Lost in Translation

As one who is literate in more than one language, I thought it would be interesting to explore a bit how translation can affect a reading experience.

Lost in Translation?
I do feel that there is a little something that gets lost in translation. When reading a translated work, I feel one doesn’t get the originally intended impact. Words are mini-packages: They are filled with distinct connotations and nuances, and at times associated with particular cultural meanings—there may be something alluded to that makes sense in American culture that may translate oddly out of context in Spanish, for example.

Here’s a quick example of how translation can change things. Examine this Spanish phrase: La belleza en la tristeza. It is balanced and parallel, and contains consonantal rhyme. But here’s what its English equivalent is: The beauty in sadness. It doesn’t even sound right . . . the whole parallelism and rhyme is completely thrown off. There’s definitely a fine distinction that is lost when converting words and phrases to another language.

Examples in Literature
Of course, I’ve noticed this phenomenon when reading foreign writers whose work has been translated into English. I finished not too long ago a couple of Haruki Murakami novels, originally written in Japanese. His prose is evocative and haunting, but sometimes the dialogue can sound a shade off—one can tell that the translator was trying to stay true to the author’s work and perhaps hoped his loyalty would excuse the uneasy rendition. In the English translation of Gabriel García Márquez’s novel Amor en los Tiempos de Cólera (Love in the Time of Cholera), the main character refers to one of his female companions as “lionlady of my soul.” That sounds weird, but when you realize it was originally leona de mi alma, it makes a little more sense, or at least, it sounds a little better.

Interestingly, some writers like Hemingway have used that “translation uneasiness” purposefully in order to signify that the characters are indeed speaking in a language other than that in which the book is written. In For Whom the Bell Tolls, fighters would proclaim, “I obscenity in the milk of the Republic!” It is a direct English translation (which makes absolutely no sense) for an unsavory phrase (which would make sense) in Spanish. Hemingway employs the same technique in the choppy dialogue found in his famed short story “A Clean, Well-Lighted Place” set in Spain. Even in the title (“Well-Lighted” instead of “Well-Lit”) he uses the direct translation effect.

True Voice = Original Language?
One of the coolest things I’ve ever done was to read an entire 19th century novel in Spanish. It was amazing! I realized I had reached a new level in my Spanish ability that I hoped to always maintain. And I know that I would not have gotten nearly the same effect, or rather, I would not have heard the author’s Voice as clearly had I not read it in its original language. Hmmm . . . I just thought of something: Would that mean I may not be getting the full impact of God’s Word because I’m unable to read it in its original Ancient Hebrew, Greek and Aramaic?