EBW Translations

A translation blog for @enbyboiwonder. I've been officially learning Japanese since early October 2021 (and reading it for two months longer). Queue posts once a day at noon CT (UTC-5).

[ebw-translations]

I'm not dead! I just haven't been doing a whole lot of translation lately, or at least not non-random translation. I'll probably start up doing the Tofugu sentences again soon. Those actually feel easier to do now, so it seems I have actually improved, though I've reached the point where it doesn't feel like I haven't been making an progress at all.

[thekimonogallery]

By Japanese creator ミチル @mitiruxxx

[ebw-translations]

Question, is this showing an author portrait in the corner of my icon? I have it turned off, but it’s still showing it to me, and I’d like to know if it’s because it’s my own blog or because tumblr’s shit.

[ebw-translations]

I don’t wanna get anyone’s hopes up, but I started translating Summer Cider, a novel Kabei-sensei wrote pre-2.43. It’s a coming-of-age, I suppose, with elements of light horror and the supernatural. Here’s hoping it goes well. It certainly feels a bit easier to read, at least, than when I first read it a little over a year ago, so hopefully I can make some actual progress in translating it.

[enbyboiwonder]

I’m working on translating the 2.43 HaruKou Arc, and I was curious why Google apparently hates “今大会” (“this tournament; the current tournament”), and.

What the fuck are you even on about.

You don’t hate it, you just want me to make the nonexistent verb before it past tense, and for some reason use a single-width period and space instead of a full-width period. And then. And then!

Okay then.

[ebw-translations]

Watched the first half of 2.43 on my Blu-Rays today, and without Funimation’s un-toggleable subs in the way, I can actually read the full text on the eyecatch cards! I may translate them, though I wish I could get screencaps too… Ah, if only the external disc drive I bought for my laptop years ago specifically to play BDs would actually still play them. It plays CDs just fine, and DVDs too even if it can be a little bit laggy at times and occasionally crash… maybe it’s about time to look into getting a new one.

[ebw-translations]

Oh, god, the sexytimes-use euphemisms in this BL novel I’m reading are all “there,” “that place,” “his thing.” On the one hand, yay, I didn’t have to worry about any of them confusing me and/or going over my head like in the first two (not by this author) I read. But on the other hand… why.

[ebw-translations]

If I have a bunch of projects, surely that means I’ll eventually finish one of them, right?

(Today I translated a tiny bit of この本を盗む者は [The One Who Steals This Book] that I read today—like, I read 11 pages and translated maybe 5 lines max, most of it stuff that isn’t a direct translation so I didn’t wanna forget it if I do end up trying to translate this, even just for fun/practice. I don’t even know if this has an official EN translation. Also this is about the same level as 2.43, so it’ll be a while before I can translate more than bits and pieces anyway)

[enbyboiwonder]

I suppose it’s comforting to know that it’s not only in English that Google will mark perfectly valid alternative spellings as straight-up wrong

[ebw-translations]

This one is objectively hilarious because GT does know that お袋 means “mother.” You type in “お袋の” and it gives you “mother’s;” you add the “味” and it gives you “taste of bag.” (Although that may still be better than “taste of mother”/”mother’s taste”? Psychic-damage-wise, if nothing else.)

This is an expression that means things like “the taste of mom’s cooking” or “the taste of home cooking.”

DeepL at least gets this one right. It is usually better than GT, but still not reliable.

[ebw-translations]

And that, kids, is why you don’t machine translate, or at least don’t rely on it—especially with dialect. It barely knows how to handle standard Japanese, so throwing a dialect, especially other than the popular Kansaiben, into the mix isn’t going to help matters. MTL can be a useful tool to help you get your bearings, but you should always take what it gives you with a grain of salt and use other resources as well.

If this were an imperative the way Google Translate translates it as, it would just be 立て, or 立てよ. Of course, there’s also 立てろ(よ), but that’s the imperative of the transitive verb 立てる, “to stand something up,” and this here is intransitive. Yes, this sentence ends with an エ sound, as many imperatives do, but only く verbs have け as their imperative, and this isn’t one.

So let’s look at what Yuni’s actually saying here.

First, we have the verb. This is the intransitive verb 立つ “to stand (up)” conjugated into the potential: 立てる “to be able to stand.” Next we have け, which is a question particle in Fukuiben and will replace か in many instances.

He’s asking, “Can you stand?”

GT completely changes the tone of this line. Cold and calloused, he orders Chika, who’s slipped and fallen after having already lost the use of his glasses, to stand up. But that doesn’t sound like him, does it? In the original, he’s worried and concerned about his best friend who’s already at a disadvantage and may now have hurt himself too and asks if he’s able to stand... while extending his hand to help him up.

Though it turns out, even if you put it into plain Japanese, GT still doesn’t know what to do with it, for the most part, and neither does DeepL:

The third is because it doesn’t realize it’s the potential form of 立つ, not the plain form of 立てる, and the first may be as well. At least, that’s the closest I can figure. The second... I have no idea. With just の, it gives you “to stand.” But with just んか or のか, it does finally get it. And literally the only difference between these is politeness/formality level.

DeepL, while often more reliable than GT, actually gets it worse, though:

I have no idea how it got “nobleman,” but “house; residence” is from the け reading of 家. Changing the け to か does not make it realize it’s a question, though it does change the translation to “making something stand up.” Which I was somewhat surprised about, considering 家 can also be read か, although that reading has to do with people/professions/etc. rather than houses.

立つ and 立てる can refer to constructing buildings (though I don’t know, if at all, how it differs from 建つ and 建てる), which is where “building” comes from in the second, though you wouldn’t stick の/ん between a verb and a noun since those just attach directly, so I still don’t know how it gets that.

But “liveliness”? “Court noble”? DeepL apparently has a habit of just guessing since it prefers natural-sounding English over an accurate translation, so that could be what that is, though I didn’t see anything about either in Goo辞書’s entry for 立てる.

This habit of guessing could be why it gives you “How are you going to stand up?” (all its alternatives also using “how”) for 立てるんですか, despite there being no “how” in the Japanese. And then for 立てますか it gives “Would you like to stand up?”

For 立てるの, it gives you “Stand.” or “Stand up.” With the period! Even GT didn’t do that when it thought it was an imperative. And this... definitely isn’t. A sentence-final の could be explanatory/emphasis (のです/のだ) or interrogatory (のか) with the second part dropped, but it’s not gonna be used with imperatives. Not to mention that there is no imperative that ends with る. There are verbs whose second-to-last mora is る, but imperatives for ichidan verbs are formed by dropping the final る and replacing it with ろ, while for godan verbs they’re formed by changing the ウ sound of the last mora to an エ (れ for る verbs, て for つ verbs, etc.). Even if a verb exists that ends in -るる, the imperative would be either -るろ or -るれ.

Like GT, with 立てるのか, it does finally give you the correct translation.

[dj-bayeux-tapestry]

the thing you need to realize about localization is that japanese and english are such vastly different languages that a straight translation is always going to be worse than the original script. nuance is going to be lost and, if you give a shit about your job, you should fill the gaps left with equivalent nuance in english. take ff6, my personal favorite localization of all time: in the original japanese cefca was memorable primarily for his manic, childish speaking style - but since english speaking styles arent nearly as expressive, woolsey adapted that by making the localized english kefka much more prone to making outright jokes. cefca/kefka is beloved in both regions as a result - hell, hes even more popular here

[marchionessofmustache]

yes this

a literal translation is an inaccurate translation.

localization’s job is to create a meaningful experience for a different audience which has a different language and different culture. they translate ideas and concepts, not words and sentences. often this means choosing new ideas that will be more meaningful and contribute to the experience more for a different audience.

[rui-cifer]

There was an example during late Tokugawa period in Japan where the translator translated, "Я люблю Вас” (I love you), to “I could die for you,” while translating  Ася, ( Asya) a novel by Ivan Turgenev. This was because a woman saying, “I love you,” to a man was considered a very hard thing to do in Japanese society.

In a more well-known example,  Natsume Soseki, a great writer who wrote, I am a Cat, had his students translate “I love you,” to “the moon is beautiful [because of] having you beside tonight,” because Japanese men would not say such strong emotions right away. He said that it would be weird and Japanese men would have more elegance.

Both of these are great examples of localization that wasn’t a straight up translation and both of these are valid. I feel like a lot of people forget the nuances in language and culture and how damn hard a translator’s job is and how knowledgeable the person has to be about both cultures. [x]

[fromtokyotokyoto]

Important stuff about translation!

Note that you can apply this to your own translations even if they aren’t big pieces of literature or something. Don’t feel bad about not translating word for word. An everyday sentence may sound odd translated literally - it’s okay to edit a little bit so it feels right!

[wildehacked]

Oh my god, I’m about to go on a ramble, I’m sorry, I can’t help it, the inner translation nerd is coming out. I’m so sorry. The thing is–there is actually no such thing as an accurate translation.  It’s literally an impossible endeavor. Word for word doesn’t cut it. Sense for sense doesn’t cut it, because then you’re potentially missing cool stuff like context and nuance and rhyme and humor. Even localization doesn’t really cut it, because that means you’re prioritizing the audience over the author, and you’re missing out on the original context, and the possibility of bringing something new and exciting to your host language. Foreignization, which aims to replicate the rhythms of the original language, or to use terminology that will be unfamiliar to the target culture–(for example: the first few American-published Harry Potter books domesticated the English, and traded “trousers” for “pants”, and “Mom” for “Mum”. Later on they stopped, and let the American children view such foreignizing words as “snog” and “porridge.”)–also doesn’t cut it, because you risk alienating the target readers, or obscuring meaning.  Another cool example is Dante, and the words written above the gates of hell: Abandon hope, all ye who enter here.  In the original Italian, that’s Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch'intrate. Speranza, like most nouns in latinate languages, has a gender: la. Hope, in Italian, is gendered female. Abandon hope, who is female. Abandon hope, who is a woman. When the original Dante enters hell, searching for Beatrice, he is doomed, subtly, from the start. That’s beautiful, subtle, the kind of delicate poetic move literature nerds gorge themselves on, and you can’t keep it in English. Literally, how do you preserve it? We don’t have a gendered hope. It doesn’t work, can’t work. So how do you compensate? Can you sneak in a reference to Beatrice in a different line? Or do you chalk her up as a loss and move onto the next problem? You’re always going to miss something–the cool part is that, knowing you’re going to fail, you get to decide how to fail. Ortega y Gasset called this The Misery and Splendor of Translation. Basically, translation is impossible–so why not make it a beautiful failure?  My point is that literary translation is creative writing, full of as many creative decisions as any original poem or short story. It has more limitations, rules, and structures to consider, for sure–but sometimes the best artistic decision is going to be the one that breaks the rules.  My favorite breakdown of this is Le Ton Beau De Marot, a beautiful brick of a translator’s joke, in which the author tries over and over again to create a “perfect” translation of “A une Damoyselle Malade”, an itsy bitsy poem Clement Marot dashed off to his patron’s daughter, who was sick, in 1537.  This is the poem:  Ma mignonne, Je vous donne Le bon jour; Le séjour C’est prison. Guérison Recouvrez, Puis ouvrez Votre porte Et qu’on sorte Vitement, Car Clément Le vous mande. Va, friande De ta bouche, Qui se couche En danger Pour manger Confitures; Si tu dures Trop malade, Couleur fade Tu prendras, Et perdras L’embonpoint. Dieu te doint Santé bonne, Ma mignonne. Seems simple enough, right? But it’s got a huge host of challenges: the rhyme, the tone, the archaic language (if you’re translating something old, do you want it to sound old in the target language, too? or are you translating not just across language, but across time?)  Le Ton Beau De Marot is a monster of a book that compiles all of Hofstader’s “failed” translations of Ma Mignonne, as well as the “failed” translations of his friends, and his students, and hundreds of strangers who were given the translation challenge (which you can play here, should you like!)  The end result is a hilarious archive of Sweet Damosels, Malingering Ladies, Chickadees, Fairest Friends, and Cutie Pies. It’s the clearest, funniest, best example of what I think is true of all literary translations: that they’re a thing you make up, not a thing you discover. There is no magic bridge between languages, or magic window, or magic vessel to pour the poem from one language to another–translation is always subjective, it’s always individual, it’s always inaccurate, it’s always a failure.  It’s always, in other words, art.  Which, as a translator, I find incredibly reassuring! You’re definitely, one hundred percent absolutely, gonna fuck up. Which means you can’t fuck up. You can take risks! You can experiment! You can do cool stuff like bilingual translations, or footnote translations! You write your own code of honor, your own rules that your translations will hold inviolable, and fuck it if that code doesn’t match everyone else’s*. The translations they hold inviolable are also flawed, are failures at the core, from the King James Bible right on down to No Fear Shakespeare. So have fun! It’s all in your hands, miseries and splendors both. 

[sol1056]

this in particular has bearing on more than just translation, but possibly in any adaptive or interpretative creative work: 

knowing you’re going to fail, you get to decide how to fail

which is actually quite freeing, once you think about it

[enbyboiwonder]

Well, thanks to reading Where the Wild Ladies Are, I now know how a couple lines of that Clare Harner bereavement poem might be translated in Japanese:

Do not stand at my grave and weep I am not there, I do not sleep

わたしのお墓の前で泣かないでください そこにわたしはいません、眠ってなんかいません

Apparently either the poem has been turned into a song in Japan, or there is a song that features lines from it. (Apparently there’s at least a couple songs in English featuring lines from it, as well.)

[ebw-translations]

迷惑メール

[home]

“You have one email in your spam folder.”

Usually, I move spam immediately to the trash, but today, I sort of felt like reading it, so I opened the email.

“Please deposit one million yen into my bank account by tomorrow.  If you don’t, I’ll post your secrets publicly on the internet.”

What a strange email, I thought.  Should I try replying, though?

“I read your email.  I felt it could have been written a little better.  I teach university-level writing classes.  I can teach you how to write.”

Soon enough, I received a response:

“I’m in high school, and I want to be an author when I’m older.  I write spam emails for practice and because I get money for it.

“Truthfully, I don’t like this job.  Will you please teach me how to write?”

A troublesome job, indeed.  The kid should quit as soon as possible.

“Of course.  But, first, you need to quit your job.  After that, I’ll teach you how to write,” I replied.

[ebw-translations]

Tofugu 500 Sentences, #271-280

[home]

271. 三分の二ほど食べてしまいました。 272. 扉をゆっくり押し開けました。 273. この場合は、この方程式を使うのがいいですよ。 274. 母は働き詰めで、一ヶ月以上も夜ぐっすり眠っていないんだ。 275. 第一印象と全然違うよね。 276. 気持ちが高ぶらないと、幸せは感じないんじゃないかな。 277. 何アレ、感じ悪い。 278. 町はシンと静まり返っていました。 279. 黒い虫が窓にギッシリと張り付いていました。 280. 心配しなくても、なんとかなるさ。

English:

271. I ended up eating two thirds of it. 272. He slowly pushed the door open. 273. In this case, it’s best to use this equation. 274. Since she’s been working non-stop, my mother hasn’t gotten a good night’s sleep in over a month. 275. You’re completely different from my first impression of you. 276. I wonder if you can really call it happiness if your emotions never get stirred up. 277. The hell is that, that’s disgusting. 278. The town was still as death. 279. A black bug was clinging tightly to the window. 280. I’ll be able to manage somehow even without you worrying.

Notes:

278. This is another sentence that follows the “combine adverb and verb that say exactly the same thing” that’s much more common in Japanese than English. シンと (also seen often seen as シーン(と), especially when used as SFX) is an onomatopoeic adverb that refers to utter or deathly silence/stillness. 静まり返る is a verb that means “to fall completely silent; to become as still as death.”

280. This is probably the one I’m least sure of from this batch. I also don’t know if the tone is supposed to be “it’s okay, I’ll be fine” or “you’re annoying, I don’t need you to worry about me.” Or maybe “You don’t have to worry, we’ll somehow manage”...

[ebw-translations]

Yeah... that’s not English, buddy.

This is from when I drew it into Google Translate to look it up in a dictionary app a while back, as I didn’t know how to read it at the time. 沙汰 (さた) means “affair; incident; issue; matter,” and that isn’t a character that’s made it into Japanese and I don’t know Chinese so I don’t know just how lost in translation it is, but uh, yeah that’s not even close lol

Though I tried it again recently and it’s fine now:

[ebw-translations]

Tofugu 500 Sentences, #261-270

[home]

261. あなたが映画スターになるなんて信じることができません。 262. 糖質ゼロのジュースしか飲まないようにしています。 263. やがて春になり、雪は溶けます。 264. 佐藤君は来週からアフリカに転勤することになった。 265. 髪が大分のびてきたよね。 266. こっちに来るといつも飲み歩いてしまう。 267. 今のはいい当たりだった。 268. この色は、何色ですか？ 269. そのうちきっといいことあるよ。 270. それでも、やっぱり彼のことが好きなんです。

English:

261. You, become a movie star? I just can’t believe that. 262. I try to only drink zero-carb juices. 263. Before long, spring will come, and the snows will melt. 264. Satou-kun will transfer to Africa next week. 265. Your hair has grown a lot! 266. I always end up going barhopping whenever I come here. 267. That one was a good guess. 268. What color is this? 269. There is good in everything. 270. Even so, I still like him, after all.

Notes:

261. なんて works as a quoting particle in this and similar instances, except while と and って are neutral, なんて is more negative.

262. I do so that I drink nothing but zero-carb juice > I try to drink only zero-carb juice?

264. Not sure if this になった is just the “it has become that” structure that you’ll sometimes see (for politeness, likely; many things are) or if it’s “it has been decided that (by circumstances or someone other than the one it affects),” but either way, it wouldn’t necessarily have to be translated directly into English.

269. This is one that I struggled to translate into natural English, even though I understand what it’s saying (within that, surely, there are good things), so I just used a saying that’s similar enough even if more general.