My Thoughts on Translations

For me, Literature is the most important thing in the world. My life revolves entirely around books – whether it’s reading them or discussing them with my friends, or just staring at them.

The written word is everywhere – it’s social media, it’s in the newspaper, it’s in marketing. It’s an incredibly important aspect of our lives, yet reading isn’t nearly as popular as it used to be.

The value of literature is going downhill. People will go and see the film adaptation rather than reading the book, but we readers all know how much better the book is. Then there’s the issue of all those articles that have been appearing lately demeaning YA and its readership. I’m not going to start on that issue because it’s something that makes me unbelievably angry. My point is reading suddenly isn’t ‘cool’ anymore.

It’s become my life mission to change this – I buy people books for their birthdays, I lend books to certain people and I talk so much about literature that I feel that eventually the people I talk to will read something just to make me shut up.

I was lucky enough to grow up in a family of readers so I’ve tried a little bit of everything. One of my favourite things is translated literature. It sounds very lame, but I love being able to experience texts and authors that I wouldn’t be able to without translations.

Unfortunately, I don’t speak every language in the world but I hate that it means I’ll miss out on some really good books. When I think of books that I couldn’t have read without the translation, two really stick out – Beowulf (as translated by Seamus Heaney from Old English) and The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank (translated from Dutch). These two are some of my favourites, and it’s weird to imagine not being able to read them. Anne Frank, in particular, changed my life and how I see the world – it’s weird to think how different things might be if I’d never read it.

There are loads more translated works that I haven’t gotten to yet, but are incredibly important pieces of literature. Anna Karenina, for example, as well as the rest of Tolstoy’s work, the Odyssey, Les Miserables and more contemporary literature like The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo and its sequels. Think of how well-known those books are now and how they may have shaped our world and other books, now imagine a world where only French speakers could have read the works of Victor Hugo. There’d be no Les Mis stage production and let me ask you this, where would be then? (Probably not curled up in balls sobbing about barricades)

That’s my roundabout way of saying that I think translations are important. There’s so much information to be shared in this world, information that could change the way someone thinks or change how a whole society thinks, to only ever share it with the speakers of one language.

Translations aren’t always easy to come by, and so there are a lot of websites and blogs that we miss out on because of language barriers. Translation companies like Smartling are working toward spreading messages like these to a larger audience so that we can all experience a more exciting and diverse world.

I want to thank everyone who commented on my post The Millicent Effect in which I talked about branching out to things like this. I was so worried about posting this but you were all so supportive of the idea. I hope it didn’t disappoint.

DISCUSSION: Terminator Genisys Trailer

Most of you probably don’t know this about me, or maybe wouldn’t guess, but The Terminator Trilogy (I will continue to deny the existence of that fourth one) are most definitely my favourite films. It’s sort of become a tradition with my dad to re-watch them every few months, and we’ve reached that point in our obsession that we can quote all three movies word for word (also, my dad recently changed our answering to machine to ‘Ha la vista’.)

Anyway, the point of all this is that the series is being reinvented with a new film called ‘Terminator Genisys’. I just watched the trailer (a few times) and I decided I’d share my thoughts on it. I don’t know if this will interest any of you, but I’m going to do it anyway. 

 (Firstly, here's the trailer here in case you're interested.)

Firstly- the effects. The original came out in 1984 so as you can imagine the effects were pretty crap, but we finally have some large scale, modern effects. I’m glad to see that the mechanical skeleton thingy of the terminators still looks the same as in the original.

I like that we get to see Kyle Reese being sent back in the trailer – it’s not something we ever saw in the originals. I don’t think the guy who plays him in this version is as attractive as the original, but maybe I’m biased. It’s also interesting to see some familiar scenes from the original before everything changes.

 (Not the world's best picture of Kyle Reese, but you get the point)

So Sarah Connor, let’s talk about her. Now in the originals, she’s already pretty damn badass but in this…just damn. I’m sure you all know how much I love my strong female characters and who could be better for the role than Emilia Clarke (Daenerys from Game of Thrones)? Also, I really like how she doesn’t look stunningly beautiful in the trailer – she actually looks like she’s been through hell so yay for the make-up department! As much as I love Linda Hamilton, I can’t say I’m sad to see that 80’s hairstyle go.

I love how it includes aspects of the original films – the Terminator guy from the second movie with his super metallic body that terrified me when I was younger, Judgement Day etc. And Arnold. How could I forgot Arnold? I have to say, he’s looking reallllllly old now (granted, he is almost 70.)

Basically, I’m not feeling too terrified by this new movie. I know it could still turn out to be terrible, but I’m still interested to see it.

That’s my post for today! I’ll be back tomorrow with the usual bookish stuff. 

DISCUSSION: Reading Slumps

There’s one phrase that can make any book lover tremble in fear. Reading slumps.

*shudders*

They are the absolute worst, aren’t they? Today we’re going to discuss them – what they are, how to get out of them and just some general ranting about how much they suck. Without further ado, let’s get started.

In my opinion, a reading slump is a feeling you get out of nowhere. One day, you’ll be zooming through books well on your way to your Goodreads reading challenge goal and then the next day, suddenly you feel as if you’re sinking into quicksand. No matter how many books you try, nothing will keep your attention for long. Then you realised, you’re in the dreaded reading slump.

It’s one of the worst things in the world, especially when you’re already a few books behind on your Goodreads challenge and your TBR pile took over all available space in your room a long time ago. You feel like you’re letting down publishers and authors, and the people who read your blog. But you know what? It’s not your fault. You can’t help getting into a reading slump, and yeah – they’re really, really hard to get out of.

I speak from experience. I can’t count how many reading slumps I’ve been in this year alone. The thing is, I’m a very intense reader. I mentioned in my answers to the Sisterhood of the World Bloggers Award post (which is going up very soon) that I’m a yoyo blogger. By this I mean that, one day I’ll write five blog posts and then the next I won’t even touch the blog. I’m the exact same with reading – I’m one of two extremes, I either read an entire book that day or I don’t pick one up. It really sucks, but that’s just how my brain works.

Anyway, due to this, I’ve worked out a few ways to work through this annoying slumps which I’m going to offer to you now. I’m not going to pretend like these are unique ideas or anything, but I will explain why I think they work.

1.       Re-read something you loved.

This is simple. What’s going to get you back into reading quicker than revisiting one of your favourite stories? 

2.       Read a children’s book

Now, this might be one of the books you decided to re-read but try giving a children’s/middle grade book a go. There usually short and really fun and easy to get through. 

3.       Join a challenge

Whether you join a read-a-long, a read-a-thon or a challenge, try picking out a few books that you really want to read and giving yourself a date to read them by. Sometimes, you just need a little bit of motivation to get yourself going.

4.       Watch book trailers/movie trailers

If there’s a book on your shelf that has a trailer, whether it be for the book or movie, try watching it. I find that this often makes me want to read the book even more – they usually pick out the interesting parts, and leave out the twist so you have to read to find out. 

5.       Take a break

If nothing else is working and your just getting more and more stressed, give yourself a break. Forget about all those TBR books for now and do something else – go for a walk, or watch a movie or bake a cake. Just do something different!

6.       Just push through

Sometimes, none of these suggestions are going to work and so you just have to push through. If you really aren’t loving a book, you can always put it down but sometimes you just need to give that book another chance.

And there you go! Those are my suggestions on how to push through a reading slump. Let me know whether you use any of these tactics, or if you have any suggestions of your own. Thanks for reading!