Nachlass

English translation: estate / unpublished works

GLOSSARY ENTRY (DERIVED FROM QUESTION BELOW)
German term or phrase:Nachlass
English translation:estate / unpublished works
Entered by: Chris Rowson (X)

12:46 May 16, 2003
German to English translations [PRO]
Art/Literary
German term or phrase: Nachlass
I must have seen the English form hundreds of times in exactly this context - or maybe we just don´t say this.

The context here is the "Nachlass" of a composer who left many unpublished works, one more of which is now to be brought out. I have the word only in the title of a brief press release: "Veröffentlichung aus "X"s Nachlass".
Chris Rowson (X)
Local time: 02:23
Estate
Explanation:
seems to be the only suggestion which was not specifically assigned to any one
person or organisation, etc.

But no, I'm not all that confident!
Selected response from:

David Moore (X)
Local time: 02:23
Grading comment
Well, many thanks to all contributors for the fine range of options, and the discussion. I digested it all, returned to the text and my feeling told me to use "estate" in my document.

In retrospect, I feel that "unpublished works" would have been a good alternative. I also agree that "posthumous works" is an accepted term that could be used here, although I personally find the oddity of the apparent meaning too much.

I am inclined to agree with Kurt and other commenters that "legacy" is a broader concept than is intended here. It can´t be "release", though: the guy´s classical and the text is "scholarly", so we don´t talk about sordid modernisms like that :-)
4 KudoZ points were awarded for this answer



Summary of answers provided
4 +4unpublished works
Andrea Nemeth-Newhauser
5 +1Posthumous works
Kurt Beals
5I agree with jerrie!
Beth Kantus
4 +1posthumous release from X / posthumous X release
Mary Worby
5from X's Opus
Nancy Arrowsmith
4legacy
jerrie
4bequest
Kim Metzger
3Estate
David Moore (X)


  

Answers


2 mins   confidence: Answerer confidence 4/5Answerer confidence 4/5
legacy


Explanation:
see link


    Reference: http://www.plumbago.co.uk/events/2002-02-19th.htm
jerrie
United Kingdom
Local time: 01:23
Native speaker of: Native in EnglishEnglish
PRO pts in pair: 1469

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
agree  Ino66 (X)
18 mins

neutral  gangels (X): Legacy is an abstraction, eg. "Haydn's legacy lives on in Mozart". Here, they talk about an 'actual work' on paper.
40 mins

neutral  David Moore (X): Too specific as to "legatee", I think
1 hr

agree  izy
2 hrs

disagree  Kurt Beals: "Nachlass" here really refers to a specific body of works which were unpublished at the time of the author's death. "Legacy" I would take to include everything which the composer left to posterity - including works published before his/her death.
3 hrs

disagree  Graeme Currie: agree with Kurt
2 days 1 hr
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4 mins   confidence: Answerer confidence 4/5Answerer confidence 4/5
bequest


Explanation:
As in literary bequest. I would think this should apply to composers too.

--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 2003-05-16 14:14:47 (GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

A mere three sonatas appeared in print in Schubert\'s lifetime. Others out of his musical bequest were published a few years after his death by friends and were given posthumous opus numbers. One of these was the monumental Sonata B flat major D 960 which was the last of the posthumous sonatas and as such Schubert\'s last instrumental composition of all.



--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 2003-05-16 14:29:41 (GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

Bach\'s choral masterpiece, the B Minor Mass, once acclaimed as the \"greatest work of music of all ages and of all peoples\", is still viewed as the summa of his vocal and sacred composition. Its genesis stretched over more than two decades from 1724, but it was not performed in its entirety until 1859. It became Bach\'s bequest to his successors and to the future as an ideal of polyphonic vocal sacred music.

http://users.ox.ac.uk/~azzopard/obc/obc_concerts02-03.html



    Langenscheidt Muret-Sanders
Kim Metzger
Mexico
Local time: 19:23
Native speaker of: Native in EnglishEnglish
PRO pts in pair: 22192

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
agree  Sanaa Omrany
13 mins

disagree  gangels (X): That's 'Überlassung' or 'Gift' respectively. E.g., "He bequeathed his unpublished works [(i.e. his 'Nachlaß'] to the nation)
33 mins
  -> Nachlass = legacy or bequest. Bequest = something bequeathed. Bequeath = to hand down

neutral  David Moore (X): Too specific as to "beneficiary", I think
59 mins
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22 mins   confidence: Answerer confidence 4/5Answerer confidence 4/5 peer agreement (net): +4
unpublished works


Explanation:
There is a catalog of Beethoven's unpublished works, for example.

Andrea Nemeth-Newhauser
Local time: 18:23
Native speaker of: Hungarian
PRO pts in pair: 53

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
agree  gangels (X)
8 mins

neutral  David Moore (X): "Publishing an unpublished work...." Hmmm...
43 mins

agree  Ron Stelter: I do think it works if you say "publishing of previously unpublished works"
1 hr

agree  Heike Behl, Ph.D.: cf Langenscheidt: literarischer Nachlaß unpublished works;
4 hrs

agree  Graeme Currie: fourthed
2 days 46 mins
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1 hr   confidence: Answerer confidence 3/5Answerer confidence 3/5
Estate


Explanation:
seems to be the only suggestion which was not specifically assigned to any one
person or organisation, etc.

But no, I'm not all that confident!

David Moore (X)
Local time: 02:23
Native speaker of: English
PRO pts in pair: 9672
Grading comment
Well, many thanks to all contributors for the fine range of options, and the discussion. I digested it all, returned to the text and my feeling told me to use "estate" in my document.

In retrospect, I feel that "unpublished works" would have been a good alternative. I also agree that "posthumous works" is an accepted term that could be used here, although I personally find the oddity of the apparent meaning too much.

I am inclined to agree with Kurt and other commenters that "legacy" is a broader concept than is intended here. It can´t be "release", though: the guy´s classical and the text is "scholarly", so we don´t talk about sordid modernisms like that :-)
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1 hr   confidence: Answerer confidence 5/5
I agree with jerrie!


Explanation:
MSN Entertainment - Music: Bela Bartok
... The composer's legacy included a number of ambitious but unrealized projects, including
a Seventh String Quartet; two major works, the Viola Concerto and the ...
entertainment.msn.com/Artist/?artist=242388 - 28k

Bob Marley Posters and His Legacy
Bob Marley Posters. Bob Marley Posters: His Legacy. Bob Marley posters are
only part of the artist's legacy; his real gift to us is his music. ...
www.bob-marley-posters.com/legacy.html - 7k

Saving Time: The Archives of The Andy Warhol Museum
... sale in history, and the glitziest." Fueled by the power of Warhol's celebrity, buyers
at the sale paid record-high prices for a piece of the artist's legacy. ...
www.carnegiemuseums.org/cmag/bk_issue/ 1996/janfeb/warhol.html - 8k

New Music for the Piano, Robert Helps
... a Ford Foundation grant; from then on most of his compositions were for ... His legacy
includes concertos for piano and violin and his Symphony on Poems of William ...
www.composersrecordings.com/releases_detail.cfm/ release_id/318 - 48k

Latin American Music
... knowledge of Mexican folk songs which he later used in his compositions. ... Gould
was comfortable composing in many genres and his legacy includes works for ...
www.brevard.cc.fl.us/~cbob/latin-american-00.html - 37k - Cached - Similar pages

Great Composers Remembered '00
... the work one of the grandest of all of Bach's compositions for organ ... His legacy includes
three symphonies, three ballets, an opera, a film score, four Broadway ...
www.brevard.cc.fl.us/~cbob/great-composers-00.html - 25k




Beth Kantus
United States
Local time: 21:23
Native speaker of: English
PRO pts in pair: 924

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
agree  izy
32 mins

disagree  Graeme Currie: As with Kurt's objection to Jerrie's suggestion, in virtually all these cases what is being referred to is an artist's entire output.
1 day 23 hrs
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2 hrs   confidence: Answerer confidence 4/5Answerer confidence 4/5 peer agreement (net): +1
posthumous release from X / posthumous X release


Explanation:
Just another idea, although I think this works more for someone who has died recently than, for example, Beethoven!

This is from the Oxford-Duden:
literarischer/künstlerischer Nachlaß unpublished/unexhibited works pl. (left by a writer/an
artist); aus dem Nachlaß veröffentlichen publish posthumously;

I agree with those above who feel neither legacy nor bequest really works!

HTH

Mary

Mary Worby
United Kingdom
Local time: 01:23
Native speaker of: English
PRO pts in pair: 2770

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
agree  Kurt Beals: You beat me to the punch... I actually think this can apply to authors from the more distant past as well (search for "posthumous works" on amazon and you get Shelley & some of his contemporaries).
1 hr
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2 hrs   confidence: Answerer confidence 5/5
from X's Opus


Explanation:
performed/released posthumously

Nancy Arrowsmith
Local time: 19:23
Native speaker of: Native in EnglishEnglish
PRO pts in pair: 474
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3 hrs   confidence: Answerer confidence 5/5 peer agreement (net): +1
Posthumous works


Explanation:
Publication of X's posthumous works

(or "Selections from X's posthumous works to be published", or something to that effect).

I know it sounds like it should mean that his corpse is composing (instead of decomposing, as it ought to be doing), but it is a standard term - look on google, or on amazon.com (e.g. Posthumous Poems of Percy Bysshe Shelley (Collected Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley)
by Percy Bysshe Shelley). Despite the contradiction, it's accepted shorthand, even used in book titles.


    Reference: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/search-handle-url/ix=books...
Kurt Beals
United States
Local time: 18:23
Native speaker of: Native in EnglishEnglish
PRO pts in pair: 52

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
agree  Ellen Zittinger
1 hr

neutral  David Moore (X): Come on, Kurt, you can't treat Google of all things as the Holy Bible!!
2 hrs
  -> True enough - but what you'll find are things like book titles, academic papers, and website about Canadian laws regarding "Term of copyright in posthumous works" - all of which seem like fairly reliable references.
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