tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Wed Sep 17 23:53:30 1997
[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next]
Re: [KLBC] RHOTS
- From: Qov <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: [KLBC] RHOTS
- Date: Wed, 17 Sep 1997 23:53:21 -0700
At 11:17 AM 9/17/97 -0700, Duncan wrote:
>What follows is the result of me sitting in bed
>sniffling, with TKD in one hand, a pen and paper in the other and my
>lines jumbling around in my head.
bIropmo' jujoy'. wejpuH. :)
For anyone following this: in many cases Duncan's translation is different
from the original in meaning, probably because he couldn't figure out how to
translate the original. I haven't commented on these deviations in most
places, because Duncan obviously knew he wasn't saying the same thing.
>peQaq(qang?).
>Save you all.
You cannot translate anything from any language until you actually
know what the original means. Go and find out what "save you all"
represents, in this context, and then translate that. If you're
supposed to make this speech in a play, then it would certainly
benefit you to know what it means. {peQaq}, as far as I know, doesn't mean
anything.
>ma'tIn 'oH pongwIj.
>My name is Martin.
Read section 6.3 on the 'to be' structure that uses pronouns. You're
missing something here.
>Spey'In SuvwI'na' jIH.
>I'm a soldier of Spain, and that's it.
Unmarked transliterations help no one. Just write *Spain*.
Consider a more precise word for soldier. Do you really believe that
"and that's it" is emphasizing the genuineness of the speaker's
soldierness, here? I don't. I think it means that the speaker is saying
that he is a soldier and nothing else. {-na'} doesn't convey this meaning.
>puH, Huch lalDan je QaHpu' veSwIj.
>Most of my life I've spent fighting, for land, treasure and the
>cross.
In English you can fight for a prize won by the victor, for a
beneficiary of your victory, or for a reason you entered the
conflict. The sentence you have translated is a zeugma, with the same word
being used once to have different meanings. The speaker's wars have not
helped money or land. Determine what each "for" really means, and translate
those.
The sentence structure may be entirely different.
>lo'laHqu' jIH! tugh jIHegh, 'ej pe'ruDaq mumol, puH wIQIH.
>I'm worth millions! Soon I'll be dead, and they'll bury me out
>here in Peru, the land I helped ruin as a boy.
Does the speaker have a specific "they" in mind, or does he just
mean that he will be buried? Consider using a {-lu'} construction
to express this. The construction "... Peru, the land I..." needs to
be taken as "... Peru, the land which I ..." Or you can move it to
a separate sentence. Some people do not believe that {-bogh} can be
used in this sort of clause, and would insist you move it to a
separate sentence.
>pIgh ngaS lutwIj - pIgh Huch je.
> THis story is about ruin, ruin and gold.
This construction works in English because the emphatic repetition of
the object immediately follows the object. It doesn't make as much sence in
Klingon. {qel} is probably preferable to {ngaS} here. And you get a mu'tay'
prize for using a word I had to look up: {pIgh}. I think, however, that it
refers to the physical remains of a ruined object, not the abstract concept
of "ruin."
> lut mIp law' vereng (ie. Ferenginar) mip pus.
> More gold than any of you
> will ever see, even if you work in a counting house.
Watch your caps. {mIp puS}. Good cultural recast.
>cha'maH loS 'uy' loD chargh wa'vatlh javmaH Soch loD! "chay,"
>botlhob - vIja'.
>I'm going to tell you how 167 men conquered an empire of 24
>million...
Excellent recast around "tell you how." Correction on verb prefixes,
though: The words spoken are not the object of a verb of saying. {chay'
Sutlhob} means "You ask how." {qaja'} means "I will tell you."
> 'ej latlh lutmey vIja'. lutmey jabe' loDpu'.
> And then things that no-one has ever told.
We've never seen {ja'} take an object other than the person
addressed. {jatlh} however, can definitely take as its object the
thing spoken. So to be safe, {lutmey vIjatlh} and {lutmey jatlhbe'}
>Sujach 'ej jInep SuQub.
>- things to make you groan and cry out I'm lying.
You will scream and say that you are lying.
If you're using Qub as a verb of saying, the speech needs to be what the
people would actually think. The people would think {bInep} so {bInep
SuQub}. If you're not using it as a verb of saying (I think either is
probably acceptable here), you need a sentence as object construction {jInep
'e' boQub}.
>chaq jInep - pe'ruDaq loDpu' QeH u'ropDaq loDpu' QeH.
>And perhaps I am. The air in Peru is cold and sour, like in a vault, and
>wits turn easier here even than in Europe.
You lost a couple of things here. Dropped half a sentence, forgotten
{law'/puS} and made some strange vocabulary choices. {QeH} is 'be angry' or
'anger.' I would translate 'wits turn' as {maw'choHlu'}.
>'ach HIHar -
maj.
>vISovpu' law' Hoch luSov, 'ej vIvuvpu'qu'. tulwIj ghaH, toDwI'-nagh beQwIj.
>But grant me this: I saw him closer than anyone, and had cause only to love
>him. He was my altar, my bright image of salvation.
You got tired here and you lost me. All of a sudden you've forgotten how to
do {law'/puS}, put an emphatic on the wrong suffix, put a noun suffix on a
verb ...
You can do better.
>'anSisHo (how do I get a "Fr") pItlha'ro!
>Fransisco Pizarro!
I'd use {vIr} if I had to transliterate. But *Fransisco* is
preferable.
>Possibly this is the worst attempt at translation any of you have
>ever read (yes - I know it's not recommended for beginners) but it
>did serve its purpose and I remain (relatively) sane.
No, it's not the worst. You have a reasonable grasp of the grammar,
and a knowledge of your limits to recast away from constructions you
can't tackle. Your major problem is that you didn't spend enough
time thinking about what every sentence, every word, really meant.
Most of your simplifications are good recasts, but there are a few
places where you would have benefited from being able to use some
more complex grammar. Did you see my post on type 9 verb suffixes.
It's time you learned them.
>ps. Qov...What happened to your (pre-BG) challenges? (They kept
>people like me from disturbing you all with botched translations!)
>Obviously if you're too busy that's understandable, but could you
>appoint a succesor as BC (Beginner's Challenger)?
I have a file of ideas for more. I'll start posting them soon. The
trick is that I have to make them relevant for the widest range of
abilities.
Here is a recommendation for everyone who wants to
translate, has listened to me and charghwI' rant about why you
shouldn't, and still wants to translate. Read your target passage
until you know well what it describes. Then put it away. Away.
Don't look at it again. Then write, in Klingon, using Klingon
grammar, Klingon constructions and Klingon thought, about the events
or ideas that the original passage considered. Feel free to leave
some parts out and add parts of your own. Post your work as 'a
Klingon retelling' of the story. That way you can use your
strengths, and the strengths of Klingon, and still have the
opportunity to share the passage that inspired you.
People usually choose things to translate because they sound
powerful, and are well expressed. This is largely because of the
original author's skill with the original language. If you
must translate, before you pick up TKD, translate the poetry of the
original into plain English, figure out what liberties have been
taken with the language, what unusual constructions have been used
and disentangle them.
>pps. Sometimes if I couldn't see how to say something I sort made up new
>grammar...sorry!
Towards the end you did that a little. You did better when you simply wrote
a sentence that meant something else entirely, but that had grammar you
could handle.
Qov ([email protected])
Beginners' Grammarian