On Translating Linguistic Variants

On June 5-7, 2015, I attended the 6th International Conference organized by the Brazilian Translators Association (ABRATES), which took place at the Rebouças Convention Center in São Paulo. On Saturday, June 6th―the first day of presentations―I spent most of my day in Room 5, where several presenters talked about literary translation.

The fourth session I attended was On Translating Linguistic Variants, presented by Solange Pinheiro Carvalho. She talked about her academic research on the work of Andrea Camilleri, an Italian author born in 1925, when few Italians were bilingual and most only spoke their regional language.

Solange explained that, for Camilleri, Sicilian was the "language of affection," while Italian was the "language of authority." Back then, it was not possible to talk to elderly people in Italian, since they only understood their own dialect. As for young people, they started to learn Italian at school, then oftentimes moved out of their hometown and, upon returning, could no longer understand the local dialect. This Italian reality is shown in Camilleri's writings, mainly as a way to indicate a character's language register, as well as the (social and hierarchical) interactions between characters.

The presenter studied different approaches from academics, such as Pym, Lane-Mercier, Morvan, and Eco to base her research, but warned that "It's impossible to think about a general translation theory; we must analyze each particular case separately." In order to illustrate this linguistic reality, the researcher compared the evolution of national language in Italy and Brazil: While multilingualism was the rule in Italian territory―where minority or regional languages contrasted from standard Italian―in Brazilian territory there has always been a multiplicity of dialects that are mutually understandable.

However, she emphasized that translators should avoid attempting a localization that could create an incorrect parallel between a dialect in the original and an accent that is characteristic from a Brazilian state, for example. In other words, it would be wrong to change a Sicilian character into someone from a northern Brazilian state.

READ MORE: 
"The Translation of
Literary Sociolect: a Study About Wuthering Heights"
―a thesis by Solange
Pinheiro Carvalho
(in Portuguese)

Solange said this Italian multilingualism causes conflicts in both Camilleri's writings and translations, because what is considered "the educated standard" clashes with the translation of linguistic variants. "In the general consensus, we're able to match different linguistic norms," she stated in regards to the translation of a standard language into another. "But how about the linguistic variants that exist within the same language?"

As an example, Solange mentioned some fragments of one of Camilleri's books, in which a character is talking to his girlfriend and ends up mixing some Sicilian with Italian, which deeply irritates her―since she only understands the latter. The presenter then reflected about how to manage this conflict in a translation into Portuguese: Instead of translating everything into the target language, which would certainly change the interaction between characters, she said some adaptations are required.

"Sometimes you must find another language to create this foreignness, especially if one of the characters will resolve this conflict throughout the dialog," she suggested, mentioning that she found inspiration in minority languages from the Iberian Peninsula, such as Galician, Aragonese, Mirandese, and Asturian, which are somehow connected to Portuguese―at least enough to be understood by the reader, while creating the same effect present in the original because of some terms that are indeed out of place and incomprehensible.

In some other instances, she opted for misspelling something to cause this oddness. During her explanation, she highlighted a piece of dialog from Camilleri's book in which the word signora (or "Mrs." in Italian) had been written as signura and, in order to be true to the author's intention and making the reader feel a bit off, she'd misspell the Portuguese senhora as sinhora, which is actually used in Galician.

"By introducing Galician into the text, we're able to show that the character doesn't quite speak the standard language used in the original, thus keeping the same level of oddness in the translation," she assured. "I just don't know how far this solution would be considered acceptable at a traditional publishing house, because we all know there's some resistance to regional variants," she reminded the audience, adding that Camilleri's work in Italy isn't as widely accepted as it should because Italian readers think his writings are "too difficult."

"If I were to translate it this way and a published put the book out like that, I'm sure they would receive many complaints about the book being badly written," she lamented.

RAFA LOMBARDINO is a translator and journalist from Brazil who lives in California. She is the author of "Tools and Technology in Translation ― The Profile of Beginning Language Professionals in the Digital Age," which is based on her UCSD Extension class. Rafa has been working as a translator since 1997 and, in 2011, started to join forces with self-published authors to translate their work into Portuguese and English. She also runs Word Awareness, a small network of professional translators.

Let's Avoid Translationese, Shall We?

On June 5-7, 2015, I attended the 6th International Conference organized by the Brazilian Translators Association (ABRATES), which took place at the Rebouças Convention Center in São Paulo. On Saturday, June 6th―the first day of presentations―I spent most of my day in Room 5, where several presenters talked about literary translation.

The third session I attended was "Let's Avoid Translationese, Shall We?", presented by Ponte de Letras, a group formed by Petê Rissatti, Carolina Caires Coelho, Flávia Souto Maior and Débora Guimarães Isidoro, four book translators (and very good friends) who got together to write a blog about the subject.

They started the session with Petê reading a thank-you note to ABRATES and, at first, it all sounded very weird to those in the audience. At the end of his reading, we found out that the odd language and behavior had been intentional: the presenters wanted us to feel uncomfortable with how unnatural it all sounded. After all, they were there to talk about "translationese."

Petê then recommended Paulo Henrique Brito's A tradução literária as a reference book for those who wish to learn more about publishing. However, he warned us that "You translate for publishers, but readers are your end client." With this reminder, Petê went back to the subject of keeping a natural language in book translations in order to hold the reader's attention.

Here are some other reminders made by the group:

• Translation, at its best, doesn't sound translated.

• When someone thinks about the translator, it's because something went wrong.

• The more translators work on a text ―making an effort to respect the original and, at the same time, make it sound natural in the target language― the least it will make themselves present in it.

• The more invisible translators are, the more we can see them.

Still on the topic of sounding natural, Flávia talked about one of her book translation and how she tried to strike a balance between making it flow and keeping true to the space and time "atmosphere" created by the author. In this case, she was referring to a noir book written by James Elroy and set in 1040s Los Angeles. With that in mind, she had to adapt slangs and language of that space and time. Her tip? "Get as close as possible to what is really being said."

Petê then mentioned the “tapestry analogy” according to which Miguel de Cervantes said translations are like the back of a tapestry: people can see the knots in the plot, some threads hanging on the backside, but can't quite contemplate the beauty of the image created. "We must strive to make sure our tapestry isn't loose and comes apart; it must be tied together well, without knots and patches," he explained.

Carolina said that "translationese" happens when translators go into "autopilot," when the deadline is too tight, or when editors change something during the reviewing process. Débora complemented that thought saying that we must read and re-read our translation to make sure our final product will be as natural as possible. For example, she likes reading her translations aloud to check if they're "easy on the ears." "There are no rules and each one of us must find our own way to accomplish it," she assured.

RAFA LOMBARDINO is a translator and journalist from Brazil who lives in California. She is the author of "Tools and Technology in Translation ― The Profile of Beginning Language Professionals in the Digital Age," which is based on her UCSD Extension class. Rafa has been working as a translator since 1997 and, in 2011, started to join forces with self-published authors to translate their work into Portuguese and English. She also runs Word Awareness, a small network of professional translators.

Research In Literary Translation: Selecting And Interviewing Sources Of Information

On June 5-7, 2015, I attended the 6th International Conference organized by the Brazilian Translators Association (ABRATES), which took place at the Rebouças Convention Center in São Paulo. On Saturday, June 6th―the first day of presentations―I spent most of my day in Room 5, where several presenters talked about literary translation.

The second presentation I attended, Research in literary translation: how journalism techniques contribute to selecting and interviewing sources of information, was by translator and journalist Candice Soldatelli, who translated Ghost Rider: Travels on the Healing Road (published in Portuguese as “Ghost Rider: a estrada da cura,”) written by Neil Peart, celebrated drummer for the rock band Rush. She talked about how this translation was, at the same time, a dream come true―she's a huge fan of the Canadian band―and a real nightmare―considering the amount of research required.

She highlighted some of the similarities between translation and journalism: being faithful to a statement and/or source text, being careful not to impose your own point of view as a journalist and/or translator, and selecting and interviewing reliable sources of information. "Writing news stories is like translating reality," she compared. "Among all qualities a good translator must have, being a researcher is crucial."

Before going into detail and telling the audience, in a very fun way, how the translation process was, Candice challenged those who attended the session: how many people there knew most of the professionals she had to resort to while trying to understand the variety of subjects mentioned in the book? Her list, which was quite extensive, included bikers and drummers―as expected due to the nature of the book, considering the author's occupation and the fact that he had gone on a lone motorcycle ride through the roads of Canada―as well as an ornithologist, who studies birds.

As an amateur bird watcher, the author mentioned several species and features observed during his trip, and these items needed to be translated precisely as not to attract negative criticism from readers familiar with the subject. "When I read the book in English, just for pleasure, I thought: 'Poor translator! He'll have to look up the name of all these birds!" she recalled, saying that she recommended the original book to Editora Belas Letras and ended up being hired as the Brazilian Portuguese translator after passing a test.

At first, she tried to look for bird names using Wikipedia, expecting to find a link to the Portuguese page on the original English page. Candice admits she often hoped to find at least a link in Spanish that could help her "see the light" and find the name of each species. However, after not finding any reliable sources, not even for the scientific names in Latin, she decided to call an expert.

"Can you imagine if an ornithologist reads it and it doesn't match?! I'd be ashamed of myself!" she explained, saying that she took her research with her when she found a specialist in the area, with whom she talked for over an hour. "When you work with an expert, you can't expect to get an education about the subject," she warned. "You must come in with a few solutions, so the two of you can have an exchange." After their conversation, she and the ornithologist ended up creating a name for a bird that only exists in Canada and, so far, hadn't made it into any Brazilian catalogs. Once they had made a decision, the expert even added the species to Wiki Aves, the Brazilian wikipage on birds.

Candice said that she followed the same researching method with bikers and a drummer. "I was able to bring arguments to the table when talking to my copy editor. How come? Because I did my homework," she pointed out, saying that she also needed precise terms for motorcycle parts and movements made by musicians who play the drums. She said it was a "total-immersion process" to understand what had been written by the author, so that she could interpret, adapt, and indicate each term with precision to a Brazilian Portuguese audience.

Once the book translation was completed, Candice had the unique opportunity of taking part in a book release event side-by-side with the author. "It's the best book about mourning that I've read in my entire life," she summarized how she felt about this rock star's story, who was pushed to the edge and decided to reflect about life and find himself again after losing his own daughter and, a few months later, his wife.

Read more:
Interview (in Portuguese) with Candice Soldatelli at music portal Whiplash.Net 

RAFA LOMBARDINO is a translator and journalist from Brazil who lives in California. She is the author of "Tools and Technology in Translation ― The Profile of Beginning Language Professionals in the Digital Age," which is based on her UCSD Extension class. Rafa has been working as a translator since 1997 and, in 2011, started to join forces with self-published authors to translate their work into Portuguese and English. She also runs Word Awareness, a small network of professional translators.

CAT Tools In Literary Translation: What Are They Good For?

On June 5-7, 2015, I attended the 6th International Conference organized by the Brazilian Translators Association (ABRATES), which took place at the Rebouças Convention Center in São Paulo. On Saturday, June 6th―the first day of presentations―I spent most of my day in Room 5, where several presenters talked about literary translation.

The first presentation I attended was the one by translator Reginaldo Francisco, who talked about the use of CAT tools in literary translations. Reginaldo highlighted the overall benefits offered by CAT tools, such as improved comfort and ergonomics, because translators don't need to use two screens or, worse, read the original straight from a paperback copy.

Another improvement is how previous translations can be leveraged, because your work is recorded in a database and reused at a later time. Glossaries can also be compiled, so that key terms will be suggested automatically whenever they show up in the original. Besides, many of these programs help with typing as well with "auto complete" or "auto suggest" features that guess what you're trying to type based on the first letters being entered and the words most commonly used in the project.

Reginaldo talked a little about some of the most popular tools, such as Trados and Wordfast, and explained that their classic version used to work within Microsoft Word by isolated segments on a document and providing a field where translators could type the respective translation. This combination of original segment and translation are then stored within a database to feed the translation memory.

RECOMMENDED READING:
"Why I Use a
CAT Tool to
Translate Books"
by Rafa Lombardino

"These are good starting points, because the learning curve is less steep," he indicated when referring to the fact that many translators are already familiar with the Microsoft Word environment, and they'd only need to get used the additional menus and hotkeys that are particular to each tool. "However, the fact that they work within Word is the best and worst of advantages," he warned. "You may be used to Word, but you also get all the bugs that come with it."

When demonstrating Wordfast Classic, Reginaldo compared it to the rule many of us have already used on top of a sheet of paper to indicate the line we're translating. With a tool of this nature, we benefit from improved ergonomics, because we avoid discomfort and the literal pain in the neck caused by looking from paper to screen.

He then demonstrated Wordfast Pro, which is a stand-alone version of this tool and works within its own window, without resorting to an additional program. Reginaldo talked about looking up previous translations, be them at the sentence or vocabulary level, and how translation memories work.

When talking about literary translation specifically, he recognized that a translator will very rarely find matches and repetitions within a memory database while translating a book. One example he did mention, from an Italian-to-Portuguese book he translated and that was written in a diary-like format, showed similar dates that were identified as matches, and it only takes translating the first date for the tool to understand the syntax and simply replace the number, while keeping the translation for the month.

Still, he says that these tools are useful for consistency and quality assurance purpose, including character names, for example. Translators can also look up terminology by doing a search and finding all segments in which a given word was used, so that they can recall how it was translated throughout the book.

Finally, making it a habit to translate books using CAT tools is something healthy for a translator's production control, because this type of software generates reports that indicate the amount of words translated and what's still left to translate, thus helping professionals organize their schedule.

RAFA LOMBARDINO is a translator and journalist from Brazil who lives in California. She is the author of "Tools and Technology in Translation ― The Profile of Beginning Language Professionals in the Digital Age," which is based on her UCSD Extension class. Rafa has been working as a translator since 1997 and, in 2011, started to join forces with self-published authors to translate their work into Portuguese and English. She also runs Word Awareness, a small network of professional translators.