Boy on the pacific

[tjstill (imported)]

I notice that the authors header is in very clear english. I wonder if they have an english version they could post up. I fully respect people posting in their native language or whatever they choose. However their advice to use google translate does result in a poor result, often ranging from incomprehensible to just about giving the idea of where the story is going. All the sublty is often lost. I guess this forum doea have a majority of english speakers and it is a shame they cannot enjoy a story if the oppertunity for a good quality translation is avaialble from the original author. Thanks for the posting anyway though, all work is apreciated

[Kiwi1972 (imported)]

It is horribly difficult to produce quality fiction in any language [even your native one]. I have four languages, but I know through experience that while it is easy to write/translate business or technical documents, anything that requires finesse or the micro-understanding of the culture of the language is beyond me. The words are there. The sense is there. The grammar and spelling are there. But the magic is sadly missing. This is because good fiction relies on common cultural experiences; ones that can not be learned from language studies alone.

[Kortpeel (imported)]

good fiction relies on common cultural experiences; ones that cannot be learned from language studies alone.

When I looked at 'Boy on the Pacific' I was pleased that the Chinese characters displayed on the screen with absolutely no problem. Well done Microsoft!

Then I was shocked that the characters were completely and utterly meaningless to me. It is a horrible experience to look at a text and find it meaningless. I am at one with the most illiterate!

Perhaps a little humiliation of this kind is good for the soul. Henceforth I will have a little more empathy with those English speakers unable to read or write their own language. Even so, I still think they are lazy for not having learned.

[kwanmingmin (imported)]

I have tried this on Google Translate and the result is highly read-able.

http://translate.google.com.hk/translat ... B%2Fea_122 001the_boy_.htm

For example, the first two paragraphs go as follows:

***

Mrs. White is a shipping company's staff. Because of the economic downturn, she had to accept the deployment of overseas to avoid being fired. Her son Andy was seven years old, must also be moved together.

They came to a remote Pacific island. Mrs. White has been arranged for the son of the new school, the day they go to school to register. Principal is a middle-aged woman, she looked at Andy, frowning, said: "I am afraid that our school is not for Andy."

***

[Slammr (imported)]

The translator worked surprisingly well for me on this story.

[tjstill (imported)]

Prehaps the translator works better for some languages, or does not work so well when the scenes get more explicit. I recall wading through paragraphs of "Tape worm references" in one I tried, I think from Spanish to english. I agree that the nuances are often lost in mechanical translation.

I just noticed the intro paragraph from the author was very clear and thought that if they had an english version it would be much closer to what they intended.

Thanks Slammer, I will try the translator version anyway as you mentions it does a reasonable job in this case.

[StefanIsMe (imported)]

I think it's at least partially a question of slang usage, and proper grammar.

I've seen German stories from here that translated very readable; I'v seen other German stories filled with un-translated words (slang, or 'creative' structure) and very hard to read off Google translate.

However, almost every Chinese story translates well. This could be due to the character set; harder, I think, to make a spelling mistake? And, perhaps the grammar is more 'built in' to "Simplified Chinese"; that is, if you know it enough to use it, you probably are going to use decent grammar.

[Prudence (imported)]

Try both translate.google.com (http://translate.google.com) and babelfish.yahoo.com (http://babelfish.yahoo.com) many times one will work a lot better than the other. Or one will translate something in a different way (and between both of them you can comprehend what the author was trying to say).

Of course neither one of these will help much with slang or cultural idioms. Too bad there isn't an "Urban Dictionary" type translator which could translate slang/idioms from one language into another.