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Gabriel García Márquez, Literary Pioneer, Dies at 87

nytimes.com

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Re: Gabriel García Márquez, Literary Pioneer, Dies at 87

#101

Post by matnewton85 »

jes5199 wrote: post #63
ramses wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You just provided the best translation :-) Now I'm wondering if the translators were intentionally trying to avoid multiple words, or if they didn't realize how much meaning they were losing.

Sometimes you have to just leave meanings implied to avoid being very discursive. Why would you take a child to see ice? Why would it be significant? "See" doesn't usually carry that connotation of "for the first time", but really the sentence can't possibly mean anything else.

Exactly.

The sentence in English is translated perfectly in this instance - the underlying implication of 'to see ice' carries the exact same meaning as the Spanish.

Re: Gabriel García Márquez, Literary Pioneer, Dies at 87

#102

Post by edanm »

ianstormtaylor wrote: post #75
selimthegrim wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"had cause to remember" and "introduce him to ice"?

Potentially to "experience ice for the first time", but that lacks the romantic-ness of the Spanish original. The problem is that English's "meet" or "know" would cause the reader to double-take, and potentially still not understand the meaning, whereas in Spanish it feels normal.

"Introduced" him to ice, maybe? It's usually translated "to know", as in "took him to know ice", but I think "introduced" works better here.

Re: Gabriel García Márquez, Literary Pioneer, Dies at 87

#103

Post by ryanpardieck »

huherto wrote: post #78
noname123 wrote: post #34

Can someone tell me what is the theme of "One Hundred Years of Solitude" as applied to modern society? I read the book awhile ago and appreciated greatly the various character sketches. Unfortunately, the literary criticism that I sought out back then at liberal arts college, focused mostly on the metaphor of the European colonialism on Latin America (industrialization of the town with the rubber-plant, and the subse…

I cannot do a literary critique. But I can tell you that when I was 17, I started reading "One hundred years of solicitude" and couldn't stop until I finished the whole book. I felt enchanted, it is a feeling that I never had either before or after. I read it in Spanish, (my native tongue) so your mileage may vary.

I think sometimes it is OK to be simply enchanted. (Well I think it's always OK, but ...) I tend to favor literary "analysis" that dwells on that feeling of enchantment, tries to explain it to an extent, and sometimes even re-create that feeling. I'm not sure an overarching "meaning" is always really needed.

For several years I followed the mailing lists dedicated to several of my favorite authors, and at the same time took literature classes at university. Both were great, but I'll always consider those mailing lists my "real" education in literature. University was mostly good for learning to write a certain kind of essay, and how to read in ways that are valued by tenured professors (which isn't exactly a bad thing--these are smart, interesting people).

Re: Gabriel García Márquez, Literary Pioneer, Dies at 87

#104

Post by ryanpardieck »

simonsarris wrote: post #15

Oh my. A paragon of magical realism and my second favorite author. Rest in peace. Liking storytelling alone is sometimes not enough to like Marquez, you have to love language too. He uses (some might say abuses) language to impact his storytelling, often using incredibly long, convoluted sentences to weave his narrative. It can be hard to follow, sometimes intentionally, but I find it enormously satisfying to read an…

I'll always love Autumn. I usually keep a small pile of "guiding light" books around, and Autumn has been in there ever since I first read it ~7 years ago. I use them kind of like reference manuals for the craft, kind of like how we might look through the docs off and on as we code. One of my most cherished book piles.

Re: Gabriel García Márquez, Literary Pioneer, Dies at 87

#105

Post by kartikkumar »

A deeply thoughtful literary great, to rank among the likes of Dickens, Cervantes and Dostoyevsky in my mind. Love in the Time of Cholera changed me, just like Crime and Punishment did. It affected me more than any other book has. At the time of my life when I read it, I felt that it spoke to my personal sensibilities. I followed that up with Memories of My Melancholy Whores, which I honestly think is his absolute masterpiece.

Gracias Señor García Márquez.

Re: Gabriel García Márquez, Literary Pioneer, Dies at 87

#106

Post by vorador »

leothekim wrote: post #14
rjtavares wrote: post #7

“Many years later, in front of the firing squad, colonel Aureliano Buendía would remember that distant afternoon his father took him to see ice." Best opening line of a book ever. RIP.

And many years after reading that book, I have that line memorized in my head. I also regret not learning Spanish well enough to read his books untranslated as I understand his writing is gorgeous in Spanish. I'm thankful that his books translated well enough into English for me to appreciate his genius. Farewell, Gabo.

Incidentally, this is why I really like reading with an e-reader. It's so much easier to get the definition of a word that it makes reading in foreign languages much more pleasant.

Re: Gabriel García Márquez, Literary Pioneer, Dies at 87

#107

Post by nardi »

tdees40 wrote: post #32

My favorite Marquez story is that he never used adverbs ending in -mente, so he called his English language translator (Edith Grossman) and requested that she not use any adverbs ending in -ly.

Hahaha. Definitely different in English. Adverbs I can think of in English that don't end in -ly: Fast, slow, quick, well. That's all I've got off the top of my head.

Re: Gabriel García Márquez, Literary Pioneer, Dies at 87

#108

Post by brunorsini »

matnewton85 wrote: post #101
jes5199 wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sometimes you have to just leave meanings implied to avoid being very discursive. Why would you take a child to see ice? Why would it be significant? "See" doesn't usually carry that connotation of "for the first time", but really the sentence can't possibly mean anything else.

Exactly. The sentence in English is translated perfectly in this instance - the underlying implication of 'to see ice' carries the exact same meaning as the Spanish.

Not really. "to see ice" in English is more dubious than the phrase in Spanish, as you don't really know whether or not the character is doing it for the first time. A translation closer in meaning would be "to get to know ice".

Re: Gabriel García Márquez, Literary Pioneer, Dies at 87

#109

Post by 616c »

rimantas wrote: post #96
noname123 wrote: post #20

OT but tangential any magical realism authors to read? So far, I got Marquez, Jorge Louis Borges and Murakami. And preferably recommendation should be good to provide philosophical consolation to a code monkey worker-bee in the capitalist society.

Master and Margarita by Bulgakov? Not sure if it is considered a work of magic realism, but elements are there for sure.

Friend convinced me to read it years ago. I found it very different from what I (and others who read more) say about Russian lit. It was very hard for me to even piece all together.

Very good recommendation. I second it!

Re: Gabriel García Márquez, Literary Pioneer, Dies at 87

#110

Post by [deleted] »

ScottBurson wrote: post #98
ianstormtaylor wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Potentially to "experience ice for the first time", but that lacks the romantic-ness of the Spanish original. The problem is that English's "meet" or "know" would cause the reader to double-take, and potentially still not understand the meaning, whereas in Spanish it feels normal.

I think "learn about ice" would have worked.

[deleted]
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