Hello! Considering chap 126, I've seen in some analysis posts people saying for Hanji there was something on the other side of if she stop fighting: "I wish we could just live together", but for Levi, there seems to be nothing and that's why he said "what's left if we just run and hide"? Can you please share your version of translation as well as your thoughts?
Hello! Like whatever analysis I do, I just have to point out this will probably be biased towards Levihan but, you can choose to just take the information or you can choose to accept my ‘take’ or my interpretation too.
It’s up to you. (But for me, I’m going down with this ship.)
いっそ二人でここで暮らそうか: Which was translated to English as “Why don’t we just live here together, right Levi?” So honestly, it is an accurate translation so there’s really nothing much to think about here.
Except the adverb いっそ. I actually ended up looking into this adverb a bit because it doesn’t reflect in the English translation. Like you could just take that word out and the whole sentence would still mean the same thing: “Why don’t we just live here together, right Levi?”
I know there are some translations that translate this as “I would rather we just live here together Levi,” and ‘rather’ can be a rough approximation of いっそ but I don’t think “I would rather we just live here together Levi” captures the translation either because Hange is actively inviting him to live with her in the forest in the scene up in the actual Japanese translation.
So looking at other examples using いっそ, there are certain elements or emotions in speech which tend to be depicted by such word and I think we could actually look into this word to infer how Hange was feeling at that time when she said it.
So going into linguistics and word usage:
Disclaimer: I am not a native Japanese speaker, any research I found here and analysis of the word usage are from other people (actual Japanese people), not mine, and I can leave the links down there if anyone wants to check it out.
Before this, I was aware that いっそ is generally used in Japan by people to joke around, or when frustrated to say stuff in the context of:
“I hate my job. Why don’t I just quit my job and just do some other bullshit which I really wanted to do?”
“Why don’t I just quit school and travel the world?”
But really, it’s an adverb I didn’t think too much of before cause I wasn’t Levihan trash then
And here’s where it gets a little interesting. I was actually reading through articles about this word and there are actually implications to adding いっそ when you suggest these outrageous claims that you’re going to ‘quit your job’ or ‘quit school’
「中途半端をやめて、思い切り～する」<--- So the writer puts this as the most accurate meaning to “ いっそ” based on a quick analysis of the evolution of the Japanese term which in English can mean:
“To stop something half way and to do X to your heart’s content”
Which Hange’s case means: “To run away from the whole war scenario and just live in the forest to one’s hearts content” Basically the main implication of this is HANGE WANTS TO DO IT. HANGE MIGHT ACTUALLY REALLY WANT TO DO IT.
Like she really, preferably seriously wants to run away to the forest with Levi. Like I have gone through other translations using 「いっそ 」
何かに迷ったりしているときに「いっそのこと、～しちゃえば」と言われると、少し勇気が出る気がします。
The author ends this with: When someone is lost with how to go about something, 「いっそのこと、～しちゃえば」, it helps them feel braver or at least it hypes them up.
And I just think that 「いっそ 」 is just an adverb which really helps people look bad at what they would have wanted to do? Or it’s one of those phrases which kinda express those few moments when people are going about the stress of their daily life and the monotony of it and think “What if I just drop all these right now and do what I actually wanted to do?”
And I honestly really believe there are ‘wishful thinking’ implications here because of the amount of time 「いっそ 」has been translated to mean “I wish...” so another acceptable translation for Hange’s phrase “ いっそ二人でここで暮らそうか” is “I wish we could just live here together.”
And if you really wanna push the agenda...
Since 「いっそ 」can actually mean “to our hearts content,” you can actually push it to mean “I wish we could live here to our heart’s content Levi”
But honestly the only point I wanna make here is because people tend to say “HANGE ONLY SAID THAT BECAUSE SHE WAS TIRED” but really after 「いっそ 」? After いっそ二人で? Which literally means “I wish.... JUST THE BOTH OF US... we could live together. So she puts the 「いっそ 」right before the 二人 (TWO OF US TOGETHER).
So I dunno but if she didn’t actually dream of living cottage core with Levi, there were so many other ways she could have phrased it and there were so many other ways she could have joked around while tired.
She didn’t have to say “THE TWO OF US LIVE TOGETHER I WISH” Did she? I’m pretty sure if I was tired and alone with some very casual friend I probably would not be declaring my wish to happily live with them too.
Check the Japanese analysis here
Okay, so about this one.このまま、逃げ隠れて、なにが残る
First glance translation: If we just run away and hide like this, what will be left?”
Looking at the English translation: “If we keep running and hiding, what will that get us?”
So looking back at this, なにが残る does not necessarily mean “what will that get us?”. It can mean “what will be left if we run away and hide?” So honestly this could also be interpreted as Levi thinking back to their important roles in the war not necessarily how useless or dumb of a wish it is to run away to the forest (which the English translation insinuates).
What he could have been saying here is “Okay, I recognize that you wanna run away in the forest but if you do that, will there really be much left of the world for us to live in?”
And so looking back at all of this... Did Levi actually reject her here?
This actually opens up another thought bunny in my head. Were Levi and Hange already aware of their feelings at this point in time?
stormborns
izzy806
discoholicmusic
origamiaround
kaledo-art
titsay
gummygunk
