Thursday, October 10, 2002

How Great is The Onion? American People Shrug, Line Up For Fingerprinting WASHINGTON, DC--Assuming that there must be a good reason for the order, U.S. citizens lined up at elementary schools and community centers across the nation Monday for government-mandated fingerprinting. "I'm not exactly sure what this is all about," said Ft. Smith, AR, resident Meredith Lovell while waiting in line. "But given all the crazy stuff that's going on these days, I'm sure the government has a very good reason." Said Amos Hawkins, a Rockford, IL, delivery driver: "I guess this is another thing they have to do to ensure our freedom." Frank Gehry No Longer Allowed To Make Sandwiches For Grandkids 8:07:42 PM     What do you think? ()

Who Says We Don't Need Organized Religion? There have been discussions of the implications of the U.S. leading an invasion of Iraq, of the likely results of such an action, of the public support for it, and of the hypocrisy of such a policy. Now a large segment of the American religious establishment has come forward to say that pre-emptively attacking Iraq would be immoral: Religious leaders began another phase of an anti-war lobbying effort on Capitol Hill Wednesday, urging Congress to explore peaceful alternatives in its dealings with Iraq. Congress is preparing to vote on a resolution giving the president broad authority to use military force to dismantle Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction. On Capitol Hill, about 100 nuns, lay people and other Catholics dropped off packets and held meetings with congressional staff, outlining their anti-war stance. Others held silent vigils outside Senate and House buildings. "Violence isn't the answer to anything," said Sister Mary Ann Smith, of Ossining, N.Y, on her way to the office of Rep. Sue Kelly, R-N.Y. "War is morally and ethically wrong." While Wednesday's events were sponsored by various Catholic groups, including the lobbying group, NETWORK, Leadership Conference of Women Religious and Pax Christi, the National Council of Churches -- made up of 36-member denominations -- also planned events for this week. "I'm horrified our president would consider a pre-emptive strike as a way to peace," said Sister Anne Marie Gardiner, 59, of Silver Spring, Md. "That's outrageous. It's a corruption of what the U.S. has tried to stand for." This is the role that organized religion can play in a healthy society. There is no other institution in a position to appeal so simply to widely shared dogma and state "war is morally and ethically wrong." 8:43:32 AM     What do you think? ()

How Does One Determine the Quality of a Translation? I received the new Penguin translation of Proust's In Search of Lost Time all the way from England Tuesday. This is only the second English translation of the whole novel from scratch. In his "General Editor's Preface," Christopher Prendergast discusses the history of Proust translation, and the reason for undertaking another one at this time. There is the tendency of previous translators to "wrench [their] syntax into oddly unEnglish shapes" and to be unnecessarily flowery, translating Odette's "body" as her "physical charms" and "forgetfulness" or "oblivion" as "waters of Lethe." Apparently, though his sentences were massive architectural undertakings, Proust's language was not as precious as it has thus far been conveyed in English. I don't speak French well enough (or really, at all) to pronounce judgement on the accuracy of one Proust translation versus another. And a side-by-side textual comparison of the two translations reveals only subtle differences. So Tuesday night, I picked up the newer translation at the point I had reached in The Fugitive and started reading. There was no difference of which I was consciously aware--it felt like I was listening to the very distinctive thoughts of the same person--but after about half an hour, I noticed that I was struggling less to make progress. I read more last night, and that continued to be true. As a monolingual reader, that is what I want from a translation. It seems to convey as directly and simply as possible the meaning and sensibility of the original. 8:22:19 AM     What do you think? ()

© Copyright 2003 Morgan N. Sandquist. Last update: 11/2/03; 10:29:33 AM.

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