AtD translation: a-thrum with excitement

[Becky Lindroos]

Great post,  Douglas!   Thanks.   (And welcome to pynchon-l.) 

Becky 

> On Mar 26, 2019, at 7:25 AM, Douglas Johnson <dmj at panix.com> wrote:
> 
> On Mar 26, 2019, at 07:58, Mike Jing wrote:
> 
>> P255.1-6 Chick greeted his shipmates, who were a-thrum with excitement 
>> What does "a-thrum" mean?
> 
> "A-thrum" is Pynchon playing with language. English occasionally uses the prefix "a-" to mean "in such a condition" Some examples are "aflutter," "aflame," and "acrawl."
> 
> "Athrum" isn't a proper English word (in the sense of being found in the dictionary). Rather, "a-thrum" is the result of Pynchon combining the "a-" prefix with "thrum" in an inventive, playful manner. (In US English, it's not uncommon to hyphenate such a temporary compound rather than close it up.)
> 
> In this case, "a-thrum" means (essentially) "thrumming." I'm curious how a translator would capture the wordplay here.
> 
> -- 
> Douglas Johnson
> dmj at panix.com
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