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It's been over eleven years since I read Ionesco's La Leçon, and I've been wondering about this ever since. Has anyone translated La Leçon into English (or any other language, but for the sake of discussion I'll assume an English translation). If so, how did the translator handle the line in which the Student asks the Teacher, "Comment dit-on 'grand-mère' en français?" A literal translation would lose the absurdity. An obvious (and appropriately Ionescian) solution would be to translate it as "How do you say 'grandmother' in English?" but I'm not sure how this would square with the translator's responsibility to maintain the integrity of the author's words. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.23.124.236 ( talk) 04:02, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
You can find the translation by Donald M. Allen on Amazon (in the collection The Bald Soprano and other plays) and use the preview, a trick that often works when Google Books fails you. Allen translates as follows:
Pupil: Oh well, one would say, in French, I believe, the roses... of my... how do you say "grandmother" in French?
Professor: In French? Grandmother.
As it's understood that both are speaking French, the absurdity remains, though of course it's still not quite the same.-- Rallette ( talk) 07:45, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
Where did patent leather get its "patent" name? I followed up the government invention patent idea, but the process seems to be very old and not originally patented. There are government invention patents on the process, but I don't think the term originated via invention patent. This website says patent leater came from: "After the Patten shoe which the young women wore in the buttery. When the cream spilled on their shoes, the fat would tend to make the leather shiny." Sounds good, but not sure whether it is true. Etymonline.com does not have an entry. -- Utmoatr ( talk) 12:09, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
While it's very easy to differentiate between a Belfast and County Tyrone accent, I personally think the Portadown and Lurgan accents sound alike. But are they really? Are there any noticeable differences between the two accents, despite the towns being close together geographically? Thank you.-- Jeanne Boleyn ( talk) 15:17, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
How does this sentence strike a non-Japanese speaker?
How does the 'A-chan' fit into this gentleman's name? Is there nothing strange about it? In actual fact, this is a nickname, or term of endearment, and not part of the gentleman's name at all. I find it odd that the BBC has even included it in the news item. KägeTorä - (影虎) ( TALK) 17:03, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
Some (all?) computer programming languages required everything to be written using only characters on standard keyboards. One can write 3 x 4 (with the letter x as a substitute for ×) when one types a letter, but in programming languages one wants that letter to be available for other uses, so a workaround was adopted, the asterisk: 3 * 4.
But within Wikipedia there's a little menu from which one can chose the "×" character, and in TeX and LaTeX and the like one can write
etc., etc. There's no need for uncouth substitutes or workarounds.
But within Wikipedia and elsewhere, even today, one finds people eating mashed potatoes with their hands when silverware is available, writing
in TeX!
Are people being taught in school today that the use of the asterisk for this purpose is a standard thing rather than a substitute used in the remote wilderness when limited to keyboard characters? Michael Hardy ( talk) 20:17, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
The asterisk was actually used for multiplication at around the same time as × was first used (1628 or 1631). It was used in Johann Rahn's Teutsche Algebra (1659), the source of our modern symbol for division, the obeliscus (or obelus): ÷. The obeliscus, as is obvious, is the direct opposite of the asteriscus, long before they were used for math. Both were originally used for editorial notation and invented by Greek scholars. The asteriscus for editorial additions, the obeliscus for editorial deletions - both surviving into modern typography as the notations *, †, and ‡; and in mathematics as ÷. So while the switch back to the asterisk might have been forced by keyboards, it was not entirely without precedent-- Obsidi♠n Soul 14:57, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
Language desk | ||
---|---|---|
< September 20 | << Aug | September | Oct >> | September 22 > |
Welcome to the Wikipedia Language Reference Desk Archives |
---|
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages. |
It's been over eleven years since I read Ionesco's La Leçon, and I've been wondering about this ever since. Has anyone translated La Leçon into English (or any other language, but for the sake of discussion I'll assume an English translation). If so, how did the translator handle the line in which the Student asks the Teacher, "Comment dit-on 'grand-mère' en français?" A literal translation would lose the absurdity. An obvious (and appropriately Ionescian) solution would be to translate it as "How do you say 'grandmother' in English?" but I'm not sure how this would square with the translator's responsibility to maintain the integrity of the author's words. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.23.124.236 ( talk) 04:02, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
You can find the translation by Donald M. Allen on Amazon (in the collection The Bald Soprano and other plays) and use the preview, a trick that often works when Google Books fails you. Allen translates as follows:
Pupil: Oh well, one would say, in French, I believe, the roses... of my... how do you say "grandmother" in French?
Professor: In French? Grandmother.
As it's understood that both are speaking French, the absurdity remains, though of course it's still not quite the same.-- Rallette ( talk) 07:45, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
Where did patent leather get its "patent" name? I followed up the government invention patent idea, but the process seems to be very old and not originally patented. There are government invention patents on the process, but I don't think the term originated via invention patent. This website says patent leater came from: "After the Patten shoe which the young women wore in the buttery. When the cream spilled on their shoes, the fat would tend to make the leather shiny." Sounds good, but not sure whether it is true. Etymonline.com does not have an entry. -- Utmoatr ( talk) 12:09, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
While it's very easy to differentiate between a Belfast and County Tyrone accent, I personally think the Portadown and Lurgan accents sound alike. But are they really? Are there any noticeable differences between the two accents, despite the towns being close together geographically? Thank you.-- Jeanne Boleyn ( talk) 15:17, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
How does this sentence strike a non-Japanese speaker?
How does the 'A-chan' fit into this gentleman's name? Is there nothing strange about it? In actual fact, this is a nickname, or term of endearment, and not part of the gentleman's name at all. I find it odd that the BBC has even included it in the news item. KägeTorä - (影虎) ( TALK) 17:03, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
Some (all?) computer programming languages required everything to be written using only characters on standard keyboards. One can write 3 x 4 (with the letter x as a substitute for ×) when one types a letter, but in programming languages one wants that letter to be available for other uses, so a workaround was adopted, the asterisk: 3 * 4.
But within Wikipedia there's a little menu from which one can chose the "×" character, and in TeX and LaTeX and the like one can write
etc., etc. There's no need for uncouth substitutes or workarounds.
But within Wikipedia and elsewhere, even today, one finds people eating mashed potatoes with their hands when silverware is available, writing
in TeX!
Are people being taught in school today that the use of the asterisk for this purpose is a standard thing rather than a substitute used in the remote wilderness when limited to keyboard characters? Michael Hardy ( talk) 20:17, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
The asterisk was actually used for multiplication at around the same time as × was first used (1628 or 1631). It was used in Johann Rahn's Teutsche Algebra (1659), the source of our modern symbol for division, the obeliscus (or obelus): ÷. The obeliscus, as is obvious, is the direct opposite of the asteriscus, long before they were used for math. Both were originally used for editorial notation and invented by Greek scholars. The asteriscus for editorial additions, the obeliscus for editorial deletions - both surviving into modern typography as the notations *, †, and ‡; and in mathematics as ÷. So while the switch back to the asterisk might have been forced by keyboards, it was not entirely without precedent-- Obsidi♠n Soul 14:57, 22 September 2011 (UTC)