tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Wed Sep 17 10:49:20 2003
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AW: lyrics
Thank's for your immidiate help Tyler, Scott, Alan, and Steven. Sorry for
answering late, I've been on holiday.
My impression is there are three interelated issus making this translation a
quite tricky thing: The idiosyncratic way Klingons describe directions and
locations, the history of Berlin, and the question of what the fuck do we
want to tell with this song.
Actually in the start this song didn't have much of meaning yet, meanwhile
it is starting to get one :-) If there's kind of message it's something
like: it's so easy to get from west to east berlin and meanwhile (after 13
years!) it seems so easy and natural that this city was (re)united, why not
doing this with the whole world - audible in all these nice languages we
sing the phrase (this may seem kind of cheesy, but what the heck...). So I
think in fact we'd like to emphasize more the trip than the destination and
more the processual part of it. We surely wouldn't like to emphasize the
former division, although it is the background. It's more like "transcending
division" by going from eastern to western Berlin.
If I got you right, in this case "chan Berlin" would be our choice. But I'm
not sure how to integrate this in Tyler's sentence:
*Berlin* 'ev tIngvo' chan *Berlin* maghoS.
*Berlin* 'ev tIngvo' chan *Berlin*.
would be my guess then. What do you say?
KAI
-----Ursprüngliche Nachricht-----
Von: Steven Boozer [mailto:[email protected]]
Gesendet: Dienstag, 9. September 2003 16:26
An: [email protected]
Betreff: Re: lyrics
At 08:00 PM Monday 9/8/2003, you wrote:
> >> ..."We go from West to East Berlin. West to East Berlin."
>
>ja' Tyler Fisher <[email protected]>:
> >I'm sure others might have better suggestions, but you might try this:
> >
> > {*Berlin* 'ev tIngvo' *Berlin* chanDaq maghoS.
> > *Berlin* 'ev tIngvo' *Berlin* chanDaq.}
ghunchu'wI':
>Watch out for the difference between "East of Berlin" and "Berlin of the
>East". I'm pretty sure {chan Berlin} is right; I'm *certain* that {Berlin
>chan} is not.
lugh ghunchu'wI'. The use of cardinal directions in Klingon is a bit
tricky. Here's part of Okrand's relevant explanation (startrek.klingon
11/21/99):
But Klingon {chan} does not work the same as English "east". From the
Klingon point of view, it makes no sense to say that something is "in
the east". One can go towards the east, something can be to the east of
something else, but nothing can actually be "in" the east. No matter how
far eastward you go, there's something still to your east. Thus the
awkward translations "area eastward, area towards the east" and so forth.
(And, of course, the same can be said for the other directions.) These
Klingon direction nouns work in the same manner as other nouns of
location
(nouns used to express prepositional concepts) such as {Dung} "area
above,"
{bIng} "area below", and {retlh} "area beside, area next to". Thus, just
as {nagh Dung}, literally "rock area-above" or "rock's area-above" is
used
for "above the rock", {veng chan}, literally "city area-eastward" or
"city's
eastward area" is commonly translated "east of the city". Depending on
the
sentence in which the phrase is used, the second noun in this
construction
(in this case {chan} "area eastward") could take the locative suffix
{-Daq},
as in: {veng chanDaq jIwam} "I hunt east of the city". The "city in the
east"
(actually, "city toward the east") or "eastern city" would be the "area-
eastward city": {chan veng}. Again, if appropriate, the locative suffix
{-Daq} follows the second noun: {chan vengDaq jIwam} "I hunt in the city
in
the east". The "city's east", meaning "the eastern part of the city",
would
make use of {yoS} "area, district": {veng chan yoS} (literally "city
area-
eastward district" or "city's eastward-area's district"). The directional
nouns may also be used with possessive suffixes.
So we have {BERLIN chan} "(area) east of Berlin" (e.g. a suburb or the
outskirts) vs. {chan BERLIN} "the east's Berlin, Berlin in the east,
eastern Berlin" (i.e. the one east of here [e.g. Moscow in Russia vs.
Moscow in Idaho). However WRT to divided cities like Berlin, the best
option seems to be {BERLIN chan yoS} "Berlin's east, the eastern district
of Berlin".
--
Voragh
Ca'Non Master of the Klingons