Ty Kendall United Kingdom Local time: 17:05 Member (2011) Hebrew to English
Sep 4, 2011
It's rare to see translation/interpreting in (fictional) media, and even rarer to see it portrayed accurately or positively...I am reminded of Nicole Kidman's "The Interpreter" :-/
...and "Spooks" (UK TV Series) where it seems almost every character can speak everything from Afrikaans to Zulu. I am reminded of one character - "Ruth's" impromptu address to a conference in Mandarin, the topic? Astrophysics. The challenge? Remembering the Mandarin word for "Quark".
....hmmm.....I'll let you draw your own conclusions about the likelihood of that.....
There may be an argument for any such exposure of translation in fictional media, no matter how inaccurate or implausible, simply to aid increased visibility....but I'm not convinced...
Though I was pleasantly surprised to see translation used as a plot device in the most recent episode of "Torchwood:Miracle Day".
The plot actually involved deliberate mistranslation, but was interesting nonetheless:
It involved an original statement "The blessing saved me" being purposefully mistranslated to "It was a blessing I was saved" (to obscure the fact that "the blessing" is an entity acting as an agent semantically) and finally mistranslated once more into English as "It was a godsend that I was saved" (to obliterate any mention of "the blessing" at all).
I thought it was unusual to see such a detailed example of translation on prime-time TV, but it was decently done and surprisingly central to the episode's plot, as opposed to being periphery or inconsequential.
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Phil Hand China Local time: 00:05 Member (2011) Chinese to English
But the Chinese for quark is just quark...
Sep 4, 2011
I haven't watched Spooks for ages, so I missed that gem. That is a particularly egregious error, because the word in Chinese really is just a transliteration: kuake (pronounced kwar-kuh).
I'd forgotten Torchwood was back. I'll have to go and see if those geeky pirates have made it available yet.
While it's a bit much to expect lots of translation on TV - it's visual medium, after all - there's lots of good stuff in books. I just read my first China Mieville (The City and the City), which I highly recommend, and I hear his latest, Embassytown, is all about language. Anyone read it yet?
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Ty Kendall United Kingdom Local time: 17:05 Member (2011) Hebrew to English
TOPIC STARTER
A quarking crime...
Sep 4, 2011
Phil Hand wrote:
I haven't watched Spooks for ages, so I missed that gem. That is a particularly egregious error, because the word in Chinese really is just a transliteration: kuake (pronounced kwar-kuh).
I'd forgotten Torchwood was back. I'll have to go and see if those geeky pirates have made it available yet.
While it's a bit much to expect lots of translation on TV - it's visual medium, after all - there's lots of good stuff in books. I just read my first China Mieville (The City and the City), which I highly recommend, and I hear his latest, Embassytown, is all about language. Anyone read it yet?
Hello Phil!
Thanks for sharing that, although that just makes the Spooks scene even more unforgivable. I suppose there's always the chance it was some form of in-joke....we can hope.
Indeed, Torchwood is back, and yes those pesky pirates have been at work, although I'm not sure I can in all honesty recommend it. The latest episode was interesting to me only because of the use of translation as a plot device. The past 9 weeks of it have been quite a yawn-fest I must admit. The online reviews aren't too favourable either, but it's all subjective really and you might love it.
Well, the final series of Spooks airs in a few weeks time, so they still have time to redeem themselves
I haven't read any of his books, but I might just do that now... is he paying you commission?
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Just Opera Belgium Local time: 18:05 French to English + ...
Plot: Russian author, Andrei Gortchakov (Oleg Yankovsky) accompanied by his translator, Eugenia (Domiziana Giordano), has travelled to the hills of Tuscany to see Piero della Francesca’s Madonna of Childbirth...
"Eugenia attempts to engage him in a conversation over Arseni Tarkovsky’s (Tarkovsky’s father) poetry, but Gortchakov dismisses the book, reasoning that the simple act of translation loses the nuances of the native language. Eugenia then argues, “How can we get to know each other?” He replies, “By abolishing frontiers between states.”
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Just Opera Belgium Local time: 18:05 French to English + ...
other one that springs to mind...
Sep 5, 2011
Jean-Luc Godard : Le Mépris
The famous "translation" scene with Michel Piccoli and Jack Palance, FFW (past the sex scene!) to 04:57 for it.
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The translation workplace 
