I am implying that up until very recently translating Classics was thought to be a very serious job where the author certainly tried to give a new angle to the work(else why translate), but did not try to radically alter the meaning. You change the angle of the spotlight, or maybe the brigtness, you don't change the object at which the spotlight is pointing.
Making a "feminist" translation of the Odyssey under the pretension that the original is a "patriarchal fantasy" is not a serious work and shouldn't be taken as such.
This translator takes the task very seriously, and is taken seriously by other professionals in her domain of expertise. I don't know how to find a stronger signal of seriousness than that.
Her introduction to the odyssey is actually a very interesting essay about the constraints and dynamics of translating ancient texts, it's definitely worth reading for its own sake.
A really interesting example of this and probably the one you're on a rant about is the "feminist" decision to use the word slave to describe the murdered house girls. Previous english translations used the word servant or maid. The original greek word is none of these, but they were slaves and an ancient greek would know that in this context. Every translator is making a decision about what information is communicated when they select a word there. And a selection is required, there's no perfectly neutral choice.
>Making a "feminist" translation of the Odyssey under the pretension that the original is a "patriarchal fantasy" is not a serious work and shouldn't be taken as such.
Why not?
Edit: Also unclear where you're quoting "feminist" and "patriarchal fantasy" from, as the article and this entire thread mention neither.
That's a false premise, I have no opinion on the translation in the article. I am responding to the premise of a feminist translation, not to this specific translation (which may in fact not be feminist at all.)
> Am I correct in inferring that you're calling this translation absurd
As I explained, no. mamonster presented the premise of a feminist translation. You asked what the problem with that would be, and I responded the premise of a feminist adaptation seems fine but a feminist translation does not. I have not argued that this translation is a feminist translation; I am responding to the same premise which you responded to when you asked "Why not?"
If you can ask "Why not?" to a premise disconnected from the article, then I can address the same premise.
>mamonster presented the premise of a feminist translation.
And there's where the breakdown occurred - mamonster didn't present a premise of a feminist translation, they explicitly called this a feminist translation in both comments.
You humored and addressed the premise when you asked "Why not?" I can (and did) also address that premise.
Anyway, I think we both understand each other now. If the NYTimes decides to let me past their captcha, I'll read the translation later and might give you my thoughts on it. Otherwise this conversation has taken an unproductive turn; I'm not amused by your attempt to rug-pull me.
>You humored and addressed the premise when you asked "Why not?"
No, I did not "humor and address [a] premise" because, again, that's not what OP did. In both comments, OP asserts that this is a feminist translation that should not be taken as a serious work. I asked OP, "Why not?" because I read the piece and disagreed with that assertion - I wanted to know, explicitly, if they were able to explain what about it they felt made it not "a serious work" and why "it shouldn't be taken as such". I wanted OP to defend their assertion made about this specific piece, and to elaborate on their perspective.
Because of that, I would imagine that it'd be clear to most people how your initial comment could've been read as arguing that this translation seems absurd, even if that's not where you were coming from.
If you think I'm wrong in reading OP's comments as an assertion rather than a premise, just look at how many other people responded in a way that suggests that they read it the same way I did.
>Otherwise this conversation has taken an unproductive turn...
Really? I genuinely thought that identifying where our disconnect occurred was productive.
>I'm not amused by your attempt to rug-pull me.
That's... not at all what I'm doing. All I've done was clarify our misunderstanding of one another, and your misunderstanding of OP's comments. It's OK to have accidentally misunderstood what someone was saying, there's no need to get personal here.
Making a "feminist" translation of the Odyssey under the pretension that the original is a "patriarchal fantasy" is not a serious work and shouldn't be taken as such.