Talk:Zero no Tsukaima:Volume14 Chapter1

translation quality in vol 14?

Dear translators,

First of all, thank you for your hard work on translating ZnT.

I recently started reading the Chinese version of volume 14 and, unfortunately, I must say that it differs quite a lot from the English translation presented here. I know that the Chinese version itself might already differ from the original Japanese version but still, the differences between Chinese and BT-English seems too much!

To verify which one is more accurate, I found the first page of ZnT 14 on the internet and tried to understand it via the kanjis used (I do not speak Japanese at all):

• go to: http://bookwalker.jp/pc/detail/d4a6cf23-319f-400c-b951-ad378a5a0fd5/?adpcnt=7qM_XJN
• click on th blue button: サンプルを見る

The following points about this first page troubles me:

• The 1st column in the Japanese text is translated by: "The river gently flowed through the Capital of Gallia where King Joseph awaited in his palace." In the Chinese version, "King Joseph" is never mentionned. Can anyone fluent in Japanese check if "King Joseph" is present in the 1st column?
• Still in the 1st column, the name Lutèce (リュテス) can be seen. Why is it not mentionned in the BT translation?
• At the end of the 2nd column, I see "三十分". In Chinese, "三十分种" means "30 minutes", hence, I assume that "三十分" means "30 minutes" in Japanese. BT translates it by "13 minutes". Also, I'm not sure about how the 2nd and 3rd columns have been translated in English.
• The 4th and 5th columns of the Japanese text corresponds to the BT translation:

"The streets got cut off, out of the long, uninterrupted stone wall. They couldn’t see that it hadn’t been cut off."

Who are "they" and what is "it"? The Chinese version proposes something like this:

Now, the streets did not show any building construction around. A very long and uninterrupted stone wall instead spreaded onwards. Even in broad daylight, the end of this stone wall could not be seen.

• The 6th column of the Japanese text corresponds to the BT translation:

On that other side of the stone wall, is where King Joseph’s family lives.

According to the Chinese version, I would rather translate it by

In front of this long stone wall, stands the royal residency of Gaul, the palace of Versailles."

• The 7th and 8th columns of the Japanese text corresponds to:

Whether or not the palace was built according to the kind of end and reading the scale would help you understand.

This much of the place was not searched and the land that makes up the large palace was elaborated everywhere around the central area.

First of all, I do not understand the meaning of these two English sentences... (don't you think it looks like Google Translation?) The Chinese version reads something like this:

Why would this palace be built in a place that far from the city? Just look at its scale to understand.

Even if you check every corner of Lutèce, you would not find any place large enough to build such a high and magnificent palace.

The problem with this translation is that the first sentence is a question, while the Japanese text do not contain any question mark in the 7th and 8th columns. On the other hand, I see in the Japanese text the term Lutèce (リュテス) which support the third sentence I wrote.

I won't list all the differences I found... These few were just to show some arguments about why I have doubts about the English translation of vol. 14 in BT by comparing it with what I understood from the Chinese version and what I can guess by looking at the Japanese version. If someone fluent in Japanese happened to read this message, could you please double check the BT-translation of vol. 14 with the original Japanese text?

Best regards, XYZ

About the lack of question marks in column 7, those are foreign to japanese syntax, but still used as a literary resource. The "question mark" equivalent in japanese is the "ka" particle, that does appear (meaning there's a question). The correct translation of the first column is: "The river Shire that flows through the center of Gallia's capital, Lutece..."--Kemm (talk) 16:24, 21 July 2013 (CDT)