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Tom Cheesman - 6 March 2012 - Towards a Translation Array: Digitally Exploring Crowds of Translations at Swansea University

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Transcast: Making Translation and Interpreting Research Public
Transcast: Making Translation and Interpreting Research Public

This paper presents the background to an experimental project newly funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council under the Digital Transformations Research Development Fund (grant for Feb-Sept 2012). The longer-term aim is to build an interactive public web interface which will facilitate explorations of variation across multiple translations of the same source text, using visual information designs to aid user navigation, present the results of statistical analyses, support the collection and curation of user-generated content, narrow the gaps between languages, and make interlingual translation culturally visible in new ways. The term translation array intends to suggest that multiple versions of a text can be used as a lens for exploring cultural histories and contemporary cultural dynamics. In short, we are trying to create an entirely new kind of participatory resource for exploring global culture one which could only be conceived as a digital device. The corpus for experimentation consists of about 40 German versions of Shakespeares Othello, dating from 1766 to 2006 (so far). In an initial phase of work in 2011, funded by the College of Arts and Humanities, the texts were digitized by Alison Ehrmann, a Swansea PhD in translation studies, and prototype visualisations were developed by Zhao Geng, a Swansea PhD in data visualisation,. The current AHRC-funded phase of work involves two co-investigators: Dr Robert S Laramee (Swansea U), a data visualisation specialist, and Dr Jonathan Hope (Strathclyde U), a specialist in literary linguistics, stylistics, and algorithmic reading. The bulk of the work will be done by a research assistant and a design consultant. Kevin Flanagan, our research assistant, is a translation software developer and Swansea PhD student in translation studies. Stephan Thiel is a freelance information designer based in Berlin. By September 2012 we aim to have a small-scale working model of an array which enables readers not only to explore the variation across German translations (with machine- and user-generated back-translations), but also, and crucially, to explore the way the propensity of the source text to provoke variations varies from speech to speech (in terms of speech-specific statistics of target text lexis) and hence also between character parts, scenes, and sections of scenes. This will offer a new way of reading a Shakespearean text, through the prism of its translations, even without knowledge of languages other than English. A fully operational translation array will work with any sets of multiply-retranslated texts. That will take some years of further funded work. To access a podcast of this presentation, visit: www.facebook.com/transcast www.soundcloud.com/transcast

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Towards a Translation Array: Digitally Exploring Clouds Crowds of Translations Tom Cheesman Swansea University College of Arts and Humanities Department of Languages, Translation and Media Research Seminar 2011-12 March 6, 2012
Version Variation Visualisation www.delightedbeauty.org Phase 1 (Feb-July 2011) Supported by Swansea U, College of Arts and Humanities, Research Innovation Fund Co-Investigators David M. Berry, Robert S. Laramee, Andrew J. Rothwell Research Assistants Alison Ehrmann, Zhao Geng Design consultant Stephan Thiel Phase 2 (Feb-Sept 2012): Translation Arrays Supported by Arts and Humanities Research Council, Digital Transformations Theme, Research Development Fund Co-Investigators Robert S. Laramee, Jonathan Hope (Strathclyde) Research Assistant Kevin Flanagan Design consultant Stephan Thiel 2
Re-translations 3
Caroline Bergvall: VIA (48 Dante Variations) (2000 / 2004 / 2005) Variants: http://www.carolinebergvall.com/projects-sound.php http://media.sas.upenn.edu/pennsound/authors/Bergvall/Rockdrill-8/Bergvall- Caroline_06_Via_Via_Rockdrill-8_2005.mp3 http://mediamogul.seas.upenn.edu/pennsound/authors/Bergvall/Bergvall-Caroline-Via-2004.mp3 4
In discarding chronological sequencing in favour of alphabetization, Bergvall carefully avoids any false sense of teleology toward some final, perfected English version of Dantes tercet, instead using paratactic form to emphasize the historical and contextual relativity of translation [E]ach translation is an actualization of a particular point on a virtual line of continuous variation that passes through all possible instantiations of Dantes lines. Indeed, from this perspective, Dantes original can no longer be privileged as the basal statement which then undergoes various subtle nuances in meaning as it is diversely translated within different historical contexts. Rather, it occupies a certain point on that virtual line of semantic values, a line that includes all of its various English translations as well. Jared Wells, Caroline BergvallsDeleuzian Stuttering (blog, 14 Dec 2010) http://sprattsmedium.blogspot.com/2010/12/caroline-bergvalls-deleuzian-stuttering.html 5
The translations themselves thus find themselves 'out of joint. However correct and legitimate they may be and whatever right one may acknowledge them to have, they are all disadjusted, since unjust in the gap [l辿cart] that affects them: within them, for sure, as their meaning remains necessarily equivocal, then in their relation to one another and thus in their multiplicity, finally or first of all in their irreducible inadequacy to the other language and to the stroke of genius of the event that makes the law, to all the virtualities of the original. The excellence of the translation cannot help. Worse, and this is the whole drama, it can only aggravate or seal the inaccessibility of the other language. A few French examples from among the most remarkable, irreproachable, and interesting: []. Jacques Derrida, Specters of Marx, trans. adapted from Kamuf, 1994: 19 6
Retranslating Translating again Chain translating Back translating SL SL ST(e1) TL1:TT1 ST TT TT2 TT2(e2) () SLTT ST(e2) TT3 TT4 TL2:TT ST(e3) 7
*+ 'active' *rather than 'passive'+ retranslations *not only reveal+ historical changes in the target culture *they also+ yield insights into the nature and workings of translation itself, into its own special range of disturbances. Anthony Pym, Method in Translation History, 1998: 82-84 8
Jan Willem Mathijssen, The Breach and the Observance. Theatre Retranslation as a Strategy of Artistic Differentiation, with Special Reference to Retranslations of Shakespeare's Hamlet (1777-2001) (PhD, Utrecht, 2007, p.26) www.dehamlet.nl/the-breach-and-the-observance.htm _________________________________________________________________________________________ _ 9
Data visualisation for literary studies 10
FeridunZaimoglu and G端ntherSenkel, Nathan Messias(2006): Nathans sermon in a Wordle (from wordle.net cf. IBMs ManyEyes) 11
Phrase Net: < s > in the Sonnets 12
Graphs from Franco MorettisGraphs, Maps, Trees (2005) Timelines showing production of differing literary genres etc 13
Literary data visualisations Franco Moretti (1998), Atlas of the European Novel (2005), Graphs, Maps, Trees: Abstract Models for a Literary History Ben Fry (2009), On the Origin of Species: The Preservation of Favoured Traces at http://benfry.com/traces/ Stephan Thiel (2010), Understanding Shakespeare: Towards a Visual Form for Dramatic Texts and Language at www.understanding-shakespeare.com 14
Translation variation visualisation Jan Rybicki (2003), Original Characters at http://www.cyf-kr.edu.pl/~strybick/original_characters.htm (2006) Burrowing into Translation: Character Idiolects in Henryk Sienkiewicz's Trilogy and its Two English Translations, Literary and Linguistic Computing 21 (1): 91-103 Rybicki applies stylistics analysis (computer stylometry, based on distributions of stop words) to differentiate between idiolects in the speech of Polish and foreign characters in three love triangles in the three novels by Sienkiewicz; and then Rybicki applies the same method to two translations of the trilogy. He finds that patterns of difference and similarity are almost mysteriously preserved in the translations, yet the translations flatten national differences, and introduce new ones: gender differences which are absent in the source. 15
Othello
17
18
Crux: delighted Puns: virtue, delighted, far more, fair, black Joke Serious Insult Praise Addressees? Overhearers? Duke: status, character Ideologies of state power, of gender, of race on & off stage 19
German versionscurrently in print Wenn man die Tugend mu als sch旦n erkennen, D端rft Ihr nicht h辰lich Euren Eidam nennen. Baudissin 1832 Wenn zur Tugend die Freude an der Sch旦nheit geh旦rt, dann ist Euer Schwiegersohn eher sch旦n [hell] als schwarz. Klose 1971 Wenn es der Tapferkeit nicht an froher Sch旦nheit mangelt, ist Euer Schwiegersohn eher wei als schwarz. Bolte/Hamblock 1976 wenn der Tugend nicht die lichte Sch旦nheit fehlt, dann ist Euer Schwiegersohn viel eher hell als schwarz. Engler 1977 Wenn Ihr der Tugend nicht Sch旦nheit absprechen wollt, Ist Euer Schwiegersohn nicht dunkel, sondern Gold! Fried 1970 G辰bs helle Haut f端r Edelmut als Preis, Dann w辰r Ihr Schwiegersohn statt schwarz reinwei. G端nther 1995 Solange m辰nnliche Tugend mehr z辰hlt als Sch旦nheitsfehler, kann man sagen, Ihr Schwiegersohn ist eher edel als schwarz. Zaimoglu/Senkel 2003 20
Baudissin (1830s): If one must recognise virtue as beautiful / you may not call your son-in-law ugly. Klose (1970s): Ifjoy in beautybelongstovirtue, thenyourson-in-lawisbeautiful [bright/light(hell)] ratherthanblack. Bolte/Hamblock (1970s): Ifcouragedoes not lack happy beauty, yourson-in- lawiswhiteratherthanblack. Engler (1970s): If virtue does not lack bright-lit (licht) beauty, then your son-in-law is much more bright/light (hell) than black. Fried (1970s): If you do not wish to deny beauty to virtue / your son-in-law is not dark but gold! G端nther (1990s): If bright/light (hell) skin were a prize for noble-mindedness / then your son-in-law would be pure white instead of black. Zaimoglu/Senkel (2000s): So long as male virtue counts more than blemishes [lit.: beauty-failings/-lacks], one can say your son-in-law is more noble than black. 21
Modern Englishes If valour is the measure of true beauty, your son-in-law is fairer than hes black. Shakespeare Made Easy. Othello, Alan Durband, 1989 If goodness is beautiful, your son-in-law is beautiful, not black. No Fear Shakespeare. Othello, John Crowther, 2003 If virtue is missing delightful beauty, / Your son-in-law is far more just than black. Othello. Side by Side, James Scott, 2005 A gloss *+ your son-in-laws virtues are so fine that they completely overwhelm any qualms you may have at his Negro race. Othello, ed. C.W.R.D. Moseley , 1974 A rewriting If virtues qualities are always rare / Your son-in-law is far more black than fair. Bit clumsy. What if I change fair to white? Um ... what about: If virtue lack no beauties that delight / Your son-in-law is far more black than white. 22 Better: white has fewer positive connotations than fair. Needs more work, though.
(2011), Thirty Times More Fair Than Black: Shakespeare Retranslation as Political Restatement,Angermion: Yearbook fur Anglo-German Literary Criticism, 4: 1-51. (2012) (forthcoming), "Far More Fair Than Black: Mutations of a Difficult Couplet. In Smith, B. and Rowe, K. (eds), Cambridge World Shakespeare Encyclopaedia, vol.2: The Worlds Shakespeare. Cambridge UP. 23
Crowd-sourcing www.delightedbeauty.org Translations in all languages + metadata + back-translations in English + users comments/debates See esp.: Polish, Persian, German VVV project outputs 24
22 French versions supplied by Matthias Zach, 2010 25
Eddy and Viv 26
Statistical analysis of translation variation: Eddy and Viv Eddy is a measure of the lexical distinctiveness of a translation text (or segment of it) relative to all comparable texts (or segments) in the same target language. Eddy is defined as 裡D/tf(w1,d wN,d) where: each translation text/segment is a document, d, containing Nwords (i.e. from word 1 to word N, or: w1,d wN,d); the corpus of all comparable ds contains D documents; and term frequency, tf, is the number of times a word occurs in the corpus. The algorithm 1. The documents are aggregated into a corpus. 2. Term frequencies are calculated for every word in the corpus. 3. For every word, tf is divided into D. (A common word acquires a low numerical value; a unique word has the highest value.) 4. D/tf totals for all words in each separate document (i.e. w1,d wN,d), are added together (裡 = sum of). Each total is the Eddy result for that document. 27
28
Eddy results (rounded): 80335, measuring distinctiveness Text-types: S = Study edition, R = Reading edition, T = Theatre script 80Engler 1977 S: If virtue not lack bright-lit beauty, then your son-in-law is much more bright than black. 80 Wieland 1766 S: If virtue is the most-bright-shining beauty, then your daughters husband is more white than black. 80Gundolf 1909 R: If virtue not lack charm and beauty / your son-in-law is less black than bright-lit. 80 Bodenstedt1867 R: If virtue does not lack charm and beauty, / your son-in-law is beautiful and lovable. [] []240Engel 1939 T: If one speaks of virtue as of a light, / your son-in-law seems not so dark to me. 245Baudissin1832 R: If one must recognise virtue as beautiful, / you may not call your son-in-law ugly. 245Zeynek1945 T: If manly courage is not without charm and radiance/glory / then he is, even if black, highly estimable. 255Zaimoglu /Senkel2003 T: So long as male virtue counts more than blemishes, one can say your son-in-law is more noble than black. 270GildemeisterR 1871: Your son-in-law if virtue makes [people] lovely / resembles more the bright day than black night. 280G端nther1995 R: If bright/light skin were a prize for noble- mindedness, / then your son-in-law would be pure white instead of black. 290Laube1979 T: If virtue is beautiful, you now have as your reward / a black but beautiful son-in-law. 290RotheR 1956: If peoples inward appearance alone *were all that] counted, / we would be darker than Othello. 305Schr旦derR 1962: Where so much courage resides with so much zeal, / your son-in-law appears less black than blond. 335 Motschach1992 T: If outward appearance were always the prize for [or: price of] inner values / many a white man would appear black, many a black man white. (NB These Eddy results are for 35 German translations, not for the back-translations !) 29
30
31
Sets of Eddy results for different sample segments show limited similarity Ranges and distributions are significantly different Sample A: the Dukes delighted beauty couplet: Eddy range 80-335, mean 182 Sample B: the first sentence in Othellos great speech to the senate: Eddy range 16-310, mean 144 32
33
Viv (Variant Intensity in Variation) measures the degree to which a source text (or segment) is associated with variation among its translations Provisional Viv formula: The Viv of a (segment of a) source text = the mean ( ) of the associated Eddy results (i.e. the sum of results, divided by the number of results), divided by SN i.e. the number of words in the source text (segment). This is a provisional, simple formula. Further experiments will discover how Viv can be weighted to reflect the ranges and distributions of Eddy results. Note that Viv is a value associated with the source segment and all the words in that segment. 34
Viv plotting For the Dukes delighted beauty couplet (in 35 differing German translations), Viv = 13 For the first sentence in Othellos great speech to the senate (in 32 differing German translations), Viv = 5.3 By plotting Viv across all segments of an entire source text, we can create a new way of reading it as refracted through multiple translators work. Readers dont even need to understand the translating language(s) (but they might feel encouraged to try to learn) 35
Translation Array design On the following slides: Mock-ups by Tom Cheesman and Stephan Thiel in: TC and the VVV Team, Translation Sorting: Eddy and Viv in Translation Arrays (draft paper, 2011, attached to www.delightedbeauty.org, and under consideration for the conference volume Un/Translatables) and included in the application to AHRC 36
37
38
39
40
SHAKESPEARE FOUND IN TRANSLATION http://globetoglobe.shakespearesglobe.com/home-shuffler http://www.shakespearesglobe.com/education/events/lectures- seminars/translation-lectures
New Variorum Edition of Shakespeare (inaug. Horace Howard Furness, 1860s): Othello, 1886 42
Tom Cheesman - 6 March 2012 - Towards a Translation Array: Digitally Exploring Crowds of Translations at Swansea University
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Tom Cheesman - 6 March 2012 - Towards a Translation Array: Digitally Exploring Crowds of Translations at Swansea University

  • 1. Towards a Translation Array: Digitally Exploring Clouds Crowds of Translations Tom Cheesman Swansea University College of Arts and Humanities Department of Languages, Translation and Media Research Seminar 2011-12 March 6, 2012
  • 2. Version Variation Visualisation www.delightedbeauty.org Phase 1 (Feb-July 2011) Supported by Swansea U, College of Arts and Humanities, Research Innovation Fund Co-Investigators David M. Berry, Robert S. Laramee, Andrew J. Rothwell Research Assistants Alison Ehrmann, Zhao Geng Design consultant Stephan Thiel Phase 2 (Feb-Sept 2012): Translation Arrays Supported by Arts and Humanities Research Council, Digital Transformations Theme, Research Development Fund Co-Investigators Robert S. Laramee, Jonathan Hope (Strathclyde) Research Assistant Kevin Flanagan Design consultant Stephan Thiel 2
  • 4. Caroline Bergvall: VIA (48 Dante Variations) (2000 / 2004 / 2005) Variants: http://www.carolinebergvall.com/projects-sound.php http://media.sas.upenn.edu/pennsound/authors/Bergvall/Rockdrill-8/Bergvall- Caroline_06_Via_Via_Rockdrill-8_2005.mp3 http://mediamogul.seas.upenn.edu/pennsound/authors/Bergvall/Bergvall-Caroline-Via-2004.mp3 4
  • 5. In discarding chronological sequencing in favour of alphabetization, Bergvall carefully avoids any false sense of teleology toward some final, perfected English version of Dantes tercet, instead using paratactic form to emphasize the historical and contextual relativity of translation [E]ach translation is an actualization of a particular point on a virtual line of continuous variation that passes through all possible instantiations of Dantes lines. Indeed, from this perspective, Dantes original can no longer be privileged as the basal statement which then undergoes various subtle nuances in meaning as it is diversely translated within different historical contexts. Rather, it occupies a certain point on that virtual line of semantic values, a line that includes all of its various English translations as well. Jared Wells, Caroline BergvallsDeleuzian Stuttering (blog, 14 Dec 2010) http://sprattsmedium.blogspot.com/2010/12/caroline-bergvalls-deleuzian-stuttering.html 5
  • 6. The translations themselves thus find themselves 'out of joint. However correct and legitimate they may be and whatever right one may acknowledge them to have, they are all disadjusted, since unjust in the gap [l辿cart] that affects them: within them, for sure, as their meaning remains necessarily equivocal, then in their relation to one another and thus in their multiplicity, finally or first of all in their irreducible inadequacy to the other language and to the stroke of genius of the event that makes the law, to all the virtualities of the original. The excellence of the translation cannot help. Worse, and this is the whole drama, it can only aggravate or seal the inaccessibility of the other language. A few French examples from among the most remarkable, irreproachable, and interesting: []. Jacques Derrida, Specters of Marx, trans. adapted from Kamuf, 1994: 19 6
  • 7. Retranslating Translating again Chain translating Back translating SL SL ST(e1) TL1:TT1 ST TT TT2 TT2(e2) () SLTT ST(e2) TT3 TT4 TL2:TT ST(e3) 7
  • 8. *+ 'active' *rather than 'passive'+ retranslations *not only reveal+ historical changes in the target culture *they also+ yield insights into the nature and workings of translation itself, into its own special range of disturbances. Anthony Pym, Method in Translation History, 1998: 82-84 8
  • 9. Jan Willem Mathijssen, The Breach and the Observance. Theatre Retranslation as a Strategy of Artistic Differentiation, with Special Reference to Retranslations of Shakespeare's Hamlet (1777-2001) (PhD, Utrecht, 2007, p.26) www.dehamlet.nl/the-breach-and-the-observance.htm _________________________________________________________________________________________ _ 9
  • 11. FeridunZaimoglu and G端ntherSenkel, Nathan Messias(2006): Nathans sermon in a Wordle (from wordle.net cf. IBMs ManyEyes) 11
  • 12. Phrase Net: < s > in the Sonnets 12
  • 13. Graphs from Franco MorettisGraphs, Maps, Trees (2005) Timelines showing production of differing literary genres etc 13
  • 14. Literary data visualisations Franco Moretti (1998), Atlas of the European Novel (2005), Graphs, Maps, Trees: Abstract Models for a Literary History Ben Fry (2009), On the Origin of Species: The Preservation of Favoured Traces at http://benfry.com/traces/ Stephan Thiel (2010), Understanding Shakespeare: Towards a Visual Form for Dramatic Texts and Language at www.understanding-shakespeare.com 14
  • 15. Translation variation visualisation Jan Rybicki (2003), Original Characters at http://www.cyf-kr.edu.pl/~strybick/original_characters.htm (2006) Burrowing into Translation: Character Idiolects in Henryk Sienkiewicz's Trilogy and its Two English Translations, Literary and Linguistic Computing 21 (1): 91-103 Rybicki applies stylistics analysis (computer stylometry, based on distributions of stop words) to differentiate between idiolects in the speech of Polish and foreign characters in three love triangles in the three novels by Sienkiewicz; and then Rybicki applies the same method to two translations of the trilogy. He finds that patterns of difference and similarity are almost mysteriously preserved in the translations, yet the translations flatten national differences, and introduce new ones: gender differences which are absent in the source. 15
  • 17. 17
  • 18. 18
  • 19. Crux: delighted Puns: virtue, delighted, far more, fair, black Joke Serious Insult Praise Addressees? Overhearers? Duke: status, character Ideologies of state power, of gender, of race on & off stage 19
  • 20. German versionscurrently in print Wenn man die Tugend mu als sch旦n erkennen, D端rft Ihr nicht h辰lich Euren Eidam nennen. Baudissin 1832 Wenn zur Tugend die Freude an der Sch旦nheit geh旦rt, dann ist Euer Schwiegersohn eher sch旦n [hell] als schwarz. Klose 1971 Wenn es der Tapferkeit nicht an froher Sch旦nheit mangelt, ist Euer Schwiegersohn eher wei als schwarz. Bolte/Hamblock 1976 wenn der Tugend nicht die lichte Sch旦nheit fehlt, dann ist Euer Schwiegersohn viel eher hell als schwarz. Engler 1977 Wenn Ihr der Tugend nicht Sch旦nheit absprechen wollt, Ist Euer Schwiegersohn nicht dunkel, sondern Gold! Fried 1970 G辰bs helle Haut f端r Edelmut als Preis, Dann w辰r Ihr Schwiegersohn statt schwarz reinwei. G端nther 1995 Solange m辰nnliche Tugend mehr z辰hlt als Sch旦nheitsfehler, kann man sagen, Ihr Schwiegersohn ist eher edel als schwarz. Zaimoglu/Senkel 2003 20
  • 21. Baudissin (1830s): If one must recognise virtue as beautiful / you may not call your son-in-law ugly. Klose (1970s): Ifjoy in beautybelongstovirtue, thenyourson-in-lawisbeautiful [bright/light(hell)] ratherthanblack. Bolte/Hamblock (1970s): Ifcouragedoes not lack happy beauty, yourson-in- lawiswhiteratherthanblack. Engler (1970s): If virtue does not lack bright-lit (licht) beauty, then your son-in-law is much more bright/light (hell) than black. Fried (1970s): If you do not wish to deny beauty to virtue / your son-in-law is not dark but gold! G端nther (1990s): If bright/light (hell) skin were a prize for noble-mindedness / then your son-in-law would be pure white instead of black. Zaimoglu/Senkel (2000s): So long as male virtue counts more than blemishes [lit.: beauty-failings/-lacks], one can say your son-in-law is more noble than black. 21
  • 22. Modern Englishes If valour is the measure of true beauty, your son-in-law is fairer than hes black. Shakespeare Made Easy. Othello, Alan Durband, 1989 If goodness is beautiful, your son-in-law is beautiful, not black. No Fear Shakespeare. Othello, John Crowther, 2003 If virtue is missing delightful beauty, / Your son-in-law is far more just than black. Othello. Side by Side, James Scott, 2005 A gloss *+ your son-in-laws virtues are so fine that they completely overwhelm any qualms you may have at his Negro race. Othello, ed. C.W.R.D. Moseley , 1974 A rewriting If virtues qualities are always rare / Your son-in-law is far more black than fair. Bit clumsy. What if I change fair to white? Um ... what about: If virtue lack no beauties that delight / Your son-in-law is far more black than white. 22 Better: white has fewer positive connotations than fair. Needs more work, though.
  • 23. (2011), Thirty Times More Fair Than Black: Shakespeare Retranslation as Political Restatement,Angermion: Yearbook fur Anglo-German Literary Criticism, 4: 1-51. (2012) (forthcoming), "Far More Fair Than Black: Mutations of a Difficult Couplet. In Smith, B. and Rowe, K. (eds), Cambridge World Shakespeare Encyclopaedia, vol.2: The Worlds Shakespeare. Cambridge UP. 23
  • 24. Crowd-sourcing www.delightedbeauty.org Translations in all languages + metadata + back-translations in English + users comments/debates See esp.: Polish, Persian, German VVV project outputs 24
  • 25. 22 French versions supplied by Matthias Zach, 2010 25
  • 27. Statistical analysis of translation variation: Eddy and Viv Eddy is a measure of the lexical distinctiveness of a translation text (or segment of it) relative to all comparable texts (or segments) in the same target language. Eddy is defined as 裡D/tf(w1,d wN,d) where: each translation text/segment is a document, d, containing Nwords (i.e. from word 1 to word N, or: w1,d wN,d); the corpus of all comparable ds contains D documents; and term frequency, tf, is the number of times a word occurs in the corpus. The algorithm 1. The documents are aggregated into a corpus. 2. Term frequencies are calculated for every word in the corpus. 3. For every word, tf is divided into D. (A common word acquires a low numerical value; a unique word has the highest value.) 4. D/tf totals for all words in each separate document (i.e. w1,d wN,d), are added together (裡 = sum of). Each total is the Eddy result for that document. 27
  • 28. 28
  • 29. Eddy results (rounded): 80335, measuring distinctiveness Text-types: S = Study edition, R = Reading edition, T = Theatre script 80Engler 1977 S: If virtue not lack bright-lit beauty, then your son-in-law is much more bright than black. 80 Wieland 1766 S: If virtue is the most-bright-shining beauty, then your daughters husband is more white than black. 80Gundolf 1909 R: If virtue not lack charm and beauty / your son-in-law is less black than bright-lit. 80 Bodenstedt1867 R: If virtue does not lack charm and beauty, / your son-in-law is beautiful and lovable. [] []240Engel 1939 T: If one speaks of virtue as of a light, / your son-in-law seems not so dark to me. 245Baudissin1832 R: If one must recognise virtue as beautiful, / you may not call your son-in-law ugly. 245Zeynek1945 T: If manly courage is not without charm and radiance/glory / then he is, even if black, highly estimable. 255Zaimoglu /Senkel2003 T: So long as male virtue counts more than blemishes, one can say your son-in-law is more noble than black. 270GildemeisterR 1871: Your son-in-law if virtue makes [people] lovely / resembles more the bright day than black night. 280G端nther1995 R: If bright/light skin were a prize for noble- mindedness, / then your son-in-law would be pure white instead of black. 290Laube1979 T: If virtue is beautiful, you now have as your reward / a black but beautiful son-in-law. 290RotheR 1956: If peoples inward appearance alone *were all that] counted, / we would be darker than Othello. 305Schr旦derR 1962: Where so much courage resides with so much zeal, / your son-in-law appears less black than blond. 335 Motschach1992 T: If outward appearance were always the prize for [or: price of] inner values / many a white man would appear black, many a black man white. (NB These Eddy results are for 35 German translations, not for the back-translations !) 29
  • 30. 30
  • 31. 31
  • 32. Sets of Eddy results for different sample segments show limited similarity Ranges and distributions are significantly different Sample A: the Dukes delighted beauty couplet: Eddy range 80-335, mean 182 Sample B: the first sentence in Othellos great speech to the senate: Eddy range 16-310, mean 144 32
  • 33. 33
  • 34. Viv (Variant Intensity in Variation) measures the degree to which a source text (or segment) is associated with variation among its translations Provisional Viv formula: The Viv of a (segment of a) source text = the mean ( ) of the associated Eddy results (i.e. the sum of results, divided by the number of results), divided by SN i.e. the number of words in the source text (segment). This is a provisional, simple formula. Further experiments will discover how Viv can be weighted to reflect the ranges and distributions of Eddy results. Note that Viv is a value associated with the source segment and all the words in that segment. 34
  • 35. Viv plotting For the Dukes delighted beauty couplet (in 35 differing German translations), Viv = 13 For the first sentence in Othellos great speech to the senate (in 32 differing German translations), Viv = 5.3 By plotting Viv across all segments of an entire source text, we can create a new way of reading it as refracted through multiple translators work. Readers dont even need to understand the translating language(s) (but they might feel encouraged to try to learn) 35
  • 36. Translation Array design On the following slides: Mock-ups by Tom Cheesman and Stephan Thiel in: TC and the VVV Team, Translation Sorting: Eddy and Viv in Translation Arrays (draft paper, 2011, attached to www.delightedbeauty.org, and under consideration for the conference volume Un/Translatables) and included in the application to AHRC 36
  • 37. 37
  • 38. 38
  • 39. 39
  • 40. 40
  • 41. SHAKESPEARE FOUND IN TRANSLATION http://globetoglobe.shakespearesglobe.com/home-shuffler http://www.shakespearesglobe.com/education/events/lectures- seminars/translation-lectures
  • 42. New Variorum Edition of Shakespeare (inaug. Horace Howard Furness, 1860s): Othello, 1886 42
  • 44. 44

Editor's Notes

  • #12: This Wordle shows word frequencies (indicated by size; colour is decorative) in a long (5,000-word) sermon delivered by the titular Nathan, the self-appointed Messiah, in Zaimoglu and Senkels 2006 tradaptation of Lessings Nathan der Weise (1779). The visualisation cannot show what is most fascinating about this play. By casting Nathan as a Messiah, the dramatists unwittingly excavated an often overlooked subtext of Lessings play. The Parable of the Rings (which Zaimoglu and Senkel cut, Zaimoglu dismissing it as an Ammenm辰rchen) is based on a narrative tradition going back to the 12th century, associated with Maimonides and other exiled and/or forcibly converted Jews. The parable is a response to an even older, transreligious, Messianic watchword: the doctrine of the three impostors, these being Moses, Jesus, and Mohamed. This doctrine enshrines radical intolerance towards all the established religions, and that is why the parable of the rings is essentially ambiguous, interpretable as a plea for inter-religious respect, but also for universal disrespect, which in turn can be read atheistically, or messianically. The three impostors doctrine gained new currency in the early 18th century in an anonymous and highly controversial book, De TribusImpostoribus, which Lessing knew. According to the research of Friedrich Niew旦hner, the book was probably written by one of the Marannos, Jews or crypto-Jews expelled from Iberia, living in Amsterdam, London, and Hamburg, and the writing was probably sparked by Diaspora interest in the movement of SabbataiZewi. Zewis messianic status had first been promulgated in 1665 by a charismatic millenarian preacher named Nathan of Gaza. Despite being ignorant of all this, Zaimoglu and Senkel translate Lessings Nathan into a millenarian, messianic enemy of the three religions. Nathans sermon denounces the three religions and their schandpriester. He brings new violence, ruptures, mayhem and death to Jerusalem. The visualisation shows the sermons politically caution in apportioning rhetorical attacks. The text was revised, following comments (not only from me) that in the first version, Islam got off far more lightly than the other two religions. Even after a revision which devoted more space to attacking Islam, you can see here that the word christianer (bottom left) is prominent compared to juden (above herrn, vertical); and moslems (to left of worden) are least often mentioned.
  • #31: REVISED range is based on inverse document frequency count (Sept 2011)
  • #32: Inverse document frequency calculated Sept 2011. Range 1-20