Our metaphor this time is one of being obliterated and reincarnated after passing through various hells. I'm going to ignore the other one because, as a product of the 21st century, I don't like it very much. From my (again) fairly short experience with Japanese nonfiction, this sounds like it would apply well. Japanese nonfiction writing conventions differ greatly from English, and I can see how conveying the same information in a well-structured English translation would take a lot of effort. Japanese nonfiction tends to kind of circle around an answer while taking meandering detours, which directly conflicts with the English convention of providing an answer and defending it. I felt this when I read a text (in English) by a Japanese author for a different class about the spatial anthropology of Edo. The author kept throwing in random, seemingly unnecessary details and stressing the same few points already introduced many times over the past few pages, and it might have been one of the most difficult texts I've ever struggled through before I found out the author was Japanese. On this topic, Terry notes that a Japanese reader might be "unable to tell you the names of the rivers or the temples" one second after reading a passage full of those same rivers and temples. And I was definitely the same way after reading the chapter; I had a vague sense of Edo's geography and layout, but I couldn't tell you a single thing about the million proper nouns except that he mentioned Venice at least five times.
Both texts offer plenty of good advice, but I think much of it can be boiled down to making sure it doesn't sound bad in English. Much of the talk about saying different things in the same circumstance, making sure repetition is necessary, words meaning more than their dictionary definition, being faithful vs appropriate or effective, and about effective allusions and figurative language, falls into this section. But some notes sounded especially useful (or just interesting) for nonfiction. Terry tells us to "avoid insulting the reader," which I grinned at. Later, he says he "can count to two, so [he] does not need [the author] to tell him the total," which was really funny. I'm glad he can count to two–counting is difficult! I also liked the example of 文化 meaning absolutely nothing other than to differentiate that one building from business. But overall, I gathered from his lecture that English convention tells us to frame our arguments as more of a conversation, as opposed to Japanese writing conventions that produce texts that sound more like lectures.
Riggs offers a lot of practical advice specifically aimed at working with argumentative text, much of which sounds very helpful. Specifically, I wasn't aware of the need to write a full intro paragraph because Japanese texts are structured so differently. I also found it kind of funny that she so casually mentions Japanese texts where the topic is "never coherently presented," because that would be an obvious mark of terrible writing in English. I was also intrigued by her mention of manuscripts written to be translated, which I've never heard of.
As an aside, many of the translators we've been reading like to use this distinctly matter-of-fact tone. Maybe they've grown used to misconceptions about their work over long careers. Also, I think it's funny that Terry, like Seidensticker, also seems to have been plagued by "critics" complaining about dropping words in translation.
I also had a few questions about both. What did Terry mean by saying "sausage" meant something different? To be honest, I'm not sure I know exactly what "sausage" means in either language. And I wonder when you might see dialogue in expository writing. I don't think it's something I've seen before.
Hopefully, Terry is right that native English speakers with a knowledge of Japanese have a good chance of producing something good. Otherwise, I'd be worried about this class.
winter
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