tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sat Dec 02 18:28:30 1995

Back to archive top level

To this year's listing

[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next]

Re: Review of translations

> I recently submitted an original work to several talented 
> "Klingonists" for review. All but one, the honorable Nick 
> Nicolas, was able/willing to put forth the effort. 
> This tells me that there are probably far too few talented 
> Klingonist out there to review all the works we would  
> like to have published. (THis also assumes that  
> there are enough completed works ready for review.) 
>  
> Let's just assume for a moment that there are  
> 10 translated/original tlhIngan Hol works ready to  
> get reviewed. Can we do it?  

I think your pessimism in this area is wrong-headed, and ultimately moot.

Think about the past few years and the growth in number and in skill of 
Klingonists, both on and off this list.

Consider that at the first qep'a' we had about ten people, fewer than half who 
might be called "fluent" (and some of those just weren't talking). Compare that 
to the same event a year later. The qep'a' cha'DIch had twenty people, all of 
whom were speaking at least some Klingon, and more than half were doing a damn 
impressive job of it. And that number does not include some of the people (such 
as yourself, David) who are experienced with the language.  Next summer I'm 
hoping we'll have thirty people and more Klingon than we've ever heard before!

My point is that we're basically growing our own translators.  That's held back 
the work because there haven't been enough qualified folks to go around.  That 
is changing, slowly, but it's changing.

Also, we're still building up a body of translated material.  It's one thing to 
translate a few lines or even a couple pages, and quite another thing to manage 
the theme and style of a larger work.  Building up some practice and expertise 
at this takes time too.  I believe that much of the editing delay of Hamlet has 
been the concequence of pulling back stylistics to a more main stream form.

And finally, to go back to the example of your poem that you had such trouble 
getting help with (and it *is* a long work), you miss an important point.  I 
view that work as an original composition in Klingon, one which you were 
translating *back* into English, and not the other way around.  This is a very 
different thing from taking someone else's work in English (or any language) and
making sure you've got the feel and the intent of those words in the first 
place, and then conveyed them in Klingon.

Bottom line, I don't see any reason to despair.  I believe the KSRP will 
continue pumping out Shakespeare on a regular basis.  I believe the KBTP will 
become fired up when they see Hamlet actually come out and will get back on 
track.  I believe that the tremendous work of the Beginners' Grammarians on this
mailing list will continue to help groom future translators and that the whole 
thing will just keep snowballing.  The trick is to get up to that level of 
momentum.

Lawrence

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:: Dr Lawrence M Schoen, Director   :: The KLI is a nonprofit ::
:: The Klingon Language Institute   :: tax exempt corporation ::
:: POB 634, Flourtown, PA 19031 USA :: DaH HuchlIj'e' ghonob  ::
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
::  [email protected]  ::  [email protected]  :::  215/836-4955  ::
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Back to archive top level