I believe that Raymond wrote all his work in English, and so
it's the French that's the translation.
As Etienne mentioned, Sick Transit is a pun impossible to
keep in French. Titles are often one of the hardest things to
translate. They can be hard to come up with, even in the
original language. In translation, you have to aim for
something catchy that will grab readers by suggesting
something about the book's content; in the case of a play on
words that doesn't translate in a straightforward way, you
can sometimes substitute another one.
For instance, I've translated two books. They are about as
far removed for this list's topic as you can get, but they're
the only first-hand examples I have. Les grands d鳯rdres
(Marie Cardinal) came out in English as Devotion and
Disorder. The editor and I tossed around about fifty ideas
before agreeing on that. Great Disorders just wouldn't work.
Le temps de la diff鲥nce (Luce Irigaray) could be literally
translated as The Time of the Difference, which is pretty
meaningless. The publisher decided on Thinking the
Difference--not my choice.
Getting back to noir, Piano barjo is at first glance a
catchy, rhyming, slangy title. But after I read the book, I
realized it was actually a kind of pun, as well. As Etienne
explained earlier, barjo means crazy. One of the main
characters plays piano in a bar. His name is Bart. And guess
what? The bar owner's name is Jo. There's no way to keep all
those layers in an English title. At least, I don't think
so.
Karin
At 12:16 AM 21/04/2006 -0400, Mark Sullivan wrote:
>Boardy wrote:
>
>"[Serpent's Tail]'re also putting out Nightmare In
The Street, which I
>presume is a collection of short stories."
>
>Actually, it's the 1988 novel that Raymond wrote in
between the initial
>Factory trilogy and I Was Dora Suarez, previously
published only in
>France, in French. The English translation of the
first chapter, with
>the same title, was published in the first Fresh
Blood anthology in
>1996. It's been a long wait for the full novel in
English. Thanks for
>letting me know it's finally imminent.
>
>Here's hoping they also publish his other French-only
novel, Le Soleil
>Qui S'Etient (which even my rudimentary French knows
doesn't literally
>translate to Sick Transit, the English title I've
seen attached to it).
>Then I'll have all of his post-Sabbatical
novels.
>
>How are his pre-Sabbatical novels? I have several,
but have only read
>Crust on Its Uppers.
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