Software of the Month Club 1996 December/Software of the Month Club 1996 December.iso/pc/dos/edu/trutrans/trantrip.txt

Text File | 1996-06-22 | 31.5 KB | 626 lines

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                    |   ____|__  |  Association of
                    |  |       |_|  Shareware
                    |__|   o   |    Professionals
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                       |___|___|    MEMBER


In the full version of the program, this file contains four
separate sections.  ("A Translation Triptych" is the name
used for an intermediate version of the program, assembled
from existing elements for showing at a conference of trans-
lators.)  In order, these sections would be:

     1.  The Paper entitled "The Genesis and Methodology of `A
     Translation Triptych.'"  This Paper was published in the
     1995 Proceedings of the American Translators Association
     Annual Conference in Nashville and is reprinted here with
     permission from the publishers.

     2.  The Acknowledgments section of this project, expressing
     gratitude to all those who helped with the developments of
     the program.

     3.  The List of Sources for all the quotations found in the
     first section of the program, "TRANSLATION AND TRANSLATORS:
     Quotations Through the Ages."

     4.  The Bibliography for this section of the program.

The free Shareware version of this program, "TRUTH IN TRANSLATION,"
contains only the first two sections.  Information on ordering the
full version is contained in the file ORDER.DOC.  See the file
README.1ST for further information about both programs.

It is not possible to duplicate the typography of the first item
in ASCII format, and so some slight editing has been undertaken to
make up for differences in typographical style.   The Paper appears
first, followed by the Acknowledgments.



1.   THE GENESIS AND METHODOLOGY OF A TRANSLATION TRIPTYCH

        By Alex Gross
        Cross-Cultural Research Projects, ATA


KEYWORDS:  Famous Quotations About Translation, Translation
History, Translation Errors, Language As Evolved Animal Spray,
Computer vs.  Print Presentations

ABSTRACT:  This paper discusses "A Translation Triptych," an
electronic presentation about translating and interpreting.  As
its name implies, the presentation consists of three principal
parts:

     1.  "Translation and Translators--Quotations Through the
     Ages," comprising approximately 150 observations on both the
     spoken and written forms of our profession.

     2.  "Famous Translation Bloopers, Real or Imagined." This is
     a collection of some remarkable translation errors, many of
     them first noted in the pages of the ATA Chronicle.

     3.  "An Unofficial History of Language and Translation."

The presentation takes the form of an electronic slide-show
lasting approximately eighty minutes.  It will be continually
recycling throughout the Nashville Conference, so that sooner or
later most people in attendance will have a chance to see most of
its parts.  In the paper the respective advantages and drawbacks
of the print and electronic media are discussed, the contents of
the presentation are analysed in some detail, and the strategy
for creating a scholarly apparatus for electronic works is
examined..  A Translation Triptych will be located in a central area
of the Conference site.



In their preface to "The Craft and Context of Translation,"
William Arrowsmith and Roger Shattuck observed in 1964:

          "...intelligent comments on translation...tend
          to be unavailable or scattered, tucked
          away in odd corners, and their arguments
          diffused1."

Although many excellent general treatments and specialist studies
on translation have been published during the thirty years since
they wrote, on the whole their observation rings as true today as
it did then.  Only a few "traductologues" or "translatologists"
(the French term being somewhat more common than the English one)
are likely to have access to such information, and even they
might be hard pressed to separate "intelligent comments" from the
far greater body of less striking ones.  How much truth their
observation contains may perhaps be gauged by the fact that it
was, for all its centrality, encountered relatively late in the
research for the current project.

"A Translation Triptych" represents a first attempt to break
through this specific language barrier and present such comments,
along with related material, to a wider audience.  Its three main
sections comprise a compendium of about 150 translation-related
quotations through the ages, a selection of outrageous
translation errors, and a semi-humorous sketch on language and
translation, with a brief "quiz" on translating and interpreting
as an addendum.

This work differs from previous studies of the subject in two
important ways.  First, it is directed mainly towards two
audiences: a somewhat new genre of specialist audience in the
first instance but in the long run towards the general public as
well.  So far neither potential audience has had any extended
opportunity to examine this material.  Even the specialist
audience in question, though an entirely logical one for these
texts, has for some reason rarely been addressed by the scholarly
community in the past.  It is none other than the community of
working translators, including not only scholars, literary
specialists, and teachers of translation but also conference and
courtroom interpreters as well as business and technical
translators.  The presentation of this version has in fact been
designed to be premièred at our very own 1995 National Conference
of the American Translators Association in Nashville.

Aside from this somewhat atypical venue, "A Translation Triptych"
differs in one other important respect from previous studies on
translation.  Its chosen medium is not a book, a monograph, or a
lecture--it has in fact been organized on a disk as a
computerized slide show, though it will also be available in
printed form.  The very nature of the electronic medium has of
course influenced the manner of presentation, as have engraved
stone or clay, papyri, incunabular and printed books, films, and
audiotapes in their respective eras.  Each of these media has its
own advantages and drawbacks, and the computer is no different.  It
should perhaps also be added that all previous studies of the
history of translation have been for all practical purposes
exclusively eurocentric in their approach--to the author's
knowledge, this collection of quotations about the translation
process marks the first time other cultures have been represented in
such studies.

Since the presentation will be viewed during a busy conference,
certain liberties have been taken with the manner of displaying
some information on the screen, though fail-safe mechanisms have
been set in place to ensure the maintenance of scholarly rigor.
It is perhaps useful to remember that those viewing this work
will be balancing food and refreshments, consulting programs, and
dashing off to meet friends or attend sessions, all of these
activities necessarily encouraging a short attention span even
among the scholarly.  On the other hand, unlike most conventional
presentations, "A Translation Triptych" can be continually
recycled for twelve hours every day, perhaps on more than one
monitor, so that all who wish can return and review its contents
more reflectively.

One further factor surrounding the development of this project
actually had the effect of encouraging more rigorous treatment
rather than the reverse.  Although "A Translation Triptych" was
intended primarily as a Conference event, from the outset it was
also conceived as part of a more ambitious proposal for a museum
exhibit devoted to translation and interpreting, which might hope
to reach and educate a more extended audience about this field.
Within the fifty separate displays of this larger exhibit, A
Translation Triptych would comprise no more than one.  Such an
exhibit would echo to some extent the excitement and "information
overload" of the conference setting, making it feasible to
convert the one into the other with at least some degree of ease.
But since both projects went through their initial research phase
within a similar time frame, more extensive work on the larger
presentation could fertilize the smaller one to some extent.

Before reviewing the actual content of "A Translation Triptych,"
a discussion comparing and contrasting print and electronic media
as vehicles for presenting ideas may be in order.  It should not
be supposed that any simplistic dichotomy between these two media
can exist.  There are many different styles and approaches in
using computers to display information, just as there are many
different ways of employing print.  And in each case both
creativity and native presentation skills are certain to play a
role.  Moreover, the available range of authoring software--even
at this early stage of computer history--is more than broad
enough to allow a veritable gamut of creative choices.

Only after carefully examining some twenty different shareware
and commercial products of this genre did the author finally
settle on one program called Automessage.  That so thorough a
search was needed reveals much about the many faces of this
medium.  Some programs permit instantaneous flashing of a message
on the screen, but this can induce boredom or even hypnosis over
the long term.  Others enforce strict message boundaries and/or
uninspired typefaces.  Still others boast an infinity of
typefaces and colors but lack crucial editing tools.  Automessage
was chosen because it offered the best of many possibilities for
this particular purpose and also because of its engaging manner
of painting messages on the screen as one watches, a sort
of latter-day "handwriting on the wall." The options of using a
hypertext or expert system environment were also considered but
rejected because they limit the number of people who can use the
computer at once.

The print medium uses the "page" as its model, while computers
are ineluctably bound to the "screen," assuming the message is
meant to be viewed on a monitor.   This limitation is actually
less restrictive than may at first appear.  In order to grasp
more clearly how "screen" and "page" can differ from one another,
let us look at an excerpt from this presentation and compare the
two versions.  One of the quotations from A Translation Triptych
looks something like this on the screen:



                       Now it is words and
                    their associations which
                     are untranslatable, not
                       ideas...there is no
                     idea...which cannot be
                     adequately produced as
                     idea in English words.

                      --Sidney Lanier, 1897


            [In the non-ASCII print version, this citation appears
            surrounded by a box.]

The quotation is placed within a box to simulate screen borders,
with the bottom line in capital letters to represent the
different colors on the screen.  This is an ideal passage in
terms of this particular program because it is exactly seven
lines long or, rather, has been "segmented" to fit into seven
lines (no actual editing has occurred per se).  A blank line is
inserted above and below the quotation simply to make it more
readable, and the type has been centered for the same reason.

Thus, it is not merely by "screens-full" that messages on
monitors are to be measured, but by "readable screens-full." This
important criterion also has its print counterpart, as we shall
see.  The reason the number of lines is important is that the
Automessage program permits exactly ten lines on each screen (or
only five if one were to choose the "double-height" option for
the message).  But this is not a general computer standard or
even a DOS one--it applies only to Automessage, and other
programs will have their own internal limits and/or drawbacks.
It is necessary to work within the limits of each program to
achieve appropriate results.

Now here is the very same passage as it might appear in an
academically "correct" printed format:

     Now, it is words and their associations which are
     untranslatable, not ideas...there is no idea...which cannot
     be adequately produced as idea in English words.
     --Sidney Lanier, 1897
     The English Novel.  New York: Scribner's & Sons, 1897.
     pp.  190-91.  (cited by Morgan, 1959.  Original text
     examined and one missing word restored.)

It should be clear from the beginning that the printed form of
this citation is intrinsically less easy to read than the screen
form, even if we ignore the several lines needed for a correct
scholarly reference.  Although more information has ostensibly
been transmitted, the overall effect could actually become one of
less information.  The other lines add what might be termed a
"noise factor" by the standards of Shannon's Information Theory.
If these last three lines were included in the screen version,
where six lines might be required--and if this model were
followed throughout the presentation--overall readability would
be greatly reduced and the willingness of conference or museum
goers to keep watching would be sorely taxed.

This extended form is indeed closely related to the one which
appears in the printed List of Sources, with the exception that
the book reference is shown simply as "Lanier.  190-91." with the
full details present in the Bibliography.  Here we also see the
typographical counterpart of contrasting screen colors: in this
case bold, italic, and slightly reduced fonts are used for the
attribution and notes.

But what if the message is more than seven lines long--does this
mean it must be "procrusteanized" into a shorter form? This is by
no means the case, as the program also permits scrolling the
screen down for longer text, or splitting a message into two
segments, or setting up top and/or bottom lines that can announce
a continuity of theme, as in the "Tale of Moses Ben Ezra" or the
examples of Machine Translation.  It is theoretically also
possible to employ 256 different color combinations on each line
of each screen, though only a few have been chosen here: the ATA
colors of light blue and white for the "body font," black on
white for attributions and comments, and yellow on red for
occasional emphasis.

Actual editing of these texts has been avoided in almost all
cases, and only two are marked as having been "adapted." It
nonetheless remains true that in a conference or museum setting,
shorter messages are more likely to be read than longer ones.
For this reason the author has sought out citations between three
and thirty words long, though a number of exceptions have been
made.

There is probably a lesson here for intellectuals and scholars in
general--the assumption that longer treatments of a subject are
necessarily more accurate or convey more actual information than
shorter ones is possibly in error.  A popularized magazine
article can indeed be more informative than a scholarly book, and
even a bumper sticker can on at least some occasions say more
than the thickest Germanic "Prolegomena zum..." From Ancient
Greek epigrams down to Quotations from Chairman Mao, people have
sought out simplified summations of knowledge in the hope of
understanding more of the world around them.

As for the quotations themselves, what is perhaps most remarkable is
that only a few recurrent themes seem to emerge over the span
of more than two millennia.  Aside from those passages offering
specific technical advice or singling out specific works for
criticism, these themes are really only three or four in number.
By far the most frequently mentioned issue is the ongoing debate
between "literalists" and "liberalists," between translating
"words" vs.  translating "sense." And by far the majority--though
not all--of the most famous authors and commentators come down
decisively in behalf of the latter.  Granted, these are for the
most part translators of literature rather than technical or
scientific specialists, but a general feeling of consensus is
nonetheless present.  (It should perhaps be added that the author
did not expressly seek out passages favoring this opinion and
would have gladly included those expressing the opposite view,
but they were distinctly hard to uncover).

There is also a clearly recognizable counter-current of those who
suppose translation is nearly impossible, is practiced mainly by
self-deceiving incompetents, or even constitutes a breach of
human or divine law.  Typifying this school of thought through
the ages, one may encounter the added suppositions that one
language is "inferior" to another or that the crux of the matter
lies in the great number of "bad translations."  When the problem
is thus defined, the solution often emerges that all translators
must be trained in a single translation method with clearly set
rules, an argument heard more than once over the centuries.
These rules frequently belong to the person advocating such a
system, even though it remains far from clear that the problem
has been correctly defined to begin with.

How are we to explain the continuous reemergence of these same
disagreements through so many eras and cultures? In the sketch
comprising the third part of the "Triptych," it has been
suggested that language might be an actual biological process
analogous to--and evolved from--primitive spraying by animals.
Because language is such an instinctive process, most people are
quite unable to view it as a complete system or make meaningful
generalizations about it beyond a certain limited point.  This
was indeed the argument advanced by Leonard Bloomfield's
"Secondary and Tertiary Responses to Language," which the author
has discussed elsewhere 2.  Bloomfield concluded that many of our
attitudes to language might turn out to be "a matter of
psychology and sociology." Although much of his work is now
forgotten, this particular observation perhaps deserves further
attention.

The notions of "culture shock" or "future shock" are both
familiar to us.  A comparable emotional confusion may affect many
people when they first encounter a foreign language or even a
translation from a foreign language.  Perhaps it should be called
"language shock" or even "translation shock." Depending on the
circumstances, such a state can prove more or less serious for
those suffering from it.  Suddenly the familiar furniture and
surroundings of one's own language, which one had supposed were
synonymous with reality itself, are ripped away.  One is invited-
-in some cases even forced--to assume that a totally new way of
categorizing the surrounding world is possible.  It is a break in
the fabric of life that most people--and even quite a few
translators--are unable to fully account for.  Add to this the
virtual certainty that no two translators will ever translate the
same text in exactly the same way and that inexperienced
translators can argue endlessly over which is the so-called
"correct" translation of almost any passage.  Considerable
grounds for confusion are quite clearly present.

Such an experience can cause a considerable jolt, especially if
one had never really devoted any thought to language before.  The
immediate reaction of those so afflicted is familiar to all of us
and may provide a concise symptomology of "language shock." Those
suffering from this condition profess to disdain the other
language--and perhaps the other culture as well.  They may reject
any influence springing from that language or culture--including
the work of a translator or interpreter.  Alternately, they may
choose to blame their own language or culture.  What we may be
seeing in many of these quotations may be nothing less than a
repeated reinfection by "translation shock" or "language shock"
through the centuries.

But can there ever be any reliable cure for this syndrome? If so,
it can only come about when human beings become more
sophisticated about the true nature of language.  To what extent
are we all like moles, happily burrowing through our own networks
of tunnels and patiently laying down our own scents upon our
domain? And how do we differ from such moles as they suddenly
come upon a neighboring set of burrows with totally different
scent marks they can neither recognize nor understand? Let us now
suppose that a "translator mole" came along and tried to explain
these foreign aromas to the others.  How would moles react in
such a case, and how do we?

We know the answer only too well.  The mole's reaction will be to
defend, to repulse, to kill.  Humans are not usually allowed this
option, and so we settle for criticizing the intruders' spray
marks--their spelling, punctuation, accent, grammar, or choice of
words, not to mention their appallingly "bad translation." And
yet, at the very moment of our utmost arrogance about language--
just as we assert our superiority over animals for having
invented it and boast of our scientific methods for studying it--
at that very instant perhaps we should recall that we too are at
work as animals, spraying everything around us in the hope of
protecting our environment or effecting a magical change in its
nature.

Another major theme present in these quotations is of, course the
practical value of translation, with such major voices as Bruno,
Goethe, Roget, and Kelly summoning us to recognize the crucial
connections between translation, science, and the entire world
economy.  One further frequently voiced attitude--here
exemplified by Fray Ponce de León, Luther, Cowley, Ladmiral,
Meschonnic, Levy, and Fauchereau--is that the academic
establishment--and perhaps even those who purport to study
translation--penetrate only marginally into its real nature and
produce little beyond "chatty essays."

This position is taken even further by the striking observations
of Steiner and MacFarlane:

     However, despite the rich history, and despite the calibre
     of those who have written about the art and theory of
     translation, the number of original, significant ideas in
     the subject remains very meagre. 3

     [My intent is] to underline the need for some new
     provisional theory of translation--new in the sense that it
     should be diagnostic rather than hortatory...concerned...
     with actualities...It is not the principles of translation
     that need re-adjusting...but rather our ideas about them.4

There is also a fair consensus through the ages, shared by
Cicero, Quintilian, Iamblichus, Roger Bacon, and Tytler, that no
so-called "universal grammar" can account for the many
differences between languages and that only concerted creativity
and inventiveness can bridge the scarcely trivial gaps between
them.  One author goes even further and insists that there may be
circumstances where no such bridge can be built at all:

     True, translation may use the value terms of its own
     tongue in its own time; but it cannot force these
     on a truly alien text.5


This observation necessarily brings us back to Sidney Lanier's
assertion in our first example, that any idea, as idea, can be
expressed in English.  Such a claim remains essentially
unprovable--if an idea did exist that could not be expressed in
English, precisely how would we learn about it? We are confronted
here by a genuine paradox, one which poses for language the same
order of difficulty that Gödel's Entscheidungsproblem posed for
mathematics.

As noted, research procedures for this study have been rigorous,
though this has been less necessary for the two specially
composed sections and the collection of translation errors, many
of which were printed in the ATA Chronicle.   But the compendium
of quotations has required and received special attention.
Although its actual text is a mere 3,000 words, about the same
length as many magazine articles, this section comprises a
veritable mine field of attribution problems, covering many eras
and cultures.   Unlike typically journalistic "Thoughts on Spring
Through the Ages" (or "Thoughts on Love, Friendship, Wine,
etc."), its citations could by no means be found simply by
picking up one's desktop Bartlett's.  Almost all these passages
have indeed proved Arrowsmith and Shattuck's words: they are
truly "scattered," "tucked away in odd corners," or sometimes
close to "unavailable."

From the outset it also became clear that any usable citations
must meet three highly selective criteria:

     1.  They should be relatively brief, ideally no longer than
         30 words (in fact, the average length is 21 words).

     2.  They should be intrinsically interesting and contain
         some useful insight for today's translation professionals.

     3.  They should, wherever possible, come from the pen of
         well-known authors or authorities in the field.

Thus, the aim of the project was from the outset an extremely
specialized and selective one.  This goal made a careful search
strategy essential from the very beginning.  The work that ought
to have provided many solutions, Lefevere's "Translation--
History, Culture: A Sourcebook" is entirely composed of
quotations about translation through the ages and is doubtless
extremely useful for some scholarly or classroom purposes.  But
almost all its selections were too long or diffuse for the
purpose of this presentation, and none in fact has been used
(though one or two may overlap from other references).  The most
valuable resource encountered was not a book at all but Bayard
Quincy Morgan's twenty-page bibliographical section from the 1959
collection of essays "On Translation," edited by Reuben Brower.

This bibliography provides some 280 listings related to
translation, about half of them containing quotations, partial
quotations, seeming quotations, or summaries.  Of these 140
listings about 32 proved of immediate interest and were in almost
all cases traced to their source or sources.  The well-known
books by Steiner and Ballard have been two other useful
resources, and to a lesser extent the volumes by Rener, Kelly,
and Apter have also been consulted.  Given the scope and
complexity of this subject and the relative scarcity of useful
leads, some 40 existing dictionaries of quotations, together with
a few electronic resources, have also been consulted and
compared.  A final source has been the author's own general
reading over several decades, though this became more directed in
nature as the project matured.  As of this writing, a more
diffuse "fishing expedition" has also been launched into the
pages of the profession's many journals in the hope of
discovering yet other quotations.

In all cases, even where the credibility of a source has been
impeccable, an earnest attempt has been made to trace each
citation to its original source and in almost all cases has been
successful.  While seemingly a scholarly crotchet, such a
procedure has on several occasions revealed that some quotations
were incorrectly or incompletely copied from their sources or
that equally incisive material lay close by.  Wherever this
procedure has failed, the comment "Cited by...." or "Summarized
by...," followed by a name appears in the List of Sources.

Perhaps the most important finding arising from this
research: fully one-half of these quotations do not
appear in major texts on translation history, and
only a small fraction appears in any single treatment.
Ironically, many have never before been translated into
English.

Much of the scholarly work takes place in an undergrowth of
references.  Many citations were in fact doubly or trebly
embedded: thus, Ballard citing Holmes citing Levy, Steiner citing
Florio citing Bruno, or Ballard commenting on Tytler by citing
Newmark and Widmer.  Passages from St.  Jerome, which came from
Labourt's bilingual French and Latin edition, were first
encountered in Ballard's French citations.  Two passages by Luther
cited by Rener in German and one cited by Ballard in
French eventually led to Luther's full text in his Sendbrief vom
Dolmetschen of 1530.

All errors in fact and procedure are the author's responsibility
alone, and an attempt will be made to remedy them in future
editions, which are somewhat easier to produce and publish in
this electronic medium than in print.  It is indeed hoped that
ATA members and others will suggest further quotations that
should have appeared in this first version.  Perhaps these will
suddenly become plentiful, now that the initial work of discovery
has been undertaken.  It is sincerely hoped that "A Translation
Triptych" will prove of interest to translators, interpreters,
terminologists, and all those concerned with language both within
the ATA and beyond it.  Perhaps this presentation can also prove
of use to the various translator- and interpreter-training
programs both here and abroad.


          1 Arrowsmith, William and Shattuck, Roger, editors.
          "The Craft and Context of Translation: A Critical
          Symposium." Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books, 1964.
          Preface, p.  xiii.

          2 Bloomfield, Leonard.  "Secondary and Tertiary
          Responses to Language." In "Language" 20: 45-55 (1944)
          and in C.F.  Hockett (ed.).  "A Leonard Bloomfield
          Anthology." Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987.
          For the discussion mentioned here: Gross, Alex:
          "Limitations of Computers as Translation Tools." In
          Newton, John (ed.).  Computers in Translation: A
          Practical Appraisal.  London: Routledge, 1992.  pp.96-
          130.

          3 Steiner, George.  "After Babel: Aspects of Language
          and Translation." Oxford: Oxford University Press,
          1975.  p.  238.

          4 MacFarlane, John.  "Modes of Translation." In Durham
          University Journal, 45: 92-93, 1953.

          5 Miles, Josephine.  "Poetry and Change." Berkeley:
          University of California Press, 1974.  p.  200.



               2.    Acknowledgments


     As should be more than clear from the preceding
Paper, the author is considerably indebted to the work
of such scholars as Morgan, Ballard, Steiner, Rener,
Kelly, Apter, and many others, as a glance at the
Bibliography will surely show.

     As in the body of the program itself, I welcome a
further opportunity to express my thanks to the members
of the Public Relations Computer Presentation Sub-
Committee : John Bukacek, Vigdis Eriksen, Loië Feuerle,
Harald Hille, Alex Schwartz, Marilyn Stone, & Robert
Sussman.  Many thanks are also due to Ali Ekram Ali,
Ronnie Apter, Walter Bacak, Bob Bononno, Albert Bork,
Mark Herman, Muriel Jérôme-O'Keefe, Peter Krawutschke,
Edith Losa, Liz Scott Andrews, Laurie Treuhaft, Ernst
Waldeck, and Leslie Willson. And to all those at the
New York Public Library who never failed to be helpful,
including the Ghost in Catnyp's machine.  Some expression
of gratitude is also in order for the authors, editors,
and publishers of all books of quotations that have
ever been written.  I am particularly grateful to
Lionel Tsao and Apollo Wu for their advice on Chinese
quotations.

Copyright (C) 1995 & 1996 by Alexander Gross