ASSUMING OWNERSHIP OF TRANSLATION WORK

ASSUMING OWNERSHIP OF TRANSLATION WORK: A TANGLED WEB

Every once in a while, after having completed a certain translation project and sent it off, someone writes back to me expecting me to agree that I have not done it right in one or more places; depending on the (supposed) error in question it just might test my willingness to assume ownership of my translation work. It’s not that I haven’t done it with all the diligence I know, but there are times when all I can do is have an educated guess of what word or expression the client would have used – assuming that it would even be a word or expression that I am familiar with.
But consider this: I’ve disown completely the idea that the answer (as far as translation matters are concerned) is always straightforward. For example: “Sobre” means “simple” in French, apparently – not “sober”, for some reason. Yet I know that “sobre” means “above” in Spanish! Although, let’s look at this example case: in this humorous bad translations book “Lost in Translation” by Charlie Croker, I saw that some Japanese person once wrote English “dryness machine” as meaning “tumble drier” – is that really a bad translation?

Let’s look at the latest batch of translation anecdotes I have known in my work as a translator…
Original (German to English): “Die Signal-Funktion der Verpackung verliert auch in der digitalen Welt nicht an Bedeutung. ”

Translation: “In the digital world, as well, the significance of packaging is not diminished.” NOT “Even in the digital world, the significance of packaging is not diminished”. And “Im Gegenteil” meaning “on the contrary” rather than “on the other hand.”

The German word “Parkplatz” can mean “parking space” or “car park” in English – is there any time where the writing the wrong translation of that word in English is perfectly understandable?
Original (German to English): “Heimatverbunden und international begehrt. ”

Translation: “homebound and internationally sought”
… or should that be “sought internationally”? Do these necessarily mean the same thing? I remember that, when I did the project in which I saw this, I considered that – by the standards of the Queen’s English, at least –“internationally sought” probably should be said when one means, “people all over the world seek this out”, whereas “sought internationally” should be used to suggest a case of when a particular thing is being sought by some individual or group of them in locations throughout the world. But this is just speculation; I could be wrong… Mind you, having said that, just how congruent is the sentence “Only a few people have seen it worldwide” with the sentence “Only a few people worldwide have seen it”?
Original (German to English): “Unsere Kueche ist wie unseres Haus”, taken from a piece of hotel advertising written in German.

Translation: “Our cuisine is like our home” rather than “Our kitchen is like our home”?
The German word “Waschtisch” apparently means “basin” in English, even though it’s nothing like a table i.e. in German, “Tisch” means “table” in English. Unlike a table, a basin is hollowed out in the middle. But are you sure you never get “washing tables”? In the project in which I saw it, I only knew it was “basin” because I could see a photo of a basin with it.
Original (German to English, from a technical text about painters and primers):“Überarbeitung”
Translation: in English, in a technical sense this means “reworking” in a technical sense rather than “revision” (as with written documents and whatnot).

The last one (French to English) is:
“Je l’utilise depuis un peu plus d’une semaine et pour l’instant je ne trouve rien à redire mais comme 10 est censé représenter la perfection et qu’à mes yeux la perfection n’existe pas alors j’ai mis 9 donc un grand bravo à Nokia si ce n’est le manque d’un lecteur de mini carte SD”

Translation: “I deduct 1 point owing to the fact that certain major applications are missing e.g. Instagram, and I deduct 1 more point owing to the major applications which do not work e.g. Youtube. Otherwise, it shows good mobile characteristics – it is not among the top 3 but it is on par with its generation; and the camera is excellent for an 8 megapixel one – when will there be a 13 megapixel one? 41 megapixels, that would be OK – but there’s still a lot to do at the end.”

Is that a correct translation?

I stumbled a bit at the end. When you think about it, I really was playing “find the missing word” – like the kind of English lesson exercises you do in primary school English lessons. One of these might be like, “insert a word (maybe from a list) into each of the following sentences to complete them and have them make sense”; another one might be reading, making sense of sentences in which each word has the wrong letter at the beginning or the end. But getting translation right – assuming ownership of translation work – isn’t about being good at that sort of thing, is it? No, what it really demands is a sensitivity and aptitude for… anyone? Consider this: an aptitude for empathy.

Johann von Goethe said, “What you don’t understand, you can’t possess.” If I write a translation about something while not knowing as much about the subject matter as I think I do, then am I at a loss to take responsibility for that translation – assume ownership of it for what it really is? What do you think I would do if this happened? The answer is simple enough: whatever I have to – or at least what I can, when I can. There’s a fine line between deeper consideration of something and acceptance of what is common sense in connection with it – but defining it is often the hardest thing to do. You may have heard the phrase, “Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong.” Well, in a world that exists only in a person’s mind, “Anything that can go right, will go right” – even if it doesn’t make sense (if that makes sense). But the core truth of it always hangs in what is said in connection with it. When you think about it, it really is no wonder that some people show vivid imaginations when it comes to looking at a translation that is supposed to be for them (and not necessarily for them alone).

They say pride is one of the seven deadly sins – this would be the ignorant and self-indulgent kind of pride, where those who exhibit it are not necessarily prone to victimising those who witness it (I think of hubris, such as that shown by Xerxes in 300). But there is also the kind of pride which makes a person feel happy and invigorated, with no element of shame about it. Shouldn’t I be proud of all my successful projects as a professional translator to date – if not without tolerating forever the frustration that my own pride in what I can do in terms of translation is capable of swaying my judgement and thereby compelling me to do things like using certain template or cliché expressions which I like to use as part of my own idiolect rather than looking for and putting anything else which could be better trusted to make the content of a translation product properly clear? And so I bend over backwards to weigh my words carefully. I don’t know everything… but then I shouldn’t forget that I’m only human. I imagine that a phobia of making mistakes is a very nasty thing to have. At least it’s the case that, when I’m doing a translation project for someone who I agree knows more about the subject matter than I do, I don’t commit the ignominy of using that an excuse to make reckless guesses which are only good for leaving others guessing.
Prepare to be alarmed or disconcerted… to me it would appear that there is some sort of so-called sense that is valued higher than “common sense”. “Idealised” is perhaps a better word – a sense which is unknowingly / unconsciously regarded or represented as better than what it might actually be in reality, including in comparison with common sense. I reinforce this claim by stating that people tend to find inspiration and that sort of thing in something that’s more elusive (and, usually, less virtuous) than common sense. One translation project I did recently was a German-to-English one that was marketing for a product referred to as “The Magic Pan”; I quote from it:

Original: “Zeigt Ihnen, wann sie auf Kochtemperatur ist!”
My translation: “Lets you know when the cooking temperature is reached!”

When I agreed to write the translation of it that I did, reproduced here, initially I just thought that the “lets you know” bit meant “an alarm rather than some sort of relatively inconspicuous visual indication.” Like I said, I find that this is indicative of a sense which seems to be valued – no, I’ll replace that word, “cherished” – more than common sense. Only later, I read none other than this in the original: “Kein unnötiges Zuwarten: Erstmals zeigt eine Pfanne, wann die optimale Temperatur erreicht ist!” – translated as “No unnecessary watchful waiting: for the first time: a pan which shows when the optimal temperature has been reached!” Something which effectively negates what I wrote earlier. I tell, you professional translation, as boring as it may seem, is not without its roller coaster rides. Yet even when I wrote “No unnecessary watchful waiting” I was torn between the following two notions: a) “no more watching the pan during the cooking” or b) like: “No more waiting, for there is this product available on the market now!”)

What about ownership of satisfaction i.e. “having” satisfaction? What is satisfaction of something if it is not real? Let me ask you this: how many things can you think of that it seems that people are expected either to like or to hate with a passion? Wouldn’t you say that this applies very much among celebrities? And online talent shows – for example, while Britain’s Got Talent introduced us all to such wonderful talents as Paul Potts and Susan Boyle, there are people who are fond of making jokes about how much that show is bad or an embarrassment, to hear them say it. And I recently read a joke about Facebook that went like this: “I posted a comment which said that Facebook is for losers who have no life. I got 156 likes.” My dictionary describes a “vicarious thrill” as “a thrill enjoyed by someone through his imagined participation in another’s experience” – ring any bells (I suggest you be honest with that one)?
You might watch a film or something and insist that you “like it” – that is, find it appealing or whatever – while having no idea what it’s all about. Or it might be jumping on some bandwagon, whatever. Don’t you believe that there is always a time and a place for the definition of any given satisfaction? For example, if you were playing a computer game which had characters in it which definitely stuck in your mind somehow, then how likely would you be to read more information about these characters if it were just presented to you out of the blue (like you just inadvertently ran into it while surfing the net)? What is it that you identify with exactly? What is its position in your life, and indeed the life of the society that you live in?
But I wanted to keep this comment relevant to my work as a professional translator. Try to imagine for a moment: a story of an English person in a foreign country, where so much is alien to them, and not just the language (and yes, I know I spent a year at the University of Poitiers as part of my degree) – now try to think about this: what about a story of a foreign person in some other foreign country? How would someone respond to something like that?
Unlike some people, I am anything but prone to linguistic mishaps i.e. just plain awful spelling and grammatical errors such as that sign which said, “Cars posted here without a permit will be toad away.” Even so, the fact is that sometimes when I do a translation project for someone they claim that I don’t understand the subject matter (“their thing”) rather than my own linguistic work in the project (“my thing”), even if they would be willing to admit to being jealous of what I can do on that score (prompted or otherwise), and even if “their thing” is none of my business personally (there is a reason where I am expected to sign confidentiality agreements in connection with translation projects from time to time). Yes, professional translation work should be more than “correct” from a purely theoretical perspective; the fact is that my clients want to be able to “own” my translation work just as I once owned it (certainly if they intend to apply it in work pursuits or whatever).

But I would like to ask: if the concept of mistranslation / representation of a text in another language is one that you can debate with some level of confidence, where and when was it really born for you? In one French to English translation project I did recently, when translating the text, “Je regrette seulement de ne pas retrouver exactement mon Outlook comme avec Windows 6.5 de mon HTC… EDWIN MAYER.”, I thought for a bit before ultimately and formally deciding on “the only thing I regret is not being able to find my Outlook in EXACTLY THE SAME WAY AS WITH WINDOWS 6.5 with my HTC… EDWIN MAYER”.

I like to believe that keeping my eyes open for chances to use particular expressions here and there which will definitely reflect faith in my translation work, is enough to keep my spirits up. Although everything said in the original document of a given translation project means one thing and one thing only, understanding is properly is but half the battle; there is any number of ways that it could be represented in a new language, but I knew a long time ago that eager creativeness in this regard should be exercised in moderation, and not recklessly! At least I can promise to place the faith in my translations that my clients don’t have time for and / or wouldn’t know how… all so that one day the client will be able to put their faith in them.

Come to think of it, if a client gets back to me about a piece of translation work that I have done for them determined to challenge me on what I believe to be a good, well-informed idea contained therein with what I can agree is a good, well-informed idea of their own (nothing capricious!), then that must ultimately mean that they place faith in my translation work like I am supposed to do! So I can’t have done that badly! I should remember to take the risk and let my translation work have the presence and influence that it is supposed to have!