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LANGUAGE_BARRIERS

                                          October 30, 2005

I stood in Stacey's bookstore,
pondering the fact that they carried
not one but three different translations
of Stendhal's "the Black and the Red".

How to choose?

Once you're familar with a
body of an author's work,         I find that I can identify
it's not necessary to know        problems in inferior
the original language to          translations of Nietzsche
spot a false note.                just by reading the      
                                  translation: "What? He
   But Stendhal                   wouldn't have said    
   was new to                     something like that!" 
   me...

   
Comparing the first few sentences   
showed no significant differences...
but down there in the second               
paragraph, a description of an 18th               A more literal translation
Century stamping mill.  Two of the                I gather:
versions called it "fearful" or                      
"frightful-looking", but in the                   "A peine entre-t-on dans    
Penguin edition, it has a "terrible               la ville que l'on est    
aspect".                                          étourdi par le fracas 
                                                  d'une machine bruyante   
                                                  et terrible en apparence." 
                                                  
    Score!                                        
                                                             
    Penguin comes
    through again.

       (Why must *everything* be
        dumbed down, including
        "Oxford Classics" editions?)


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