August 30, 2008

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  After two nights losing my sleep, and two days walking around like a zombie, last night I went to sleep at nine and slept through.  I did not know if there was a rain or how heavy.  I just knew when I woke up I heard water dripping from the leaves to the roof and window.  I could “hear” water rolling from window to gutter.  Cool air.

   

  I am working on The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao.  I “pity” anyone who translates this book because it is tremendously toiling work.  Junot Diaz’s language is very “colorful.”  Almost in every page readers can find words such as fuck, bitch, tons of slang, Spanish, and Spanish slang.  Tons of idioms, references from Comics, and The Lord of The Rings.  It is a very good book.  Pulitzer winning.  It locks me in as soon as I start.  I do not use foul language, except when I am extremely angry.  When only cussing can describe my anger and prevent me from slamming the one who angered me.  I never, or almost never call someone a bitch.  A witch maybe but very seldom.  Here in this Oscar Wao book, bitch, fuck, motherfuckers etc… are casually used, like a comma or a period in a sentence.  It is like the “like” or “you know” in the every-day-teenager talks.  For a translator, he/she has to make a choice how much colorful words can be brought to different audiences in a very different culture.  How well these “foul language” terms will be received and perceived?

   

  I do not use foul language often. I do not have the need or think it is necessary to use it.  But Diaz uses this language to describe not only a person, but also describe himself and his class in depth, culturally and socially.  When you are exposed to something so much, to perceive it as normal daily life, you lose your sensitivity.  What people think it is normal can be perceived as unrefine, rude, raw, blah blah.  I can start to imagine the pen of editors in Vietnam and the criticism of literature folks.  A translator in this work must walk a fine line.  Bring enough the feeling of the work and choose when to use foul language in what form.  The normal daily talk of American, low income parent college students in this book is parallel with rough, street talk and I wonder how it can be perceived in Vietnam.

   

  Although I am very sensitive to loul language, I think Diaz is a shrewd writer.  His writing skill and how he structures the book are marvelous. 

   

  Here I cited a few sentences I came across.

   

  These days I have to ask myself:  What made me angrier?  That Oscar, the fat loser, quit, or that Oscar, the fat loser, defied me?  And I wonder:  What hurt him more? That I was never really his friend, or that I pretended to be?

   

  He wrote these sentences after he wrote many pages about how Yunior had tried to help Oscar to lose weight.  This kid was 307 lbs, shy, nerdy, wanted love and be loved.  If Oscar can lose weight, he will look better and can get a girl friend.  But after awhile, Oscar quit.  Yunior prodded.  They fought, physically and their friendship broke after that.  Oscar was just being Oscar, gentle, nerdy.  But Yunior and his friends being popular are brutal.  Teasing.  Putting down.  Calling names.  The things could drive kids in Columbia Highschool to become killers.  He did not mention what was going to happen to Oscar that would happen further down in the book, but he offered Yunior‘s thought about himself and Oscar.

   

   

  • 7:24 am
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