The Art of Translation, pt. 2

As I explained in my previous post on the topic of translations, one way we can start judging the strength of a translation is via idioms. But of course not every sentence has an idiom. In fact, you might only come across a handful of idioms in an entire book. (Actually, this is unlikely. When you’re reading a book written in your own first language, you won’t even notice the majority of the idioms used because they’re already part of your everyday speech. Kind of weird, if you think about it.)

Now let’s take a look at another angle we can play: use of descriptions.

Suppose we have a translated-into-English book that begins with the line, “The sky was blue.”

(Let me interrupt myself already with a pro tip for you: Say you’re standing in a bookstore, curious about this new book you just happened to pick up. If the first sentence is “The sky was blue.” just set the book down and walk away. You don’t need that monotony in your life. Anyway. Moving on…)

Like I said, suppose we have a translated-into-English book that begins with the line, “The sky was blue.”

This is a really boring line, isn’t it? At least, it’s a boring first line, if nothing else.

So if we pick up a translated-into-English book that begins with this line, are we dealing with a bad translation, or a boring writing style?

Likely it’s a boring writing style, right? It’s not the translator’s fault that the book was written so tediously; he has to play the cards he’s been dealt. (<-- Look at that! - another idiom.)

Now let’s suppose we pick up a translated-into-English book with the first line(s) something like this:

The sky was blue, but only barely; you might have even missed its blueness if you didn’t look closely enough. It was almost blue by mistake, like a blueness just barely squeezing its way through the thick clouds, a blueness trying to prove that it was here first, that it would still be here even after all the clouds and their unearthly gray have moved on to haunt a different corner of the world.

(I kind of like those sentences, actually. Heck, maybe I’ll put them in one of my own stories someday…)

If we read these sentences, is this good translation, good original-author’s style, or possibly both?

In this case, we can’t know how accurate the translation is. But we can rest assured that the author’s original probably wasn’t just “El cielo era azul.” (“The sky was blue.”) Right? (That’d be a mighty brave translator, if so.)

It turns out these sentences were good writing, and, therefore, most likely they were put there by the original author.

Again: the translator has to play the cards he’s been dealt. And in this case, he’s been dealt some good cards.

If you’re reading a translated-into-English book, ask yourself, How solid are the descriptions? If the descriptions are decent, you can guess that the author’s original writing is pretty decent, too. (And, clearly, there’s a good chance the translation is solid as well.)