Translation holds so many places in our society, and it can be very interesting to learn about some of them. I’m not a big opera fan, and I never thought about translation needs of an opera house. In the Baltimore Sun, they wrote of an opera performance where a poor translation lead to a distraction of laughter during the performance.

The Baltimore Opera Company’s opening performance of Verdi’s darkly beautiful ‘La forza del destino’ was nearly ruined for me by a sound not typically associated with this work: laughter. No, I’m not talking about the mild comic relief Verdi intended, a la Shakespeare, in a couple of scenes involving an out-of-sorts friar. The giggles and guffaws came instead in the midst of deadly serious business. I consider the primary culprit to be supertitles, the translations of the text projected above the stage. Sometimes I think people were better off not knowing every line in an opera.

…The line in ‘Forza’ that started the laughter Saturday night at the Lyric Opera House came at one of the most introspective and lyrical passages in the score, when the doomed Alvaro contemplates his misery. The original words from the libretto are probably best translated as ‘Life is hell for those who are unhappy.’ The translation used here (if memory serves) was ‘Life is miserable when you are unhappy.’ Either way, it’s not a great line — in English. And I can understand why it would strike some folks as comical. I still wouldn’t disturb a performance by laughing, or blurting out, as the man behind me did, ‘Boy, that’s profound.’ The point, expressed by Alvaro in more poetic Italian, is that the heavy curse of a cruel fate has made him feel that living without his beloved Leonora is worse than not living at all. When people are robbed of what gives them happiness, life is hell. Not such a belly laugh, now, is it? I hope the opera company will replace that supertitle translation in the remaining performances, and just get the gist across, not worrying about the closeness of the translation. Or just remove it entirely. Nothing, at any rate, should disturb Antonello Palombi’s gorgeous singing in that scene.

It may strike most of us as a minor difference in meaning, but to the intended audience is meant a lot. Like many translations, it’s not the literal meaning of the words, but the shades of language and communication that are so difficult and so important to capture. Read more.

This is a fun site - translations of High School the Musical in Spanish. But what’s more interesting to me is the preface that describes the translations…

Welcome to Breaking Free, a humble site for fans of the Disney Channel Original Movie High School Musical who are either Hispanic or studying Spanish in school. After hours of strategic paraphrases, syntactical experimentation, revisions, and verbal debugging, I am pleased to present a complete collection of all the songs from the movie translated into Spanish.

What makes these Spanish lyrics useful is that I did not translate the songs literally. The translations here are pro canendo (Latin: “for singing”) translations. Each one remains as faithful as possible to the meaning of the original lyrics while expressing that meaning in words that fit the rhythm and melody of the song. While some specific meaning is sacrificed, the loss is minimal and well worth the preservation of the musical quality.

Translation is not a static job. A good translation is not about a literal word for word English to Spanish change. You need to take into account context, subject and purpose. In this case, the purpose is to have singable and possibly rhyming / musical lyrics. Read more and enjoy the music.

 Harry Potter made the news again, this time with the most recent translation into Ukrainian. Not long ago, HP made the news because of the throngs of “netroot” fans doing mass unauthorized translations of this popular book. Now it’s making news because of a current and new translation was the first in the Russian states. Read more. And if you want to see photos from the release party, click here.

In an attempt to win over extra readers, the A-Ba-Ba-Ha-La-Ma-Ha publishing house once released “Harry Potter and the Order of Phoenix” – the fifth installment in the famous series – considerably earlier than Russian publishers, which made the book an absolute bestseller in Ukraine. The same thing happened with the sixth novel.

But with the latest seventh and final installment, “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows,” Ukrainian publishers literally beat everyone, having officially released the Ukrainian translation of the book on Sept. 25, which made it the very first translation of the book to be released in a foreign language in the whole world.

I just came across this 10+ year old interview that Madonna had when she was filming Evita in Budapest. Apparently Madonna sat down with a Hungarian reporter, and the reporter’s questions were posed in Hungarian, then translated into English for Madonna, whose replies were then translated back into Hungarian for the paper’s exclusive. Shortly thereafter, at the request of USA Today, Madonna’s comments were then retranslated from Hungarian back into English for the benefit of that paper’s readers. The results are humorous to say the least.

A few highlights:

Blikk: Madonna, Budapest says hello with arms that are spread-eagled. Did you have a visit here that was agreeable? Are you in good odor? You are the biggest fan of our young people who hear your musical productions and like to move their bodies in response.

Madonna: Thank you for saying these compliments [holds up hands]. Please stop with taking sensationalist photographs until I have removed my garments for all to see [laughs]. This is a joke I have made.

Blikk: Madonna, let’s cut toward the hunt: Are you a bold hussy-woman that feasts on men who are tops?

Madonna: Yes, yes, this is certainly something that brings to the surface my longings. In America it is not considered to be mentally ill when a woman advances on her prey in a discotheque setting with hardy cocktails present. And there is a more normal attitude toward leather play-toys that also makes my day.

Blikk: Is this how you met Carlos, your love-servant who is reputed? Did you know he was heaven-sent right off the stick? Or were you dating many other people in your bed at the same time?

Madonna: No, he was the only one I was dating in my bed then, so it is a scientific fact that the baby was made in my womb using him. But as regards these questions, enough! I am a woman and not a test-mouse! Carlos is an everyday person who is in the orbit of a star who is being muscle-trained by him, not a sex machine.

Read the entire interview.

This is so interesting to me. Translation is so important to communication, to our spirits, to living. This article says that they completed the first translation of the old and new testaments into Persian in over 100 years! No matter your religion, it has to be important to know that we have the ability to reach out to people all over the world with our messages.

“Today’s Persian Version” of the Bible has been completed and was officially dedicated in Istanbul, Turkey in August, enabling Persian-speaking people around the world to have a present-day translation of the Old and New Testaments.

The translation is significant because the last Persian translation of the Bible was done in the 1890s.

“This means that we now have a translation that is easy to understand and is in contemporary modern Persian language,” said the Rev. Kenneth Thomas, translation consultant for the new Bible and a former Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) mission co-worker in Iran.

Persian is the language of more than 100 million people worldwide, with the majority of them living in Iran, Afghanistan and Tajikistan.

While most of our translations are professional and commercial in nature, we never forget translation is always about communication and often it is about art, poetry and connecting to other cultures. In this story, a college professor eloquently expresses how translation can be a bridge between worlds.

“I think of translation as a type of magic,” Chambers said to a crowd of about 40 ASU students, faculty and community members after reading aloud one of the stories in his volume.

Fulton and Chambers provided a unique perspective on literature, audience members said.

Asian language graduate student Brian Hurley said he found the readings and question-and-answer session interesting because “translators don’t get a ton of attention.”

“They exist in a strange gray area, and they function as a bridge,” Hurley said. “Dr. Chambers summed that up really well.”

Both professors said they carefully select their projects based on the writing style of the original author to make their function as a bridge easier.

“There is a kind of conjunction, a kind of merger of personalities when we translate,” Fulton said about a translator’s relationship with the original text’s author.

Chambers said he agreed that translating requires a certain likeness between the original author and translator. He looks for a text that “resonates,” he said.

“If you don’t feel that kind of affinity with the author, it’s difficult to translate, to even muster the will to translate,” Chambers said.

This is an interesting article that basically says two things… 1) Providing materials in a communities makes sense from a business or from a mission point of view. 2) You need to provide professional translation or you are going to cause more problems that you help. I think the most telling two paragraphs are here:

A cursory survey of documents provided in Spanish by various agencies turned up many riddled with errors, from misspellings and grammar problems to literal renderings bordering on the incomprehensible.

Huszar thinks that written translation should be done by native speakers who have lived in a Spanish-speaking country and studied at the university level. Inaccurate translations or those using “Spanglish” only add to the distortion of the language, she says.

Read more.

How do The Dalles families who speak only Spanish get information on vital services from local public agencies? More or less imperfectly, it seems, especially when it comes to written text.Local strategies for providing information in Spanish run the gamut from manual translation work by paid, qualified staff to computer-assisted, on-the-fly translating.

And everything in between — or nothing at all.

“They’re not that good,” says Casa Loma resident Fanny Vazquez of the majority of translations done here. The young mother, who was raised in The Dalles and speaks both Spanish and English, often accompanies friends from her west-end apartment complex as an interpreter.

“Most of the Mexicans don’t even understand how they [translate] from English to Spanish,” she says. “[They think], ‘What are they talking about?’”

Still, whatever the challenges, methods, and flaws of the practice, many agencies are increasingly attempting to serve the growing Spanish-speaking community through translation.

“It just makes sense,” says Wasco County District Attorney Eric Nisley, who knows of no legal requirement outside of the court system to provide for interpretation or translation into a language other than English — except sign language and braille, as mandated by the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Still, he says, many organizations have made a policy decision to provide information in Spanish, finding that it gives them an economic advantage — or a service advantage in the case of public agencies.

f the local entities The Chronicle talked to, four — the Northern Wasco County People’s Utility District, the Northern Wasco County School District, Wasco Sherman Public Health, and the Wasco County Department of Youth Services — say they regularly provide written information in Spanish.

New York City is planning on translating their website into multiple languages for better access for their highly immigrant workforce. This is great news for the millions of city residents who do not speak English as a primary language. This is also great news for city services which should be relieved by being able to provide services on the web without having to find live interpretation services. Read more.

The city of many tongues will soon have a Web site nearly everyone can understand.

City Hall plans to translate nyc.gov - the city’s English-only, multiagency Web site - into several languages “to better serve the city’s diverse population,” said Mayor Bloomberg’s spokesman Matthew Kelly.

At least 36% of the city’s population are immigrants, and the census data show that nearly half of the city’s residents speak a language other than English.

The city Department of Information Technology and Telecommunications began advertising last week for companies that may be interested in taking on the task.

While only in the infant stages, the goal is to allow visitors to click on a button that translates the information into Spanish, Chinese and several other languages - an option already available on Access NYC, a site that lets residents know what services they qualify for.

This story is an interesting read because it speaks to the artistry / challenges in translating unusual language. It takes a very skilled translator to keep the original intent of the author, and this article illustrates one reason why. More.

China’s literary scene seems to have found a new icon in Guo Xiaolu, whose book A Concise Chinese English Dictionary for Lovers, published in 2006, has been a runaway success in the UK and has been shortlisted for the Orange Prize.

Writing in a second language, it would seem, is still a huge barrier for the Chinese. But Guo, currently riding the wave, has shown that it doesn’t have to be.

Despite her recent foray into English fiction, the 33-year-old Fujian-born film maker and writer has turned what is her potential weakness into her greatest strength. Rather then trying to rid her language of any Chinglish-sounding phrases, she’s made Chinglish part of her style.

In her book, Guo tells the story of a naïve Chinese exchange student, Z, who falls in love with a hopeless commitment-phobe and artist in Hackney, east London. When Z touches down at Heathrow, her English is, in fact, quite broken, but as the novel proceeds it becomes more and more fluent.

…

“They said it was wonderful but they couldn’t publish it. At the time, I thought I should make it difficult for Westerners to read my Chinese English, but then I realised that no one could follow because I deliberately inserted so many errors; each sentence was upside down. My ambitions to play with the language were too grand and it killed the story.”

Citing examples of her vaguely Dadaist prose (“I on the sky. I not mature yet. Here on the mountain, 1993 eat the barbeque.”), Guo describes the process as having linguistic fun. But the fun truly begins when the book is translated into other languages.

Says Guo, “The Italian version just came out and they say it’s a cool, really funky translation and I said ‘Are there any mistakes?’ And they said ‘No, almost no mistakes.’ I just laughed because the grammar and the structure is wrong in the English original. My German translator is working on the novel and she says that there are loads of mistakes in the German version and I think it’s wonderful.”

Guo’s first critical success abroad, Village of Stone, was a compelling story about a girl who tries to leave her loveless childhood behind. She explores a similar theme of “rural escape” in her upcoming novel, Desperate Kingdom of Desire, about a Chinese ragpicker who sorts through British garbage in China.

Guo’s daring manoeuvre has, for sure, paid off well. Is it all a bit gimmicky? Perhaps, but Guo has shown not only an ability to transcend language, but also an adept use of imagery and metaphors which don’t get lost in translation.

While I don’t listen to punk rock, I love this review of the punk music band, La Plebe. The band, which sings in Spanish, provided an English translation which was appreciated by the reviewer, showing that bridging the language divide can help communication in just about any community. Read more.

Recorded at Motor Studios with producer Bill Gould (founding member of Faith No More, Brujeria), ¡Hasta la Muerte! is 30 minutes of pure energy. The song “Pinches Fronteras” sings of America’s arrogance towards those trying to find a better life across the border; “Plebe Por Vida” serves as an anthem for the band shouting “We have each other, we’re stronger than those who control,” and “Cerdos Al Marchar” is a tale of a rally turned riot: “They’ve come prepared with rags to protect their faces, for justice they rose together as brothers.”

…

Being someone that doesn’t speak Spanish I have to thank the band for putting the translations in the insert with the lyrics. The message of this record is strong, and including the translations insures that that message is not lost by any of the audience. This record is out; go buy it, give it a couple of listens, and then tell your friends about how awesome it is. You’ll thank me, I promise.