Sentence and Punishment

Sentence and punishment
Source sentence structure, or writing, as opposed to ‘just’ translating
One of the most common translation problems I’ve noticed comes with retaining
a Serbian (or other) sentence structure when it’s inappropriate. It can be
grammatically correct, but just not the way an English-speaking person would
express it. It can also be confusing. When you come across a long, complex
sentence in Serbian that you have to read three times to understand, it is of
course possible that the author intended the difficulty (especially if it’s a doctoral
thesis by a politician). But it is more likely that they were just poor writers, and
in most cases I think a good translation should help sort that out for them and
make it understandable. Yes, there’s a danger that you miss the main point if
that was to confuse the reader, but the risk the other way is usually greater.
When you translate, you often have to judge these risks and sometimes even flip
a coin, unless you have aeons of time and full access to the author – unusual
luxuries.
Many Serbian texts use dreadfully long, composite sentences. Their flow is often
interrupted by comma-bound clauses that make you feel as if you are riding a
train with loose couplings between the carriages: stop, start, stop, start before
you get to the point. After a few pages you need treatment for lexical whiplash.
Let’s look at this.
First, be careful: such a sentence can sometimes be well constructed, with

Serbian case endings making clarity of complexity, though often it is just clumsy.
When you translate it into caseless English, however, it becomes so unwieldy it is
hard to understand on first reading even if it is ‘correct’.
Here’s a mild example. ‘The government, at its session of 23.10.2014, decided,

in view of the need to support the economy, to allocate funds, since there was a
primary budget surplus, for subsidies to certain companies’ .
Try and sort it out a bit: ‘In view of the need to support the economy, at its
session of 23.10.2014 the government decided to allocate funds for subsidies to
certain companies, since there was a primary budget surplus’ . Getting the
principal subject and verb together often helps make it clearer what’s going on.
Better still, break up the sentence. ‘At its session of 23.10.2014 the government
noted a primary budget surplus. To support the economy, it therefore decided to
allocate funds for subsidies to certain companies.’
However, the extent to which you should re-phrase it depends on the purpose of
the document: for a law or contract, be very careful indeed; for a more informal
presentation for English speakers take a lot of liberty to get the point across in a
natural way.
The big question in commercial translation is of course: how far to go? That
depends on the style of the original, the purpose of the text, the target group
and the good sense of the client. For certain contracts, for example, no-one will
care a hoot if the style is lousy, just as long as they are legally watertight as
interpreted by lawyers and judges. For an advertisement, it may be best to
understand the aim, ignore the source text entirely and write afresh for a
culturally different target group. (The latter is often called ‘localisation’ in the
industry jargon, but it’s really just translation done right in a given context.)
These are the extremes. It is my dream to get every client to indicate on a scale
of 1 to 10 where to pitch the translation of their text. Trouble is, many clients
just don’t know. They think translation is either right or wrong, whereas in reality
the complexity of language makes it very much an art, not a science. Picasso
was neither right nor wrong, just great. Writers are artists too and translators
are writers. So it is up to translators to judge for themselves, and take the flak
when the client judges differently. Too bad, art has always been an ill-
appreciated metier in the lifetime of the artist.
However, in commercial translation, clients have an important role to play – they

pay the bill. So if you are asked to use forms and phrases that are not good
English you should often agree to do so, since in business the customer is always
king. But if you do this, please make a note about it with the translation, to
inform the client of the error of his ways.
I’ll leave you with a couple of nice examples from the real world this week.
Before
Our beginning, unlike many others, was not difficult.
After
Unlike many others, our beginning was not difficult.
That may sound simplistic, but if you have to read several pages of this kind of
stuff, you get really tired of it.
The next one is not a legal document like a law or contract, but a lawyer trying
to explain the situation to his client. The important thing here is that the client
should understand what’s going on. He’s really outdone himself.
Before
On 1 October 2016, the Higher Public Prosecutor in Xgrad, following upon the
observations of the appellate court in Xgrad, ordered, on the basis of decision No
ABC999/99, a supplementary economic and financial examination, to be carried
out by a court expert, into the circumstances in which the defendants, in the
period referred to in the indictment, might have obtained material gain, and/or
unlawful material gain, for the companies “COMPANY 1” d.o.o., “COMPANY 2”
d.o.o. and/or “COMPANY 3” a.d., and, if they had, what was the amount of the
material gain, and/or unlawful material gain, each defendant, given that the
defendants were being accused of commission of the offence of abuse of office
of a responsible person, by incitement, under Article 234 paragraph 3, with
respect to paragraph 1 of the Criminal Code of the Republic of Serbia, and/or the
criminal offence of the abuse of office under Article 359, paragraph 3, with
respect to paragraph 1 of the Criminal Code of the Republic of Serbia, had
individually obtained for the companies referred to, with regard to which the
amount of the obtained unlawful material gain is of the essence for the
assessing of the legal qualification of the alleged criminal offence.
After
Following the observations of the appellate court in Xgrad and on the basis of
decision No ABC999/99, on 1 October 2014 the Higher Public Prosecutor ordered
a supplementary economic and financial expert examination. This should assess
the circumstances in which the defendants may have obtained material gain or
unlawful material gain for Company 1 d.o.o., Company 2 d.o.o. and/or Company
3 a.d. in the period referred to in the indictment. The defendants stood accused
of the offence of abuse of office by incitement of a responsible person under
Article 234 paragraph 3, cf. paragraph 1 of the Serbian criminal code, and of the
criminal offence of abuse of office under Article 359, paragraph 3, cf. paragraph
1 of the code. If such gain were established, the examination should determine
the value that each defendant had obtained for these companies. This was
deemed necessary because the value of unlawful material gain is essential for
determining the legal category of the alleged criminal offence.

Sentence and Punishment

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Sentence and Punishment

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Sentence and Punishment

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Sentence and punishment

Source sentence structure, or writing, as opposed to ‘just’ translating

First, be careful: such a sentence can sometimes be well constructed, with

Here’s a mild example. ‘The government, at its session of 23.10.2014, decided,

However, in commercial translation, clients have an important role to play – they

Our beginning, unlike many others, was not difficult.

Unlike many others, our beginning was not difficult.

You might also like