (a real possibilityhere), “gebärde” must be a verb, areflexive verb (“gebärde mich”),meaning “I <behave/act/pretend to
be>.” We believe that the poetintended all of the considered mean-ings and shifts in parts of speech topass through the reader’s mind.
Reproducing Klees’ Effects inEnglish
Some of Klees’ effects are easilyreproduced in English. Some are not.
1) Lack of PunctuationThis is directly reproducible in
English, which, like the German, canrely solely on line breaks and wordsense to substitute, however ambigu-ously, for periods, commas, semi-colons, etc. One minor differencebetween English and German, notarising in either of the examples justshown, is the English use of the apos-trophe to indicate contractions (abol-ished in modern German usage) andpossessives (never a part of Germanusage). In our English translation, weeliminate them, thereby being “consis-tent” and also partially compensating forthe lost shock value of lowercase nouns.
➡
Thomas Klees: “berliner tage”
berliner tage
meine fremde hierfür mich zu behalten suche ich mir noch in derwohnung die wege destages zusammen zu gehen
wissenden schrittesgelange ich von einemungewollten ort zumanderen gebärde mich
bis zum abendweiter daheim woich doch niebleiben möchte
(of) Berlin days
my <foreignness/strangeness> herefor myself to keep seekI <to/for> myself still in the<dwelling/habitation/home> the <paths/methods/manners/courses> of theday [I try to make the ways of the day converge for me/I try to go alongtogether with the ways of the day]<going together/uniting>with a <knowing/sure> step<arrive/reach/attain> I from <an/one><unwished/unmeant/unintended/undesired> <place/village/town> <to theother/for the second time><air/bearing/appearance/demeanor/gesture/Ibehave/I act/I pantomime/I pretend>till eveningfurther at home whereI however, neverremain would have <desired/wanted/wished>
The ATA Chronicle | February 200328
2) Lack of Initial CapitalsKlees’ lack of initial capitals is
only approximately reproducible inEnglish. Eliminating capital letters atthe beginnings of sentences has thesame effect in both languages, buteliminating initial capital letters froma few English proper nouns has amuch lesser effect than does elimi-nating all initial capitals from allnouns in the original German poems.The erstwhile German nouns are ren-dered potentially ambiguous as to partof speech in a way wholly foreign tostandard written German usage. Andyet, because of the inflectional end-ings, they are still less potentiallyambiguous than ordinary English non-capitalized nouns, which are routinelyused as other parts of speech. Theimportant word is potentially: habitand context usually render a word’smeaning and grammatical functionunmistakable. For example, few nativeEnglish speakers would have troublewith the sentence “We milk milk fromthe milk-white milk cow.” despite thefact that the word “milk” is, in turn, averb, noun, adverb, and adjective. Infact, sentences in English in which aword shifts its part of speech are rare,and usually require a strategicallyplaced line break. One such sentencecan be found in Kenneth Rexroth’spoem “Advent” (1949: 51), in whichthe word “veins” shifts from a noun toa verb across the line break:
In the meadowsAnd high pastures, the green grass veinsThe grey.
In German, on the other hand,because writers routinely rely on ini-tial capital letters to distinguishnouns, it is much easier than inEnglish, despite inflectional endings,once initial capital letters are elimi-nated, to introduce the ambiguities
described above for the words “zum /anderen gebärde mich.”
In addition to the beginnings ofsentences and nouns, there is theproblem of the initial capital letters atthe beginnings of pronouns. The onecapitalized German pronoun is “Sie”(polite form of “you”). Removing theinitial capital is not only in oppositionto standard usage, but also makes theword ambiguous, with “sie” meaning“she” or “they.” However, because“Sie” takes plural verb forms, conju-gation endings on verbs following thepronouns usually remove any ambi-guity with “sie/she.” The ambiguitywith “sie/they” remains. The one cap-italized English pronoun is “I.”Making “I” lower case, which we do,is in opposition to standard usage, butdoes not introduce any ambiguity.
3) Meaning ShiftsWhile reproducing Klees’ shifts of
parts of speech is usually difficult, repro-ducing those shifts of meaning, whichdepend on whether a line is read in con-junction with the previous line or subse-quent line, is fairly easy for English. Infact, such a shift in meaning is usuallyreproduced even in a literal translation,as demonstrated by the literal transla-tion of “auf dem weg” on page 26.
4) Overall EffectThe usual impression left by a
Klees poem is that of one long a-grammatical sentence, consistingof overlapping clauses, in which thethoughts constantly shift but remainunbroken by even implied periods orcommas. This is not always possibleto achieve in English, or at least wehave found it not always possible toachieve, as demonstrated by the fol-lowing translations.
English Translations of ThomasKlees’ Poetry
Below is our translation of “aufdem weg.” The original German isonce again reproduced for purposesof easy comparison. This translationof “auf dem weg” reproduces fairlywell the overall effect of one long a-grammatical sentence that charac-terizes the original poem. But it doesnot reproduce the effect perfectly. Inparticular, while there are no impliedperiods in the English translation,there are two implied commas at theend of the fourth line: after “day,” andat the end of the fifth line, after“sealand.” Neither of these appear inthe original German.
It could be argued that the firstcomma, after “day,” is easily eliminated
Translating an A-Grammatical Contemporary German Poet into English Continued
Translation of Thomas Klees’ “auf dem weg”
auf dem weg
kaum warst du fortging es los mitder regnerei erwachteich andertags alsbewohner bewegten seelandesüber nacht schwimmkundigwie der schnellstein den wassern sehe ichjetzt schon diefelsen gibraltars
on the way
you had hardlygone free asrain wokei next daydweller in welling sealandovernight as big a swimming staras the fastest in the water i seeeven now therock of gibraltar
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 29
by including the word “as” after“day,” which would correspond to theGerman word “als.” But we decidedagainst this on the grounds thatadding “as” would disturb the rhythmof the fourth line and interfere withthe alliteration between “day” and“dweller.”
The comma after “sealand” is notso easily eliminated, even in theory.The German language accommodatesinterrupting clauses much moreeasily than does English. Therefore,“über,” at the beginning of line 6,joins up with “als,” at the ending ofline 4, almost as if the interveningthree-word fifth line were not there.That is why there is no impliedcomma in the German. It is muchharder to read the English as if therewere no comma at the end of the fifthline. The words “day” and “overnight”do not link up as do “als” and “über,”because the intervening line gets in theway. The English would be easier toread without a comma after “sealand”if “overnight” were moved to the end ofthe preceding line. But this gainsnothing but a shift in the impliedcomma to after “overnight,” and per-
haps at the cost of wrecking therhythm of both lines 5 and 6.
In a more complex poem like“berliner tage,” it is even harder torender the overall effect in English(please see our translation below).Once again, the German reads as onelong ungrammatical sentence ofoverlapping clauses with no breaks.This effect is not achieved in ourEnglish translation. In particular, wehave introduced two breaks inthought, in lines 5 and 8, because itmakes no sense to read “together”with “go” in line 5 or “another” with“the” in line 8.
While “together” and “go” do forma possible single-thought wordsequence in English, in context (i.e.,because of the word “flow” before“together”), the reader would ask:Together with whom? Together withwhat? In the original German, thebreak is avoided because only one gen-eral verb, “gehen,” is needed, whereasEnglish requires two more specificverbs, “flow” and “go.” Also, Germangrammar allows the single verb tocome after “zusammen/together,” in anambiguous position connecting either
to the previous or subsequent phrase.But reducing the two English verbs toone, whether the resulting phrase were“flow together,” “together flow,” “gotogether,” or “together go,” wouldunambiguously mean that “the daysways together go with a knowingstep.” The possible meaning inGerman that “i go with a knowingstep” would be eliminated. In thetranslation given below, both meaningsare still possible, because “go” can befinite with “i” as its subject (a parallelwith “i try” in line 2), or it can be aninfinitive (a parallel with “to flow” inline 5).
The break in the English thoughtbetween “another” and “the” in line 8is avoided in the original German bythe sequence “zum / anderen gebärdemich” discussed above. The Englishcan be read without a break, with themeaning: “to / another [person] thepretense / till evening / continuing,”but the more likely English readingincludes a break after “another,”thereby losing the continuousthought. However read, the idiomaticGerman meaning of “zum anderen”—“for the second time—has been lost inthe translation.
Such are the frustrations of trans-lating Klees. It should also be notedthat these two are by no means themost grammatically confusing of hispoems.
ConclusionTranslating a poem by Klees is
like taking a lesson in the similaritiesand differences between English andGerman sentence structure. The shiftin parts of speech characteristic ofEnglish is also characteristic ofspoken German and written German,if the latter eliminates the initial cap-italization of nouns. However, it is
Translation of Thomas Klees’ “berliner tage”
berliner tage
meine fremde hierfür mich zu behalten suche ich mir noch in derwohnung die wege destages zusammen zu gehenwissenden schrittesgelange ich von einemungewollten ort zumanderen gebärde michbis zum abendweiter daheim woich doch niebleiben möchte
berlin days
as for mei try to keep my strangeness hereto myself in theflat try to get the daysways to flow together gowith a knowing stepfrom one undesired spot toanother the pretensetill eveningcontinuingat home wherei neverwanted to stay
Continued on p.32
The ATA Chronicle | February 200330
T he polyphonic literary text,which embeds varying levels ofdiscourse, different language or
cultural referents, mixed genres,and/or narrative voices, presents dis-tinct challenges for the translator.These challenges can be summarizedas belonging to one or more of the fol-lowing categories: 1) translator igno-rance of the multiple linguistic orcultural referents being alluded to; 2)“faithful” rendering of each narrativevoice, while retaining consistency oftone in the target language; and 3)identifying appropriate word and syn-tactic choices based on the expecta-tions set up by each level of discourseor each genre in a mixed genre text.
Perhaps more than in any otherkind of translation, we should recog-nize that a text which crosses theunspoken boundaries of reader expec-tation, by refusing the more tradi-tional use of one language, one genre,one voice, one discourse, or one cul-tural referent, will create stumblingblocks that require more than theusual number of resources or strate-gies to successfully translate bothform and content. It is true that onecould privilege content over form bygenerating a kind of generic transla-tion that would get the point across.However, anyone who has ever read atranslation of Verlaine’s poetry, onethat was rendered solely for “content”as a narrative translation, understandsall that is lost by prioritizing contentto the exclusion of form. The samecan be said of any written expressionof emotion, which is communicatednot just in what is stated, but in how itis phrased.
Prioritizing form over content hasits drawbacks as well, as can be heard,for example, in a forced alexandrinetranslation from French to English,where the English often doesn’trequire as many syllables to express a
similar idea. (Translations of the playCyrano provide good examples ofthis). If we agree as literary transla-tors that a balance must be struckbetween the communication of formalelements and content elements, thenthe difficulties outlined here must alsotake this basic premise into account.The following are examples of waysin which a translator might navigatepossible literary choices. They aredrawn from francopohone texts trans-lated into English, where the contextsvary from Africa, to the Middle East,to Quebec.
Multiple Linguistic and CulturalReferents
Lebanese writer Evelyne Accadprovides examples of all three typesof challenges we have outlined. Hernovels, which include poetry andsong, always take place in more thanone cultural context. Her third novel,Blessures des mots: Journal deTunisie, which I translated asWounding Words: A Woman’s Journalin Tunisia, takes the reader fromMidwestern U.S. to Tunisia, and thenon to France, while also referring tothe main character’s Lebanese originsand the current conflict in thatcountry. I chose to add to the originalFrench title in my translation to indi-cate a gendered perspective(“Woman’s Journal”). I did this for acouple of reasons. As this workrecounts events in the Tunisianwomen’s movement around 1985, and
since the journal is written by afemale narrator, it made marketingsense to me to suggest the inclusionof this perspective in the title. On theother hand, I was not enamored withthe literal translation of Blessures desmots as Wounding Words, with its useof alliteration and present participle,but the editors chose to adopt thispiece of the title. Words in Arabic, uti-lized in the French text, which haveno specific cultural equivalent inEnglish, are often preserved in thetranslation. Words such as harissa,médina, muezzin, and hadra used inthis novel are ultimately understoodby the anglophone reader in the con-text of the story. While some readerswill not immediately understand thesereferences, these represent caseswhere the translator chose to preservethe original linguistic and cultural ref-erents. To eliminate them would ster-ilize the text of important content andlose the meaning so closely tied tocultural context. In addition, the useof Arabic in a text on Tunisia inFrench recalls the French colonialhistory that created a bicultural lin-guistic context in this area.
Consistency of Tone Across MultipleNarrative Voices
Accad’s second novel, Coquelicotdu massacre (literally, Poppy of theMassacre), deals with some women’sresponses to the civil war in Lebanonthat began in 1975. We note severaldistinct female narrators in this work,one of whom leads each chapter.Their stories can be read distinctly,but are not sequential, causing thetranslator to change focus and toneeach time a different narrator is pre-sented. The novel has not been trans-lated, although it was attempted inpart by one of my graduate studentslast spring. She chose to follow onenarrative voice or character and to
Navigating Literary Translation Choices: The Case of the Polyphonic TextBy Cynthia T. Hahn
“…For the translator tonavigate successfully, sheor he must look below the
surface of the text…”
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 31
translate her story across the novel.This was my student’s way of navi-gating the text, as she found that thedifficulty of switching narrators atalmost every chapter was a transla-tion exercise beyond her reach.Certainly choosing one voice at atime, translating each embeddedstory before beginning to tackle thenext voice and story, would seem toprovide an interesting technique forconsistency across the narrativevoices in this particular work. In thisway, character consistency, wordchoices, and syntactic choices arelimited to one’s understanding of thisparticular character’s world. Ofcourse, one also has to understandhow each character relates to theothers in order to lend readability orcoherence to the entire work.
Discourse and Genre Expectations:Word and Syntactic Choices
What kinds of expectations are setup by a particular level of discourseor genre within a target culture,which, to some extent, govern theword and syntactic choices faced bythe literary translator? For example, areader may expect a first person nar-rative to contain elements associatedwith autobiography, calling intoquestion the veracity of the culturaland historical information provided.When the narrative is interrupted bythe use of poetic text in the thirdperson, reader expectation changes asmetaphor becomes the predominantsource of meaning, and formal ele-ments such as vocalization and repe-tition set up another level ofdiscourse in the text.
Evelyne Accad’s novels embodyboth the semi-autobiographical firstperson narrator and the use of poems,which interrupt the narration and arealso characteristic of a type of tradi-tional Middle Eastern narrative. This
brings up the difference in culturalexpectations between readers ofArabic, who may have encounteredthis mix of poetry and prose in litera-ture, and English or French speakers,for whom this mixed genre provokesdisorientation and calls into questionthe novel’s narrative focus, develop-ment, and categorization. Accad’swriting switches from descriptive nar-rative (diary journal), to dialogue, toanalytical discourse (giving voice to acultural “other”), and then to poetrybased on Accad’s songs. Such a lit-erary technique illustrates the impor-tance of taking reader expectationsinto account when making linguisticchoices. I have also encountered otherwriters who display cultural multi-plicity by utilizing instances of lin-guistic interference or interplay intheir work.
East African writer AbdourahamWaberi’s use of emotionally distant,formal language to describe scenesof violence also calls into question aprobable reader’s expectation ofemotionally charged language todescribe such scenes. Algerian writerNoureddine Aba mixed genres toprovoke various tonal effects in hisnovels based on expectations associ-ated with his anticipated reader ofFrench. Some newer novels, such asL’homme au complet by Quebecwriter Aude, cite e-mail within amore traditional narrative. This formof abbreviated writing also comeswith certain reader expectationsbased on culture and experience thatinfluence a translator’s word andsyntactic choices. Such diverse textsadd to our understanding of howboth genre and textual discourseexpectations will necessarily influ-ence the word and syntactic choicesof the translator.
Even the book jacket may set upvery different reader expectations. In
the case of Accad’s third novel,Voyages en cancer, the French cover,while displaying a photo of the authorafter her mastectomy, uses discreetframing of the chest to avoid fullexposure. On the other hand, theEnglish translation, published byfeminist press Spinifex of Australia,includes a photo which does notattempt to hide the author’s chest, andconveys in no uncertain terms that thisnovel will “uncover” some of thetaboo topics related to the causes andeffects of breast cancer. Of course, theliterary translator, like the author,often has little or no control over thechoice of the book’s cover. It isimportant to be aware that thesechoices could create important ➡
The ATA Chronicle | February 200332
discrepancies between cover contentand text. In the end, as with othertypes of translation, the editor, pub-lisher, or client will tend to have thefinal say regarding the product that isultimately seen by the public or targetclient. Therefore, the translator mustrealize that the extent of their influ-ence on the translation will be limitedby the publication circumstances. Thetranslator’s carefully chosen languagemay in fact be edited or changed tosuit the contractor.
ConclusionAs you can see from this brief
overview, the polyphonic text pro-vides the translator with a sea ofchoices. For the translator to navigatesuccessfully, she or he must lookbelow the surface to see how many
and what kinds of cultural and lin-guistic elements are at play at anygiven moment in the text. As the orig-inal text may be multicultural in termsof its linguistic elements, cultural ref-erents, and target audience, so thetranslation should attempt to retainthe polyphonic quality of the original.
References1. Aba, Noureddine. Trans. Cynthia
Hahn. 1999. Le Chant perdu aupays retrouvé/The Lost Song of aRediscovered Country. Paris:L’Harmattan.
2. Accad, Evelyne. 1993. Blessuresdes mots. Journal de Tunisie. Paris:Indigo & Côté-Femmes. Trans.Cynthia Hahn. 1996. Wounding
Words: A Woman’s Journal inTunisia. Oxford: Heinemann.
3. ——-. 1988. Coquelicot du mas-sacre. Paris: L’Harmattan.
4. ——-. 2000. Voyages en cancer.Paris: L’Harmattan. The WoundedBreast. 2001. North Melbourne:Spinifex Press.
5. Aude. 1999. L’homme au complet.Montréal: XYZ éditeur.
6. Waberi, Abdouraham. “A Womanand a Half.” Translation, CynthiaHahn. Ed. Adèle King. 2003. NewStories from French Africa.Nebraska University Press.
The Case of the Polyphonic Text Continued
other genres—reportage, proverbs,legal documents, anthropologicaldata from the field, song lyrics,advertising, diaries, oral histories,case studies, and essays—as well asshort articles concerning the transla-tion process. Especially sought areworks which bring to the attention of
the reader new genres and rarer lan-guages. Please submit previouslyunpublished translations only. Inorder to be considered, submissionsmust include a brief introduction(generally under 1,000 words) withinformation about the original author,the background of the piece, special
problems the translation presented,and the piece’s relation to the themeof the issue. For complete submissionguidelines, please go to our website(www.twolines.com).
On Publishing the Literary Short Story: Some Advice and Reflections Continued from p.21
clear that verb position in Germanoften allows for a more seamless shiftin the flow of ideas than can beaccommodated in English if theEnglish must also reproduce theGerman meanings.
ReferencesKlees, Thomas. 1999. Spurlos
werden: Gedichte. Stuttgart:Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt.
Rexroth, Kenneth. 1949. TheSignature of All Things. Verona:New Directions.
Translating an A-Grammatical Contemporary German Poet into English from p.29ATA Members
Check out Medical, Life, and Disability Insurance through Mutual of Omaha
800.223.6927 402.342.7600
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The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 33
I n the Caribbean and Africannovels discussed here, the authorsbring several languages into play
in a text based in French. It should benoted that in addition to the tensionbetween different languages, thebasic French discourse itself isaffected to varying degrees byauthors who consciously distortRacinian French.
In Jacques Stephen Alexis’sL’espace d’un cillement (In theFlicker of an Eyelid), Spanish andKreyòl are used throughout the novel,with occasional expressions inEnglish. As you will see, there is atextual justification for this mixtureof languages. For starters, the prin-cipal scene of the novel takes place ina bordello, the Sensation Bar, in Port-au-Prince, where a number of theprostitutes, including Cuban La NiñaEstrellita, are Spanish-speaking. Inthe story, a warship from the U.S. isin port and swarms of sailors andmarines flock to the Sensation Bar.The Spanish and English phrasesuttered by the characters are usuallylimited to swearing and obscenities,but La Niña also sings songs inSpanish and frequently prays to theVirgin of the Pillar. Apart from wordsand phrases in Spanish and Kreyòl(often annotated or explained byAlexis), the French language itselfdisplays a wide range of registers,from the conversational style of ElCaucho (a Cuban mechanic) and theregulars at the bar, to learned terms,medical terms, and archaicisms.
En attendant le vote des bêtessauvages (Waiting for the Vote of theWild Animals), by the Ivoirian novelistAhmadou Kourouma, belongs to anentirely different and distinctly Africanmode of fiction. It is completelyinscribed in the oral traditions ofAfrican storytelling and, in particular,the rituals of the hunters’ societies of
Western Africa, although the setting isroughly 1960-1996, the period duringwhich West African dictators vied forfavor and money from the West orEast during the Cold War. The exploitsof Koyaga, master hunter and presi-dent-dictator of the Republic of theGulf (a thinly disguised image ofmodern Togo), are chanted by the sèrè(the official hunter’s bard) and hisaccompanist during a six-day celebra-tion of the 30th anniversary of theregime. The recital includes manywords from the Malinke language, as
well as pithy French translations ofproverbs and the verbal satire in whichthe chanter indulges. A recapitulationof the wanderings of Macledio,Koyaga’s close advisor, takes thereader on a virtual odyssey of WestAfrican countries and cultures, fromthe Cameroon northward to Morocco.This telling brings in numerousexpressions from different Africanlanguages, ranging from CameroonianBamileke to Arabic.
The Caribbean DiscourseThe text of Alexis’s third novel is
divided into six “Mansions” plus aCoda. The first five Mansions areeach centered on one of the fivesenses, and the last is devoted to “TheSixth Sense.” The simple plotinvolves the process by which El
Caucho (the man with an elastic gait)notices an attractive young prostituteoutside the Sensation Bar. He is sostruck by La Niña Estrellita that hebegins to frequent the bar. Eachobserves the other, sense by sense,beginning with “Sight,” but withoutdirectly speaking to one another.Each senses, through observationalone, that the other is Cuban. Onlyin the fourth Mansion, “Taste,” do thetwo finally speak directly to oneanother, just before El Caucho givesLa Niña a passionate kiss.
Alexis underscores the theme ofthe entire novel with an epigraphfrom Walt Whitman’s AutumnRivulets (Leaves of Grass): “Youprostitutes, flaunting over the trot-toirs or obscene in your rooms,/Whoam I that I should call you moreobscene than myself?” Each of thesix Mansions and the Coda is alsointroduced by a thematic epigraph,four of them from Latin Americanand Spanish authors. The epigraph tothe fourth Mansion is an excerpt froma beautiful prose poem on the exqui-site taste of the pomegranate, takenfrom Juan Ramón Jiménez’s LaGranada (Platero y yo):
“¡Platero, qué grato gusto amargoy seco el de la difícil piel, duro yagarrada como una raíz a latierra...Ahora, Platero, el núcleoapretado, sano, completo, con susvelos finos, el exquisito tesoro deamatistas comestibles, jugosas yfuertes, como el corazón de no séqué reina joven...¡Qué rica! ¡Conqué fruición se pierden los dientesen la abundante sazón alegre yroja! Espera, que ne puedo hablar.”
(Platero, what a pleasantly bitterand dry taste the tough skin has—it’s tough and clings like an earth-bound root...! Now, Platero, ➡
Cultural Tensions in Multilingual Fiction: Examplesfrom African and Caribbean Francophone NovelsBy Carrol F. Coates
“…The French discourseitself seems to be
variously shaped byHaitian or African cultures
and modes of thoughtconstituting a virtually new
variety of French…”
The ATA Chronicle | February 200334
the concentrated seed, healthy andfull with its delicate fibers, theexquisite treasure of edibleamethysts, juicy and hard as theheart of some young queen...Delicious! With what a sensationthe teeth sink into the joyous andabundant red ripeness! Wait, Isimply cannot speak).
I should mention that Alexis givesonly the French translation, not theoriginal Spanish text (this is myEnglish version, but I acknowledgethe published version by Antonio T.de Nicolás).
On his unforeseen road to thatgrenadine kiss, El Caucho meets Ti-Djo, a kind of leech with a sympa-thetic side to his character (Espace225-226; Flicker 151-153). He offersa bottle of tranpe (known as“Peterplancher”), a cheap and populargrade of rum that is frequently fla-vored with fruit or herbs. Ti-Djo com-plains that the projected InternationalExposition being planned byPresident Estime (this is spring 1948)has not brought any work so far. Hesuggests that they should buy a littlesomething with which to enjoy thetranpe. El Caucho invites Ti-Djo toDelicia’s little sidewalk restaurant,advertised as “Chez Délicia, propretéet gastronomie” (Delicia’s Place,Cleanliness and Gastronomy).
Delicia’s menu continues the gus-tatory sensuality announced by theepigraph from Platero y yo:
“du riz au poulet qu’ensoleillentdes pois de souche dorés, du tassotde cabri à la sauce piquante, forcebananes-plantain et des bananesmûres frites à tire-larigot commedessert.”
(chicken and rice, decorated withgolden butter beans, goat jerky in
a spicy sauce, a lot of fried plan-tains, and fried ripe bananas in acream sauce for dessert).
Essentially, this is a Haitian menufor which Alexis has translated mostof the Kreyòl: diri ak poulè, pwasouch, taso (beef or goat jerky, butspecified as taso kabrit here), andbannann peze. More than once, I havehad to make confessions of errors ordoubtful expressions in publishedtranslations. The dessert here, “desbananes mûres frites à tire-larigotcomme dessert,” is translated as“fried ripe bananas in a cream saucefor dessert” (Flicker 152). From theSpanish translation “Como postre,plátano maduro en dulce...” (Abrir141), I took the logical (and evenprobable) idea of a cream sauce forthe bananas, but I was casuallyassuming that the term “à tire-lar-igot” was the French term for “creamsauce.” First-language speakers ofFrench will hasten to correct me: “àtire-larigot” is in the Petit Robert andmeans “en quantité,” essentially asynonym of “force” applied to thepreceding banana dish: “forcebananes-plantain et des bananesmûres frites à tire-larigot commedessert” (Espace 226). The larigotoriginally meant a type of flute...aword of unknown etymology. TheMexican translator Robert JorgeZalamea, presumably familiar withthe dessert, appears to have interpo-lated the idea of a cream sauce.
Simply on the basis of this briefpassage, focused on popular Haitiangastronomy, we can draw several ten-tative conclusions. Alexis had astrong tendency to creolize hisFrench (especially concerning drinks,food, animals, etc.), occasionallyretaining original Kreyòl words suchas taso (spelled tassot by Alexis—atthe date of publication, the spelling
was usually gallicized according tocommon practice). Particularly inthis novel, there is a justifiable focuson Spanish as spoken by Cubans, andon a more general Caribbean culture.The chicken and rice dish can serveas one example. This is a dish knownacross the Caribbean, with someregional variations: in Haiti, we havediri ak poulè; in Cuba and PuertoRico, it is pollo con arroz.
Another trait of Alexis’s novelisticdiscourse is to mix literary, scientific,or archaic terms into his French.Precise anatomical words known byDoctor Chalbert, who treats the pros-titutes and likes to spend his free timeplaying guitar in the bar, turn up inthe narration and the thoughts ofcharacters who do not have technicalor a high level of education. In thequoted episode between El Cauchoand Ti-Djo, the narrator notes that “lapiaule de Ti-Djo n’est pas trop loin...”(Espace 225): piaule is a popularword for “digs,” translated here as“Ti-Djo’s place” (Flicker 152). Thenarrator takes over toward the end ofthe episode, however:
“Aujourd’hui, El Caucho a toutfichu en l’air, il est peu loquace et‘descend’ les breuvages avec unecélérité telle que Ti-Djo a dû aller quérir d’autres bouteilles”(Espace 226).
(Today, he [El Caucho] has laideverything aside, he isn’t verytalkative, and he ‘downs’ theglassfuls at a pace that has sent Ti-Djo hunting for more bottles”).
We can note the popular expressions,such as “fichu en l’air” (a slightlybetter rendering would have been“thrown everything aside,” to suggestthe devil-take-the-hindmost attitudeof El Caucho) and “descend,” marked
Cultural Tensions in Multilingual Fiction: Examples from African and Caribbean Francophone Novels Continued
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 35
with quotes by Alexis. Juxtaposed inthe latter part of the same sentence,however, are the exressions “loquace”and “célérité.” Both of these are ofLatin origin and are less likely to befound in popular speech. The word“quérir” is an archaic word for“chercher” (to look for), which islikely used with a tinge of irony bythe narrator, and would logically notbe heard in El Caucho’s own speech.
The African Hunter’s DiscourseLike Alexis’s In the Flicker...,
Kourouma divides his novel into sixprincipal parts (with no Coda), termed“Veillées” in the original French text.These chapter headings presented animmediate problem for the Englishversion. A veillée is an evening (ornight) spent: in a meeting; in the com-pany of friends and neighbors duringthe winter (with local connotations forQuébécois); in card playing; or in aknightly vigil (all of these definitionsare from the Robert & Collins SuperSenior. Grand dictionnaire français-anglais/anglais-français (1996). It canalso mean a wake. None of thesevarious meanings for a wakefulevening have any relation to the“veillée” of the Mande hunters ofWest Africa. In consultation with anAfrican colleague (Traoré), who isalso an initiated hunter and has pub-lished a revealing thesis on the cul-ture and vision of the hunters, I tookthe Malinke term sumu (a ritualgathering) to designate the chapters,thus following the example ofKourouma’s text, which often retainswords from various African lan-guages in the novelistic discourse.
Due to space constraints, it is nec-essary to forego a survey of the var-ious African languages thatKourouma inscribes in this novel. Itmust be understood that the oral “cel-ebration” of Koyaga’s glory at the
ritual meeting of the hunters’ societyconstitutes the entire novel! Theritual is conducted by the sèrè (sorain Kourouma’s text) or hunter’s bard,Bingo, assisted by his répondeur orkoroduwa, Tiécoura, who plays theflute and the kora and engages indancing, obscene gesturing, andmaking irreverent faces at the huntersin attendance. The ritual narrative ofthe master hunter’s life is the donso-mana, the recital of hunting exploits.The sèrè has complete freedom inchanting the glories of the honoredhunter, as well as in telling the fulltruth of his foul deeds and treachery.The entire novel is presented withinthis ritual recital of the exploits ofKoyaga, master hunter and dictator-president of the Republic of the Gulf(a lightly disguised image of Togo).
The third “Sumu” is a lengthydigression from the celebration ofKoyaga’s career. It recounts the pica-resque adventures of his primaryadvisor, Macledio, an unprincipledskirt-chaser who, following “lin-guistic” research in France, wanderedacross West Africa in search of hishomme de destin (man of destiny;Bêtes 119). Macledio, the bearer ofan ill-fated norô, was born destinedto wander until he found the “man ofdestiny” who would deliver him fromhis unfortunate fate. By indirection,the apparent digression concerningMacledio’s norô and his tragicomicwanderings ultimately reflects on the“glories” of master hunter Koyaga’scareer. At the end of the novel,Koyaga has been chased from officein the disorder following a nationalconference. He has lost the two mys-tical symbols of his omnipotence, themeteorite and Qur’an given to him byhis sorceress mother. Smiling, heawaits the magic reappearance ofthese symbols and the restoration ofhis power.
The passage on which I want tofocus in order to give additionalinsight into Kourouma’s distortion ofthe French language recountsMacledio’s stay with a Bamileke kingin Cameroon. Macledio has been sentby a French entrepreneur to work onharvesting precious woods in thetropical forest of the Cameroon. HisBamileke “boy” (servant) sings thepraises of his king, “le père desorphelins” (the orphans’ father), withsuch enthusiasm that Maclediodecides that Chief Foundoing mustbe his “man of destiny,” and he setsoff to the great chief’s village.Having worked in Cameroon himself,Kourouma undoubtedly picked upsome conversational knowledge ofthe Bamileke language, but he usu-ally deforms the words (whetherthrough his own aural interpretationor deliberately, I can only surmise).In any case, it is clear that in hisFrench text he uses Bamileke wordsthat are not in Le Petit Robert. Theword for chief or king, as given in thetext, is fog. There are a number ofBamileke dialects, but my principalinformant, Ambroise Kom, suggestedfe’eh, which I substituted for fog inthe translation.
King Foundoing was the “solepossessor of 212 wives, 403 pigs, 64servants, a great palace, and morethan 60,000 subjects, of whom36,092 were female, over whom heheld seignorial rights” (Bêtes 127;Waiting 90–91). Through his “kindlydisposition” toward the king,Macledio endeavors to replace theking in some of his nightly duties. Hesoon fathers a child with Hélène, theyoungest and most beautiful of theking’s wives. However, Maclediofails to understand that he must ceasehis dutiful activities at the momentwhen the king’s favor lights oncemore on his young wife. As a ➡
The ATA Chronicle | February 200336
result, a village council decrees thatMacledio must die. Somebodyinforms Macledio of his doom and heslips out of the village the same night,taking with him a sack into which hehas unceremoniously dumped themost ancient skulls of the king’sancestors—objects of great reverencein Bamileke traditions.
At dawn, the king’s sicarii (aRoman term for hired killers) enterMacledio’s hut to find he has fledand subsequently discover the sacri-lege he has committed in the sanc-tuary of the ancestors. “Le fog et sonPremier ministre levèrent le tso, ladanse du chef et de la puissantesociété secrète du même nom. Lemaître du ké convoqua tous lesjeunes au bois sacré; les affiliés aulila se regroupèrent sur le plateauavec les armes pour la danse guer-rière; les membres du mwop se réu-nirent au marché et les adhérentes aumaso, la danse des femmes, s’at-troupèrent aux différentes portes dela ville. Tout le pays dansait et devaitdanser le deuil des crânes jusqu’à ceque les reliques revinssent dans lesanctuaire.” (The fe’eh and his primeminister initiated the tse’eh, whichwas both the name for the dance ofthe king and for a secret society. Themaster of the kèn called all the youngmen to the sacred wood. Those affil-iated with the lali gathered on theplateau with their arms for the wardance, the members of the mwuopgathered at the marketplace, and thewomen of the masoh trooped to thevarious gates of the city. The entirecountry danced and had to keepdancing in mourning for the skullsuntil the relics were returned to theirsanctuary: Bêtes 129; Waiting 92).Note that in this excerpt from oneparagraph, Kourouma incorporatessix Bamileke words when referringto the king and the rituals of
mourning provoked by Macledio’ssacrilege: he uses tso/tse’eh andmaso/masoh for the king’s dance andthe women’s dance. The lila/lali(warriors’ dance), the ké/kèn, and themwop/mwuop (other dances) remainunclarified. Apart from the ritual ter-minology, this passage is in interna-tionally comprehensible French, butthe reader is plunged by the narrator(the sèrè) into the consternation ofthe Bamileke discovery of the dese-crated sanctuary.
I would like to point out one othersystematic aspect of Kourouma’sFrench, which Makhily Gassama hascharacterized as the “translation” or“transposition” of African thought(97). At the beginning and end of eachSumu, the sèrè presents a series ofAfrican or hunters’ proverbs relating tothe general theme of the chapter. Asone example, the final proverb of thethird Sumu is as follows: “Quand unhomme la corde au cou passe près d’unhomme tué il change de démarche etrend grâce à Allah du sort que le Tout-Puissant lui a réservé” (When a manwith a rope about his neck passes closeto a dead man, he changes step andgives thanks to Allah for the fate thatthe Almighty has reserved for him:Bêtes 168; Waiting 120). This proverbdoes not contain one African word, andyet the sentence is cast completely inthe mode of proverbial thought: “unhomme la corde au cou” (a man with arope around his neck); “un hommetué” (a killed man) instead of “unmort” (a dead man); and, in particular,the apparent reverence toward Allah,the All-Powerful. The lesson lightlydisguises the irony: the man walkingtoward the gallows should thank Godthat he is not already dead.... This is thelast word in the Sumu of Macledio’spast, which has focused on man’sinability to escape his fate.
Closing ThoughtsLet me close with a few compara-
tive remarks about similarities anddifferences of style in the two novelswe have just examined. Alexis’s In theFlicker... is basically what I wouldterm a “proletarian” novel—a novelby a marxist Haitian writer with med-ical training who writes with thevision of a unified Caribbean on theeve of Fidel Castro’s takeover inCuba. The novel is never satirical,although there is a bit of gentle humorin the narrative observations ofHaitian traditions and individual char-acters. Alexis takes a serious view ofprostitution as an “industry” that iscarried on within the control of crim-inal enterprise and government collu-sion, but he views the prostitutes ashuman beings who, in their dailydegrading routine, consider becomingunionized like other “workers.”
Kourouma, on the other hand, haswritten a highly satirical novel that ini-tially focuses on the usurpation ofpower by the dictator-presidents ofWest African countries during theCold War. His specific focus is theregime of Gnassingbé Eyadema ofTogo, the only dictator to have seizedpower in the 1960s who has managedto survive popular revolts and remainin power to date. My sense is thatKourouma, who was raised in Muslimtraditions but no longer practicesactive religion, looks with gentlerirony on some of the traditions andreligions that he caricatures in thenovel, but without the same anger thathe directs at dictators who abusepower for personal glorification andprofit. Alexis often uses footnotes totranslate Spanish, Kreyòl, and Englishexpressions. Kourouma avoids foot-notes in favor of intratextual explana-tion, and frequently lets certain terms
Continued on p.39
Cultural Tensions in Multilingual Fiction: Examples from African and Caribbean Francophone Novels Continued
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 37
A re there two thousand, threethousand, or more? At anyrate, the number is exactly
equal to the number of languages thatI will never learn. A sad and humili-ating thing to admit for someonewho, since a boy, has felt a sort ofpassion for languages and who, stilltoday, every time he hears peoplespeaking an unfamiliar language inthe street, has feelings of envy.
When, for the first time in my life,I saw a really valuable piece of papercurrency—I might have been aboutseven—I probably wanted to have it,like everyone else. If I did, I have for-gotten about it. But I remember dis-tinctly the unquiet curiosity withwhich I set out to decipher the twowords—HUNDRED CROWNS—that the note boldly displayed in theeight languages of the now defunctAustro-Hungarian monarchy.
As an adolescent, I secretly nour-ished the hope of becoming themaster, as time went on, of the largestpossible number of languages: 20,30, perhaps even more. One of myteachers assured me that only the first15 were difficult. And in my ramblesthrough the used bookshops ofEurope, I would pick up every pecu-liar book in order to make use of itlater, in the leisure time that wouldcertainly come: a grammar of Ladinoor Rhaeto-Romance with a key topronunciation; Malagasy in 20Lessons; a book of readings for thesecond grade in the elementaryschools in La Valetta, Malta, withouta single vowel in the title; a manualof the Swedish language forItalians...a true bazaar of bizarre oldbooks which the booksellers hadwatched getting old on the last shelf,and were happy to give to me practi-cally for free.
But time went by, the leisure timenever came, my library was definitively
scattered in the assault on Budapest,and all those languages continueintact, unrevealed, making fun of me.Someone else has probably learnedMalagasy in 20 lessons. And I con-tent myself with dreaming of themarvelous opportunities I lost.
Perhaps in an Icelandic book Iwould have found the answers to myquestions. Maybe the poet who bestexpressed my angst did so inJapanese haiku. But we never were tomeet, as if they did not exist, or as ifI myself did exist.
What most torments me are thelanguages which I began to study andthen abandoned for lack of time, ofenthusiasm, of perseverance.
I am inconsolable for not havinglearned Hebrew, which they taughtme for several years. To read theprophets, the Song of Songs in theoriginal! But my teachers did nothave the least notion of pedagogy:they chopped the text up into littlepieces of four or five words and gavethe corresponding translation, liter-ally, stupidly. We memorized it andthen recited it, painfully sounding outthe original. However, this wasenough to inspire in the child an insu-perable aversion to those hieraticalcharacters, which in the beginninghad attracted him so.
Another language I lost, whenalready an adult, was Finnish. By
virtue of its pallid and distant connec-tion with Hungarian, a candidate forteaching Hungarian had to study it. Iwas one of those. Finnish grammartaught me a lot: for example, that mymother tongue had declensions withmore than a dozen cases, and that, upuntil that point, I had used them mar-velously well without even suspectingtheir existence. I envied the Finnishtheir possession of a verb of negation,which allowed them to negate in avague way without specifying whatwas being negated—an excellent verbfor ladies. And I felt sorry for them inthat it was precisely the letter F and itscorresponding sound that was lackingin their language. None of that, how-ever, was of interest to my examiner.He only wanted to know my knowl-edge of the development of the labio-dentals in Finnish, Estonian, Vogul,Ostiac, and Zurienian. I passed theexamination, but nevermore set footin the classroom of that famous lin-guist, who, in only 50 years, managedto sap the will of an entire country toget to know another one.
I had a similar experience withSanskrit, for which I could sense thebeginning of a passion. Unhappily formy master, the holy language of Indiahad no words: it was a collection ofpure radicals. The blackboard wasfilled with arrows, lines, and mathe-matical symbols which linked theSanskrit root to the Greek flower orthe Roman fruit which sprouted fromit. Only years later did I discover thatSanskrit also possessed completewords and even sentences; however,it was already too late.
A third professor, whom I onlysaw once, posted himself at the doorof Danish to bar me from entering. Itwas the first class of a course at theSorbonne. There were, in addition tome, another five students, all Swedes.The professor spent all of his
The Languages I Didn’t Learn
By Paulo Rónai, translated by Tom Moore
“…What most tormentsme are the languages
which I began to studyand then abandoned for
lack of time, ofenthusiasm, of
perseverance…”
➡
© By Cora Tausz Rónai and Laura Tausz RónaiRights granted by Solombra Books ([email protected])
The ATA Chronicle | February 200338
The Languages I Didn’t Learn Continued
time correcting their pronunciation,contaminated by Swedish influence.As my pronunciation had not beencontaminated by anything, I did notappear at the second class, nor at anyof the others.
More forgivable, I think, is myignorance of Etruscan, even thoughthere was a course in Etruscology atthe University of Perugia. To give usa taste of the discipline, the professortook us to see a famous Etruscantomb in the vicinity of the old city.But the Etruscans of the tomb weretoo dead, in contrast with a blondNorwegian student named Solveig. Igave up on Etruscan.
I let Turkish escape due to agrammar which had too few rules,fewer readings, and no conversationalexercises, but an enormous numberof proverbs. Some of them were evennice: “Death is a black camel, itkneels at every door.” I would havepreferred more practical lessons, andput the book down in spite of reallyenjoying the law of vocalic assimila-tion, which produced words of 10syllables with as many i’s and u’s.Perhaps things might have turned outdifferently if the book had containedat least one of those long stories toldentirely in gerund (“A hermit,passing through the forest, hearingthe song of a little bird, pausing anddelighting in the song...”), with asingle perfect preterite in the rapidand brutal conclusion (“wasdevoured by a tiger.”). But they onlytold me that later.
There were languages, there’s nopoint in denying it, which I failed tolearn through my own fault. It wasfrivolous, if not a crime, not to havestudied Chinese with my friend KanWoo in Paris, where he was, asstrange as it may seem, collectingmaterials for a study on Hungarian lit-erature. But certain of his confidences
frightened me. We lunched togetheralmost every day in the Chineserestaurant in Rue Victor Cousin, heusing chopsticks, I, through a specialdispensation from the waiter, withspoon and fork.
“How is the essay going, Mr. KanWoo?” I asked him one day.
“It is almost leady,” he answeredin his languid but correct language.“It just needs to be copied.”
The study had been completed intwo months. The copying had beendragging on for a year, and it still wasnot done. When I expressed my sur-prise, my friend explained that thehard thing was not to write the study,but rather to do the calligraphy.
“You know, I am tlying to intloducein the middle some vely complicatedchalacters that have not been used formore than a century. It is also notalways easy to find the third lhyme.And then there are the allitelations!”
I did not want to believe that asimple essay demanded rhyme, allit-eration, and such elaborate characters,but my friend assured me that this wasactually the case. And a year later themagazine Ki ta wen hio yen tsi k’ouanarrived from Shanghai—even today Ikeep it with special affection—inwhich Kan Woo showed me my namein Roman letters surrounded by themost peculiar hieroglyphs.
“It’s a dedication that I did foryou,” he said to me. “There are twovely lare letters.”
If only I had studied Sogdian. Inone of the thousands of “workcamps” invented by the Nazis, whereI spent five months, I came upon adear friend one day, a specialist oforiental languages who was alreadyfamous. We defended ourselvesagainst despair by reading during thehours when we were not being madeto tear down one house only to con-struct another identical to it five
meters away. My friend used to carrya Sogdian text in his pocket. It was, ifI recall, the holy language of ancientPersia, which was known, heexplained to me, by only about 10philologists in the entire world. And Icould be the 11th. But in the stablewhere we gathered to spend thenights, I had an astrologer as aneighbor. He predicted that I wouldescape from the camp, arrive in a dis-tant land, and begin an entirely newcareer. And, in this case, Sogdiancould be dispensed with. (Is the poorastrologer still alive? And my wisephilologist, who was so out of his ele-ment in that inhuman reality? Wouldhe have survived the concentrationcamp, the deportation, the killings?)
There were other languages withinmy reach that I could not touch, sincethey belonged exclusively to friends.To touch on Catalan would have beento enter the dominions of a goodfriend, who, years later, would teachHungarian (to whom?) at theUniversity of Barcelona. Anotheryoung man in my circle appropriatedJapanese. And most especially eachof the Finno-Ugric languages, poorrelations of Hungarian, had its ownmaster. A friend had annexedCheremissian, and no one could dis-lodge him. During the First WorldWar he had discovered, amongstthousands of Russian prisoners, anilliterate Cheremissian, and with theapproval of the authorities, tookresponsibility for him, squeezing outof his brain volumes of folk taleswhich appeared in an alphabet espe-cially invented for the purpose. (Oneof these stories appears in the firstvolume of the Sea of Stories.)Another acquaintance had shown me,among the family mementos, a thickmonograph by his father on Vogulpronouns. No one was to be pokingaround in those.
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 39
But what is the use of blamingmen, books, and circumstances?What there was to be learned waslearned. Twenty years ago, in passingby a used bookshop in Paris, I saw onthe street an enormous Portuguesedictionary for 10 francs. I was goingto buy it, but the person I was withdissuaded me:
“Come now! You will never need aPortuguese dictionary.”
But, coming back through thesame street, alone, two hours later, Icouldn’t resist temptation and went tolook for my dictionary. They had soldit, and I thought that my relationswith the last flower of Latium were atan end.
Perhaps it may even be for the bestthat so many languages remainedclosed to me, refusing to reveal theirmysteries. What a disappointment if Ihad discovered that Armenian wasalso rich in clichés and that the lan-guage of Hafiz was excellently suitedto the most depraved platitudes!
in African languages go unexplained. Iwould suggest that Alexis is moreinclined to write standard French lacedwith Kreyòl and Spanish, in particular,where they relate to Caribbean cultureor the actual speech and thought of hischaracters. Kourouma, on the otherhand, takes the French dictionary (lex-icon) and manufactures new meaningsor new idioms. He manages to turnFrench into African discourse, and hasbeen recognized for his idiosyncraticFrench since his first novel, Les soleilsdes indépendances (The Suns ofIndependence) was first published inMontréal in 1968 and in France in 1970.
References (with abbreviations)Alexis, Jacques Stephen. 1983
[1959]. L’espace d’un cillement(Espace). Paris: Gallimard.
———. 1969. En un abrir y cerrar deojos (Abrir). Versión castellana deJorge Zalamea. México: Edici-ones ERA.
———. 2002. In the Flicker of anEyelid (Flicker). Translated andwith an Afterword by Carrol F.Coates and Edwidge Danticat.Charlottesville: The University ofVirginia Press.
Gassama, Makhily. 1995. La langued’Ahmadou Kourouma ou lefrançais sous le soleil d’Afrique.Paris: ACCT/Karthala.
Jiménez, Juan Ramón. 1979 [1917].Platero y yo. Edición de MichaelP. Predmore. Segunda edición.Madrid: Ediciones Cátedra.
———. 2000 [1985]. Platero and I.Translated by Antonio T. DeNicolás. Lincoln: iUniverse.com,Inc. (to Excel).
Kourouma, Ahmadou. 1998. Enattendant le vote des bêtessauvages (Bêtes). Paris: Seuil.
———. 2001. Waiting for the Vote ofthe Wild Animals (Waiting).Translated and with an Afterwordby Carrol F. Coates. Charlottesville:The University of Virginia Press.
Traoré, Karim. 2000. Le jeu et lesérieux. Essai d’anthropologie lit-téraire sur la poésie épique des chas-seurs du Mandé (Afrique de l’Ouest).Köln: Rüdiger Köppe Verlag.
Cultural Tensions in Multilingual Fiction: Examples from African and CaribbeanFrancophone Novels Continued from p.36
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The ATA Chronicle | February 200340
T he Bible has been translatedinto more languages than anyother book in history. Bible
translation has been a central themeof Christianity ever since theChristian New Testament was com-pleted near the end of the 1st centuryA.D. As the Christian messagespread, it was soon translated intoAramaic, Coptic, Georgian, andLatin. Within a relatively short periodof time a variety of translationssprang up within Latin itself, andJerome, now honored as the patronsaint of translators, was asked to pro-vide an authorized translation in thevernacular Latin, the “Vulgate.” Astudy of Jerome’s work on theVulgate translation reveals a detailedand lively discussion on translationtheory between Jerome and therenowned scholar Augustine. Theirdisagreement serves as a precursor ofthe arguments that have continuedfrom the 4th century into the 21st.
The controversies surrounding thetranslation of the Bible (i.e., theJewish Bible, known as the OldTestament by the Christian Church,and the Christian New Testament)have continued throughout history,although much of the dialogue hasbeen lost. However, we can see theeffect this controversy had on individ-uals such as John Wycliffe andWilliam Tyndale, pioneers of EnglishBible translation who were persecutedand eventually murdered by those whoopposed their translation efforts.
From the days of Jerome to the eraof the Protestant Reformation, Bibletranslation took place at a steady butrelatively slow pace. This is under-standable, especially consideringtransportation and technological diffi-culties. In the early 1500s, the devel-opment of printing in the West and thediscovery and codification of Hebrewand Greek manuscripts, along with
the renewed interest in helping peopleread the Bible in their own language,caused a marked increase in the paceof Bible translation.
The era of Western explorationincreased the exposure of Christiansto the languages of the world, andhence the need for more translationefforts. From 1800-1900, over 500languages received portions of theBible for the first time.1
During the 20th century it finallybecame possible to reach most everyarea of the world. Linguists “discov-ered” that there are over 6,800 lan-guages in the world.2 First typewritersand then computers aided the Bibletranslation efforts of dozens of spe-cialized agencies (e.g., the Britishand Foreign Bible Society, TheInternational Bible Society, WycliffeBible Translators). As the work ofBible translation flourished, Dr.Eugene Nida3 developed and pro-moted a theory of translation that wastaught and practiced by hundreds ofBible translators around the world.Dr. Nida’s “dynamic equivalence”theory, which has also been taught byhis students, has shaped Bible trans-lation for the past 50 years.
At the end of the 20th century, thestatistics on Bible translation reflectenormous progress. The entire Biblehas been translated into over 350 lan-guages, and portions of the Bible areavailable in more than 2,200 languages.4
Recent English Translations or Revisions
Since 1900, there has been anaverage of one translation or revisionof the Bible or the New Testament inEnglish each year.5 The past 25 yearshave been no exception. See Table 1on page 41 for a list6 showing 27recent English translations (in alpha-betical order).
Controversy About Translation Theory
At the beginning of the 21st century,the controversy surrounding Bible trans-lation theory centers around the verynature of translation. One of the mostfamiliar definitions of translation comesfrom Nida’s 1969 book, The Theory andPractice of Translation: “reproducing inthe receptor language the closest naturalequivalent of the source language mes-sage, first in terms of meaning and sec-ondly in terms of style.”7 Nida’semphasis on meaning as opposed toform has been the accepted theory ofBible translation for several decades. Heand his disciples sought to convey themeaning of the original texts in clear andunderstandable target language forms.Making the meaning of the source textclear in the target language ofteninvolved linguistic and cultural adjust-ments. The end goal of translation wasto communicate the original message ina way that conveyed the same meaningas the source text, while at the same timeeliciting a similar response from thetarget language readers.
Nida’s dynamic equivalence theoryhas recently been attacked from anumber of sides as being too “free” andtoo interpretive. Linguists, translators,and even theologians with no transla-tion background have started discussingtranslation. One example of the recentdebates about translation theory is thecall for “transparent”8 translations.Proponents of “transparent” translation
Current Issues in English Bible Translation
By Peter J. Silzer
“…Since 1900, there hasbeen an average of one
translation or revision ofthe Bible or the New
Testament in English eachyear…”
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 41
urge efforts to retain the distinct cul-tural and lexical features of theHebrew and Greek texts and opposeNida’s adjustments. The OriginalBible Project is an example of thisapproach. Promotional materials statethat the OBPV: “is decidedly on the‘literal’ side of the spectrum, althoughthe concept of transparency betterconveys its theory and method…oneshould be able to ‘peer through’ theEnglish translation and…see, hear,and even feel the dynamics of the orig-inal text.” In a recent article inChristianity Today, Raymond C. vanLeeuwen says, “…for serious study,readers need a translation that is more
transparent to the ‘otherness’ ofScripture… even if that seems strangeand odd to readers at first glance.”
Advertisements for the EnglishStandard Version also reflect a moveaway from Nida’s dynamic equivalence:
“[The ESV] is an ‘essentially lit-eral’ translation…emphasizingword-for-word accuracy and lit-erary beauty.”
Likewise, the Third Millennium Bibleadvertisements declare:
“[The TMB] represents a return tothe use of traditional Biblical
English which has inspired anduplifted readers for centuries…Biblical English is distinctiveand can be recognized immedi-ately as the Word of God.”
There have also been translationsthat specifically attempt to “foreignize”the New Testament to show its originalJewish flavor.9 The Jewish NewTestament, translated by David Stern,renders John 1: 19-21 as follows:
“Here is Yochanan’s testimony:when the Judeans sent cohanimand L’viim from Yerushalayim toask him…‘Are you Eliyahu?’…(Yochanan 1: 19-21)
Willis Barnstone also prefersHebrew-sounding proper names in histranslation10:
“Yohanan the Dipper appeared inthe desert, preaching an immer-sion of repentance for the remis-sion of sin. The whole land ofYehuda and all the people ofYerushalayim came out to him andwere being immersed by him inthe Yarden river.” (Mark 1:4-5)
Nida’s dynamic equivalence transla-tion strategy is still followed by manyrecent translations, but there is amarked swing of the pendulum backtowards a more literal (or “trans-parent”) and “foreign” approach aswell. One of the primary areas of con-troversy about whether to reflect moreliterally the forms and flavor of thesource languages or to adapt to changesin English usage is the recent contro-versy over gender-specific language.
Controversy Over Gender LanguageA recent example of the contro-
versy over Bible translation is theheated debate in American ➡
Contemporary English Version (CEV) 1995 (NT)English Standard Version (ESV) 2001God’s Word (GW) 1995Holman Christian Study Bible 2000Inclusive New Testament 1996 (NT)International Children’s Version 1983-1986International Standard Version (ISV) 1998 (NT)Jewish New Testament 1989 (NT)McCord’s NT of the Everlasting Gospel 1989 (NT)The Message 1993 (NT)New American Standard (NASV) 1960-1995New American Version 1970-1991New Century Version (NCV) 1987-1991 (NT)New International Version (NIV) 1973-1984New International Reader’s Version (NIrV) 1994 (NT)New Jerusalem Bible 1985New King James Version (NKJV) 1979-1982New Life Bible 1969-1986New Living Translation (NLT) 1996New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) 1989Oxford’s Inclusive Language Version 1995 (NT and Psalms)Revised English Bible 1992Simple English Bible 1980Third Millennium Bible 1998Today’s NIV (TNIV) 2002 (NT)Twenty-First Century KJV 1992-1994World English Bible (WEB) 2000? (NT)
Table 1: Recent English Translations or Revisions
The ATA Chronicle | February 200342
Christian circles over the so-called“gender-inclusive,” “gender-neutral,”or “gender-accurate” translations ofthe Bible into English. This discussionhas taken place in the popularChristian press (e.g., ChristianityToday, World, Christian News,Touchstone), on Christian radio talkshows, in books, on websites, and inpublic forums. At times the languageof the debate has been heated andargumentative (e.g., “HereticalBibles,” “New NIV translation dese-crates God’s Holy Word,” “TNIVcritics blast Scripture ‘distortions’”),but the issue has brought translationtheory and practice out into thecommon arena and away from the lim-ited confines of academia.
At issue is whether English trans-lations, which must choose betweenmasculine and feminine pronouns(among other gender-related vocabu-lary), should follow the literal genderof the original Hebrew and Greektexts, which also have gender distinc-tions in pronouns and other grammat-ical forms. The discussion recentlybecame more active when the widelyaccepted New International Version(NIV) was augmented by the Today’sNIV (TNIV), in which male pronounsand male nouns in the original lan-guages were sometimes translatedwith a more neutral word (e.g.,“people” instead of “men”) or by aplural form (e.g., ‘they’ instead of‘he’). Although the controversy is pur-portedly about translation theory, itoften sounds as though it is about thewider cultural phenomenon of politi-cally correct speech. Opponents of theTNIV adjustments11 frequently accusethe translators of following a feministagenda. Proponents of the TNIV12
argue that gender bias in English hasbecome offensive to many people,and that they want to avoid givingoffense in the English translation.
The translation theory question inthis recent debate centers on whetherthe gender markers in Hebrew andGreek should be translated literallyinto English. Proponents of a “trans-parent” translation would urge thatthe male-dominant language of theancient texts should be retained toshow the culture of the times.Proponents of Nida’s dynamic equiv-alence and of indigenizing the trans-lation support adjustments in thisarea, as they do in other literal versusidiomatic questions.
ExamplesThe following two examples illus-
trate the ways male-specific languagehas been handled in several recentEnglish translations13, including theTNIV. The NIV retains much of theliteral gender references of the Greektext that had been common inEnglish translations until the 1970s,while the other versions illustratesome of the adjustments made to cur-rent English usage regarding genderinclusive language.
1 John 4:19-21NIV 19We love because he first loved
us. 20If anyone says, “I loveGod,” yet hates his brother, heis a liar. For anyone who doesnot love his brother, whom hehas seen, cannot love God,whom he has not seen. 21Andhe has given us this command:Whoever loves God must alsolove his brother.
NLT 19We love each other as a resultof his loving us first.20If someone says, “I loveGod,” but hates a Christianbrother or sister, that person isa liar; for if we don’t lovepeople we can see, how can welove God, whom we have not
seen? 21And God himself14 hascommanded that we must lovenot only him but our Christianbrothers and sisters, too.
TNIV 19We love because he first lovedus. 20If we say we love God yethate a fellow believer, we areliars. For if we do not love abrother or sister whom we haveseen, we cannot love God,whom we have not seen. 21Andhe has given us this command:Those who love God must alsolove one another.
James 1: 22-25NIV 22Do not merely listen to the
word, and so deceive your-selves. Do what it says.23Anyone who listens to theword but does not do what itsays is like a man who looks athis face in a mirror 24and, afterlooking at himself, goes awayand immediately forgets whathe looks like. 25But the manwho looks intently into the per-fect law that gives freedom,and continues to do this, notforgetting what he has heard,but doing it—he will beblessed in what he does.
NLT 22And remember, it is a mes-sage to obey, not just to listento. If you don’t obey, you areonly fooling yourself. 23For ifyou just listen and don’t obey,it is like looking at your face ina mirror but doing nothing toimprove your appearance.24You see yourself, walk away,and forget what you look like.25But if you keep lookingsteadily into God’s perfectlaw—the law that sets youfree—and if you do what itsays and don’t forget what you
Current Issues in English Bible Translation Continued
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 43
heard, then God will bless youfor doing it.
CEV 22Obey God’s message! Don’tfool yourselves by just listeningto it. 23If you hear the messageand don’t obey it, you are likepeople who stare at themselvesin a mirror 24and forget whatthey look like as soon as theyleave. 25But you must never stoplooking at the perfect law thatsets you free. God will blessyou in everything you do, if youlisten and obey, and don’t justhear and forget.
TNIV 22Do not merely listen to theword, and so deceive your-selves. Do what it says. 23
Those who listen to the wordbut do not do what it says arelike people who look at theirfaces in a mirror 24and, afterlooking at themselves, go awayand immediately forget whatthey look like. 25 But those wholook intently into the perfectlaw that gives freedom andcontinue in it—not forgettingwhat they have heard but doingit—they will be blessed inwhat they do.
ConclusionDespite the long history of Bible
translation and the thousands of lan-guages that have received portions ofthe Bible through translation, contro-versies about what is a good transla-tion still remain. These controversiescenter our attention on the nature oftranslation. I see at least two positiveresults of these recent discussions:
1. The purposes of translation arebeing debated in a variety of circles.
2. Translation theory is on the “frontburner” in Bible translation.
I suggest that translators should bemore active in the Bible translationdialogue and need to engage inresearch and discussion with thetheologians who are currentlydebating these issues.
Notes1. See Stine 1990 for an overview of
the history of Bible translation.
2. The Ethnologue, published bySIL Inc., is invaluable for statis-tics about the world’s living lan-guages. The data is also availableonline at www.ethnologue.com.
3. Nida began his work as a linguistwith SIL Inc., but soon special-ized in translation studies with theBible Society. His textbooks ontranslation are still used exten-sively around the world.
4. See www.biblesociety.org/index2.htm for the most recentstatistics.
5. I am indebted to Dr. GeorgeCowan, President Emeritus ofWycliffe Bible Translators, forthis information. Dr. Cowanmaintains a list of English transla-tions and frequently speaks onthis topic.
6. Primarily from Wegner (1999).
7. Nida and Taber (1969:12).
8. Those opposed to dynamic equiva-lence tend to avoid the word “literal.”
9. Jesus was Jewish, as were hisoriginal disciples who wrote thebulk of the New Testament.
10. Peter Monaghan reviews Barn-stone’s translation in the Chronicle
of Higher Education (May10, 2002edition).
11. Grudem, Poythress, and others.See articles and books in the ref-erences below.
12. Strauss, among others, includingspecialists in Bible translation,theologians, and linguists.
13. Data is given from the Contem-porary English Version (CEV),the New International Version(NIV), the New Living Trans-lation (TLT), and Today’s NewInternational Version (TNIV).
14. None of the translations cited haveadjusted the masculine forms usedin relationship to God. However,the Oxford Inclusive LanguageVersion (1995) and the InclusiveLanguage Version (1996) do makeadjustments to avoid attributingmasculine terms to God.
ReferencesBarnstone, Willis. 2002. The New
Covenant, Commonly Called theNew Testament: The Four Gospelsand Apocalypse. Riverhead Books/Penguin Putnam.
Bock, Darrell L. Winter 2002. “DoGender-Sensitive Translations DistortScripture? Not Necessarily.”www.bible.org.
Comfort, Philip W. 2002. EssentialGuide to Bible Versions. Wheaton,IL: Tyndale House Publishers.
Grudem, Wayne. 1997. What’s Wrongwith Gender-Neutral Bible Trans-lations? Libertyville, IL: Councilon Biblical Manhood andWomanhood.
➡
The ATA Chronicle | February 200344
Hutchens, S. M., et. al. April 2002.“Heretical Bibles.” Touchstone.
Jones, Peter. Fall 2002. “The TNIV:Gender Accurate or IdeologicallyEgalitarian.” Journal for BiblicalManhood and Womanhood. pp.15-20.
Leeuwen, Raymond C. van. October22, 2001. “We Really Do NeedAnother Bible Translation.”Christianity Today, pp. 28-35.
Metzger, Bruce M. 2001. The Bible inTranslation. Grand Rapids, MI:Baker Academic.
Monaghan, Peter. May 10, 2002.“Telling the Tale of Yeshua ofNatzeret.” Chronicle of HigherEducation.
Neff, David. October 7, 2002.“Meaning-Full Translations.” [Aninterview with Eugene A. Nida]Christianity Today, pp. 46-49.
Nida, Eugene A. and Charles Taber.1969. The Theory and Practice ofTranslation. Leiden: E. J. Brill.
Olasky, Susan. March 29, 1997.“Femme Fatale.” World 12:2.
Plowman, Edward E. February 23,2002. “Should We Trust IBS?”World 17:7.
Poythress, Vern. Fall 2002. “AvoidingGeneric ‘He’ in the TNIV.”Journal of Biblical Manhood andWomanhood, pp. 21-30.
Poythress, Vern S. and Wayne A.Grudem. 2000. The Gender-NeutralBible Controversy: Muting theMasculinity of God’s Words. Nash-ville, TN: Broadman and Holman.
Rhetts, Bill. March 2002. “New NIVTranslation Desecrates God’sHoly Word.” Southern CaliforniaChristian Times.
Rogerson, John, ed. 2001. TheOxford Illustrated History of theBible. Oxford: Oxford UniversityPress.
Stine, Philip C., ed. 1990. BibleTranslation and the Spread of theChurch: The Last 200 Years.Leiden: E. J. Brill.
Strauss, Mark L. 1998. DistortingScripture? The Challenge of BibleTranslation and Gender Accuracy.Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsityPress.
_____. April 2002. “Negative Reactionto TNIV is Unwarranted—AndUnfounded.” Southern CaliforniaChristian Times.
Thomas, Robert L. 2000. How toChoose a Bible Version. Ross-shire, Great Britain: ChristianFocus Publications.
Torade, Sam. July/August 2002. “TheAbolition of Man.” World, 42-44.
Veith, Gene Edward. February 23,2002 “Does It Mean What ItSays?” World 17:7.
Wegner, Paul D. 1999. The Journeyfrom Texts to Translations: TheOrigin and Development of theBible. Grand Rapids, MI: BakerAcademic.
Websiteshttp://thesumners.com/bible/
versions/index.html: The BibleShelf’s list of English transla-tions. Includes comments about
translation theory, translators,copyright dates, etc.
www.centuryone.org/translation.html:An explanation of “transparent”translation theory and of TheOriginal Bible Project.
www.gospelcom.net/ibs/bibles/compare.php: A site by the Inter-national Bible Society that allowscomparative searches in 11 Englishtranslations.
www.tmbible.com: The home site ofthe Third Millennium Bible.
www.tniv.info: The site of Today’sNew International Version.
www.wbt.org: The home site ofWycliffe Bible Translators.
www.geocities.com/bible_translation/:Wayne Leman’s extensive site onBible translation issues.
Current Issues in English Bible Translation Continued
ATA’s Customized Website Program
ATA and Two Radical Technologies(2RAD) have teamed up to provideATA members an opportunity tobuild their own customizedwebsites. Through 2RAD’s onlinecreation tools—RADTown—ATAmembers will be able to set uptheir own online presence. Theoffer includes obtaining a domainname and creating links to the ATAonline directories. For moreinformation, please contact 2RADat [email protected] or log onto www.atanet.org/radtown.
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 45
Behind the Scenes: “What is wrong with this picture?”
The Onionskin is a client education column launched by the ITI Bulletin (a publication of the U.K.’s Institute ofTranslation and Interpreting) in 1996. Comments and leads for future columns are very welcome; please include fullcontact details. Contact: [email protected] or fax +33 1 43 87 70 45.
The Onionskin By Chris Durban
T ranslators are hopelessly pedantic,complains one reader—chronicnigglers and nitpickers.
Others insist that attention todetail goes with the territory.Assuming linguists keep the big pic-ture squarely in view, they argue, it isprecisely this rigor that makes manytranslations a welcome improvementon the original.
Equally important, details canreveal where and how a translationcareered off track, thus pointing theway to solutions for shell-shockedtranslation buyers eager to get it rightthe next time around.
• Phonetic renderings of standardwords and phrases are often a signthat nonnative speakers withoutformal training in the target lan-guage have been lending a hand. Aboard in an Assisi parking lotwarns car owners to pay the priceor face “sunction[s] accordingwhat prescribed by traffic low,”while an Argentine retailer’s bilin-gual product descriptions list“raping paper” (papel paraenvolver). Clearly, (perceived)oral fluency is no guarantee ofskill in writing. And whileresorting to untrained in-housetalent may help keep costs downin the short term, it also setswould-be international players upfor unwelcome attention whenword gets out. Translation errorsare always funnier if it is not yourown budget and image that aregoing down the drain.
• The sheer loopiness of misappliedmachine translation is another tell-tale sign of process run amok, asoften reported in this column.Unfortunately, such mistakes tend
to be in a foreign language andthus go undetected until too late,unless the buyers seek feedbackfrom their target audience in goodtime.
Thus, in Portland, Oregon,regional transit authority Tri-Methad no idea that “transit tracker”had mutated into the approximateequivalent of “hunter chasingdown wild animals” in theRussian version of its website,nor that “detours and rider alerts”had become “a roundabout wayfor a vigilant horseback rider.” Inthe Chinese version, software con-verted the transit authority’s namefrom Tri-Met to “three meetings,”while in Vietnamese “lost andfound” became “lost and stolen.”
“We were very naive,” admittedKim Duncan, Tri-Met’s executivedirector of marketing, in the SeattleTimes [July 16, 2002: “LanguageGets Maimed in Oregon TransitTranslation”]. “This past winter,we found an automatic onlinetranslation service that we thoughtwe could just run our websitethrough. It was inexpensive. Lifewould be golden.”
Fortunately, Tri-Met submittedthe texts to native speakers ofthese foreign languages before thesite went live, and at their urging,hired a professional translationcompany to do the job right.
• Work by students or other unqual-ified suppliers is also easily recog-nizable (although the lineseparating earnest student effortsfrom the output of low-end profes-sional translators is sometimesunclear). Key warning signs:phrasing and syntax that cry outtheir foreign origins, even if
spelling passes muster. In mostcases, an overly timid or inexperi-enced translator has failed to takecontrol of the text. Some fledglingtranslators may be unwilling (orunable) to identify the purpose ofthe translated document, and maybe unaware of the need to workclosely with the client.
An example flagged by anOnionskin reader is displayed atwww.tirebouchon-sable.com, a sitetouting “A new patented kinematicprinciple to make you love sharingyour best bottles a little more.”
Or, as inventor JacquesLefebvre explained when wecalled, an innovative corkscrew.
“Used for what it is meant, thiscorkscrew will serve you a veryvery long time,” the text lurcheson, noting that the device makes awonderful present for “relativeswho are always fighting and mud-dling to uncork bottles of wine.”
Mr. Lefebvre recruited hisnative English-speaking studenttranslator in the suburbs of Paris,on the campus of NanterreUniversity. The young man haslong since returned home (with afew of those handy tools inremembrance of his stay abroad,one hopes). Foreign sales are slug-gish, laments Mr. Lefebvre.
The Onionskin agrees with thepedants that language mishaps canbe offensive, even dangerous. Butmany more are amusing. Better yet,they are thought provoking, sincemangled vocabulary and phrasingcan lead even monolingual readers toreflect on how language works. And,with time, on the importance of get-ting both the big picture and thedetails right. ➡
The ATA Chronicle | February 200346
Hot Pulse“Eerily prescient” is how Susan
Adams describes the adventure sto-ries of Jules Vernes in Forbes maga-zine. Born in 1828, the French authorwas fascinated by technology and inhis books described airplanes, gas-powered cars, an elevated masstransit system, movies, guided mis-siles, submarines, the electric chair,air conditioning, and the faxmachine—all well before their time.
In the original French, Vernesmade a point of including technicalexplanations of how his inventionsworked. English publishers tended toaxe these sections, says Adams, buteven worse than the dumbing downwas the “atrociously sloppy” qualityof many early translations: “In the1872 English version of 20,000Leagues (regrettably still in print),Canadian harpooner Ned Land lightsa fire with ‘a lentil.’ The originalFrench reads lentille, meaning eitherlentil or (more likely) ‘lens.’”
Czeching In“For the Czech Republic, EU mem-
bership will mean increased cross-border business and culturalexchanges,” notes Amalaine Diabova,president of the Czech and Slovaktranslators’ association JTP. Like manyCzechs, Diabova welcomed Ireland’srecent “yes” vote to the EuropeanUnion’s Nice Treaty and the comple-tion of negotiations that open the wayto enlargement of the EU to the east.
“Contacts always go moresmoothly when each side speaks theother’s language,” she says, “which is
where translators come in.”Putting its money where its month
is, JTP teamed up with the U.K.’sInstitute of Translation andInterpreting (ITI) to launch a Czechversion of Translation, Getting itRight, on January 14. The brochure isa short guide to commissioning andpurchasing translations.
“Translators and interpreters havea vested interest in ensuring that allparties involved in cross-border tradeuse their services to best advantage,”says Alan Wheatley, general secre-tary of ITI. “For the ITI, this guide isa means of doing just that in theCzech Republic.”
The brochure was first publishedin English in 2000 (The Onionskinadmits to a personal interest). In2001, it was adapted into French inan edition co-produced with theFrench translators’ association SFT,and in December 2002, ATA mem-bers were asked to provide feedbackfor a U.S. English version.
The Czech and U.K. English andFrench editions can be downloadedfree of charge from www.iti.org.uk andwww.jtpunion.org. Paper copies areavailable free on request from both JTPand ITI. Sponsors are currently beingsought for additional foreign-languageeditions, starting with German, Dutch,Russian, Spanish, and Slovak([email protected]).
With thanks to Bob Blake, Jane Coulter, NeilInglis, Otto Pacholik, Elke Ronan, andHector Schoo.
The Onionskin Continued
For complete membership information: visit atanet.org
ATA’s44th AnnualConference
Phoenix, Arizona
November 5-8, 2003
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The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 47
Elsevier’s Dictionary of Civil Aviation English→Russian, Russian→EnglishAuthors:S. Beck, S. AslezovaPublisher:Elsevier: Amsterdam, Boston, London,New York, Oxford, Paris, San Diego, SanFrancisco, Singapore, Sydney, Tokyo©2002 Elsevier Science B.V.ISBN:0-444-50883-XPrice:$175; EUR 175Available from:Elsevier Science Inc.P.O.Box 945Madison Square StationNew York, NY 10159-0945 (www.elsevier.com)
Reviewed by:Dr. Vadim Khazin
Type of Work:Specialized dictionary whose scopeembraces various areas directly orindirectly related to civil aviation.Volume:Two parts (737 pages in a single vol-ume, approximately 19,000 terms inthe English→Russian part and 21,000in the Russian→English part)Typographic Quality andArrangement:As usual with Elsevier dictionaries: hard-bound, excellent paper, two columns perpage. Bold typeface for the entries andregular type for the translations.Grammatical Information andPronunciation: None. Appendices:NoneEvaluation:
The first curious thing about thisdictionary is the curtain of secrecy
about its authors: only the cities andcountries are given (Ramsgate, Kent,United Kingdom for S. Beck, and St.Petersburg, Russia for S. Aslezova).In the preface signed by S. Beck, he(or she?) mentions in addition that S.Aslezova is (or was, since it is notclear) his (her?) grandmother, whohad started working on this dictionaryback in the 1960s (!). What a uniquecombination of authors, and what aprolonged duration of work!
The scope of the dictionary isdefined in the following manner:“…terms and expressions relating toair traffic control, air navigation,flight operations, aviation meteor-ology, radio communications, airtransport, economics of civil aviation,airports, aerodynamics, and aviationengines.” Indeed, all these areas, andsome additional ones, are coveredhere, and quite professionally, I mustsay. Some aviation-related abbrevia-tions can also be found in alphabet-ical order with the terms in both partsof the dictionary.
To make a judgment about anymissing terms, I chose some terms ofcommon knowledge, and also com-pared the English→Russian part ofthis dictionary with the correspon-ding sections of The Oxford-DudenPictorial English Dictionary (OxfordUniversity Press 1996), and theRussian→English part of this dic-tionary with the Pyccкo-ayrлuqcкuqaвuawuoyyo-кocмuчecкuq cловapь(F.V.Vehfirtdbx> Vjcrdf> Djtyyjtbplfntkmcndj 1989). Of course, thiscomparison was far from thorough,so the selection of missing terms israther arbitrary. Here are some ofthem: chopper; crescent wing; cruci-form tail; zap flap; fan-jet turbine;droop nose; air bridge; border control(although customs control is there);
metal detector; overhead (luggage)compartment; nponeллep, бaгa;yaяmeлe;кa, зaxвam caмoлёma. Mygeneral impression is that the authors,when compiling this dictionary, caredmostly about the terms used by pilotsor aviation engineers, and not thoseused by airplane passengers or airportpersonnel dealing with them, espe-cially in view of safety concerns.
“Filler” words, unfortunately, arequite numerous, appearing, I wouldsay, on every other page. Examples:phase, pay roll (should be one word),star, telephone, employee, half, inter-national, мeyяmь, pyкa, nocmynoк,кpyг. And even among them I foundsome inexplicable errors. Forinstance, while мeлкuq is translatedcorrectly as fine, its opposite(кpynyыq) is translated as heavy. Or,кpymoq is translated as tight, anduзъяmue as off (?).
One uncommon feature of this dic-tionary is that there are no subentries,only entries themselves. As a result,there are, for instance, 108 (!) entriesstarting with ynpaвлeyue and 106entries starting with cкopocmь. Sosuch terms as pyлeвoe ynpaвлeyue oraвmoмamuчecкoe ynpaвлeyue mustbe searched under the correspondingadjective, not under ynpaвлeyue. Andsome of the entries may comprise ratherlong phrases, e.g., cкopocmь в yaбopeвыcomы no мapшрymy co вceмupaбomaющuмu двuгameлямu oraэponopm, чepeз кomopыq ocyщec-mвляemcя вoздyшyoe cooбщeyuec зapyбe;yымu cmpayaмu.
Another, quite innovative in myopinion, feature of this dictionary is anabundance of entries that are preposi-tional phrases, especially in theRussian→English part. For example,there are 70 entries starting with thepreposition c (c зaлumымu
Silversteyn is chair of the ATA Dictionary Review Committee.
Dictionary Reviews Compiled by Boris Silversteyn
➡
The ATA Chronicle | February 200348
Dictionary Reviews Continued
бaкaмu, c peaкmuвyым npu-вoдoм, c noдвempeyyoq cmopoyы,and so on), and 25 entries starting withthe preposition в (в aвmoyoмyoмpe;uмe, в зoye дeqcmвuя лyчa,etc.). In the English→Russian part thereare many fewer such entries, whichmay be one of the reasons why there isa 2,000-term discrepancy between thenumber of entries in the two parts.
To conclude, this dictionary, beingthe first of its kind, would be a valuabletool for both English→Russian andRussian→English translators who dealwith texts in various areas of aviation,and I recommend it to everybody anti-cipating one or more jobs in this field.
Elsevier’s Russian→EnglishDictionarySecond, Revised Edition Author:Paul MacuraPublisher:Elsevier: Amsterdam, Lausanne, NewYork, Shannon, Singapore, Tokyo©1999 Elsevier Science B.V.ISBN:0-444-82483-9Price:$403Available from:Elsevier Science Inc.P.O. Box 945Madison Square GardenNew York, NY 10160-0757(www.elsevier.com)
Reviewed by:Dr. Vadim Khazin
Type of Work:General dictionary with an extended scope.Volume:Four volumes (3,630 pages altogether,with about 280,000 terms)
Typographic Quality andArrangement:
Hardbound, good paper, twocolumns per page; bold typeface for theRussian entries and subentries, and reg-ular type for the English translations.Grammatical Information andPronunciation (for the Russian only):
Parts of speech are indicated. Forthe nouns, singular genitive endingsare given, along with some other end-ings in singular and plural if deemednecessary. For the adjectives, shortpredicative forms and feminine end-ings are given, as well as some non-trivial forms. For the verbs, basicconjugational endings (first andsecond person singular) are given inpresent, and sometimes in past and/orfuture, tenses, as well as in impera-tive; aspects (perfective or imperfec-tive) are indicated. Separate entriesare given for participles (present andpast) and for adverbial participles(past only). Stresses (and shifts ofstress when changing the grammat-ical form) are given for all Russianwords, but the one-syllable ones.Appendices:None
This dictionary’s volume is enor-mous: just to compare, the classical four-volume Ushakov’s Toлкoвыqcлoвapь pyccкoгo языкa comprises“only” about 90,000 words, and thelatest (2001) <oльшoq opaoгpa-auчecкuq cлoвapь pyccкoгo языкahas “just” 106,000 entries. I can imaginethat the author gathered all the wordsand terms available in numerousRussian→English and monolingualRussian dictionaries, encyclopedias,and reference books, both general andspecial (he mentions just a couple ofdozen, but my impression is there weremany more), and incorporated them
here.As a result, there are abundant
entries that you would probably neverencounter in your entire life as atranslator: special terms like гucme-pocaльnuyгогрaauя or puккem-cuocmamuчecкuq; obsolete wordslike вmopa or кopmoмa, and bizarreforms of adverbial participles likeдomoлoкшu or oбмёpзшu.
Not that I see this as a short-coming. I can only admire the incred-ibly hard work the author has done,and I see it as a certain advantage thathis dictionary may serve as the onlysource for translations in multipleareas. Especially in botany and elec-trotechnology—the two areas inwhich Paul Macura had previouslycompiled separate Russian→Englishdictionaries. I can only wonder wherehe acquired the knowledge ofnumerous Russian slang and vulgarterms, since he cites no relevant refer-ences. But you can find the wholebunch of the so-called “four-letterwords” and their derivatives (only inRussian they may be three- or five-letter words).
To review the whole dictionarywould require years. I obviously spentmuch less time on it, and my impres-sion from what I managed to analyzeis that most of the translations are cor-rect. I found some inexplicable mis-takes, though. For example, one entryis: gthtrhfotybt—desition. Here,both words were unknown not only tome but to the dictionaries I possess.Curiously, when I searched for thesewords in Yandex, I found both ofthem…but only as misspelledghtrhfotybt and decision.
Many entries for widely usedwords are illustrated with examplesof usage. This is a great advantage;however, some of these phrases have
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 49
omissions or misspellings. For example, in the entrygjkj;tybt, there is a phrase, “tuj gjkj;tybt,tpyfl=;ysv,” where either the latter word shouldbe “,tpyfl=;yj” or the verb “zdkztncz” should pre-cede it. In the entry lfnmcz, the word “obsession” ismisspelled twice, with “c” inserted between the “s”and “e.” Some other typos are: “if he had know”(not “known”) in the entry ,s; gthghzub instead ofgthtghzub; the wrong stress in the second meaningof the word celyj (bedpan), which differs from thestress in its first meaning (vessel).
Regrettably, not many of the changes thatoccurred in Russia and around it in the 1990s havebeen incorporated. This is particularly evident forthe adjectives derived from the names of geograph-ical places. Such terms, abundant in the dictionary,were probably taken from the respective 1986 glos-sary the author mentions in the preface, without fur-ther attention to the changes in the names.Otherwise, there would have been no such com-ments, as in the entry jhl;jyblptdcrbq: of Ordzho-nikidze (formerly Vladikavkaz…), while this citywas again renamed Vladikavkaz after the breakup ofthe USSR in 1991. The same goes for the entryaheyptycrbq (Aheypt is now <birtr) and anumber of others.
To conclude, the dictionary would be a valuable(in all meanings of this word) asset for Russian→English translators, and its author deserves muchappreciation for his tremendous job. I wish inanother 10 years we could see its third edition,with another 40,000 words added (such was theaddition he made to the first edition published in1990).
Vadim Khazin, Ph.D., works at the International Center forEnvironmental Resources and Development at the CityUniversity of New York, and as a freelance translator/editor/interpreter for various agencies, mostly in English,Russian, and Ukrainian. He has published a number oftranslations of novels and other fiction writing, as well as atrilingual dictionary, in the former Soviet Union. He is ATA-accredited (English→Russian). Contact: [email protected].
The ATA Chronicle | February 200350
Address your queries and responses to The Translation Inquirer, 112 Ardmoor Avenue, Danville, Pennsylvania17821, or fax them to (570) 275-1477. E-mail address: [email protected]. Please make your submissions by the25th of each month to be included in the next issue. Generous assistance from Per Dohler, proofreader, isgratefully acknowledged.
The Translation Inquirer By John Decker
W hat was it that Putin said,Grieved, of course, byhostaged dead,
Well aware that he got flakFor his s.w.a.t. team’s gas attack?Here is what Vladimir said,Mis-translated, thus unread:
“If you wish to become a committedIslamic radical, and are ready toundergo circumcision, then I inviteyou to come to Moscow. Ours is amulti-faith county. We have wonder-ful specialists in this field. I will rec-ommend that they do the operation insuch a way that after it, nothing growsout again.” (Tckb ds ;tkftnt cnfnmpfrjyxtyysv bckfvcrbv hflvrfkjvb ,eltnt ujnjds gjldthuyenmczj,htpfyb/> nj z ghbukfif/ dfc dVjcrde. E yfc—vyjujrjyatccb-jyfkmyfz cnhfyf. E yfc ghtrhfcystcgtwbfkbcns d 'njq j,kfcnb. Zgjhtrjvtyle/> xnj,s jyb ghjdtkbjgthfwb/ nfrbv j,hfpjv> xnj,sgjckt ytt e;t ybxtuj yt dshjckj).
Some translating PC-headTweaked on purpose what P. said,Thus “castrating” quite plain prose,Which, for truth’s sake, we disclose.
[Abbreviations used with this column:A–Arabic; D–Dutch; E–English;F–French; flak = from Fliegerabwehr-kanonen = anti-aircraft guns; [here:]criticism, opposition; G–German;I–Italian; Mc–Macedonian; P.–Putin;PC–political correctness; Po–Polish;Pt–Portuguese; R–Russian; Sp–Spanish;Sw–Swedish; s.w.a.t.–special weaponsand tactics.]
New Queries(E-A 2-03/1) The question arose
for a ProZ user as to what a kill feeor rejection fee is in Arabic. Is it partial compensation given to a
writer for work not used by the pub-lisher, or for an assignment terminat-ed before completion?
(E-F 2-03/2) A ProZ correspon-dent asked about good French forsnap-ring pliers (closing type).Anyone out there dripping with hard-ware knowledge who can try this?
(E-F 2-03/3) Nothing better at sub-mission time other than an Anglicismhad been proposed for reporting struc-ture for this sentence, on its way toFrench: Those people who design thework itself, not just the technology,make up a very typical reporting struc-ture of small work groups reporting toa central manager. To the TranslationInquirer, it sounds like a military-stylehierarchical structure. In any case,what would be good French for it, andnot a cop-out Anglicism?
(F-E 2-03/4) From a Lantra-L mem-ber comes a query from a piece of fic-tion in which a man is described usinglanguage that might point either towardhis being gay, or quite the opposite, to amilitantly macho type. See how youread it: “un homme à hommes…l’un deceux qui aiment par-dessus tout setenir…. En compagnie d’autreshommes.” Or might the author deliber-ately wish to play on the ambiguity ofit, as fiction writers do at times?
(F-E 2-03/5) Here is a title andsubtitle of an article, a particularlyawkward place to perform translationpyrotechnics because it leaves noroom for explanation. The title, asfound by a Lantra-L questioner, reads“L’EXPERTISE, LA SCIENCE ETL’INCERTITUDE: l’expertise scien-tifique ou la langue d’Esope.” TheAesop’s tongue being referred to evi-dently does not correspond to anycatchy English phrase. And whatexactly does it mean anyway?
(G-Po 2-03/6) With this much of asentence for context: “Während des
Schweißens und Erkaltens derSchweißnaht (Blauwärme) sindErschütterungen und Schwingungender geschweißten Teile zu vermeiden.”Can a good Polish (or even English)equivalent for the word in bold printbe found to help a member of ProZ?
(I-F 2-03/7) Here is some contrac-tual boilerplate, trying to make itsway with the help of a translator mid-wife, from Italian to French. The trou-blesome three words in the followingquote are “eccezioni di sorta:” “Tuttigli elaborati prodotti da Contraenterimarranno di esclusiva proprietadella F. che potra liberamente dis-porne senza che da parte delContraente possano essere sollevanteeccezioni di sorta.” What is it, asks aProZ correspondent?
(R-E 2-03/8) While fighting hisway through a list of specifications forrepairs required on a damaged air-craft, a ProZ member got stumpedwith the following. And presumablyboth clear text and abbreviationsmade life difficult: Ecnhfytybtyjdht;ltybq ecnfyjdjxys[ 'ktv-tynjd RD h#cn ≤Zlhj-Y:≥. Whatkind of damaged parts are beingrepaired here?
(Sp-D 2-03/9) Okay, go by way ofEnglish first if need be for this one. Ina document related to law and patents,a ProZer had trouble with “recurso desuplicación.” With only that much togo on, and with no indication ofwhich country the document origi-nated in, can this puzzle be solved?
(Sw-E 2-03/10) Does acidic hearthor acid oven come fairly close toexpressing the meaning of “surugn” inthe following quotation regarding 19th-century ore-processing technology?Barry Creveling presents this sentence:“Sedan smältes den rostade malmen ien surugn som hade 4 formor och enblåsmaskin.” What is it?
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 51
Replies to Old Queries(D-E 11-02/1) (“natiebedrijven”):
Eric Douma has looked at the overallcontext of the query, as found on page65 of the November-December issue,and has come to the conclusion that thebest translation is public-service cor-poration or quasi-public corporation.The term refers to corporations whoseoperations serve and contribute to pub-lic comfort, convenience, or welfare.He would stay away from public cor-poration or government corporation.These terms imply bodies created forpolitical and governmental purposes,such as townships and school districts.
(E-Sp 10-02/5) (set the table):David Russi is puzzled by the objec-tion to “poner la mesa,” since it isclearly enough defined in theDiccionario de la Real Academia as“cubrir [la mesa] con los manteles,poninendo sobre ellos los cubiertos ydemás utensilios necesarios paracomer.” The reverse process is“quitar” or “levanter la mesa.”
When Rudi Theis’s wife asks him,“¿Pusiste la mesa?” she does notmean whether he put the table in aspecific place. Rather, she means, Didyou put the plates, glasses, silver-ware, etc., in their proper places onthe table?
Eugene Wirkus, having lived inMexico, states that Spanish-speakingrestaurant professionals, both in theU.S. and Mexico, use “montar lamesa,” and he regards that as the cor-rect term.
If Maria Barros had to translate putthe table into Spanish, she wouldnever use “poner” but might go with“colocar la mesa.” In other respects,she agrees with the definition sup-plied above by David Russi.
Maritza Ascencios states that“poner la mesa” must be seen as a
whole, and not understood literally asviewed word-for-word. Therefore, noreason whatever exists, she says, toundervalue Spanish by stating that itlacks an equivalent for set the table. Inneither language is the expression tobe examined for its meaning by tryingto understand the separate words of it.In essence, Perla Morley agrees.
(F-E 11-02/6) (“La société pro-duit, distribue et exploite les films”):As for the third, bold-print verb, EricDouma does not believe that it repre-sents one verb too many at all.Logically translated as exploitation, itmost likely refers to the commercialexploitation of the intellectual prop-erty rights held on the films that theorganization produces and distributes.Such can include licensing of thecopyrights, trademark rights, andother related rights for them. Ericshould know: he has a master’s degreein international property law.
G-E 11-02/7) (“Leitendzeit”): Thisis the on time, or maybe the con-ducting time, in devices which controlpower by conducting only through acertain (variable) fraction of eachcycle in the device’s operation, saysDenzel Dyer. He cautions that this isout of his field, and there may bebetter terms for it.
(G-E 11-02/9) (“Jetzt-erst-recht-Stimmung”): Allan Wier believes it tobe a mood of now, more than ever.Kriemhilde Livingston says that thephase generally is translated as all themore or more than ever. Here is herattempt at the overall sentence, quotedon page 65 of the November-December 2002 Chronicle: Yes,instead of sadness, an almost defiantnow-more-than-ever mood determinedthe atmosphere.
Taking a different approach, EricDouma points out that this expression
occurs frequently in German textsdescribing situations in which oneparty has made another party lookbad, or treated that party unjustly orunfairly, without sound reason. Thevictimized party and its followersmay then adopt a “Jetzt-erst-recht-Stimmung.” In essence, this meansthat it will seek requital or vindica-tion. Therefore, requital first moodwould be a good translation.
Chris Hollingsworth is aware ofthe overall context of the query, whichis a business aviation convention.When you do something “erst recht,”you do it in spite of what was said ordone to you before, maybe in a disci-plinary manner or by way of punish-ment. The emotional world of chil-dren is evoked by the phrase, alongwith a related one, “und dennoch…”(in spite of…), which applies to kidswho defy authority or common sense.She believes the closest one-wordtranslation of the problem wordswould be defiance.
(Mc-E 11-02/10) (“vo vrska soVasheto baranje”): With kind assis-tance from an administrator at theMacedonian embassy in Washington,Marijan Boskovic discovered theproblem phrase, part of a longer quotefound on page 65 of the November-December Chronicle, to mean simplyin connection with your request...“Vrska” means connection, tie, link,ribbon, liaison. Evidently, the originaltranslator’s problem lay in the rela-tionship between the words in thesource language.
Can you identify the 19th-centuryAmerican writer who is being imitatedin the 10 lines of verse at the head ofthis column, even down to the point of
Continued on p.52
The ATA Chronicle | February 200352
A s government officials in theU.S. continue to happilymangle the English language
without any guidance, the Chinese,like the French, seem to believe thatthey can impose linguistic standardsfrom the top. According to anAssociated Press account of an articlein the state-sponsored China Daily,sent to me by Hector Legrand, offi-cials in China have launched a cam-paign to correct the English used inBeijing on tourist signs and menus,and by taxi drivers and policemen.The campaign is meant to accommo-date the tourist trade in general and
the 2008 Olympics in particular.If the government has its way,
“Chinglish” expressions such as“fried pawns,” “bean eurd,” “col-lecting money toilet,” and “to takenotice of safe, the slippery are verycrafty” will be a thing of the past. Thelast, by the way, is supposed to indi-cate “slippery roads.” Students at elitePeking University are being enlistedto find and fix improper English onpublic signs. The goal, according toone city official, is “linguistic perfec-tion.” I wish them luck.
Another item regarding signs comesfrom Walter F. Stewart. Here the sign
in question is in Japanese, to accom-modate Japanese visitors to the UnitedStates. A Japanese-speaking conciergewanted a suitable sign for his work-space, and Stewart’s organization pro-vided a transliteration in kana. Theconcierge objected, demanding insteada translated sign that said “sekkyaku”(“guest reception”) in Kanji, not real-izing that this is identical to theChinese euphemism for “pimp.” Whenthis was pointed out, the conciergeaccepted the first sign. For some of thehotels I’ve been forced to stay in, thesecond sign would be more accurate.
Herman is a librettist and translator. Submit items for future columns via e-mail to [email protected] or viasnail mail to Mark Herman, 5748 W Brooks Rd., Shepherd, MI 48883-9202. Discussions of the translation of humorand examples thereof are preferred, but humorous anecdotes about translators, translations, and mistranslationsare also welcome. Include copyright information and permission if relevant.
Humor and Translation By Mark Herman
Proper English and Improper Chinese
Proposed ATA Middle Eastern Languages Division
During ATA’s 43rd Annual Conference in Atlanta, a group of attendees met to discuss the establishment
of a new ATA division, the Middle Eastern Languages Division (MELD). As its acronym suggests, MELD
will be designed to serve as a nonpolitical forum that welcomes participation from all translators and
interpreters working in the languages of this region. For more information or to volunteer with this effort,
please contact Haleh Vakhshori, MELD coordinator, at [email protected].
This is an exciting opportunity for you to share your knowledge and experience
with appreciative colleagues. For more information, contact:
Virginia Perez-Santalla ([email protected]).
ATA’s Spanish Language Division 2nd Annual ConferenceSt. Anthony Hotel • San Antonio, Texas
April 25-27, 2003using the same meter and rhymes? Andwhat is the name of the poem, the firstsix and last four lines of which suppliedthe style? Hint: his greatest fame camefrom work done west of the Mississippi.
The Translation Inquirer Continued from p. 51
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 53
ATA Accreditation Exam Information
Upcoming Exams
CaliforniaApril 26 2003San FranciscoRegistration Deadline:April 11, 2003
July 12, 2003GardenaRegistration Deadline:June 27, 2003
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MassachusettsMay 4, 2003Somerville, MARegistration Deadline:April 18, 2003
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GermanyMay 24, 2003RegensburgRegistration Deadline:May 9, 2003
VenezuelaMarch 29, 2003CaracasRegistration Deadline:March 14, 2003
Congratulations
Dutch into EnglishSijbout A. ColenbranderEdinburgh, U.K.
David A. McKayRyswyk, The Netherlands
Spanish into EnglishKimberley StevensBrighton, MA
English into DutchMarcel van De VorleDeventer, The Netherlands
English into GermanAnke Heckhoff-WedulDenver, CO
Andrea V. ZüchnerSeattle, WA
English into HungarianKornelia DeKorneEl Rito, NM
English into ItalianNovella BonaffiniNew York, NY
Lia D’AntonioGiulianova Lido, Italy
Liza DianaCaselle Landi, Italy
Angela Di Chiara HardinSpokane, WA
Tiziana GhidinelliCarobbio delle Angeli, Italy
Barbara LassarndroRome, Italy
Francesca MarcheiAscoli Piceno, Italy
Giovanna MassariRodengo Saiano, Italy
Alice PandolfiRome, Italy
Roberta L. RiccardiParma, Italy
Maria Elena TondiLecce, Italy
English into PolishRyszard KasprzykDenver, CO
English into PortuguesePedro M. MendesPinole, CA
English into RussianMarina BraunPortland, OR
English into SpanishNancy P. AndradeNew York, NY
Maria Antolino-GirondaTampa, FL
E. Humberto BanosHouston, TX
Marcelo BellizziLauderdale Lakes, FL
Alicia Isabel BermateneRosario, Argentina
Daniela BoppelGrand Rapids, MI
Valeria M. BratinaBuenos Aires, Argentina
Maria A. CabezasWashington, DC
Cecilia D. Castro de AndersonCastle Rock, CO
Avelina MartinezSan Diego, CA
Norah MichelliMiami, FL
Judith NovalOshkosh, WI
Celia B.SzewPacific Palisades, CA
Lida C. Barbetti VrosWayne, NJ
Bernadette WangMadrid, Spain
Deborah F. WexlerNorth Hills, CA
Please direct all inquiries regarding general accreditation information to ATA Headquarters at (703) 683-6100. Registration for all accreditation exams should bemade through ATA Headquarters. All sittings have a maximum capacity and admission is based on the order in which registrations are received. Forms are avail-able from the ATA website or from Headquarters.
The ATA Chronicle | February 200354
ATA Awards: Call for Nominations
ATA Alexander Gode Medal The Alexander Gode Medal, the
American Translators Association’s mostprestigious award, is presented to an indi-vidual or institution for outstanding serviceto the translation and interpretation profes-sions. This award may be given annually.
Individuals or institutions nominated donot have to be members of ATA. However,a history of constructive relations with ATAand the language professions in general isdesirable. Nominees do not have to be U.S.citizens. Petitions and letter campaigns arenot encouraged.
Nominations should include a sufficientlydetailed description of the individual’s orinstitution’s record of service to the transla-tion and/or interpretation professions toenable the Honors & Awards Committee todraw up a meaningful short list for approvalby the ATA Board of Directors.
Nomination Deadline: May 1, 2003. Please send your nominations of the
individual or institution you consider wor-thy of receiving the next Gode Medal to theChair of the ATA Honors & AwardsCommittee at the address listed at the bot-tom of the page.
ATA Ungar GermanTranslation Award
ATA invites nominations for the 2003Ungar German Translation Award. This awardis bestowed biennially in odd-numberedyears for a distinguished literary translationfrom German into English published in theU.S. (The Lewis Galantière TranslationPrize for translations from any language,except German, is awarded in even-num-bered years.)
To be eligible for the award, to be pre-sented at the ATA Annual Conference inPhoenix, Arizona, November 5-8, 2003, thepublished translation must have beentranslated from German into English andpublished in the U.S. in 2001 or 2002.
The published translation must list thetranslator’s name on the title page and
preferably also on the dust jacket.Preference will be given to published worksthat provide information on the translator.The translator need not be an ATA member,however, the translator should have astrong connection with the U.S. (citizen-ship or permanent residence). The nomina-tion must be submitted by the publisher ofthe translated work.
The nomination must include a coverletter, with complete publication informa-tion for the work being nominated,together with a brief vita of the translator,at least two copies of the nominated work,plus one extra copy of the dust jacket, andtwo copies of at least 10 consecutive pagesfrom the original work as keyed to the pagenumbers of the translations (ESSENTIAL!).
Nomination Deadline: May 15, 2003.Publishers are encouraged to submit nom-inations early!
Award: $1,000, a certificate of recogni-tion, and up to $500 toward expenses forattending the ATA Annual Conference inPhoenix, Arizona, November 5-8, 2003.
Please contact the ATA Honors &Awards Committee at the address listed atthe bottom of the page.
ATA 2003 StudentTranslation Award
In 2003, ATA will award a grant-in-aid toa student for a literary or sci-tech transla-tion or translation-related project. Theaward, which will be presented at the ATAAnnual Conference in November 2003, isopen to any graduate or undergraduatestudent or group of students attending anaccredited college or university in the U.S.Preference will be given to students whohave been or are currently enrolled intranslator training programs. Students whoare already published translators are, how-ever, ineligible. No individual student maysubmit more than one entry.
The project, which may be derivedfrom any facet of translation studies,should result in a project with post-grant
applicability, such as a publication, confer-ence presentation, or teaching materials.Computerized materials are ineligible, as aredissertations and theses. Translations mustbe INTO ENGLISH from a foreign language;previously untranslated works are preferred.
Applicants must complete a form (avail-able from ATA Headquarters) and submit aproject description not to exceed 500words. If the project is a translation, thedescription must present the work in itscontext. It must also be a substantivestatement of the difficulties or innovationsinvolved in the project and of the post-competition form the work will take. Theapplication must be accompanied by astatement of support from the facultymember who is supervising the project.This letter of support should demonstratethe faculty supervisor’s intimate familiaritywith the student’s work, and include adetailed assessment of the project’s signif-icance and of the student’s growth anddevelopment in translation.
If the project involves an actual transla-tion, a translation sample of not less than400 and not more than 500 words, togetherwith the corresponding source-languagetext, must accompany the application. Thetranslation sample may consist of two ormore separate passages from the samework. For poetry, the number of wordsmust total at least 300.
Application Deadline: April 15, 2003Award: $500, a certificate of recogni-
tion, and up to $500 toward expenses forattending the ATA Annual Conference. Oneor more certificates may also be awardedto runners-up.
All nominations and materials should beaddressed to:Chair, ATA Honors & Awards CommitteeAmerican Translators Association225 Reinekers Lane, Ste 590Alexandria, VA 22314Phone: (703) 683-6100; Fax: (703) 683-6122; E-mail: [email protected]
AssociationsMake A BetterWorld
Check out ATA’s online JobBank in the Members Only section of the ATA website atwww.atanet.org/membersonly.
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full-time position?
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 55
Register Today!
LEGAL TRANSLATION CONFERENCEHyatt Regency ▼ Jersey City, New Jersey ▼ May 2-4, 2003
Join your colleaguesin the New York City area, May 2-4, forin-depth sessions on legal translation.
FRIDAY: Legal translation sessions will be presented in English.
SATURDAY & SUNDAY: Specialists will present language-specific sessions.
Participants are asked to sign up for a specific language pair, but are free to attend sessions in other languages.
Languages offered will be based on early registration figures (early March cutoff).
All sessions will be submitted for Continuing Legal Education Credit by the State of New York and Continuing Education
Credit by the States of California and Washington (Sessions are pre-approved by the State of Oregon).
▼ REGISTRATION FEES ▼
Early-Bird (by March 7): ATA Members $245 Nonmembers $360
After March 7 and Onsite: ATA Members $305 Nonmembers $420
Space is limited. For more information, contact ATA Headquarters at (703) 683-6100 or visit the ATA website at
www.atanet.org and click on the Legal Translation Conference link on the home page. (Direct link is
www.atanet.org/legal.)
COMPLETE THE REGISTRATION FORM ▼ ON THE FOLLOWING PAGE! ▼
Hotel Information: Be sure to make your hotel reservations at the Hyatt Regency, 2 Exchange Place, Jersey City, NJ
07302. A small block of rooms has been reserved at $149 single/$169 double a night, plus tax. To take advantage of this
special rate, reservations must be made by April 10. Contact the Hyatt at (201) 469-1234 for reservations. Be sure to
mention that you are attending ATA’s Legal Translation Conference.
The Hyatt is located 20 minutes from Newark International Airport on the Harborside Financial Center’s south pier,
overlooking the New York Harbor.
★ ATTENTION EXHIBITORS AND SPONSORS ★
If you would like to participate in the ATA Legal Translation Conference, please contact Walter Bacak at
▼ An ATA Professional Development Conference ▼
REGISTRATION FORM
Name: __________________________________________________________ ATA Member Number: ____________________________First Name Middle Initial Last Name
Employer/School: _________________________________________________________________________________________________(Only list employer or school if you want it to appear on your badge.)
Address: ________________________________________________________________________________________________________Street
________________________________________________________________________________________________________City State/Province Zip/Postal Code Country
Telephone–Primary: _________________________________________ Secondary: ___________________________________________
Fax Number: ______________________________________ Email Address: ________________________________________________
Please indicate the primary and secondary language pairs you are interested in. If there is insufficient registration or speaker availabil-ity in your primary pair, you will be offered a full refund. Please note that the first day features general sessions in English. The secondand third days will offer both general and language-specific sessions.
Primary Pair: Source Language: ________________________________ Target Language: ________________________________
Secondary Pair: Source Language: ________________________________ Target Language: ________________________________
CONFERENCE REGISTRATION FEES: ATA Member Nonmember*
Early-Bird (by March 7) $245 $360 $__________
After March 7 and Onsite $305 $420 $__________
*Individuals who join ATA when registering for this seminar qualify for the ATA member registration fee. Please contact ATA or visit the ATA website for a membership application.
TOTAL PAYMENT: $__________
Cancellations received in writing by April 25, 2003 are eligible for a refund. Refunds will not be honored after April 25. A $25 administrativefee will be applied to all refunds except for the cancellation of a given language pair.
❑ Check/Money Order: Please make payable, through a U.S. bank in U.S. funds, to American Translators Association.❑ Credit Card: Charge my ❑ American Express ❑ VISA ❑ MasterCard ❑ Discover
Card No. ____/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/ Expiration Date: _____________
Name on Card: ____________________________________________ Signature: _____________________________________________
Please send payment and completed form to: American Translators Association, 225 Reinekers Lane, Suite 590, Alexandria, VA 22314.OR, if paying by credit card, please fax your completed form to: (703) 683-6122.
_____ Please check here if you require special accessibility or assistance. (Attach a sheet with your requirements.)
For more information about the ATA Legal Translation Conference or ATA membership, please visit the ATA website at www.atanet.org or contact ATA at (703) 683-6100 or [email protected].
LEGAL TRANSLATION CONFERENCEHyatt Regency ▼ Jersey City, New Jersey ▼ May 2-4, 2003
✁
meeting site and the number of mem-bers in the area. Because of the sizeof our meeting, we have to bookyears in advance. We are currentlylooking at sites for 2007.
Hotel Negotiations. Once the var-ious proposals are winnowed down(due to room rates being too high,optimal dates not available, etc.),Conferon forwards the proposals tothe Board. For the past six or sevenyears, the Board has held its summerBoard meeting at one of the proposedhotels. The Board then tours themeeting space and property. If thehotel is acceptable, the Board tenta-tively approves the site selectionpending final negotiations. Conferonworks with Executive Director WalterBacak on these final negotiations,which always include getting the
guest room rates as cheap as possible.We have all seen the headlines
regarding the tough times for thetravel/hotel industry. This situationhas helped us negotiate low rates formeetings held in the short-term, suchas for the upcoming Legal TranslationConference in New Jersey. However,hotels are still holding the line onmeetings four and five years out.
Why not a cheaper hotel? First,the cheaper hotels do not have themeeting space required for the con-ference. Second, the hotel contractrequires that we fill a certain per-centage of the guest rooms for whichwe contracted or else we have to paya penalty, so it is not in the bestinterest of the membership overall.(Our conference already takes upmore meeting space than hotels are
usually comfortable booking.) Third,we want to encourage staying in theconference hotel because this facili-tates networking and enhances the“conference experience.” The confer-ence is about more than attendingsessions; it is the after-hours net-working and social events that trulyround out attending the conference.
So, how was Phoenix selected:great rates, optimal dates, warmweather, and in 43 years, ATA hadnever held a conference there! Markyour calendar for a Southwesternexperience as ATA holds its 44thAnnual Conference in sunny Phoenixthis November. Watch the ATAChronicle and the ATA website formore information.
The ATA Chronicle | February 2003 57
From the President Continued from p. 7
Legal Translation Conference.The ATA Legal Translation Confer-ence is scheduled for May 2-4, 2003in Jersey City, New Jersey. Registertoday for what is sure to be a veryrewarding and educational profes-sional development conference. Theconference will be held in the newHyatt Regency Jersey City, located onthe Harborside Financial Center’ssouth pier on the Hudson Riverdirectly across from Manhattan.
Awards. Nominations are cur-rently being sought for ATA’s Gode
Medal, the Ungar German TranslationAward, and the Student TranslationAward. The Gode Medal recognizesoutstanding service to the translationand interpreting professions. TheUngar German Translation Award isbestowed for a distinguished book-length literary German-into-Englishtranslation. The Student Award recog-nizes an outstanding translation doneby a student. In addition, theAmerican Foundation for Translationand Interpretation is seeking appli-cants for its JTG Scholarship inScientific or Technical Translation or
Interpretation. For more informationon all these awards, please go towww.atanet.org/awards or contactATA Headquarters.
Membership renewal. Please renewyour ATA membership if you have notalready done so. You may renew onlinein the members only section of the ATAwebsite: www.atanet.org/membersonlyor you may contact ATA Headquartersfor a renewal form. If you have renewed,thank you.
From the Executive Director Continued from p. 8
ATA’s Portuguese Language Division 9th Annual Spring MeetingRoney Palace Resort
Miami, FloridaApril 25-26
Watch for details and registrationonline and by e-mail!
www.ata-divisions.org/PLD/index.htm
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The ATA Chronicle | February 200358
R e n a i s s a n c e B i s c a y n e B a y • M i a m i , F l o r i d a • M a r c h 2 2 - 2 3 , 2 0 0 3
~ Sponsored by ATA and FLATA ~
Join your colleagues in Miami, March 22-23, for a weekendof in-depth sessions on medical translation and interpreting.
The American Translators Association (ATA) will provide a full dayof in-depth sessions, including a continental breakfast in the morningand a Networking Session following the final presentation.
� How to Translate for the Healthcare Consumer – Maria A. Cornelio
� AIDS and HIV for Medical Translators – Dr. Steven Weinreb
� Beyond Conduit: Finding Your Cultural Center as a Medical Interpreter– Zarita Araújo-Lane and Vonessa Phillips
Sessions will be submitted for Continuing Education Credit for the States of Californiaand Washington and are pre-approved by the State of Oregon.
The Florida Chapter of ATA (FLATA) willprovide a half-day of sessions.
� Ethical Issues in the Role of the MedicalInterpreter – Zarita Araújo-Lane
� The Language of Clinical Medicine– Dr. Rafael Rivera
� Miami-CSI: The Real Thing– To be announced
Hotel Information: Be sure to make your hotel reservations at the RenaissanceBiscayne Bay, 1601 Biscayne Boulevard, Miami, FL 33132. A small block ofrooms has been reserved at $99 single/ double a night, plus tax. To takeadvantage of this special rate, reservations must be made by February 28.Contact the Renaissance at (305) 374-0000 for reservations. Be sure to mentionthat you are attending the Medical Translation and Interpreting Seminarsponsored by ATA and FLATA.
The Renaissance, overlooking Biscayne Bay, is located 15 minutes from MiamiInternational Airport and is near Bayside Marketplace, South Beach, andCoconut Grove.
Medical Translation & Interpreting Seminar
SaturdayMarch 22
Early-Bird (by March 14):ATA Members $145Nonmembers $260
After March 14 and Onsite:ATA Members $215Nonmembers $330
FLATA members may registerat ATA member rates.
SundayMarch 23
Early-Bird (by March 14):FLATA Members $50Nonmembers $75
After March 14 and Onsite:FLATA Members $70Nonmembers $95
ATA members may registerat FLATA member rates.
Attend 2 Daysand SAVE!
Early-Bird (by March 14):ATA/FLATA Members$180 – SAVE $15Nonmembers $310 – SAVE $20
After March 14 and Onsite:ATA/FLATA Members$265 – SAVE $25Nonmembers $395 – SAVE $30
An ATA accreditation exam sitting will be held on Sunday, March 23. This will be a standard exam, not specialty-specific. To register, please visit the ATA website to obtain the Accreditation Examination Registration Form.
Visitwww.atanet.org
for moreinformation.
REGISTERTODAY!
Medical Translation and Interpreting SeminarRenaissance Biscayne Bay ▼ Miami, Florida ▼ March 22-23, 2003
REGISTRATION FORM
Name: __________________________________________________________________________ ATA Member #: __________________First Name Middle Initial Last Name
Employer/School: _______________________________________________________________ FLATA Member #: __________________(Only list employer or school if you want it to appear on your badge.)
Address: ________________________________________________________________________________________________________Street
________________________________________________________________________________________________________City State/Province Zip/Postal Code Country
Telephone–Primary: _________________________________________ Secondary: ___________________________________________
Fax Number: ______________________________________ Email Address: ________________________________________________
REGISTRATION FEES
BOTH DAYS, MARCH 22-23 ATA/FLATA Member Nonmember* PaymentEarly-Bird (before March 14): $180 – SAVE $15! $310 – SAVE $25! $__________After March 14 and Onsite: $265 – SAVE $20! $395 – SAVE $30! $__________
SATURDAY, MARCH 22 ATA/FLATA Member Nonmember*Early-Bird (before March 14): $145 $260 $__________After March 14 and Onsite: $215 $330 $__________
SUNDAY, MARCH 23 ATA//FLATA Member Nonmember*Early-Bird (before March 14): $50 $75 $__________After March 14 and Onsite: $70 $95 $__________
TOTAL PAYMENT: $__________
*Individuals who join ATA when registering for this seminar qualify for the ATA member registration fee. Please contact ATA or visitwww.atanet.org/membapp.htm for a membership application.
Cancellations received in writing by March 14, 2003 are eligible for a refund. Refunds will not be honored after March 14. A $25 administrative fee will be applied to all refunds.
❑ Check/Money Order: Please make payable, through a U.S. bank in U.S. funds, to American Translators Association.❑ Credit Card: Charge my ❑ American Express ❑ VISA ❑ MasterCard ❑ Discover
Card No. ____/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/ Expiration Date: _____________
Name on Card: ____________________________________________ Signature: _____________________________________________
Please send payment and completed form to: American Translators Association, 225 Reinekers Lane, Suite 590, Alexandria, VA 22314.OR, if paying by credit card, please fax your completed form to: (703) 683-6122.
_____ Please check here if you require special accessibility or assistance. (Attach a sheet with your requirements.)
For more information about the ATA Medical Translation and Interpreting Seminar or ATA membership, please visit the ATA website at www.atanet.org or contact ATA at (703) 683-6100 or [email protected].
An accreditation exam sitting will be held on Sunday, March 23. This will be a standard exam, not specialty-specific. To register, please visit the ATA website to obtain the Accreditation Examination Registration Form.
p/u UPS Ad—film
American Translators AssociationOfficersPresidentMr. Thomas L. West IIIIntermark Language Services Corp.2555 Cumberland Pkwy, Ste. 295Atlanta, GA 30339Tel: (770) 444-3055Fax: (770) [email protected]
President-electMr. Scott Brennan14211 Lotus Lane #5112Centreville, VA 20120Tel: (703) 815-1593Fax: (413) [email protected]
SecretaryMs. Courtney Searls-RidgeGerman Language Services2658 48th Avenue SWSeattle, WA 98116Tel: (206) 938-3600Fax: (206) [email protected]
TreasurerDr. Jiri Stejskal7312 Oak AvenueMelrose Park, PA 19027Tel: (215) 635-7090Fax: (215) [email protected]
Directors Committee Chairs Division AdministratorsMr. Kirk Anderson2455 Flamingo Drive, #401Miami Beach, FL 33140Tel: (305) 532-7252Fax: (305) [email protected]
Ms. Beatriz Bonnet7465 E Peakview AvenueEnglewood, CO 80111Tel: (303) 779-1288Fax: (303) [email protected]
Mr. Robert A. Croese204 Neely Crossing LaneSimpsonville, SC 29680Tel: (864) 967-3955Fax: (864) [email protected]
Ms. Marian S. Greenfield2619 Holly AvenueSouth Plainfield, NJ 07080Tel: (908) 561-7590Fax: (908) [email protected]
Prof. Alan K. Melby1223 Aspen AvenueProvo, UT 84604Tel: (801) 422-2144Fax: (801) [email protected]
Mr. Robert E. Sette109 Biddle AvenuePittsburgh, PA 15221Tel: (412) 731-8198Fax: (412) [email protected]
Ms. Ines Swaney6161 Harwood AvenueOakland, CA 94618Tel: (510) 658-7744Fax: (510) [email protected]
Ms. Laura E. Wolfson244 Riverside Drive, Apt 5ENew York, NY 10025Tel: (212) 665-5003Fax: (212) [email protected]
Mr. Timothy Yuan89-33 Pontiac StreetQueens Village, NY 11427Tel: (718) 776-8139Fax: (718) [email protected]
AccreditationLilian Novas Van VrankenSpring, TXTel: (281) [email protected]
Active Membership ReviewLeland D. WrightKent, OHTel: (330) 673-0043Fax: (330) [email protected]
ChaptersRobert A. CroeseSimpsonville, SC Tel: (864) 967-3955Fax: (864) [email protected]
Dictionary ReviewBoris M. SilversteynVenice, FLTel/Fax: (941) [email protected]
DivisionsDorothee RacetteSaranac, NYTel: (518) 293-7494Fax: (518) [email protected]
Education and Training(Non-ATA Programs)Gertrud Graubart ChampeSurry, METel: (207) [email protected]
EthicsVacant
FinanceJiri StejskalMelrose Park, PA Tel: (215) 635-7090Fax: (215) [email protected]
Honors and AwardsVacant
Interpretation PolicyAdvisoryChristian DegueldreSan Diego, CATel: (858) 569-6162Fax: (858) [email protected]
Mentoring Task ForceCourtney Searls-RidgeSeattle, WATel: (206) 938-3600Fax: (206) [email protected]
Professional Development(ATA Programs)Marian S. GreenfieldSouth Plainfield, NJTel: (908) 561-7590Fax: (908) [email protected]
Public RelationsChris DurbanParis, FranceTel: 33(1)42935802Fax: 33(1)[email protected]
Kevin S. HendzelArlington, VATel: (703) 516-9266Fax: (703) [email protected]
Special ProjectsAnn MacfarlaneSeattle, WATel: (206) 542-8422Fax: (206) [email protected]
TerminologySue Ellen WrightKent, OHTel: (330) 673-0043Fax: (330) [email protected]
Translation and ComputersAlan K. MelbyProvo, UTTel: (801) 422-2144Fax: (801) [email protected]
Chinese LanguageFrank MouPittsburgh, PATel: (412) 767-4788Fax: (412) [email protected]
French LanguageMichèle HansenHinsdale, ILTel: (630) 323-4720Fax: (630) [email protected]
German LanguageDorothee RacetteSaranac, NYTel: (518) 293-7494Fax: (518) [email protected]
InterpretersHelen D. ColeSilver Spring, MDTel: (301) 572-2855Fax: (301) [email protected]
Italian LanguageMarcello J. NapolitanoBeaverton, ORTel: (408) 422-7008Fax: (425) [email protected]
Japanese LanguageIzumi SuzukiNovi, MITel: (248) 344-0909Fax: (248) [email protected]
LiteraryClifford E. LandersNaples, FLTel: (941) [email protected]
Medical [being established]Martine DougéHollywood, [email protected]
NordicDavid RumseyElk Mound, WITel: (715) 962-3151Fax: (715) [email protected]
Portuguese LanguageTereza d’Ávila BragaDallas, TXTel: (972) 690-7730Fax: (972) [email protected]
Slavic LanguagesNora Seligman FavorovOrlando, FLTel: (407) 679-8151Fax: (646) [email protected]
Spanish LanguageRudolf HellerBrookfield, MATel: (508) 867-8494Fax: (508) [email protected]
Translation CompanyLinda GauthierMontreal, CanadaTel: (514) 376-7919Fax: (514) [email protected]
To International Federation ofTranslators (FIT)Peter W. KrawutschkeKalamazoo, MITel: (269) 387-3212Fax: (269) [email protected]: www.fit-ift.org
To Joint National Committee for Languages (JNCL)Christophe RéthoréHarrisonburg, VA
Tel: (540) 568-3512Fax: (540) [email protected]
To ASTM Translation UserStandards ProjectBeatriz A. BonnetEnglewood, COTel: (303) 779-1288Fax: (303) [email protected]
ATA Representatives
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44th Annual Conference of the American Translators AssociationPhoenix, Arizona • Pointe South Mountain ResortNovember 5-8, 2003