Re: Need help choosing a novel to read

From: Paul Blay (ranma_at_saotome.demon.co.uk)
Date: 01/13/05 

Date: Thu, 13 Jan 2005 13:15:05 -0000

"Chris Kern" wrote ...
> This is, in fact, the response I got from asking my conversation class
> about this tonight. They seemed to think that it wasn't Harry Potter
> specifically that's odd, but that there's a certain style of Japanese
> employed by translators of English books that seems "odd" when
> compared to normal Japanese. They weren't able to clarify it any more
> than this.
>
> I do find this a bit strange; the same doesn't seem to be true of
> English translations of foreign works.

I think this may have to do with the attitude of Japanese towards the
English language and western stuff in general. 'Faithful' translation
trumps natural Japanese. I'm sure others in this group will have
more accurate insight on the matter though.

> Does this mean that reading a translated novel in Japanese is a bad
> way to try to improve your Japanese?

Not necessarily. Your skills in _writing_ Japanese are likely to be such
that any slight oddness from having read Harry Potter will be lost in
the background noise. (Nothing personal, my Japanese writing skills
suck muchly.) On reflection it shouldn't cause any trouble in reading
Japanese.

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