Read the Japanese version back whenever it was that it came out, and I thought it was among his best. This looks like a decent translation, too, so I’ll be interested to check it out.
Incidentally, his next one, Afterdark, isn’t as good a story but it does reinforce the feeling that he’s shifted up a gear.
I am very pleased with Kafka, but the translation does bother me on a few points.
First, I think it is right to translate the sense of language as much as possible, but where there are international standards of measure or issues of currency conversion, I don’t think translation is a useful practice.
I was first struck by the use of american curency conversions from Japanese into the English translation version I am reading. This presumes an awful lot, and is an unnecessary addition. What if I were from Canada where the dollar values are very different? Or from other English speaking countries like Singapore, England, Australia, Ireland, etc. where these currency conversions would mean as little to me as the value in Yen? This is not a common practice and I don’t quite know why it was done.
Second, why would kilometers be converted to miles? There is no sense in doing this internationally, and it changes the sense of distance, somewhat, especially in a Murakami novel. Murakami’s work is full of subtle inuendo, a mysticism that plays on space, time and language, and these changes change that sense for me.
These two examples make reading this book a little more difficult for me. When reading such obvious changes, I worry about the rest of the translation’s validity. I spend too much time questioning that which I cannot question, since I do not speak or read Japanese.
I do have a sense of translators taking liberties in this way, and know that it can be detrimental to the original work, no matter how innocent it may seem. For instance, the common mistake in Cervantes Don Quixote is the opening translation. Parapharased, the problem is that in many cases the English translation opens with: ‘ In a small town somewhere in La Mancha.’ But the Spanish, and the better translations have a very different opening: ‘ Somewhere in La Mancha.’ The difference may seem simple to the casual reader, but to the student of the novel, or an historian to the time, or a Spaniard, the difference is very large.
I have lived in La Mancha. It is a place of myth, mostly, but it exists. And there are large differences between the towns and the countryside. Somewhere in La Mancha suggests a farmer or a gentleman directly, someone who is not tied to a place but to a life. Someone who is not directly owned by the rules of a place. Someone who, at least for his own space, makes his own rules. This is an important premise for why Quixote exists, even in his relative poverty, as an independent thinker and defender of honesty, morality, chivalry and faith. If Quixote were a town/city dweller, the rules of the place would take precedence, and he would be a different man.
These are my thoughts. I don’t know if anyone will read them, but my dissapointment with the translation needed to get out of my head and into print. This seemed a reasonably decent place to let loose. Let me know if you would like to discuss further.
Eric
Nice one, Gen! Thanks.
I am half way thought it. It is wonderful.
Read the Japanese version back whenever it was that it came out, and I thought it was among his best. This looks like a decent translation, too, so I’ll be interested to check it out.
Incidentally, his next one, Afterdark, isn’t as good a story but it does reinforce the feeling that he’s shifted up a gear.
I am very pleased with Kafka, but the translation does bother me on a few points.
First, I think it is right to translate the sense of language as much as possible, but where there are international standards of measure or issues of currency conversion, I don’t think translation is a useful practice.
I was first struck by the use of american curency conversions from Japanese into the English translation version I am reading. This presumes an awful lot, and is an unnecessary addition. What if I were from Canada where the dollar values are very different? Or from other English speaking countries like Singapore, England, Australia, Ireland, etc. where these currency conversions would mean as little to me as the value in Yen? This is not a common practice and I don’t quite know why it was done.
Second, why would kilometers be converted to miles? There is no sense in doing this internationally, and it changes the sense of distance, somewhat, especially in a Murakami novel. Murakami’s work is full of subtle inuendo, a mysticism that plays on space, time and language, and these changes change that sense for me.
These two examples make reading this book a little more difficult for me. When reading such obvious changes, I worry about the rest of the translation’s validity. I spend too much time questioning that which I cannot question, since I do not speak or read Japanese.
I do have a sense of translators taking liberties in this way, and know that it can be detrimental to the original work, no matter how innocent it may seem. For instance, the common mistake in Cervantes Don Quixote is the opening translation. Parapharased, the problem is that in many cases the English translation opens with: ‘ In a small town somewhere in La Mancha.’ But the Spanish, and the better translations have a very different opening: ‘ Somewhere in La Mancha.’ The difference may seem simple to the casual reader, but to the student of the novel, or an historian to the time, or a Spaniard, the difference is very large.
I have lived in La Mancha. It is a place of myth, mostly, but it exists. And there are large differences between the towns and the countryside. Somewhere in La Mancha suggests a farmer or a gentleman directly, someone who is not tied to a place but to a life. Someone who is not directly owned by the rules of a place. Someone who, at least for his own space, makes his own rules. This is an important premise for why Quixote exists, even in his relative poverty, as an independent thinker and defender of honesty, morality, chivalry and faith. If Quixote were a town/city dweller, the rules of the place would take precedence, and he would be a different man.
These are my thoughts. I don’t know if anyone will read them, but my dissapointment with the translation needed to get out of my head and into print. This seemed a reasonably decent place to let loose. Let me know if you would like to discuss further.
Eric