BotNS in German

Hmpf MacSlow · 03 Dec 2004, 16:51 · from 2004-December.txt.gz

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From: hmpf1998 at gmx.net (Hmpf MacSlow)
Date: Fri Dec  3 16:51:35 2004
Subject: (urth) BotNS in German
In-Reply-To: <20041203235555.73231.qmail at web14726.mail.yahoo.com>
References: <6.2.0.14.0.20041203214147.03cf27b0 at pop.gmx.net>
	<20041203235555.73231.qmail at web14726.mail.yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <6.2.0.14.0.20041204013348.01ca0ef0 at pop.gmx.net>

At 12:55 AM 12/4/2004, you wrote:
>Good grief!  How on earth do you plan to replicate his
>vocabulary?

Uhm... I dunno. Consulting a really good dictionary would be my first 
guess. Hey, I've only just started, and I'm not sure yet how serious I am. 
Thing is, I want to teach myself how to translate literature, and have in 
fact been doing the odd little translation job (not literature, though) on 
the side for a while now, and translating Gene Wolfe certainly is one hell 
of an efficient way of learning to translate.

>Does German even have an analogue to the OED?

I'm pretty sure we do, and I'm pretty sure that theological, architectural, 
military etc. dictionaries would/will be a great help, too. I'm lucky, too, 
as I happen to live in the city where the Deutsche Bibliothek is - that's 
our equivalent to the Library of Congress. So, whatever book I might need, 
I could get - at least to look at. They don't give books away there. Our 
university library isn't half bad, either.

A more difficult problem might be that German, as far as I am aware of - 
and my German vocabulary is pretty big, even for a native speaker, or so 
I'm told - does not have as many foreign words as English. In English, you 
can always find a more complicated way to say something simple (E.g. 
'barbican' for 'watchtower'). I'm not sure that's always possible in 
German. So, a bit of the special flavour of the book will definitely get 
lost. But then, something is always 'lost in translation'.

>Will you add critical information?

What kind of information? I *have* no critical information! Besides... if 
I'm doing this, I'm doing it purely for my edification, not for 
publication. I mean, I sure wouldn't mind if someone wanted to publish it, 
but the problem - apart from the fact that there are probably better 
translators out there than me, and I'm not a recognized 'pro' - is that 
it's already been published. It's just out of print.

>~Maru
>Even if you stop tomorrow, I admire the scope of your dreams and
>devotion.

LOL... yeah, 'delusions of grandeur' is my middle name. I'm also thinking 
about planning a convention right now (not Wolfe-related). I should try to 
remember that I'm supposed to be a student... and that I need to set some 
time aside for uni, and for earning a living... *g*

Hmpf

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