Tag Archives: translation

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The SS American Legion

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And the translation work keeps coming. This is most gratifying to me, though it means some long hours at the keyboard for a few days. Also I’ll have to bow out of something I meant to do with the Vikings tomorrow. One must prioritize, and I choose money. Not for my own sake, of course, but for the sake of the people who send me bills.

Above, another newsreel clip giving background on the “Atlantic Crossing” miniseries. Here you’ll see the arrival of the SS American Legion, on which our principal characters fled to America. We see Mrs. Florence Harriman, Ambassador to Norway, a character in the series, as well as Crown Princess Martha and her children. The news conference is precisely the one re-created for the series, even down to the dress Martha is wearing.

Another notable figure who travelled on the SS American Legion was the humorist/musician Victor Borge, a Jew fleeing Denmark.

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For your Spectation

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Suddenly, I have lots of translation work. For a day or two, anyway.

This helped divert my thoughts from the impending verdict in the Chauvin trial. This was of particular interest to me, since my city was likely to burn if the “wrong” decision was made.

But the verdict was just announced. Guilty on all counts. I’m pretty sure at least part of it is unjust, and likely to be overturned on appeal. So I have the uneasy sensation of being relieved, due to what looks like a lynching.

Of this I am ashamed.

I wrote down some thoughts for The American Spectator Online here. They are not happy thoughts. Though some are clever, I think.

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Translating Journal: A good day

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Big day. Put my clothes in the wash. Went to the gym. And when I got back from my grueling workout, I found translating work waiting for me. A nice large job, too. Better still, it’s a project about something that interests me – can’t tell you what, of course. Still, that means all my big plans for a wild Friday night on the town had to be put on hold. But my immunization will mature on Monday, and then all this pent-up social energy will burst forth upon the world. Look out, Robbinsdale.

Another gorgeous day, it was. Not as warm as some days we’ve had, but it was nice – the little time I spent outside. On the way home from the gym, I actually had the presence of mind to stop at the drug store and pick up the prescription that’s been waiting a couple days. At my age, that’s what they call, “He’s having one of his good days.”

I had a plan to call a guy to inquire about printing up a paper version of The Year of the Warrior (I have the rights for that), but I’ve been too busy translating to look into the details. I’ll keep you posted if it happens.

Have a good weekend.

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Blathering post, in lieu of actual thoughts

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Why is it taking me so long to finish this book I’m reading? I haven’t been that busy – just some volunteer translation. And the book’s interesting enough. And yet I’m proceeding at a very slow pace. I could finish it tonight and then offer up a late review, but my Kindle tells me there’s 2 hours of reading left.

So what to write instead? Post a YouTube video? Did that last night. Writing advice? The night before that. Report on my afternoon movie viewing? Today it was one of the Renfrew of the Mounted Police series, and it wasn’t memorable for anything except the original concept that a group of thieves at an airfield would kill their enemies by sabotaging their own airplanes – an expensive modus operandi, that one.

Today the weather was beautiful, and I didn’t get out in it at all. Should have, but the sidewalks are still icy, and I need to remember I’m an old man with hips made in China (I assume that’s where they were made – everything else is). When I was younger I had other excuses for not going for a walk, but this one should last me the rest of my life.

My volunteer translation project is moving along. I figure it’s better to take the tortoise strategy – I do one page a day, every day, rather than wearing myself out on a long, obsessive session one day, then being too tired of it the next day to do anything. I’m better than half-way through, so steady as she goes. That’s how I write novels too. When I write them at all.

Personal note: Like so many American men, I’ve gone about a year without a haircut. I’ve now reached the point where I can tie my mane up in a queue and it doesn’t all work itself out in floating strands over the course of the day. I remember a time, back during the tumultuous ‘70s, when I facetiously told my dad I was thinking of growing a bicentennial queue for 1776. He was not amused.

It’s not a ponytail, by the way. It’s tied low, at the nape of the neck. In my world, a ponytail sits high on the back of the head, and resembles the south end of a north-bound horse. Girls have ponytails. I have a queue.

One advantage is that when they come to take us away to the re-education camps, I might be able to sneak away through the crowd, disguised as an old member of the Weather Underground.

Music

‘Den Fineste Jinta’

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Roughly 3 days’ work, but I have finished my translation job and sent it winging off to Norway. I have the satisfaction of a job well done, plus the pleasure of a rare November day with sunshine and temperatures near 70. I did a couple hours of my work out on the porch, enjoying the remission.

For reasons I won’t bore you with, I happened to listen to an old musical cassette from long, long ago (still listenable). It was an album of a Norwegian folk group called Vandrerne (the Wanderers). They did a mixture of Norwegian folk songs, original music, retro popular songs, and Celtic folk. The number embedded below, “Den Fineste Jinta” (The Finest Girl), is an adaptation of a well-known Irish song, “Black Velvet Band.” It roughly follows the plot of the Irish song — the young man meets a bewitching young girl who wears her hair “tied up in a black velvet band.” She entices him into a scheme to steal jewelry. He is arrested and ends up being transported to Van Diemen’s Land (Tasmania). Norwegian criminals didn’t generally get transported, so this guy’s fate is different. But I don’t understand the dialect well enough to tell you what it is.

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Stacked

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Another day, another failure to finish a book to review. So you’re condemned to a personal update. Unless you choose to just surf on. Which might be the way of wisdom.

Today was another example of what I call “temporal stacking.” (Did I invent that term? Or did I borrow it in a moment of absentmindedness, which is what most of my moments are these days?) Today is one of those earmarked for specified chores – on Thursdays I pay my bills. And I take the garbage out.

But I also had to go to the doctor today. (Warning: old fart’s repulsive health talk ahead.) I noticed a spot on my nose that I thought my dermatologist (never thought I’d have a personal dermatologist, but all the cool kids are getting them nowadays) should look at. He, of course, was not available at the office that’s located a mere fifteen minutes away. He was at the office that’s a half hour away. So I drove out to Excelsior (we have a town called Excelsior. So there) and showed it to him. He said no, it was nothing. However, that other spot on my cheek over there looked sketchy. I then received the Deadly Touch of the Frost Giant, and was sent home clothed and in my right mind.

All this was capped (and pleasantly so) by a new batch of paying translation work. It won’t pay my mortgage off, but it’s work and I’m grateful. I’ve put in 2.5 hours on it so far; more is to come.

Meanwhile, I’ve been making slow progress on the new Erling novel. The work is like punching my way through a room full of oatmeal – I can move ahead, but it’s an effort. I’m on the cusp of what ought to be a pretty nifty supernatural scene, but it will probably have to wait for realization.

Reviews

Free-Lancing, and ‘The Girl Hunters’

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Happy Friday. Some people still have Fridays, I’m told. Such people are described as Essential. I am not worthy, I am sure, to unlace the latchets of their sandals.

I was busy yesterday, though. The translation job I got had me working 12 hours straight, pausing only for meals and comfort stops. Also to open the windows, because the day was beautiful.

I won’t say it’s a joy of the free-lancing life, but it’s certainly one of its qualities, that much of the time you wish you had work, and then occasionally you have too much. The big stars can regulate their own schedules, but the rest of us are carrion birds, on the watch for cadavers of opportunity.

While I was working, I streamed a curious old movie on Amazon Prime: The Girl Hunters, a 1963 Mike Hammer flick. What makes it memorable is that the creator of the character, writer Mickey Spillane, played his own creation in this one.

The story involves PI Mike Hammer waking up from a long drunk to find that his secretary Velda is dead, and that his cop friend Pat Chambers now hates his guts. Then Mike gets a hint that Velda might be alive. He will, of course, steamroll anybody who tries to keep him from finding her.

As a late semi-noir, The Girl Hunters isn’t bad. It was produced by an English company, and the obscure cast (except for Lloyd Nolan and Shirley Eaton, who’s best remembered for getting painted gold in “Goldfinger”) turn in solid work. Spillane himself is better than you might fear. He gets his words in the right order, and generally keeps his facial expressions and body language consistent with them. His big problem is that he has zero charisma. He’s not good looking enough to be a leading man, and on top of that he isn’t likeable. You wouldn’t trust this guy to watch your suitcase in a train station.

But the production’s not bad, the music’s good, and the script is adequate. Worth watching mostly for the novelty of the thing.

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A weekend of extreme translation

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By Hesse1309 – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=487491

The picture above isn’t one of mine. It’s in Norway, though. I think I may have seen this sign on one of my journeys; I know I saw one like it. We take our trolls seriously, we Norwegians. If they kidnap a princess or two, well, that’s the price of living in the most beautiful place in the world.

It was quite a weekend, friends. I was intensely engaged with the Norwegian language. I will not tell you what translation project I was working on, and I’ll not tell you whom it was for. It was a script. You can guess the medium for yourself.

But I had a lot of work to do, and a deadline to meet. I was a little insecure about meeting it, but it turned out I’d underestimated myself. The work went faster than I’d looked for.  The thing didn’t get delivered as soon as I hoped, due to a glitch that appeared and wiped away a whole lot of work that had to be done all over again. But I got up early and worked late, and delivered everything well before I’d estimated.

It’s a little disconcerting that I haven’t heard anything back from the client (checking again to see that my email with the files actually went out; yes, it did). But if my product had been awful, I suspect somebody would have said something. I take comfort in that thought.

After all these months, it was sweet to open up the First Draft app and do that voodoo that I do so adequately. It was fun, in the same sense that being a rodeo rider or a cage fighter is fun. It takes its toll, but you come out stimulated. While all around me people were going batty with cabin fever, I was in my element, growing as a craftsman. It was, frankly, the best weekend I’ve had in quite a long time.

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Dispatch from the translation front

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I’ve become a little cautious about discussing translation work. So suffice it to say that I snagged a nice one, and there’s a deadline coming on, and I can’t really spend much time on a blog post.

But rejoice with me that I’ve found work, when better men are filing for unemployment. Whatever my project is, it’s interesting. Have a good weekend. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do (that ought to keep you pretty safe).

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‘Ragnarok’ on Netflix

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At long last, and now that I am well and truly out of the script translation business, you’ll have the opportunity to view a Norwegian production I had a hand in translating. (I can’t watch it myself, having divested myself of Netflix in the recent austerity initiative.)

Ragnarok can perhaps be described, in what scriptwriters call an “elevator pitch” (a description short enough to be given during an elevator ride) as “American Gods,” crossed with “Stranger Things,” set in a Norwegian high school.

The theme is environmental, and the visuals are, by all accounts, spectacular. I worked on two or three episodes, and some of my work will probably have survived in the subtitles. Not for younger kids.