tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Fri Jun 26 06:32:22 2009

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Re: Klingon translation

Terrence Donnelly ([email protected]) [KLI Member] 

--- On Thu, 6/25/09, David Trimboli <[email protected]> wrote:


> Michael Everson wrote:
> > I am doing a short translation. The text is
> well-known, but is 
> > syntactically complex in English. I have made a stab
> at the first 
> > sentence; my rendering of it came to two separate
> sentences in Klingon.
> > 
> > How about if I give my translation here, without the
> original (which 
> > is well-known, but let's forget that) and see if it
> makes sense.
> > 
> > Here it is:
> > 
> > âIv HoS lawâ âIv HoS puS, âeâ ghoHtaHvIS SuS
> bIr Hov je, ghoSpuâ 
> > lengwIâ. wep tuj tuqtaH ghaH.
> > 
> > What do you make of it?
> 
> "While the cold wind and the star argue that who is
> stronger, the 
> traveler has gone. He is [wearing] a hot jacket."
> 
> I don't recognize it. It's hard to advise if I don't know
> the concept 
> you're trying to get across. I'll just point out some of
> the biggest 
> errors without necessarily recommending a correction.
> 

It's "The North Wind and the Sun", which I've seen used fairly often in conlanging as a common text for translation.  I think I've even seen someone's effort in Klingon before this.

SuStel's comments are all accurate (BTW, I'm currently the Beginner's Grammarian [BG], so if you mark a text KLBC, I will answer you first, then others get a stab at it).

Here's how I'd tackle your first sentence: {'Iv ghaH nIvbogh HoSwI''e'? 'e' ghoH SuS bIr qo' Hov je.} "The cold wind and the homestar argue 'Who is the strongest'?"  This doesn't actually restrict the choices of the strongest to the two disputants, but it's a lot less wordy than the only alternative I can think of: {SuS bIr HoS law''a' qo' Hov HoS puS'a' pagh qo' Hov HoS law''a' Sus bIr HoS puS'a'? 'e' ghoH SuS bIr qo' Hov je.} On the other hand, Klingon seems more friendly to that kind of repetition than English, so maybe the longer form would be preferred. I've made the sentence with {'e'} separate from the question in both cases, because I'm not sure that you can use {'e'} with preceding questions as part of the same sentence.  When used by itself, {'e'} to me just implies 'that whole thought which came before'.

-- ter'eS BG

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