German translators of AtD

[Mark Kohut]

what a great discussion and I have probably only an irrelevant footnote
to add......I reread The Tempest earlier this year and learned more clearly
from a footnote a meaning of "for" [fur] contained in one of "Against"'s meanings
in English....

8)In preparation for; in anticipation of: food stored against winter

TRP knows it.



----- Original Message ----
From: Michael J. Hußmann <michael at michael-hussmann.de>
To: pynchon-l at waste.org
Sent: Thursday, November 29, 2007 7:46:36 AM
Subject: Re: German translators of AtD

Monte Davis (monte.davis at verizon.net) wrote:

> I don't know German, but the English title certainly embraces all of:
>
> 1) in preparation for the [coming] day... with biblical connotations of
> warning, prophecy (is "gegen den Tag" in Martin Luther's 2 Peter 3:7,
> Proverbs 21:31, John 12:7 etc.?)
>
> 2) opposing the day... with connotations of darkness 
>
> 3) backlit or silhouetted (a la contre-jour) ... the "against" simply
> geometrical

The problem with the biblical connotation is that it depends on a
specific translation, i.e. the King James Version. Luther has "für den
Tag", just like the New International Version's "for the day". The
Einheitsübersetzung has "bis zum Tag" ("until the day"). The literal
translation of "Against the Day" thus misses the allusion to 2 Peter 3:7
etc., and the only translation preserving the biblical connotation,
namely "Für den Tag", would contradict 2 and 3. "Gegen den Tag" captures
2, but not 3 -- "contre-jour" would be "Gegenlicht". "Gegenlicht" could
also express the "opposing the day/light" aspect, so that's two out of
three for "Gegenlicht" compared to one out of three for "Gegen den Tag".

- Michael


Michael J. Hußmann

E-mail: michael at michael-hussmann.de
WWW (personal): http://michael-hussmann.de
WWW (professional): http://digicam-experts.de


      ____________________________________________________________________________________
Be a better sports nut!  Let your teams follow you 
with Yahoo Mobile. Try it now.  http://mobile.yahoo.com/sports;_ylt=At9_qDKvtAbMuh1G1SQtBI7ntAcJ
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://waste.org/pipermail/pynchon-l/attachments/20071129/7b3765fd/attachment-0001.html>