[ 1 ☽ 13 ☼ 2015 年 ]

Inbox

SUBJECT: RE: On Empathy

TO: F◼-kun <◼@live.com>

FROM: Matcha <◼@gmail.com>

Waahh, you asked me a question! XDDDD

Yesterday's ask.fm question was whether you like to talk or listen more, and honestly speaking I'm probably a talker... orz

I took an interview on Baka-Tsuki quite a while ago. It'd probably answer some of your questions.

As for why I'm so passionate about fan translations?

I'm not so sure. XD It sort of just happened. I suppose I'm passionate as a translator because I know what it feels like to be a fan. I know what it feels like to desperately want to read the next chapter (which exists but isn't translated). I've spent those hours hunting for summaries and spoilers. I've felt that pain and urge to swim through garbage cans because you just have to know. 

Now that I can read/translate for myself, remembering what it's like to be a fan like that keeps me going.

It makes me happy to think that I can make so many others happy from the direct result of my effort. In a cheesy way of putting it, being a fan translator means that you can make others smile. You can make jump inside their hearts when they see that their favorite light novel was just updated. Something about anime/manga/lightnovels is so alluring; it's addicting and people get hooked on it. Because you enjoy it so much, you get this urge to share that special feeling that you have.

@cloudiirain I don't really watch anime or read this type of stuff, but I stumbled upon this ln, and now my guilty pleasure. Ty so much!

Essentially, I'm drunk off the feeling of self-gratification. |D

People on DeviantArt frequently have this mantra that viewcount shouldn't matter. You should draw or write or whatever regardless of the fan reception that you have. If you love music or poetry, you should be happy playing for yourself. I think this is a healthy view to have, but I'm pretty sure I'm a little different with regard to fan translations. To me, it's like being in the entertainment industry. You can have ulterior motives (like improving your Japanese), but ultimately the purpose of being a translator is to share dreams with others. In the end, I think it's all about the fan experience.

So yes, translation speed does matter to me. So does translating a light novel in order and not skipping chapters all over the place (which is done sometimes on Baka-Tsuki >____>). So does creating a product that fans can shower love over or bash together.

A long time ago, before I even considered being a translator, I read T◼'s interview. It struck me that his response to "What do you think is the most important aspect of a novel that should be convey to the readers?" was: PLOT. At the time, this seemed heretical to me; as a writer, I feel like I would have chosen something like style, voice, or theme. But the more I've had to think about it, the more I've come to think he's actually right.

Light novels aren't exactly what you call masterpieces of literature.

I think during my time at Baka-Tsuki, I've seen and talked to a lot of translators that do different things. I've met some that actually mix and match and merge paragraphs. I've met some that want to preserve every last comma. I've met some translators that would blow their top at editors who tried changing a word to a synonym that means very closely the same thing. I've also talked to some people at Japtem who machine translate (apparently, they use QCers who can read Japanese to check over the work). I've met some people who do very loose translations and translators who recommend reading a paragraph, putting the book down, and try and phrase it without looking back at the raw.

The conclusion that I've come to is that every translator does things differently.

It's the same like every musician does thing differently.

Even if you asked all of them to translate the same thing, every single one would come out unique.

The thing about us translators is that we're all biased. Literature doesn't really have pictures. We're required to formulate images of the scenes and characters in our heads. Not everyone has the same images. As a matter of fact, the images that we have hinge on our own experiences. The way you portray ◼ might not be the way I portray ◼ in English. 

You also can't definitively say one of us is more "right."

And honestly speaking, that's okay. Because our readers will get a different image of ◼ based on the English that we write. That's inevitable. It's also something that we should accept. Translations aren't perfect; like that anon on ask.fm put it:

people have different preferences on how they like things translated. as long as you are translating how you believe it should be translated and are happy with your translations then that is fine. it's impossible to perfectly replicate the original work through translation. learn japanese for that.

As long as you portray your translations appropriately to your own mental image, then you've done your best and nobody should ask for anything more. 

Also, please don't compare yourself to other translators, F◼-kun. >___________<

There's a lot of really really really passionate people out there. Sometimes, the more you get to know them, the more you realize how insane they are. T◼ is one of those people; he translates day in and day out. He translates in class at uni, too. XD It's because of that that he can finish an entire volume in four days. Let's not even talk about J◼. XD

I'm pretty sure you know what it's like too. I've done it; last year during winter break, all I did was come home from work, eat dinner, and get straight to translating for six hours every night. I finished OreShura volume 4 in about two weeks. I didn't watch any anime or TV or do anything else.

But it's also an unreasonable way to live. You have to be understanding towards yourself. Just because other people are fast translators or dedicate their lives to translating isn't a valid reason to pressure yourself into doing it. Passion also isn't unlimited; it's all too easy to burn out (I'm probably a living example of that, lol). You should only do things as much as you're happy doing it.

If you're starting to feel the effects of the pressure, please know that O◼ isn't going to run away from you. 

It's just you and something you love to do.

--matchaaaaaaa

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【 matcha - written 1513 days ago 】