I prefer reading a book in its original language if I can. I guess that just includes Danish and English, as it's been years since I've been practicing any German.

But I find that every time I pick up a translated book in Denmark, that I wanna read, it's the same translator: Arne Herloev Petersen.
He must be a workaholic! He's everywhere. And sadly I feel that he might not be doing a great job (rush jobs?).
And doh!...he's been doing every single Gibson book so far. :-/

I wouldn't try to translate the great prose of Mr. Gibson myself. It must be a tough job. But the Danish books are quite boring compared to the originals.

And there are even very obvious errors...

He managed to screw up the opening lines of Virtual Light. Translating the word "gunship" to the Danish equalent of a regular bomber plane. When in fact these gunships must be the Apache helicopters. I can't believe the wasp-metaphor didn't give him a hint, but apparently not.

Anyway, I would guess that many Gibson-readers worldwide might read his books in both their own language and in English. I did with Neuromancer, because the English version was difficult for me back then. First I got the plot (in Danish) and THEN I could get the original and feast on the style. :-)

I haven't bought "Pattern Recognition" yet (which was for some reason published in Denmark before the rest of the world - like Paul Auster recently did with his book!?!). I'm afraid that it's bad translated....and well, it cost a whooping 350 Danish kroner...which is 50 American dollars right now! And it's not even hardback.
I'll better start with the original language version this time around.

Oh, well, just wondered if any of his other readers have "bad" experiences with THEIR local versions of his work.

Lars

...here (in spanish, though), about the problems with translating terms with no equivalents and how the "texture" of the text is lost then. Plus, the spanish as spoken in Spain (where these editions were done) is very different from that as spoken in Mexico, Argentina, Colombia, Venezuela... so, for a Spaniard the translation may be adequate, but not for others.

[This message was edited by fuldog on March 07, 2003 at 11:44 PM.]

I don't know -- I have never read a Russian translation of anything by Gibson. I guess, it can be translated just fine, or it can be translated awfully bad depending on the translator's talent.

I only read a few chapters of the Danish translation of Neuromancer years ago, but i distinctly recall that is was not a pleasant experience.

I don't think Mr. Gibson's books are among the easiest to translate. Any translation good or bad would be probably be unsuccessful. How would you translate Rastafarian slang ?

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Originally posted by rs:
I only read a few chapters of the Danish translation of Neuromancer years ago, but i distinctly recall that is was not a pleasant experience.

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Well, Neuromancer has been done twice in Danish. Arne Herloev Petersen being the newest - and said to be better than the first.
I just got annoyed with the sloppiness when I can really spot - like in Virtual Light.
And the Danish language just gets boring in Arne's hands. And that's too bad, because Danish CAN be alive and kicking.

Last year Pynchon's Maxon & Dixon was translated into Danish. And the reviews applauded the work put into it. I haven't read it myself, but apparently it had been translated into "old Danish" (I guess the original was in "old English" then?).
Well, that's the kind of work I think Gibson's work deserves. It just seems that the publishers in Denmark are more focused on the visions in the books (and that word "cyberspace") rather than the beautiful prose that keeps it all together.
I guess Arne has to make a living as a translator and to do that you'll have to translate a lot...fast. I dunno.

L

I wouldn't say that the swedish translation is bad, but it sure as hell doesn't have the same 'linguistic rhythm' as the original.

And the Rasta Patois spoken in Zion is translated to regular Swedish...

Nowadays I usually buy books in English (if that is the original language) but unfortually I'm having a hard time to prioritize Gibson over books that I don't allready own.

I read all the books (up to Idoru) in French, and I thought they were more than readable.
Jean Bonnefoy is really good (the Rastafarians speak a sort of "cool" French), but nothing's like the original
--
ArkanGL, glad to read English
(but i'd like to speak it better)

Give your thumbs up to Armitage Corto, the Hungarian translator of Neuromancer and Count Zero.. Corto managed to pull off the haectic buzz of what we've all dreamed off, transposing everything to perfect mirror images. Mona Lisa Overdrive has been handed out to some other guy whose translation feels like kitchen utensils stabbed into vital organs - a real pain to read.

One question - how was ICE translated to languages other than English?

In Romania, Neuromancer, Count Zero, Burning Chrome and Mona Lisa Overdrive (as yet unpublished) were translated by Mihai Dan Pavelescu, who did an excellent job. Mircea Stefancu translated Virtual Light, and he smoothed/edulcorated it to the point where all the explicit language was eliminated. Not that there was much of that to begin with, but it's gone anyway. The Difference Engine was translated by Gabriel Stoian, who did a decent job. The trouble with that book is that it was next to impossible to render to the Romanian readers the sort of cultural impact that 19th-century British English has on 20th-century American English speakers.
Oh, and I translated "The Gernsback Continuum" by myself and "Skinner's Room" with Ana Maria Negrila. In a way, "Skinner's Room" is my second favourite piece of Gibson fiction, right after "Johnny Mnemonic".
As a translator, I think that no matter how well a literary text is rendered in a foreign language, some of the original's flavour is invariably lost, and this is especially true for those works which make use of non-standard brands of English, real or invented. William Gibson's books are certainly a case in point, alongside with, say, Jack Womack's Dryco series or Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. This is why I collect them in original editions, not in translation, even if they sometimes cost me an arm and a leg
On the other hand, if it weren't for translators, a writer's impact on the world culture would be significantly smaller. So I guess translators, especially very good ones such as the Hungarian Armitage Corto and the Romanian Mihai Dan Pavelescu, have a lot going for them.

After lurking for some time, not even registering, i'm here now. as one of those sinners - i.e. translators.

In Estonia we have a very bad translation of "Neuromancer" from '97. (One of two translators involved has improved a bit since.) For years i was sure that Gibson is untranslatable. But it's also a challenge... So about a year ago i started translating "idoru" - as i still think it's stilistically and linguistically (and whatever) the easiest Gibson novel to translate. It took me 2,5 months - more, of course, than my average "pages per day" rate with easier texts. So i'm about 95% satisfied with the result. (If i had a month more, maybe the percentage would have risen to 97...)
So, since last autumn we have "idoru" and also "Burning Chrome" - as i like the young translator who did it, i've been afraid to check the translation

As always, it's the details, not the "big picture" that's hard to do. In my case, the biggest pain in the a** was to find a word for "meshbacks".

That first "Neuromancer" translation did some damage, so Gibson is not a very popular author here. i hope things will change.

Oh, yes, another reason to start with "idoru" here: it's about the russian maffia's plan to build dope factory in my home town (called Tallinn, not Tallin). They already have the "affluent gated suburb" - but i'd think they mostly import dope from Sevastopol...

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Originally posted by d4m4g3:
Give your thumbs up to _Armitage Corto_, the Hungarian translator of Neuromancer and Count Zero.. Corto managed to pull off the haectic buzz of what we've all dreamed off, transposing everything to perfect mirror images. Mona Lisa Overdrive has been handed out to some other guy whose translation feels like kitchen utensils stabbed into vital organs - a real pain to read.

One question - how was ICE translated to languages other than English?

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In Danish ICE (ie. the word ice) was translated directly, and some technical name was then made up to make the acronym fit. This of course results in a rather poor translation of Intrusion Countermeasures Electronics (or what it is ICE stands for), but it preserves the implied coldness of ICE, which in my book is the lesser evil.
As _Lars D_ points out, there have been two translations into Danish, and I sadly cannot remember which of them (or both) used this translation.

BTW: You must be kidding, when you say the Hungarian translator is named Armitage Corto.

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Originally posted by odMoore:
As _Lars D_ points out, there have been two translations into Danish, and I sadly cannot remember which of them (or both) used this translation.

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I've only got the newest translation and there it's called "is" (the Danish word for "ice"). Is ice spelled with big letters in the original? ICE? I can't remember. It's with small letters in Danish (which means it could actually also mean "ice cream" - "is" is "is" in Denmark) :-)

L

Lars: it's not all-caps in the English text, except when the acronym is explained early on. ("Ice from ICE, intrusion countermeasures electronics," p 28 in the ACE paperback.)

caoine.org is rich in nutrients

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Originally posted by emma:
Lars: it's not all-caps in the English text, except when the acronym is explained early on. ("Ice from ICE, intrusion countermeasures electronics," p 28 in the ACE paperback.)

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Wow. You're sorted. :-)

I'm SO close to giving it a re-read. But I just started on Mona Lisa Overdrive. :-)
I haven't got Pattern Recognition yet. Waiting for a paperback I can afford. :-)
Things are expensive in Denmark - plus we got a 25% sales tax. :-(
The Danish P.R. is 50 dollars.

L

www.angelfire.com/indie/lars-kd
www.supertanker.tk (Danish music)

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Wow. You're sorted. :-)

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Only because I just decided to do a reread, too, so I read that very passage on the subway yesterday morning. I'm dying to reread PR, but I figured I should wait a few weeks so I'm doing the others first.

caoine.org is rich in nutrients