In Spanish it’s RABO de TORO estofado; in French it’s RAGOÛT de QUEUE de taureau. And in English it’s:
Category: language & communication
same difference
A couple of weeks ago I was asked to quote for a translation project that entailed translating a big corporate website from Spanish to English.
The potential job was passed on by a friend, so I didn’t know the client and they didn’t know me. We exchanged a few emails, in which I hope I came across as professional and experienced, and then I sent them a price per word (they’d agreed they could provide text documents) and a time frame.
I never heard back from them, so I suspect they chose a cheaper option with a shorter time estimate.
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gender agendas
I’ve mentioned to several people recently that I don’t seem to have many ideas for new writing, and although I know it’s only a small sample, their reactions seem to clearly support the idea that men and women use language for different purposes.
From the women there have been vague sympathetic noises, general clichéd reassurances that the tide’s bound to turn, and reminders that it’s not the first time I’ve complained of lack of ideas.
The men, though, have offered ‘solutions’.
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time for thought
I’m currently working on a translation project to produce an English version of the voice-over script for a dance video. The original is not precisely poetry, but it’s certainly not standard prose and it does depend on multiple meanings and interpretations.
This is the sort of project I love, as it offers all sorts of creative potential – as long as the person you’re working with doesn’t demand that the translation say exactly the same as the original.
To begin with, there’s no way I can find a word in English like the Spanish word tiempo, which can be used for ‘verb tense’, ‘weather’, ‘time’ and ‘time signature’, plus a few other unrelated concepts.
This, of course, is one reason it’s fun being a ‘creative translator’. It probably also accounts for the fact that my thesaurus is falling apart.
the present poetic
I recently sent a very early draft of a poem to a friend for comments. The piece began:
Catless for too many years, I have forgotten
the building of trust. She spends an hour
pacing, investigating every wall and angle,
exploring draughts from window frames
and under each door, establishing
her points of exit.
Leaving aside criticisms of the participles and the prosaic nature of the verbs – it was a draft, after all – I am interested in the comment that was made after the break on ‘spends’:
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don't confuse the narrator 