Rat Creature ([info]ratcreature) wrote,
@ 2004-11-02 23:50:00
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Entry tags:comics, comics: rants, daredevil, language, marvel, rants

there's a place for BabelFish translations, but published writing isn't it...
So I'm reading Daredevil #66, and rather contrary to the mood of the issue I find myself giggling constantly. You see, it has flashback sequences to the 1940s, and there's some villains talking "German", unfortunately too frequently for me to just overlook the dialog, i.e. it's not just one isolated speech balloon, but goes on for a few pages. And it's just... I don't have words. *still in giggles*

I mean, in some cases I can figure out what the speech balloon was supposed to say by translating it word for word back into English, and it becomes clear which words were meant, even if the German translation of the English term that was chosen doesn't have the meaning of the English word that was meant in the context as all, as of course both German and English words all have multiple meanings and not all of them match 1:1. And it's not just with figurative vocabulary either, though those examples are the funniest (like in German you just don't call a crazy person "Fruchtkuchen" no matter that it's a correct translation for the English "fruitcake"). Not to mention that the sentence structure is frequently wrong. And yet in some cases I can't figure out at all what the speech balloon was supposed to say. As a whole it's just totally hilarious, and not at all conducive to a gritty crime sequence feeling.


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[info]basingstoke
2004-11-02 11:16 pm UTC (link)
oh, man, fanfic is bad enough. Just, dudes, write the speech bubbles in italics. Something. Anything. Put "[GERMAN]" in brackets like that. Put an asterisk and a footnote: "read with English accent!" like in the old movies.

You should start a site: "Dreutsch." Like "Engrish."

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[info]ratcreature
2004-11-03 12:01 am UTC (link)
Yeah, I wish they'd just stick with the bracket solution. I really don't see how hilariously wrong foreign language fragments add much of anything. Personally, when I *don't* speak the language I'm frustrated when there's several pieces of dialog I don't get, even if they supposedly are not important, and when I *do* understand the other language I more often than not just end up laughing at the bizarre mistakes. The only times so far this worked for me was with Spanish inserts, because it seems there are enough Spanish speakers working for US publishing houses that it doesn't seem too bad (and it probably helps that I don't know enough Spanish to catch minor gaffes but enough to understand most of such simple sentences). Actually I notice these funny language mistranslations more often in comics than in fanfic. I guess it might be easier for fans to find some fellow fan who knows enough German, French, Spanish or whatever to translate a few simple sentences and sentence fragments like "What about the diamonds?" or "Someone kill this fruitcake!"

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[info]dawnglider
2004-11-03 02:02 am UTC (link)
Personally, when I *don't* speak the language I'm frustrated when there's several pieces of dialog I don't get, even if they supposedly are not important ...
Yeah, I'm always thrown out of a story when that happens. I must confess that one of the reasons I learnt French was to understand it when it appeared in books I was reading, 'cos I got tired of it popping up and me not being able to understand it.

I have seen one story when it worked, in Terry Pratchett's Mort:
Then Mort said, 'What do all those symbols mean?'
'Sodomy non sapiens,' said Albert under his breath.
'What does that mean?'
'I'm buggered if I know.'
But that's the only time it's worked when I didn't know the language (and one could argue that dog latin doesn't really fit that description).

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