Tokyo Babel Translation Discussion

[DharmaFreedom]

Is there a hotkey to take screenshots? can't find one...

[Chronopolis]

Grinnity grin grin is a pretty slick translation. Mainly cause it does a good job possibly replicating the original line's tone.

[Kirashi]

On 09/07/2016 at 6:08 AM, Conjueror said:

Our approach was probably more similar to the one on the left, except that Tokyo Babel's Japanese script uses stuff like "it's like sex in my mouth" and what some people seem to want is for us to turn it into "That was delicious." in English script instead.
 

How can you say that just after telling me, that you translated an onomatopoeia with a word that doesn't even exist because a Hungarian asked for it and it sounded cool? It's more than obvious that you rewrote most of the sentences, I can hardly find one close to the original context (literally speaking I mean of course) but at least I have my answer now: if I understood well, you don't want to use basics words to please the natives speakers, so you chose to use difficult/unknow words because you're affraid they will find it boring... I can understand that, but please, don't start telling me now I am not able to understand english because of that. And don't make it sound like I ask you to turn the meaning of the sentence into something else either, since you already did it yourself. It's not a matter of a game "KNOWN for its kinda flowery writing" anymore, I would say it's most likely a matter of the translator tastes here.

Well, I just wanted to tell you how I felt while reading TB. Even though I didn't like your cynical way to answer me, I thank you for reading me and answering me so far. If I may ask, would you accept to share the japanese scripts with me and discuss about the matter and the words I don't understand by pm instead? I think it would be good idea instead of throwing salt to each other (and I don't like doing that anyway).

Good luck for your career of translator anyway.

[Darklord Rooke]

4 hours ago, Kirashi said:

How can you say that just after telling me, that you translated an onomatopoeia with a word that doesn't even exist because

Onomatopoeia are the written form of sound effects. Because they mimic what things sound like, they sometimes take the form of 'made up' words. "FWOOMP" is an onomatopoeia, yet you won't find it in any dictionary. "BAMF" is another one. Western comics used to be littered with them.

It wasn't translated into 'Grinnity' because it 'sounded cool', it was translated into that because it kept the tone. Chronopolis is another Japanese speaker and thinks the tone is replicated to a decent extent, which means mission accomplished?

[Kirashi]

7 minutes ago, Rooke said:

Onomatopoeia are the written form of sound effects. Because they mimic what things sound like, they sometimes take the form of made up words. "FWOOMP" is an onomatopoeia, yet you won't find it in any dictionary. "BAMF" is another one. Western comics used to be littered with them.

It wasn't translated into 'Grinnity' because it 'sounded cool', it was translated into that because it kept the tone. Chronopolis is another Japanese speaker and thinks the tone is replicated to a decent extent, which means mission accomplished?

I know what onomatopoeia are, I even talked a bit about those earlier but the point is, as long as you understand what grinnity means, it can fill the bill yes. But I still think the english language is rich enough to translate it by something... that everyone can understand...

[Decay]

Grinnity isn't a word, there's nothing there to understand or not understand other than it's a playful take on the word "grin," which is a universal concept not exclusive to native english speakers.

[Chuee]

5 hours ago, Kirashi said:

Well, I just wanted to tell you how I felt while reading TB. Even though I didn't like your cynical way to answer me, I thank you for reading me and answering me so far. If I may ask, would you accept to share the japanese scripts with me and discuss about the matter and the words I don't understand by pm instead? I think it would be good idea instead of throwing salt to each other (and I don't like doing that anyway).

Good luck for your career of translator anyway.

Here's an idea. If you come across a word that you don't understand, type it into google. You can't expect the translator to dumb down the vocabulary of the game to specifically pander to you. 

[Fred the Barber]

1 minute ago, Chuee said:

Here's an idea. If you come across a word that you don't understand, type it into google. You can't expect the translator to dumb down the vocabulary of the game to specifically pander to you. 

Well, in fairness to Kirashi, this made-up word doesn't come up with anything if you type it into google (unless you count this thread; seriously). But in fairness to the translator, it's still obviously completely intelligible to native English speakers, and I agree completely with the second half of your response, that the translator shouldn't be expected to dumb down the vocabulary a la Simple English wikipedia.

Frankly, Kirashi, if you had trouble understanding that line, you probably shouldn't be trying to translate this script from English, and the translation isn't at fault for that; your English is. Sorry.

[Kirashi]

1 hour ago, Chuee said:

Here's an idea. If you come across a word that you don't understand, type it into google. You can't expect the translator to dumb down the vocabulary of the game to specifically pander to you. 

I already tried that, as I said earlier... You didn't read right?

1 hour ago, Fred the Barber said:

Frankly, Kirashi, if you had trouble understanding that line, you probably shouldn't be trying to translate this script from English, and the translation isn't at fault for that; your English is. Sorry.

Translate this script from english? You mean using japanese script instead? 

Onomatopoeia are universal (as far as I know) so understandable for everyone (as long as you really want to know the answer though). You are saying that's okay to translate those by some made-up line. How do you expect no native speaker to understand those when they see it for the first time? 

Just so you know how I would "translate" this line: Grinnity grin grin.

 I can understand what "grin" means, okay! but now I see that the word is typed twice, that's a bit confusing, but I can still think it is about grinning, and the second grin would most likely be a typo... Now you add  one more grin with ity, Grinnity and... 2 Grin... Grinnity... Google can't help  me... I am lost... I never saw that  word and it certainly doesn't look like the english I saw so far... Explain me how the hell am I supposed to understand that?

Just don't forget that this is supposed to be an onomatopoeia, something simple... That's why I can't help but feel sad when I see the translation. Thank you for remembering me one more time my english is worthless. Guess I'll just give up after all.

[Darklord Rooke]

4 minutes ago, Kirashi said:

Onomatopoeia are universal (as far as I know) so understandable for everyone

They're not. They're language and culture dependent.

My personal theory is that (heh) certain people are tone deaf and cannot accurately replicate sounds, and so without a certain amount of cultural familiarity you wouldn't know what the hell some of them mean. Take a rooster - 'Cockle doodle do' in the West and kokekokko in Japanese. Wan Wan vs bark bark for a dog. Kon for a fox vs ... whatever the hell it is in English. They are not instantly recognisable as animal sounds.

So yes, it's perfectly normal to translate onomatopoeia, because many Japanese onomatopoeia would make no sense in English. Especially in cases where there is no English equivalent, like in (I assume) the above.

And considering replicating sounds involves (on occasion) making up words, it's perfectly okay to translate them into 'made up' words.

It's understandable that you're frustrated with the translation, the problem is that there isn't a Global language to translate stories into for everyone. There should be a bigger French translation community, so it can be translated into French also.

[littleshogun]

Speaking about rooster, I remember that in Indonesia the onomatopeia was like 'kukuruyuuuk', and that's for the place when I live. I read that in other area there's different onomatopeia for rooster here (It's still in Indonesia by the way).

Okay, I think I saw Kirashi problem here. My suggestion here would be instead of keep trying to translating every word, just enjoy the game without too much bothered by that. I mean it's not like you miss overall plot for Tokyo Babel because of word like grinnity or yummers, right?

[Decay]

1 hour ago, Kirashi said:

I already tried that, as I said earlier... You didn't read right?

Translate this script from english? You mean using japanese script instead? 

Onomatopoeia are universal (as far as I know) so understandable for everyone (as long as you really want to know the answer though). You are saying that's okay to translate those by some made-up line. How do you expect no native speaker to understand those when they see it for the first time? 

Just so you know how I would "translate" this line: Grinnity grin grin.

 I can understand what "grin" means, okay! but now I see that the word is typed twice, that's a bit confusing, but I can still think it is about grinning, and the second grin would most likely be a typo... Now you add  one more grin with ity, Grinnity and... 2 Grin... Grinnity... Google can't help  me... I am lost... I never saw that  word and it certainly doesn't look like the english I saw so far... Explain me how the hell am I supposed to understand that?

Just don't forget that this is supposed to be an onomatopoeia, something simple... That's why I can't help but feel sad when I see the translation. Thank you for remembering me one more time my english is worthless. Guess I'll just give up after all.

You figure it out the same way everyone else does. You don't understand that line by having a deep understanding of the English language, because as you said a part of it isn't even using a real english word. You understand that line by being less rigid in your thinking and using context to extrapolate meaning from nonsense. 

Thankfully, it seems like the overwhelming majority of non-native readers are actually able to read this perfectly fine. Seems like their translation methodology worked quite well.

[Chuee]

4 hours ago, Kirashi said:

 I can understand what "grin" means, okay! but now I see that the word is typed twice, that's a bit confusing, but I can still think it is about grinning, and the second grin would most likely be a typo... Now you add  one more grin with ity, Grinnity and... 2 Grin... Grinnity... Google can't help  me... I am lost... I never saw that  word and it certainly doesn't look like the english I saw so far... Explain me how the hell am I supposed to understand that?

There's a famous line in the three little pigs, where a character says "not by the hair on my chinny chin chin". Same principle as what was done here, and this is something small children read all the time. The line you're talking about isn't hard to understand. Grinnity grin grin, all of them contain grin, so it should be clear as day that "grinnity" is a modification of grin. So then all you need to understand as what the "ity" is. If you know English, you'll know that when you modulate a base word and have it end with a y you change it to an adjective. Example, the verb fidget you can change to fidgety. So in here they're taking grin and changing it to an adjective (though the word grinnity isn't an actual word).

[Darklord Rooke]

1 hour ago, Chuee said:

There's a famous line in the three little pigs, where a character says "not by the hair on my chinny chin chin". 

Intriguingly, there's quite a few google results for 'grinny grin grin'. A great deal of heartache might have been saved by just using that xD

[novurdim]

On 07.07.2016 at 4:57 PM, Conjueror said:

The Miley Cyrus reference had a Japanese idol that was infamous for revealing clothes that no English speaker would've ever known, so I just tled her name to something familiar to English speakers that should conjure the same image.

While I like the translation overall, I... can't really agree with this part. People are already reading visual novels with certain "exotic" expectations, they know how these works of fiction are inherently japanese and are usually ready to encounter some specific things that they may have to look up. There's nothing wrong with that, it doesn't hamper the "experience" and globalization/localization is not a goal in itself.

And at the same time would you agree with the same change during the translation of the "big" literature? Would any "professional translator" that Conj likes to bring up think this is a good idea? Would changing Ishiguro to Akunin in the context of, say, "writing a butler story reference" during the translation to russian just because he is a lot more famous in Russia and most people will "have the same experience without looking up what was the talk about that person all about" be deemed as acceptable by avid russian readers? Or by anyone for that matter. Why should gamers be treated any different and why should weird double standards be created specifically for them? Or vice-versa, if you think that example is too famous. I doubt many of you know Lev Leschenko, so should he be just changed to Tom Jones on a translator's whim in a translation of a russian story? Just so people shouldn't have to look into the estrade of a different country and continue reading with the similar analogue in mind? I don't believe that's how "delivering the same experience" works.

[Fred the Barber]

47 minutes ago, novurdim said:

And at the same time would you agree with the same change during the translation of the "big" literature? Would any "professional translator" that Conj likes to bring up think this is a good idea? Would changing Ishiguro to Akunin in the context of, say, "writing a butler story reference" during the translation to russian just because he is a lot more famous in Russia and most people will "have the same experience without looking up what was the talk about that person all about" be deemed as acceptable by avid russian readers? Or by anyone for that matter. Why should gamers be treated any different and why should weird double standards be created specifically for them? Or vice-versa, if you think that example is too famous. I doubt many of you know Lev Leschenko, so should he be just changed to Tom Jones on a translator's whim in a translation of a russian story? Just so people shouldn't have to look into the estrade of a different country and continue reading with the similar analogue in mind? I don't believe that's how "delivering the same experience" works.

World-renowned novelist and translator Umberto Eco would undoubtedly support Conjueror on this one. I'll direct you to the section "Sameness in Reference" in his essay collection Experiences in Translation, pages 14-17, where he talks about his own translators handling a scene from Foucault's Pendulum. Eco's original describes the scenery using a literature reference to a hedge which would only be recognizable to Italians. He basically told all his translators to put some literature reference that would be understood by a native speaker of their language, even if it was to something not literally depicted in the original (e.g., add a freaking castle or a tree or whatever instead of a hedge, for all he cared), because the important thing was to keep some recognizable literary reference, not the specifics of the scenery. The English translation, for instance, made a Keats reference.

On a personal note, I recently edited a reference to a mid-90s Japanese pop song by some band I've certainly never heard of (and mad props to the TL for recognizing the reference, seriously...) into a Bruno Mars reference, so that you could understand that the character was kinda singing a pop song, not spouting complete nonsense. It was completely incomprehensible before. Now it's understandable. It's pretty obvious which is the better translation.

[novurdim]

42 minutes ago, Fred the Barber said:

It's pretty obvious which is the better translation.

Obvious to me that the translator's ability to recognize the reference and pass it on to the readers should be valued higher and never would I trade a chance to learn something new for the tired mainstream american substitute that almost feels like a cultural superiority complex. Oh well, still kudos to you for remembering and telling me about Eco, my point now certainly looks a lot more moot to the most.

[Darklord Rooke]

As an example in Episode 12, Season 4 of Friends, it is revealed that Michael Flatley, Lord of the Dance, scared the bejeezus out of Chandler. This was changed in the Japanese translation due to the perception that hardly anybody in Japan knows who the hell Michael Flatley is.

1 hour ago, novurdim said:

People are already reading visual novels with certain "exotic" expectations, they know how these works of fiction are inherently japanese and are usually ready to encounter some specific things that they may have to look up.

There is no preconceived notion in genre fiction from the audience that they may encounter something they'll have to look up. Genre fiction's goal being entertainment and not to educate the audience about all things Japan. That is why most when I pick up 'The Ring' I see zero footnotes, but if I pick up a piece of classical literature I see hundreds. And that has to do with the difference in purpose - literature is rewarding and requires serious thought, genre fiction is entertaining and relaxing and doesn't require the audience to pay as much attention. 

[novurdim]

9 minutes ago, Rooke said:

That is why most when I pick up 'The Ring' I see zero footnotes, but if I pick up a piece of classical literature I see hundreds.

Right, obviously not because it simply doesn't require a hundread footnotes. And even then I believe I've seen a few in my Amphora translation, can't say they destroyed the experience or could have taken me out of anything. On the other side, that I can actually say about a random Bruno Mars discussion in a japanese highschool.

[Fred the Barber]

1 hour ago, novurdim said:

On the other side, that I can actually say about a random Bruno Mars discussion in a japanese highschool.

Actually, you probably wouldn't say that, given that it's an oblique reference in passing, not "a Bruno Mars discussion" - but I'd urge you to reserve judgment until you've at least read the Majo Koi Nikki prologue patch and seen it in context.

Edit: By analogy, the song reference is approximately as important as that Italian hedge. Definitely not something worth confusing the hell out of people for, and also literally unintelligible in the original - you could not even look up what the hell was going on if you wanted to.

Anyway, I'll stop beating that particular dead horse. But the bottom line is, your argument was "professionals wouldn't adjust a reference based on different cultural background for a translation", and it's demonstrably false, given that noted professional translators actually do, and given that a noted scholar of language dedicated a large section of an essay on translation towards encouraging translators to do exactly that.

[Chuee]

1 hour ago, novurdim said:

On the other side, that I can actually say about a random Bruno Mars discussion in a japanese highschool.

Also note that Japanese high schoolers don't speak English. I guess we should just stop translating altogether now because it being in English would break immersion.

[Conjueror]

7 hours ago, novurdim said:

While I like the translation overall, I... can't really agree with this part. People are already reading visual novels with certain "exotic" expectations, they know how these works of fiction are inherently japanese and are usually ready to encounter some specific things that they may have to look up. There's nothing wrong with that, it doesn't hamper the "experience" and globalization/localization is not a goal in itself

I think something like this should be done on a case by case basis, depending on the author's intent. I'm all for educating readers on Japanese culture, but here we had a scene where the only point was "we'll have you dress like a bitch as a penalty" and the Japanese idol referenced was so obscure in the west you can't even look her up, so the joke (and the very point) would've been lost completely. If the target of the reference was in any way important to the image, I would preserve the original, but the only thing that was referenced here was "dressing bitchy" and Miley Cyrus was just too perfect to express that point.

[novurdim]

8 hours ago, Chuee said:

Also note that Japanese high schoolers don't speak English. I guess we should just stop translating altogether now because it being in English would break immersion.

If in the process we are going to casually swap their minds with random american brats then we probably should indeed, my little juggler.

I do understand the sentiment and maybe I'd even do the same in some cases but these things still always rub me the wrong way. Making several wrong steps, losing balance in the process and people can get to the disasters akin to some of the nintendo "localizations". VNs are way too niche for the something like that, of course, but you still can't escape the sour aftertaste.

[Decay]

I actually do agree that you shouldn't take out too much of the origin culture's "flavor" in a translated work. But Conjueror's explanation makes perfect sense to me and I feel like the change was justified and for the better. I'm not really interested in arguments about how it could go wrong, when that wasn't the case here.

[ChaosRaven]

I think the only thing that really annoyed me in Tokyo Babel's translation was the overuse of the term 'Raison d'être'. It appeared so often that I really don't want to see it anymore for the next two years. 

Not sure if synonyms like 'reason for being' or 'meaning of life' would have been valid though. It's not necessarily the fault of the translation if there's no other way to translate it accurately, BUT it also isn't an English term, it's french. But if foreign words are okay, then why was it necessary to translate Samael's 'Onii-san' to 'mister'? That's way more off the original meaning than 'reason for being' or 'meaning of life' would have been from 'Raison d'être', and I dare to say that more people in the VN and anime community know the term 'Onii-san' than 'Raison d'être'.