Turned out that she posted her translation without permission anyways
I mean since it’s not on AO3, writers have no way of knowing. Maybe they couldn’t care less anyways but it bugs me, how bad it is. I wish it doesn’t frustrate me this much but now it haunts me. Some real examples taken from her translation below. Not exaggerating at all this is how she does it.
“B’s being ridiculous, but N's been expecting it.”
Her version: B is funny, but N likes his humor.
?????
“But B throwing aside his own personal interests for the good of someone else is more like a page out of N’s book.”
Her: is more like a story that N is writing in his book.
Does not get what taking a page out of someone’s book means here. Doesn’t even make sense in context.
“N: Are you being self-sacrificing?”
Her: are you trying?
It’s very obvious that she has trouble following the conversation and why “you” is italicized here because she doesn’t get the “a page out of N’s book” part.
“B smirks a little. He finally looks N in the eye and says, ‘People are going to accuse you of rubbing off on me, sir.’”
“N thinks about taking the opening B's left him. He could turn the conversation dirty. He could literally walk over to B and start rubbing off on him in a totally different way, but it wouldn't do either of them any good in the long run. ”
Her: B smiles painstakingly, ... N thinks about B’s opening about leaving him/breaking up with him. He could destroy the conversation. He could walk away from B and just get over him.
This is literally first two paragraphs of the first part of the fic. I made the mistake of not stopping right there unfortunately. She doesn’t understand what B is trying to do there before his deployment and how N is taking it; the failed interpretation then mislead her and it shows in her entire translation. Again I wish I could make this up but it is how she did it. Perhaps it shouldn’t bother me this much since I usually read in English only, but wow. Everyone can have different understandings yea, but this is just wrong and I feel so bad.
Not gunna start a witchhunt but oof I wouldn’t feel comfortable asking my favorite author for permission to translate if I’m not comfortable with my English skill at all. Bravo! You tried.
I sent her a very humble PM full of suggestions and offered to beta for her and she blocked me ayeeee. Maybe I sounded too condescending idk I tried to be nice. Perhaps it’s petty of me to post here but no one from that community follows me on tumblr or ao3 in English anyways.
