Tuesday, August 5, 2008

On a lighter note

I watched a ton of anime growing up, and like any purist, I know that only subtitles can capture the language/vibe accurately. Dubbing remains the bane of my existence, so it's interesting to read this first hand perspective of the life of an European subtitler. The whole thing is excellent, but this made my laugh the hardest:

Once I had to do a whole series of funny American cartoons for kids. In one episode the expression “it is raining like cats and dogs” was used in combination with an image of actual cartoon cats and dogs falling out of the sky that totally belied my earlier argument that I do not have to mention these creatures in my translation. After all, this time the animals were shown on screen. So what does a good translator do in a case like this? Well, first of all you cry a little and curse the fact that you chose to become a subtitler.

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