Bush Vet Translation

[snarf]

Terrance wrote:

>Brazil simply doesn't have war veterans like the USA or Australia or
>England so ... while the word veteran is used to describe so very old
>war veterans and old sometimes old people generally or anyone who has a
>lot of experience doing something, the phrase "veteran of the jungle"
>simply doesn't make any sense at all in Portuguese.

So you think that because we don't have war veterans we don't know the
military implications of the word? This like saying that if you don't live
in Australia you don't know what a kangaroo is....  Vineland is not set
neither in Brazil, nor in Uruguay, but we are not as dumb as you seem to
belive and although we read the book on translation, Vineland is perfectly
readable and understandable for us, and set in USA in 1984. For this reason,
although we haven't got war veterans (thank God!) we can perfectly
understand that you have (and unfortunately still will have for years to
come). Have you read One hundred years of solitude as if was set in
California?
And by the way, why are we arguing about portuguese? I was talking about the
spanish translation of Vineland, and it's a good one.

>The abbreviation Vet. and the informal Vet  are not used in either Spanish
or Portuguese.

So what? I have already said that the veterinarian implication was lost on
the translation, but not everybody in this list agree about RC being a
veterinarian. As the double meaning of Vet was impossible to translate, the
translator choose to preserve the veteran meaning over the veterinarian one.
I think it's a wise and meaningful election.

>A person like RC would not be a veteran of the jungle in any sense in
Spanish either.

Does every American use this Bushlike logical reasoning? How can anybody
that does not speak the lenguage is sure that a phrase in spanish does not
make any sense based on speculations about portuguese? Oh, Terrance, you
should run for president and attack Iran based on your wive's especulations
about Ecuador...

And I agree that this discussion does not deserve to go any further. I give
up...