My all time favorite SF-writer is Jack Vance who died at May 13th 2013 at the age of 96. He wasn’t a follower of the hard science fiction category, there are far more qualified writers for this genre like Larry Niven with his fabulous novel Ringworld, full of hard core science.
In fact Niven had to write a sequel to Ringworld because he wanted to correct a rather stupid technical error in the original story. One which was pointed him out by MIT students.
Sorry, I digress.
Vance books are more fantasy based and he used the SF frame merely to put his ‘cast’ outside the everyday environment.
The most remarkable feature that his stories all have in common is the high rhetoric level that all characters possess. They all are language virtuosos.
The simple servant on a filthy barge is as eloquent as the leader of a mighty empire.
In all of his books he maintains this particular style and in the translations of his stories into Dutch (at the time I read the Dutch translations). this distinctive style was not lost.
True sf adepts respectfully called him The Master.
And then some day I read his story ‘Het Laatste Kasteel’, translation of ’The Last Castle’. I was stunned. His familiar eloquent characters were replaced by the everyday guy and gal who came up with commonplaces and platitudes.
As I said, I was shocked. This wasn’t a Vance creation!
Later I got myself another copy of ‘Het Laatste Kasteel’ edited by another publisher and more important translated into Dutch by another linguist.
And guess what, the hand of Jack Vance reappeared in the story, the level of expression was reinstated.
That made me decide to translate one of his stories myself and I chose ‘Guyal of Sfere’ from ‘The Dying Earth’.
This appeared to be an exhausting job but at the end the real Jack Vance came forward in my translation.
What did I learn from this exercise?
First, translation is hard labor at least when it comes to a literary level with a rich idiom. And of course the original character of the novel must be preserved and not mutilated. I processed two pages of the book on an evening and I made long hours! You have to feel, taste, smell and visualise the text and then rewind several times to check whether there isn’t a phrase that fits better.
Second, I was amazed to discover that the effort did more to improve my Dutch than it did my English.
When Paul announced that he would translate his story The Big Day into Dutch, I kept quiet. Learned from the previous experience I had (and have) no ambition to spend long hours at the job.
He did the job himself and did it in surprisingly little time. Of course he then asked me to run through his text , looking for anomalies, illogical constructions and downright errors.
So, I worked my way to about half the story and found quite a lot of little annoying misplacements. At that point I had to face reality: Paul’s Dutch language skills are a bit worn out. No offence Paul!
I don’ t want to give an example here but it is often similar in logic as a double negative like: I didn’t do nothing.
Something Paul would never do in English.
I contacted Paul about these findings and we deliberated how to proceed.
He was thinking of an entirely new attempt of the translation, with aborting the project as a final option.
I then developed the idea to bring some professional linguists to the rescue.
So I selected some characteristic paragraphs and fed them into our nowadays artificial and intelligent friends. Which are: ChatGPT which I used to call Arty in previous encounters and the AI from Microsoft Edge called BingGPT. And of course I copy/pasted the text into Google Translate.
Two of these paragraphs and translations can be found underneath.
I paid particular attention to the extent to which the character of the genuine text was kept intact.
And here is where it gets interesting.
Arty (ChatGPT 3.5) seems to have more imagination than the other AI’s and he delivered an acceptable translation. I rewarded him with a 7.
BingGPT (Microsoft Edge) came up with an uninspired translation, a kind of word by word translation. I gave him a 5.
Google Translate did even worse. Its translation was grammatically even downright disputable. He got a 3.
And then Paul. He did best. His style kept intact rather well. In other paragraphs (not printed here) that was even more pronounced.
Paul was rewarded with an 8. He appeared to be very pleased with this result.
I did my own translation (out of competition of course) and I found that the original character is best maintained by not translating a phrase as is, but by implementing the general idea of it into the new language.
Paul’s style is foremost: building phrases with a maximum of expression by a pleasant minimum of words.
Now the decision has been made: Paul will once more scrutinize his translation whereafter I will perform my final editorial work.
Be aware that all this concerns the technical language skills level of today.
The recent AI developments are amazing and accelerating more and more. How long do we still need professional translators?
The near future Arty is one who can take any audiobook while translating it flawlessly into any required language and recite it at the same time using any voice of choice.
The paragraphs
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Original text.
Lou sat motionless behind the wheel, shocked by the unexpected event and considered what to do now. Thinking was not Lou’s major asset as others in the organisation were deemed more qualified for that, he was more the do-er of any operation. Lou was simply better at following instructions than concocting them. Lucky for Lou, he did not have to think long.
The judge had been studying Banning for a while to find out where he got all this nonsense from. But before he could comment, Reece jumped up and objected to the argumentation. The only prints of Jerry found in the house were on the revolver, nothing in the rest of the house. Which according to the defense proved he had not been there.
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Vertaling van Paul van Doorn
Lou zat bewegingloos achter het stuur, in shock door deze onverwachte ontwikkeling en vroeg zich af wat nu te doen. Maar denkwerk was niet echt Lou’s specialiteit, anderen in de organisatie waren daarvoor beter gekwalificeerd, hij was meer de doener bij elke operatie. Lou was nu eenmaal beter in het volgen van instructies dan het beramen ervan. Gelukkig voor Lou, hij hoefde niet lang na te denken.
De rechter had Banning al een tijdje nader bestudeerd om te zien waar hij al die onzin vandaan haalde. Maar voor hij op deze laatste onzinnige bewering kon reageren sprong Reece al op om bezwaar te maken tegen de gebruikte argumentatie. De enige vingerafdrukken die in het huis waren aangetroffen zaten op de revolver en nergens anders. En dit was volgens de verdediging het bewijs dat zijn client nooit in het huis was geweest.
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Vertaling van BingGPT
Lou zat roerloos achter het stuur, geschokt door het onverwachte gebeuren en overwoog wat hij nu moest doen. Denken was niet Lou’s grootste troef omdat anderen in de organisatie meer gekwalificeerd werden geacht voor dat werk, hij was meer de doener van elke operatie. Lou was gewoon beter in het opvolgen van instructies dan in het bedenken ervan. Gelukkig hoefde Lou niet lang na te denken.
De rechter had Banning al een tijdje bestudeerd om erachter te komen waar hij al deze onzin vandaan haalde. Maar voordat hij kon reageren, sprong Reece op en maakte bezwaar tegen de argumentatie. De enige afdrukken van Jerry die in het huis werden gevonden, waren op de revolver, niets in de rest van het huis. Wat volgens de verdediging bewees dat hij daar niet was geweest.
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Vertaling van ChatGPT (Arty)
Lou zat roerloos achter het stuur, geschokt door het onverwachte voorval en overwoog wat hij nu moest doen. Denken was niet Lou’s grootste talent, anderen in de organisatie werden daar meer geschikt voor geacht, hij was meer de uitvoerder van elke operatie. Lou was simpelweg beter in het opvolgen van instructies dan in het bedenken ervan. Gelukkig hoefde Lou niet lang na te denken.
De rechter had Banning al een tijdje bestudeerd om erachter te komen waar hij al deze onzin vandaan haalde. Maar voordat hij commentaar kon geven, sprong Reece op en maakte bezwaar tegen de argumentatie. De enige afdrukken van Jerry die in het huis werden gevonden, zaten op de revolver, niets in de rest van het huis. Dit bewees volgens de verdediging dat hij daar niet was geweest.
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Vertaling van Google Translate
Lou zat roerloos achter het stuur, geschokt door de onverwachte gebeurtenis en overwoog wat te doen nu. Het denken was niet het belangrijkste troef van Lou, omdat anderen in de organisatie daarvoor meer gekwalificeerd werden geacht, hij was meer de do-er van elke operatie. Lou was gewoon beter in het volgen van instructies dan ze te verzinnen. Gelukkig voor Lou, hoefde hij niet lang na te denken.
De rechter studeerde al een tijdje verbieden om erachter te komen waar hij al deze onzin vandaan haalde. Maar voordat hij commentaar kon geven, sprong Reece op en maakte bezwaar tegen de argumentatie. De enige prints van Jerry in het huis waren op de revolver, niets in de rest van het huis. Wat volgens de verdediging bewees dat hij er niet was geweest.
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Eef, 2023-04
Editorial comment:
I indeed confirm to be very happy with my score of 8. Note that this is an 8 on a scale of 1 to 10, with 5 or lower being a failure to pass. I do not recall getting language grades close to that during my time in high school, so age can help improve things, as with good wine!
‘Paul’s Dutch language skills are a bit worn out.‘ No offense taken!
Eef also mentioned in an email that the cost for Arty to embark on a translation is not all that indecent. He also announced his interest and the probability of an experiment. He promised to keep me posted, and I will keep y’all posted on this.
Paul
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