I’ve had it suggested to me that I shouldn’t mention Meg Rosoff quite so often. By Meg. I’ve tried to be good, but right now she is supposed to be in North America on tour, and so she really won’t have a clue, will she?
Recently received a copy of Just in Case in brand new Swedish translation. It’s good, just like the translation of How I Live Now. I came to the conclusion that Meg’s style is close to the Swedish way of speaking, which could explain why it works so well.
I had one gripe with HILN. I feel a translator should know the difference between a place where you drink tea, and the place where you buy it. (I do recall the young witch being offered cream tea, somewhere in Kent I think, and saying that no, she’d like it with milk… But I wasn’t translating any books then.)
In Justin’s case I looked up my favourite piece about the man who tried to rescue a goat. Unfortunately the translated man rescued a coat, which is very true, but nowhere near as funny. I’d like to think it was a carefully considered leaving out of the goat, rather than a reading error.
And no play with words as regards the title, but that would have been a lot harder to do.
5 responses so far ↓
Nick // February 13, 2008 at 9:48
I am most curious to see how the German translation of THE CAT KIN will turn out. Embarrassingly, there are a few German phrases in it which are slightly inaccurate, due to me not being very good at German; but accurate or not, how does a German translator translate someone speaking German in the story, heard by the heroes as a foreign language, when everyone is speaking German already?! Sounds like a logistical puzzle.
Alistair Spalding // February 13, 2008 at 10:59
I’ve been reading A Series of Unfortunae Events in Norwegian. I think if you translate from English to scandinavian it’s not too hard for new English readers to translate it back again, certainly it’s easier than trying to read orinigial Norwegian.
There’s something so satisfying about “getting” a joke in a translation, you’re laughing, and you feel smart at the same time!
Meg Rosoff // February 16, 2008 at 23:50
HA! I’m back, and I’ve caught you! (I didn’t say you couldn’t EVER mention me, and actually was starting to feel a little lonely). My favourite translation niggle so far was the golden retriever on the cover of the German edition of How I Live Now. “So, uh, you don’t have Border Collies in Germany,” asked I with a slightly fixed smile. “Of course we do,” answered the translator, “but the editor found a nice dog picture for the cover, so we changed the dogs in the book to golden retrievers.” Sometimes you just gotta smile sweetly.
Meg Rosoff // February 16, 2008 at 23:51
p.s. love the idea that my written English is very like Swedish. This could explain my passion for meatballs, pickled herring and Henning Mankell.
bookwitch // February 17, 2008 at 7:50
Oops.
Leave a Comment