Hibbett and Nathan

Hibbett:

Hibbett spent a lot of time talking about the authors of the work he translated in the past before talking about his translation on The Key. He talked about how the secret diaries were written in masculine and feminine style, and also in different styles of kana. I am curious to see how he ended up translating the piece. He also discussed the problems when It came to translating titles. The title doesn't seem like something that you can directly translate from Japanese because it has to match up with the rest of the story. Because the Japanese language has a lot of ambiguity, it is difficult to use the direct translation for a title because it wouldn't be parallel to the rest of the story. He mentions that he tries to avoid reading other translations of the work before he formed his own understanding well enough. Personally, while translating Yukiguni and the poetries, having a translated version right next to the original influenced my final translation because I would always refer to the translation when I'm not sure how to translate a sentence rather than thinking more about how I can translate on my own. 

Nathan:

Nathan, along with other readings we have read by translators, talked about translating faithfully and being an invisible translator. Every translator seems to struggle with translating faithfully. Will the voice of the original author stay if the translator makes themself invisible? I think it depends on what language the person is translating in. If the two languages are more homogenous, then translating faithfully should not be a problem. But if two languages are heterogeneous like Japanese and English, it is more difficult to translate faithfully while making the work enjoyable to read for an average English speaker. However, I think it all comes down to personal preference. It was also interesting how Nathan talked about the mistranslation in "Annani Toi no ni". 

Sophia