Prologue Edits?

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onizuka-gto
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Prologue Edits?

Post by onizuka-gto »

This discussion has been moved from the Prologue talk page.
This must have been so hard to translate! Trying to keep track of all the future/present/past tenses...

While reading through it I thought of a few ways to help clarify things, but since I don't have the original text and couldn't read it anyway, I'd like to discuss them so the translation stays as accurate as possible.

First suggestion, to clarify which Nagato is being discussed, I propose we refer to the "past" version as "Nagato of the past" (or something similar) and the other as either just plain "Nagato". This is done in one spot, but I think it would clarify things to do it throughout.

Second, just a minor personal preference, I think a slight rewording of this passage would make it more "natural" sounding:

<i>This Nagato was that Nagato. The Nagato that appeared at the hospital that night was this guy. The one that said her own punishment was being discussed and annoyed the shit out of me was this guy.</i>

I'd suggest simply removing "was this guy" in both cases. Since the two Nagatos are set equal by the first sentence, it doesn't matter which one you're talking about.

Lastly, the following line:

<i>This is all my assumption, and the result will be that we will all be like the helpless Nagato.</i>

The context is very difficult to judge here, just from the way the story is written. But taking a guess, would the it still be accurate to say:

<i>This is all my assumption, and the result would be that we all end up like that helpless Nagato who changed the world that night.</i>

Taking some liberty here, adjusting the tense and clarifying the subject.

I'll have to read through it again, and there are some very minor changes I feel I could make, but I'd like to discuss any larger changes first. [[User:Smidge204|Smidge204]] 04:29, 20 November 2006 (PST)
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Post by BaKaFiSh »

I'll just address them in order then~

1) I have no clue. lol, seriously.. I just literally translated it, because it would hurt my head even more if I had to think.... Sometimes it says past, sometimes it just says Nagato, sometimes it says future, stabbed, that just stabbed, etc, etc...
And when it just says Nagato, it means one or both of them....

If you want to and have time to, please try and straighthen it out - make it less confusing.

2) Actually, that's not a bad idea. Makes it less confusing. Go ahead. ^__^

3) Hmm....After re-reading it a couple times, I think it should be helpless like Nagato, not the helpless Nagato..^__^

Any minor edits, go ahead, I don't mind..^^
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Smidge204
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Post by Smidge204 »

Well, I guess I'll register an account here and continue :)

I re-read everything and fixed a bunch of minor typos and such, and limiting ellipses to three dots (pet peeve of mine, sorry!) There were some words in (parens) which I felt worked well, so I kept them. A detailed list of changes with descriptions is below.

I noticed BaKaFiSh made two minor edits while I was doing that, so I was careful not to undo them!

I also added a footnote about "pochibukuro", which I believe is a decorative envelope. If this is wrong let me know! I'm also not sure if putting the footnote at the bottom of the page is appropriate.

Detailed list of changes! Spoiler-tagged because it's long.
Spoiler! :
Line 13 #1: "Transform" is a good word here.
Line 13 #2: Slight rewording.
Line 13 #3: Fixed ellipsis.

Line 25 #1: "Even though" doesn't fit with the "but" in the second half.
Line 25 #2: Condensed into one line to be clear it's all one thought.

Line 47 #1: Couldn't think of an adjective equivalent to "happy" that didn't sound "engrishy" - dropped it. Also included "extremely healthy" when describing Haruhi by replacing the comma with the word "and."

Line 55 #1: Slight rewording. This may not be totally accurate from the original intent.
Line 55 #2: Removed parens. "Clinking and clanging" fits nicely IMHO. (Second edit changes this to "clinking and clanging")

Line 79 #1: Hyphenated "carefree-ness."
Line 79 #2: Removed parens. I felt "pochibukuro" would be a bit cumbersome to replace with an all-english equivalent.

Line 88 #1: Removed extra white space.

Line 99 #1: I don't know why this is highlighted since I didn't actually change it. This paragraph references a story I haven't read, so I can't suggest anything to replace the words in parens. I left it as-is.

Line 99 #2: Spelling/typo and ellipsis correction.

Line 111 #1: Ellipsis again.

Line 117 #1: ...and again.
Line 117 #2: Changed "thinking" to "consideration." Seems to fit better.
Line 117 #3: Spelling/typo correction.

Line 113 #1,#2: Ellipses
Line 113 #3: Shortened dash, capitalization. I know there's supposed to be a special character for that dash but I can't think of it...

Line 143 #1: "reined" is a great word to use here.
Line 143 #2: Ellipsis.

Line 155 #1: Spelling/typo correction.
Line 155 #2: I didn't change anything here...
Line 155 #3: Ellipsis.

Line 175 #1: I know the author's writing style tends to do this, but the double negative here was just a headache. Changed ("won't not" to "would still")

Line 175 #2: Again, no actual change but highlighted anyway.
Line 175 #3,#4: Ellipses.
Line 175 #5: Spelling/Typo correction.
Line 175 #6: Ellipsis.
Line 175 #7: Clarify who "wanted to add some footnotes". (Nagato)
Line 175 #8: Tense agreement. I *think* this sentence is present-tense, so Kyon is thinking about potential consequences. Hence "is" -> "would be"

Line 175 #9: "Travellers" (two Ls) is technically the British spelling. Nitpick...

Line 215 #1: Traveller/Traveler, is/that's
Line 215 #2: "has already done" just seems more natural than "has done before"
Line 215 #3: BaKaFiSh's edit, changed "all be helpless" to "all end up helpless"
Line 215 #4: "video-cam" to "video camera" (Also a nitpick...)
Line 215 #5: Ellipsis.

Line 239 #1: Again, no actual changes.

Line 245 #1: Traveller/Traveler
Line 245 #2: Spelling/Typo correction.
Line 245 #3,#4: Ellipsis.
Line 245 #5: Spelling/Typo correction.
Line 245 #6: Moved the words around a bit to make things more complete.
Line 245 #7: Slight reword to better include "Standby Mode" (This description was also used in Vol. 4 Ch. 4)

Line 277 #1: Spelling/Typo correction.

Line 285 #1: "Her from the future " to "her future self" (ugly preposition)
Line 285 #2: "Goose bumps" (two words)

Line 295 #1: Removed duplicate word ("the the")
Line 295 #2: Ellipsis.
Line 295 #1: Put "me" in quotes, as Kyon refers to his (as Nagato would say) differential temporal clone.

Line 307 #1: Ellipsis.
Line 307 #2: "Working" fits best here.

Line 321 #1: Ellipsis.
Line 321 #2: Is "me" a proper noun in this case? I honestly don't know...
Line 321 #3: Changed to "my" and "this other" Nagato to (hopefully) clarify which is which.
Line 321 #4: Uncap "me" again. Not sure if it even matters.
Line 321 #5: "My Nagato" to clarify which one is stopping Asakura.
Line 321 #6,#7,#8: Ellipses.

Line 359 #1: Uncap "me" again.
Line 359 #2: No change.
Line 359 #3: Uncap "me" again.
Line 359 #4: Ellipsis.
Line 359 #5: "My Nagato" to clarify, Uncap "me" again.

Line 375 #1: No change.
Line 375 #2: Spelling/Typo correction.
Line 375 #3: No change.
Line 375 #4: Uncap "me" again.

Line 395 #1: Added question mark.
Line 395 #2: No change.
Line 395 #3, #4: Ellipses.
Line 395 #5: I think, following the conversation Kyon is addressing the "past" Nagato (the one holding the glasses). Even though he wasn't supposed to talk to her, the response of not being able to contact the IDSE suggests which Nagato we're dealing with.

Line 421 #1: "My" Nagato, to clarify, since she is still connected to the IDSE.
Line 421 #2: Closed open quotes.

Line 429 #1: No change.
Line 429 #2: Replaced "Unseeable" with "Unperceivable" - "Unseeable" seems both right and wrong at the same time... so I dropped it.
Line 429 #3: Dropped "was this guy" as discussed above.
Line 429 #4,#5: Ellipses.
Line 429 #6: Added question mark (Maybe?)
Line 429 #7: Ellipsis.
Line 429 #8: Footnote added.
(Whew!)
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Post by BaKaFiSh »

Aww, I was trying to put the exact same number of ellipses as the actual novel, but oh, well~

I read through it and it makes much more sense now...xD...lots of little typos on my part..xD

and I need to find a longer dash...dunno where to look tho..^__^

Anyway, that was amazing..^^

One thing, I liked the why without the question mark. Less emotion shown on Nagato's part. Your choice~

Food time, translating after.
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Smidge204
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Post by Smidge204 »

If there's a specific reason for that many dots, I'll put them back on the next pass-through. No biggie. I'll also fix Nagato's punctuation.

I also see you've discovered the longer dash. :p

I'll be blunt: If you have even the slightest opinion about something, such as with Nagato's punctuation, I'll follow it. From where I stand I basically work for you, so you're the boss! Let me take care of the cleanup :E
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SubordinateFive
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Post by SubordinateFive »

Smidge204 wrote:limiting ellipses to three dots (pet peeve of mine, sorry!)
BaKaFiSh wrote:Aww, I was trying to put the exact same number of ellipses as the actual novel
Smidge204 wrote:If there's a specific reason for that many dots, I'll put them back on the next pass-through
For some reason, Japanese ellipses use six dots, not three. (From a Western point of view, that's simply two ellipses in a row.) The dots (especially with the wiki's font) are so tiny I don't see any harm in having the same number as the original novel. Same goes for the long dashes.

I recently reread Maria-sama ga Miteru and the ellipses/dashes were the same there too. (Source: here.)

Hope this helps!
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