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Translating a quote

de hannah40077, 2010-februaro-03

Mesaĝoj: 10

Lingvo: English

hannah40077 (Montri la profilon) 2010-februaro-03 11:20:18

Saluton! Mi ne vere komprenas Esperanton, sekve demandos en angla lango.gif (sorry for any mistakes there!)

I'm trying to translate a quote by L.L. Zamenhof into Esperanto for a project and because it's a quote, I would like to keep the wording as close to the original as possible. However, as grammar often makes this impossible, I understand that I won't be able to keep it exactly the same.

"If I hadn't been a Jew from the ghetto, the idea of unifying mankind would either never have entered my head, or at least not dogged me so persistently throughout my entire life." - This is the quote, and I'd like to get your opinion on a few parts of it. Firstly, how would you translate "the idea of unifying"? I get the impression that participles are often quite clumsy, but I don't know what to do here. Secondly, I can't seem to find the word for "unify", nor "dogged". Thirdly- "at least"? Finally, should I simply use estis for "had been", or is there a pluperfect style of rendering it so that it won't sound incorrect or strange? I want to keep faithful to the English because I want to keep a similar meaning, but if I have to sacrifice some of it so that it makes sense, I'm happy to do so.

Multajn dankon!

tommjames (Montri la profilon) 2010-februaro-03 11:44:20

hannah40077:Firstly, how would you translate "the idea of unifying"?
La ideo unuigi

hannah40077:Secondly, I can't seem to find the word for "unify"
To unify is to "make as one". The translation is therefore unuigi.

hannah40077:nor "dogged"
In English the verb form of "dog" means something like to chase or to persistently follow. So I'd translate that as either persekuti or persiste sekvi, probably the former.

hannah40077:Thirdly- "at least"?
Almenaŭ.

hannah40077:Finally, should I simply use estis for "had been", or is there a pluperfect style of rendering it so that it won't sound incorrect or strange?
There is, but you don't really need it because "throughout my entire life" already makes the time sense clear.

I would translate the sentence as follows..

Se mi ne estus judo de la geto, la ideo unuigi la homaron aŭ ne venus en la kapon, aŭ almenaŭ ne tiom persiste persekutus min dum mia tuta vivo.

hannah40077 (Montri la profilon) 2010-februaro-03 11:52:23

Thanks for the help- looks like I'm thinking in English too much when I should be thinking directly in Esperanto! rideto.gif

darkweasel (Montri la profilon) 2010-februaro-03 12:02:55

Pri Zamenhof
"Se mi ne estus hebreo el la geto, la ideo pri la unuigo de la homaro aŭ tute ne venus al mi en la kapon, aŭ ĝi neniam tenus min tiel obstine en la daŭro de mia tuta vivo." (Zamenhof skribis en letero en la jaro 1905)

tommjames (Montri la profilon) 2010-februaro-03 12:03:59

Heh I was searching for that.. I was sure it was Esperanto originally!

hannah40077 (Montri la profilon) 2010-februaro-03 12:05:17

Dankon! I didn't realise it had already been translated.

tommjames (Montri la profilon) 2010-februaro-03 12:14:06

hannah40077:Dankon! I didn't realise it had already been translated.
I don't think it's a translation, it's the original. The English sentence is the translation.

Rogir (Montri la profilon) 2010-februaro-03 16:00:41

Which is obvious since Zamenhof didn't speak English very well and German and French were more common international languages back then.

hannah40077 (Montri la profilon) 2010-februaro-03 21:32:21

I assumed that he had written it in German or another language he was fluent in (considering he was the son of a German teacher), and that as such the translation I found in English was from German- obvious? I'm not so sure.

erinja (Montri la profilon) 2010-februaro-04 02:29:25

It's obvious to me that the quote was originally in Esperanto, because it happens to be a very famous quote of Zamenhof's, from some of his Esperanto-language correspondence. This Esperanto correspondence has been collected and published, so it is still possible to read many of Zamenhof's letters to early Esperantists.

However, you are a newbie, so you'd have no way of knowing what Zamenhof's famous quotes are, and therefore this definitely wouldn't be obvious to you. For future reference, I can't think of any of his famous quotes that were originally in another language, and later translated to Esperanto. So if you hear a quote from him, you can safely assume it was originally spoken in Esperanto.

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