Lesson 1 Monday 24th September

We made an unusually early start (don't worry, next and successive weeks will be the usual 1.10 or 1.15 starting time) in order for me to have time to cope with any potential difficulties with the computer and the projector - the banes of my existence! Ironically everything worked quite well (let's hope that's not famous last words!).

I went over various administration points, structure of Lingua Ingiese 1 and, especially, Laboratorio di LIngua Inglese and then talked about this course, being especially firm about doing homework and making sure it is all your own work with no assistance from electronic sources. I told you that the Dispense should be ready from Thursday and to bring a copy of it to the lesson next week. I told you that most of the texts which we shall be working on will be taken from Children's Literature.

I gave out photocopies of four short texts comprising one source language (SL) text (in English) and three different target language texts (i.e. 'translations' of it) and we went over these together looking at how they dealt with intentions of the text, satisfying or upsetting the expectations of the TL (target language ) reader from the point of view of culture, lexis, grammar and syntax to varying degrees. In doing so we talked about units of translation (hardly ever the single word), inappropriate choice of TL word for SL word with more than one meaning ('her', 'wood', etc.), lack of one-to-one range of meaning between SL and TL words (e.g. 'to bake'), subject pronouns, etc. Even though none of the TL texts was acceptable, it was interesting to note that the two computer generated translations were becoming surprisingly good. 

We finished the lesson slightly early (it won't happen again!).

Homework for the next lesson (01.10.18)

Translate the text 'Babes in the Wood' (on back of  One Text and Four Funerals of Translation photocopy given during class) and bring your version of it, in written form to next week's lesson. This will serve as the basis fro our group comparison of solutions for the translation and will enable us to discuss points of interest for Translation which it throws up.

Lesson 2  Monday 1st October

My powers were displayed by causing the first rain in over a month simply by giving you a text to translate which deals with heavy continual rain! Some other mysterious powers (not mine!) were revealed with respect to the computer which first refused to work and then began talking!

We went through your first versions of 'Babes in the Wood'. We dealt only with points which you yourselves brought up: names of institutions (Job Centre, Sainsbury's), names of streets, names of characters, name of church, the 'rain-punctured lake' metaphor, the units of measurement for the depth of water, 'the end of the garden'. We didn't deal with the title, which I was surprised about since it is a very interesting point. However, even so we ran out of time before we could get on to the other material I had wanted to deal with today, so that will have to slide over onto next week.

Homework for the next lesson (08.10.18)

(i) Edit your versions of 'Babes in the Wood' in the light of our discussions today. Remembering to leave it to rest for a couple of days once you think it is ready and then having it checked by another person who knows nothing about the English text and can therefore give you an unbiased objective evaluation of your translation, prepare a final printed version of it to hand in next week (one and a half interlinear spacing and at least size 12 font);

(ii) Read the notes on Character names in translation on pages 5-7 of the Dispense and for each of the categories of translation which Van Coillie gives, try to think of an example of a character name from a book, story, film, cartoon, etc., which has been translated into Italian following that strategy.

Lesson 3  Monday 8th October

I collected your final versions of 'Babes in the Wood'. which I shall mark (from A to E) to give back next week when we shall also discuss variations and choices. Then we went over the categories outlined by Van Coillie for the translation of character names and discussed some of the examples you had found for each category. Disney cartoons proved very fruitful here, although we also dealt with Harry Potter, Roald Dahl, Peter Pan and Laurel and Hardy! We then looked at Pokemon, which do not have translated names in Italian but simply their English names which are not only difficult to pronounce for Italian children but which do not convey anything about the shape or behaviour of the creatures as they do in English, thus depriving Italian children of an important layer in their perception and reception of Pokemon.

Homework for the next lesson (15.10.18)

(i) Invent names for the Pokemon we looked at today. If you can't remember or don't know what their special characteristics are, the web is full of material to help you. We shall discuss our names next week, but I would like you to have a version of them which you can hand in; 

The Pokemon were:

Charmander

Charmeleon

Charizard

Squirtle

Wartortle

Blastoise

Bulbasaur

Ivysaur

Venusaur

Horsea

Delcatty

Sandshrew

Oddish

Ekans

Torchic

Snorlax

Ditto

(ii) Try to find a suitable Italian name for Miss Honey (Matilde) which, like the English version conveys aspects of her character but which is also a plausible name. 

Lesson 4 Monday 15th October

I gave back your translations of 'Babes in the Wood' and we went through possible solutions and inappropriate solutions for words and phrases at some length. This is a very important part of the course which is designed to help you learn how to translate and the discussion of points and the comparison of other versions increases everyone's experience and equips them better for future translations. We spent some time talking about the title which nobody had provided a suitable version of. The English title plays on intertextuality with the fairy story which readers are expected to know and to compare and contrast with this text. Since this particular fairy story (unlike so many others) does not also form part of the Italian knowledge of fairy stories, a text outside of fairy tales needs to be found to achieve the intertextuality. I encouraged you to ask about as many points as possible in the next (and successive) texts once you have your draft version, so that the final translation you hand in can be as complete as possible. The emphasis should be on discovering the points of interest and/or problems for translation rather than individual translation, correction by me.

We then looked at Picture Books and the various ways in which text and pictures can interact: illustrating the text, contradicting the text, telling a story separate from the text, reinforcing or parallelling the text even in the choice of colour of the print. We looked also at a book which illustrated the difference in the image of the child between the SL text and its TL version (Jazzy in the Jungle vs Gin-Gian nella Giungla). We then looked a several Maisy-Pina books wherein we saw that the translations had not taken into consideration all the points of the SL text and had produced texts which did not reflect the world of the TL child. All of this left us no time to deal with the Pokemon names, so we have put this off until next week. We did discuss the name for Miss Honey, however, and had two good suggestions with 'Angelica' and 'Serena'.

Homework for the next lesson (22.10.18)

(i) Read the two critics' texts on page 9 of the Dispense.

(ii) Look at the text 'Bunny Money' on pages 14-19. Look carefully at how the text relates to the pictures and try to identify potential points of interest for translation. Try to find a suitable translation of the title and the names of the two main characters (Max and Ruby).

Lesson 5 Monday 22nd October

We began by looking at some examples of character names to translate in a young adult Fantasy novel by Garth Nix: Sabriel. The main character's name could be retained as it was equally unusual (but not bizarre) in both languages, but Touchstone, Mogget and the Disreputable Dog needed more effort.  We then considered the names in Peter Pan and saw how Peter and Wendy had remained 'untranslated' in all the various translations of the novel (as well as the Disney cartoon) over the years, but that Tinker Bell, the Lost Boys and some members of the pirate crew had undergone translation: Giovanni or Gianni for Wendy's brother John, and, only in the most recent translation, Spugna for Smee (Irish in the SL, drunk in the TL version). 

We then moved on to the Pokemon names and spent some time o the Bulbasaur, Ivysaur and Venusaur group finding it very difficult to maintain the plant/flower  + poisonous themes for all three, although the suffix 'sauro' could be used without causing any problems. We did slightly (!) better with the Charmander, Charmeleon and Charizard group with prefixes with 'brucia', or 'fuoco' or 'piro'. The individual Pokemon were less troublesome to deal with since they did not require recurring elements and Snorlax had several convincing translations (though some students over-emphasised its bulk!). Ditto likewise found satisfying solutions with Bis, and Idem and Oddish with Stravanello. All of this left us no time to deal with the 'Bunny Money' names and title, so we have put this off until next week, but added to it the translation of the text up to and including page 11 ("'Money down the drain, Max'").

There will be a lesson as usual next Monday.

Socrates took Hemlock.

Homework for the next lesson (29.10.18)

(i) Look at the text 'Bunny Money' on pages 14-19. Look carefully at how the text relates to the pictures and try to identify potential points of interest for translation. Try to find a suitable translation of the title and the names of the two main characters (Max and Ruby) in Bunny Money.

(ii) Make a first version translation of the text up to and including page 11: ("'Money down the drain, Max'") (p.17 of the Dispense).  

Lesson 6 Monday 29th October

I began by confessing that unfortunately I had not had time to mark your Pokemon names homework for which I apologise and promise to so for next week. I told you that with respect to the name of the character  Touchstone, which we discussed last week, the character by that name in As You Like It does not have the same name in every Italian translation and is sometimes Petruccio and sometimes Paragone.

We then turned to 'Bunny Money'  and began by discussing the names and title, both very complex and far from easy choices. It seemed impossible to recreate the form, with the assonance and parallelism of the two words, especially since 'bunny' is a children's words for rabbit and money has such a central and indeed material role in the story. We considered some other possibilities, perhaps choosing a less effective general title, referring to the birthday present for Nonna, or Max's lucky coin. I then suggested taking a key phrase in the story, "Money is running through our fingers, Max" which is a common proverbial phrase in English and using a adaptation of this as the Italian title: Le zampine bucate.

For the characters' names we tried various versions, again trying to recreate the frequency and effect of the SL names and decided that although Italian names (rather than simply leaving the SL names) was preferable in order to make the world of the book reflect the world of the Italian child reader, Max was used quite commonly as a name in Italian and could be combined with Gemma or Giada or Perla in order to keep the frequency and connotations  of Ruby.

We went through the first pages and made some decisions about saying verbs and naturalness of forms and simplicity of language suitable for very young children. For next week, we shall go thorough the rest of the text - though not in such thorough detail. I shall resort to the method of only dealing with what students ask me about. In this way we should be able to finish 'Bunny Money' and perhaps start looking at The Cat in the Hat'.

Homework for the next lesson (05.11.18)

Continue making a possible first version of the whole of the text of 'Bunny Money' (pages 14-19). Use the points we discussed today to help you with the rest of the text and be ready to call attention to any points of interest you meet in the rest of the text.

Lesson 7 Monday 5th November

Luckily I had been able to keep my promise and I had marked your Pokemon names homework which I gave back to you with some comments. I then showed you the French names for Pokemon and commented on those too, so that you see that I do not reserve my critical comments solely for you! 

We then turned to 'Bunny Money'  and went through the rest of the text - though not in such thorough detail, only dealing with what students asked me about: the bluebird earrings which needed to be either a more familiar (but still colour-coded!) bird such as 'pettirosso' or a hypernym such as 'uccellini, the song which they play, again needs to be familiar to TL readers, for example 'Volare'; the lunch items, perhaps replace 'peanut butter sandwich' with something more common for TL children's lunch (but which still fits in with the illustration): 'toast al prosciutto', the cup cakes would be more familiar as 'muffins'; Candi's Corner which needed an italian name which incorporated a female name perhaps with sweet items such as 'Le chicche di Chicca'; the unit for 'vampire teeth': 'un paio di denti da vampiro'

We then started looking at 'The Cat in the Hat' where the constraints are even more than usual since there is the addition of the rhyme and the rhythm, the structural feature of containing almost exclusively monosyllabic words, the need for simple everyday words suitable for children who are just beginning to learn to read, the repetitions of both words and phrases and the need for the test to keep the relationship with the accompanying pictures. I passed around the book so that students could see how these worked together. We tried a first experiment of translating the first four lines and going over the problems which presented themselves: rhyme, very long lines, order of words, possible substitutions ...

Time is beginning to run out now as we have completed Lesson 7 today which leaves us only with Lesson 8 and Lesson 9 before the end of the course, so we have to speed up. I want to complete the Harry Potter text before we finish.

Homework for the next lesson (12.11.18)

(i) Edit your complete translatlon of 'Bunny Money' ready to hand in at next week's lesson (so typed neatly , please). 

(ii) Make a translation of the first 30 lines of 'The Cat in the Hat' (up to and including 'Lots of fun which is funny') to hand in next week, so typed neatly please. Use the points we discussed today to help you with the rest of the text and keep a note of the problems and/or solutions you found to share with the rest of the group.

(iii) Have a look at the Harry Potter text on page 23 and think particularly about the names (of which there are many!). Bring your ideas on these to discuss during the lesson next week.

Lesson 8 Monday 12th November

I took in your translations of 'Bunny Money' and the first lines of 'The Cat in the Hat'.

We talked about timing for the last lesson (Lesson 9) and the End-of-Semester Test. I suggested that since there are now two pieces of homework for me to mark (which will take a very long time!), we should suspend Lesson 9 until two weeks from now, that is Monday 26th November, and have a pause for reflection  - for you- and a pause for marking - for me -  on Monday 19th October. We shall finish off 'Harry Potter' on Monday 26th, as well as having back 'Bunny Money' and 'The Cat in the Hat', and then you will hand in your final edited version a couple of days later  to give me time to mark it to give you back on Monday 3rd December. Since it will only be a giving back and commenting session, we won't need the full two hours and shall therefore start at 2.10pm. The following week (Monday 10th December), still in the lesson time and room, we shall do the End-of-Semester Test. This way you will be able to have back all the texts you have translated during the course before you do the Test Translation and will therefore be able to benefit from the mistakes or inappropriate translation choices you might have made with these texts before you do the Test text. We also decided that for the Test Translation you would be able to use only English-English dictionaries, since the Italian dictionary you have in your head is far more useful than any bi-lingual dictionary might be. 

Having decided all these administrative points, we then turned to 'Harry Potter'  and began to deal with the names of people, places and shops in the text. We discussed the names of Harry, Hermione, Ron, the  Weasleys, the Grangers, Gilderoy Lockhart, The Leaky Cauldron,  Flourish and Blotts, Quality Quidditch Supplies and Gambol and Japes. The basic process to apply is to create names which seem at first sight (to an Italian non-expert reader of English) to be English names (according to the form of the words) but which immediately suggest a meaning in italian which relates to the person or place being named. this is the technique which J.K. Rowling used to create the original names in English. At first sight they seem to be real names, but on closer inspection, and particularly be reading them aloud, they reveal aspects of the person or place. Gilderoy Lockhart is 'gilded', that is he has a thin layer of gold covering a less valuable metal and he is much appreciated by the female  members of the  magic world: he locks their hearts.

Homework for the next lesson (26.11.18)

(i) Edit your translatlon of 'Harry Potter' om the basis of what we dealt with in the lesson and try to think of appropriate versions for Knockturn Alley and Gilderoy Lockhart using the processes we went through and perhaps asking for help or suggestions from family or friends. Try out your versions on these subjects and see how they react.

Lesson 9 Monday 26th November

Today was the last formal lesson although we shall have a half-lesson next week (Monday 3rd December) to give back the Harry Potter translations and go over the general points together before the End-or-Semester Test on Monday 10th December (in the usual room at the usual time)

 I gave back the marked copies of 'The Cat in the Hat' and Bunny Money and we went through the general points and common mistakes or inappropriate translations together. We then continued going through your first versions of the Harry Potter text and dealt with  the books Break with a Banshee and Magical Me, and the bag of gold jangling in Harry's pocket. I was surprised that the group didn't feel that there were more points to discuss together. We shall see what we shall see! 

Homework: 

 Edit your final version of the Harry Potter text* and hand it in (via my pigeon-hole in VSR)  tomorrow Tuesday 27th or Wednesday 28th. I won't be able to mark any versions which come in any later than this. NB I cannot accept versions sent via e-mail . If you can't personally deliver a hard copy of your text to VSR, organize with another member of the group who can to send them your version and ask them kindly to print it up and deliver it together with their own text.

Don't forget to give your text a title.

* From the beginning up to  "We'll be able to see him in a minute..."

Monday 3rd December

We met for an hour to have back the Harry Poter texts with my comments- As I feared, you really should have taken the opportunity at last week's lesson to ask about many of the points in the text, as the translations I marked were rather disappointing and we could have sorted out many of the problems together during the lesson (if only you had asked!). It seemed you had underestimated the text. In most of your translations there was an over-reliance on the SL syntax, grammar and lexis with the result that your texts were not convincing as natural Italian texts. 

Next week, Monday 10th December, we shall have the End-of-Semester Test in Aula 14, VC, from 1 to 3 pm. Since we only have two hours, let's all try (me too, I promise!) to get there early so we can start as soon as possible. Remember, no dictionaries. I shall provide paper on which to write the text to be marked, but if you wish to make a rough copy, bring a piece of your own paper, but you will have to hand this in too. Mobile 'phones will be left on the cattedra for the whole course of the Test and no notes, conferring, copying or consulting will be permitted. Anyone caught doing so will be sent away from the room and their text invalidated.