“Eight Ways to Say You" comments- Maya

”It is a balancing act, requiring sensitivity and intuition, a combination of humility, vigilance, and arrogance.” Personally, this quote would be the most important take that I would get from this article. When I first read it, I was mostly agreeing with sensitivity, intuition, humility and vigilance, but arrogance? I couldn't understand it at first; I thought a translator must always stay humble as to not disturb the author's intended message by unnecessary add ons. However, as I read her article, I realized that she had a Japanese way of thinking when she said "arrogant". Having "the ability to become the author in another language" sure sounds arrogant, but I felt like since she doesn't actually feel like she could be the author in another language (unless her translations are similar to that of Birnbaum's), then I do not feel like that could be called as arrogance. It would only be humble imitation, or not even imitation; a humble offering of help to broaden the audience of the author. Hence, I thought it was very interesting for her to say that a translator had to be arrogant. In my opinion, as long as one stayed humble as a translator who is only a "tool", I do not feel the need to have arrogance. An arrogance would only be present if one put new vocabulary or sentence structure (or rather the feel of sentence structure) to the already finished work.

Usage of "I" or "you" is also something that I have struggled a lot while translating. It is quite hard to give the readers the idea of how the characters are responding to a situation based on their choice of "I" or "you". It is also the same case with how people address each other in Japanese (e.g. -san, -chan). I always had an irrational judgment against translators who refused to use or give the idea of these name endings. I realized that most of the translators would be flat out ignore the usage of "I", "you" or "-san, -chan, -kun". I do understand how difficult it is to convey that, but in my opinion, at least in anime subtitles, people could definitely use -chan or -san if needed be since their audience most likely have an understanding on how they work. (I do not feel the same way with how people address themselves. The reason is because most of the time, when there is a change in tone that was achieved by a change of how a character addresses themselves and the other, it is quite easy to notice it with their voice. However, that change may not be that noticeable in the form of writing.)

This article also reminded me of the time when I used to use "boku" when I was smaller. Since I grew up with my older brother, I was only imitating him, and I did not see the importance of the words for first person, so "boku" stuck with me. It wasn't until my grandmother heard me on the phone and politely but firmly corrected me to use "watashi" when I was referring to myself. I think that was the first time when I actually became conscious of the difference between the languages that I was using in my daily life. Since Turkish doesn't have another word to say "I", I didn't think it was that important in Japanese as well. (Obviously it did matter to my noble women of a grandma).