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JAT Kansai Meeting, July 2001, Kyoto Gaikokugo Daigaku
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July 2001 Meeting Report:
Beth Cary: The Loneliness of the Long Distance Translator
I will speak today as a working translator in order to discuss the process of long term and book translation; I will not focus on theoretical issues. As a translator based in the U.S., I feel the need for keeping updated on Japan and the Japanese language, necessarily at a "long distance". In terms of projects, I try to keep a balance between interpretation assignments and book translations, or "long distance" projects.
Book translation is qualitatively different from shorter projects. It is essential that one have an affinity for the original text in Japanese. Although it is not necessary to love the text, one should feel some rapport with the text or the author as it will be a long term association. My own theory is that one can keep up a hyper schedule for two weeks, whether for work or for a vacation, but after that it becomes a long term endurance test, requiring strategizing for the duration. Pacing oneself involves balancing the long term, usually less lucrative, project with other assignments; and making sure not to neglect everyday life and tasks. As the deadline nears, one naturally feels stress, and it may be necessary to resort to such tactics as being incommunicado for hours on end. It works best in some cases not to have Internet or telephone access; or at least let the technology work for you to answer messages during the time needed for concentration. One is constantly immersed in the translation: even while doing other things it stays in the back of one's mind. Yet, each day it seems to take a while to get back into it, so one needs to allow that extra leeway in time and mindset. In my case, it often helps to have a few pages to input from the previous day to get myself going. Keeping focused while avoiding burnout can be accomplished by keeping up one'fs interest in the topic, keeping an eye on the deadline, doing some related reading, or attending lectures on similar fields.
Stylistic issues come to the fore as the translator must recast the narrative so that it will read smoothly in the target language. Setting the tone and keeping it consistent is a major task. In the case of "A Spring Like Any Other," the deliberate indecisive tone of the narrator needed to be rendered. "Senso," however, required an attempt at suggesting some 300 different voices; and just as I got used to one writer's tone, the short piece would end. Another effort required in English is the use of a variety of phrases where the Japanese author can (and often does) alight on one phrase and repeat it to good effect over and over again. This must be avoided in careful English writing. It is, in effect, the opposite of building glossaries and pulling out the corresponding terms that one can use in many technical translations. The thesaurus gets a work out; as well as the mulling over capabilities of one'fs mind.
In the actual work of translation, comprehension of the original is key, requiring overall reading, then contextual reading, and sentence by sentence reading as one translates. My experience is that when I ask native Japanese readers about unclear sections, it is usually unclear to them as well, much to their annoyance. It is ideal if the translator can check with the author. In a recent comment, I saw that a Japanese author, realizing that the translator was taking his place in presenting his novel in the other language, said he explained the concealed meaning in his work that he had not revealed when it was originally published. If all authors were this attentive it would make things much clearer for the translator. Without this kind of awareness or access, the best one can do is to derive the meaning from the context.
The tactics that I have resorted to include writing in longhand and using the dictionary as little as possible to keep the flow of my effort, without being distracted by the screen and technology. Then I input, as I check any unclear passages and look up words in dictionaries. The next step is to edit; for me it is easier to edit a printed out copy and then input the changes. If there are many changes, it may be less cumbersome to type in a fresh text rather than taking time to cut and paste text around on the screen.
Another step is what could be termed fact checking. This is not strictly translation, but a check of the proper English term to use for jargon or specialized terms. As works in English require stricter reference to citations, I must locate accurate quotes and references. A decision must be made whether to use existing translated works (and obtaining the proper permissions) or to translate anew. When English language sources exist, I find it is essential that they be used rather than reverse translating from Japanese back into English what the author translated from English into Japanese. If it is impossible to find the original English, then one may have to resort to paraphrasing the quote.
Editing is another key step. Often the original Japanese text is not thoroughly edited. Once something is written, the words seem to be cast in stone; and there seems to be an aversion to editing in Japan's publishing world. This can be from a concern that editing may present a particular viewpoint on difficult and sensitive topics. Works that were originally serialized contain redundancies that have not been edited out in subsequent versions. And some unfortunate surface observations and comments have been kept and put into volumes of collected essays, even when they are published years later when the comments seem no longer valid.
The translator must edit once a clean translation is completed. It must be gone over for readability in English, including some rearranging of sections, paragraphs, and cutting of redundant text. The next step is editing by an associate. It is essential that another pair of eyes attached to another brain read the text for clarity. In my case, I ask a friend to be a "ghost editor." As the publisher's editor is the first English reading audience, this person's comments, queries, and suggestions are extremely valuable. In some cases there may be no editor at the publisher, in which case it is even more essential to ask on's own associate to do the work of editing. This may even entail offering payment for this effort.
Some other tasks which are peripheral to translation, but may be integral to the entire project, have included the following efforts: selecting and working on a sample chapter to send to publishers or funding sources; categorizing the content into topic areas; compiling and selecting which entries to include in the English language volume; fact checking; arranging for permission to use the original or translation; and preparing the introduction.
Audience setting is important in terms of marketability of the translated work. The original may have been a general audience book in Japan, but the English translation may end up being for specialists. This also affects the tone needed for the translation: if it is to be an academic work, footnotes and citations must be evident. If the work is to be marketed as a certain literary genre, such as a mystery, the text must be trimmed to fit the genr's standard page length, repetitive scenes must be cut, and perhaps even the title changed – for example from the rather lyrical "Suna no Utsuwa" ("Vessel of Sand"?) to the more mundane "Inspector Imanishi Investigates." Who knows, this may have been the right choice as royalties are still trickling in.
The translator must also be alert to the negotiations on payment. The project may be based on an advance against royalties (usually split with the author), or funded from a grant, or paid as a set fee. In any of these cases, the project can fall through. My advice is not to work on the translation until the terms are set; and schedule other work so that one can keep solvent.
After engaging in the "long distance" run of the work of translating a book, seeing the final product in print and knowing that a wider audience can be introduced to the work is the reward for the loneliness that one may have felt during the process of translation.
Speaker Bio:
Born and raised in Kyoto, Beth Cary now lives in northern California where she interprets and translates. Her interpretation assignments in the business, government, academic, and arts fields has taken her around Silicon Valley, San Francisco, and farther afield. As a counter balance, she translates on her "off" days.
Published translations include "The Japanese Conspiracy: The Oahu Sugar Strike of 1920" ("日本の陰謀：ハワイオアフ島大ストライキの光と影")
by Duus Masayo (ドウス昌代); "Senso: The Japanese Remember the Pacific War: Letters to the Editor of Asahi Shimbun" ("戦争：血と涙で綴った証言") edited by Frank Gibney; "A Spring Like Any Other" ("いつもと同じ春") by Tsujii Takashi (辻井喬)[Tsutsumi Seiji (堤清二)]; "Inspector Imanishi Investigates" ("砂の器") by Matsumoto Seicho (松本清張). Current project: "An Ecological View of History: Japanese Civilization in the World Context" ("文明の生態史観"), by Umesao Tadao (梅棹忠夫).
