GR translation: they are transubstantiated

[Michael Bailey]

Such a grisly reversal of the Mass!

Bread -> Jesus’ flesh

Corpse -> daily bread

War is hell


On Wed, Jan 29, 2025 at 3:20 AM Mike Jing <gravitys.rainbow.cn at gmail.com>
wrote:

> V368.25-30, P374.22-27    . . . by now it’s clear that they’re human
> bodies, dug from beneath today’s rubble, each inside its carefully tagged
> GI fartsack. But it was more than an optical mistake. They are rising, they
> are transubstantiated, and who knows, with summer over and hungry winter
> coming down, what we’ll be feeding on by Xmas?
>
> The word "transubstantiate" has two basic meanings:
>
> a. transitive. To change from one substance into another; to transform,
> transmute.
>
> b. spec. in Theology: see transubstantiation n. 2.
>
> Clearly, both meanings are intended here, (a) being the apparent meaning,
> with connotation of (b). Problem is, in Chinese, the two meanings are
> represented by different words. If I choose (a), the connotation of (b)
> will be lost. But if I choose (b), it doesn't quite work either because
> what's happening here is not the same as the transubstantiation in
> Theology, but rather the reverse. This is just one example of the kind of
> problems you may run into when translating between languages that are
> sufficiently different.
>
> By the way, in "what we’ll be feeding on by Xmas", does "by Xmas" mean at
> the time when Xmas comes around, or does it mean between now and Xmas?
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