Reason # 1739 why I love my job despite the never-ending horrendous English translation edit I am currently mired in (It must be a black hole, how else can I have put THIS much time and overtime hours into it and yet still be stuck and just over half-way through?!)
Annnnyways...
The reason was what a coworker said to me today, after I spent the morning translating (and rewriting) her abstract for a conference presentation proposal: "A good translation is like ice wine – it takes the essence, the flavour and sweetness of the grapes, and rids itself of the excess water, leaving behind a better, more nuanced, and easier to understand text… Now I have to go and rewrite the Japanese original!"
"I have to rewrite the Japanese original." That is the nicest compliment towards a translator I've ever heard. ^^ I would still be grinning like a maniac if I were you.
ReplyDeleteIt wasn't so much a compliment on my translation skills, but the outcome of a discussion of what she was actually trying to say, and thus a rewriting of her original abstract... but it did feel really good to help her turn her abstract into something much much better!
DeleteAnd she was so excited when I taught her a new word - "brainchild"!