Talk:Hidan no Aria:Volume1 Prologue

Major edit. I changed weird diction choices, corrected tenses, corrected sentence structures, and added some extra adjectives and adverbs here and there so as to help the reader understand what's being said in context. I tried to retain the original meaning of the initial translation, but I don't really know how successful I was. If this was a rough draft, and you were planning to edit it yourself, revert the changes back to the initial translation, and edit yourself. If you feel this is an incompetent edit, again, revert back to pre-edit page. Anyways, good luck with the translation. I appreciate it, even if I've only read the prologue (which wasn't the most interesting or inspiring thing in the world).

I would disagree with some of the edits, like:

"But that's none of your concern." to "But that shouldn’t be of any of your concern."

...donned... to ...wore...

since there are nothing wrong with them. But overall your edits are not too bad, so it's all right to leave it as it is.

--Zyzzyva165 13:15, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

Hmmmm, you're right when you say there's nothing wrong with them grammatically. Those were more of diction choices/style changes I made based on the context in an attempt to make it flow better.

"But that's none of your concern" <-- Not wrong grammatically, but it just felt more offensive than it should have been, and I don't think that's what he was trying to go for based on the context of what I read.

"...donned..." to "...wore..." <--- I've never heard anyone say go don your shirt, or I donned my shirt before getting out of bed. For me the word don has a more majestic and fanciful connotation/feel to it. I'd use it to describe putting on a suit of armor <--- ie. "I donned my armor, and stepped forward onto the battlefield" or something like that. In that context, the word don sounds natural, as opposed to overblown. However, here, it just sounds too fanciful, since the character putting on his uniform to greet someone at the door really a grand enough moment to entail the usage of the word "don". That said, although there was nothing wrong with it grammatically, the word just felt out of place due to its connotation for me.

I do understand where you're coming from though, seeing as making too many unnecessary changes will ultimately result in an unfaithful translation. I understand that. However, I felt that those changes were necessary, which is why I made them. Literal translations are okay in the beginning stages, as they are ultimately the most faithful kinds of translations, but imo, a translation should still be readable when faithful, and it should still have a distinct style that flows well in order to be consistent for readers to be able to read. Translators who are proficient in both English and the language they're translating from tend to be able to adapt a style that flows well while consistently remaining faithful to the original text (they are also able to do a literal translation, and make faithful stylistic changes themselves later). However, in the case of a super rough draft, or a translator who's not as proficient in English as they are in the language they're translating from, vice versa, there's no consistency or conformity to the writing style; the writing style is all over the place, and just that makes the work both awkward and hard to read.

Those are the reasons I made the changes. That aside though, I'm not going to undermine the translator's work by rewriting everything just because I think his/her style sucks; I'd only change words that I feel are out of place, leaving as much intact as possible, while making it easy to read. Still, a translation check/edit by translator would be nice, since it'd ensure accuracy and faithfulness, and it might even add a consistent style to the work. It'd also make editing a lot easier, since it took me about 2 hours to edit just 7 pages (It's not that I read slow, it was just that HARD to edit/read).

"Her face gradually turned blue" is that the right color? (no idea about the original novel so I'm just asking)

it should be red i think, blue should be when you don't breath or something like that

According to the novel it's 蒼白, meaning pale. EusthEnoptEron 21:59, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

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'"But that shouldn’t be of any of your concern."

Something about this still sounds really awkward... Maybe change it, but I'm not too sure, so I'm just gonna put a note here. "But that shouldn't be any of your concern" is what you were going after? Though it still sounds a bit too...distant. "But you shouldn't worry yourself about it"?

I'm pretty good with English as a native speaker, and "But that shouldn't be of any of your concern." is extravagantly formal at best and downright awkward in the conversational tone the narrator takes on during the prologue. Sorry if I offended you, but I'm going to do my best to make the overall tone and flow of this series more relaxed in my edits (If the translator finds any offense to any of my corrections please alert me; I'll be glad to make amends). Asteradragon 6:16, 8 April 2011 (EST)