http://www.lingo24.com/blogs/christof/how-translation-theory-informs-the-translation-process.html Comments and insight from one of Translation Memory's leading lights Sun, 12 Oct 2008 10:49:21 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.3.1 http://www.lingo24.com/blogs/christof/how-translation-theory-informs-the-translation-process.html#comment-77 Scott Mon, 09 Jun 2008 18:25:07 +0000 http://www.lingo24.com/blogs/christof/how-translation-theory-informs-the-translation-process.html#comment-77 As a translator of Ancient Greek and Latin on my spare time, I do not feel that a 'theory' is particularly necessary towards making a useful and well-put translation. Rather, from each text that you read, you should get a feeling of rapport with the author. Depending on that rapport, you should get a feeling for how well you match the writer and whether you are capable of transforming the writers thoughts into another language. For example, my own style as a writer is rather brisk and to the point, whereas other writers such as Umberto Eco can go on and on forever about the same thing, so I would match well with brisk writers such as chroniclers and historians, while he would go well with oftentimes religious texts and rhetors. However, this does not mean that you cannot grow as a writer to translate a text, it just takes a good thesaurus and a lot of work! Furthermore, I think a knowledge, at least a reading knowledge, is necessary of as many languages as possible that contribute to your source language and language to translate to because languages build and thrive off of one another. An example of this comes from a letter that I was recently looking at where the writer Michael Psellos was describing his loneliness not having his friends there and how 'zw de peri ta biblia kai tas apsychous homilias twn syngrapsamenwn auta', where the writer leaves a blank for us as to what is meant by apsychous. Does he mean the company (homilias) is dead, 'without a spirit.' Obviously not, but I found the best rendering of these words could be used through a knowledge of Latin where animus is the 'spirit', where in English 'unanimated' would be the best equivalent and still keep some of the rhetorical cleverness of the writer that was based off the derivations of words. As a translator of Ancient Greek and Latin on my spare time, I do not feel that a ‘theory’ is particularly necessary towards making a useful and well-put translation. Rather, from each text that you read, you should get a feeling of rapport with the author. Depending on that rapport, you should get a feeling for how well you match the writer and whether you are capable of transforming the writers thoughts into another language. For example, my own style as a writer is rather brisk and to the point, whereas other writers such as Umberto Eco can go on and on forever about the same thing, so I would match well with brisk writers such as chroniclers and historians, while he would go well with oftentimes religious texts and rhetors. However, this does not mean that you cannot grow as a writer to translate a text, it just takes a good thesaurus and a lot of work!
Furthermore, I think a knowledge, at least a reading knowledge, is necessary of as many languages as possible that contribute to your source language and language to translate to because languages build and thrive off of one another. An example of this comes from a letter that I was recently looking at where the writer Michael Psellos was describing his loneliness not having his friends there and how ‘zw de peri ta biblia kai tas apsychous homilias twn syngrapsamenwn auta’, where the writer leaves a blank for us as to what is meant by apsychous. Does he mean the company (homilias) is dead, ‘without a spirit.’ Obviously not, but I found the best rendering of these words could be used through a knowledge of Latin where animus is the ’spirit’, where in English ‘unanimated’ would be the best equivalent and still keep some of the rhetorical cleverness of the writer that was based off the derivations of words.

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