It’s Sonderling Sunday! That time of the week when I play with words by looking at the German translation of children’s books. Okay, Sunday is almost over, and I probably should forgo Sonderling Sunday until February is done and I’ve gotten moved. But I’m copying CDs anyway, and it really is fun. I’ll just do a little bit….
This week, I’m going to go back to Das Buch der Tausend Tage, The Book of a Thousand Days, by one of my favorite authors, Shannon Hale.
Last time I looked at this book, we covered Day 6 and Day 11 of Dashti’s journal in the tower. Today we’ll tackle Day 13.
This is much more prosaic than what we find in Der Orden der Seltsamen Sonderlinge, but it’s a bit more useful:
“While I was washing up tonight” = Als ich heute Abend den Abwasch machte
I like this sentence. The word for “toe” of a shoe is different than the word for the part of your foot, Zeh.
“She wears fashionable shoes with the toe long and curled toward her ankle.”
= Sie trägt modische Schuhe mit einem langen Schnabel, der sich zu ihrem Knöchel krümmt.
(Literally, according to Google Translate, that would translate back as, “She wears fashionable shoes with a long beak, that to her ankles curl.”)
“Ancestors” = Ahnen
“I feel like a mucker from the ends of my hair to the mud of my bones.”
= Ich fühle mich von den Haarspitzen bis ins Mark meiner Knochen wie eine Aratin.
(German uses “marrow” of my bones, which makes sense, but loses the colorful language Shannon Hale used.)
Ha! I saw this and thought they were talking about e-mail for a second!
“enamel tiles” = Emailziegeln
Hmm. In German, they say the lord’s house is as beautiful as baumen, trees, in Autumn, instead of “beautiful as a mountain in Autumn.” Again, I think it’s losing a little of Dashti’s voice.
“women were wailing, men were yelling” = die Frauen heulten, die Männer brüllten
“waiting for someone to be sensible” = wartete auf einen vernünftigen Menschen (“waiting for a reasonable man”)
“errand boys” = Botenjungen (“request-youths”)
Here’s a good one!
“squinting” = mit zusammengekniffenen Augen (“with together-slitted eyes”)
“puffy” = verquollen
Again, not quite as picturesque language:
“straight as a tent pole” = stocksteif (“stock-stiff”)
“muddle of her hair” = ihre zerzausten Haare
“fur or felt” = Fell oder Filz
“embroidered” = bestickt
“sunset” = Sonnenuntergang (“sun’s exit”)
I like this, too:
“as if fighting off a fit of sobs” = als wollte sie einen Weinkrampf unterdrücken
(“as if she wanted to a crying-spasm push under”)
“lovely” = liebreizend
“bleating” = plärrst
“your mess” = dein Schlamassel
“a touch of sympathy” = ein Hauch Mitgefühl
“from duty” = aus Pflichtgefühl
“cowards” = Feiglinge
“useless” = überflüssig (“overflowing,” “superfluous”)
“birth splotches” = Storchenbissen (“stork bites”)
“rummaging” = wühlte
“hooks” = Bügeln (Hmm. I bet that’s where Bugles got their name, from their shapes.)
“enviable” = beneidenswerte
“rebellion” = Auflehnung
“suspicious of the sun” = voller Argwohn gegen die Sonne (“full of suspicion against the sun”)
“a heap of sticks and felt” = ein Haufen Stangen und Filz
“blessed” = guthie?en (“good-called”)
That’s it for Day 13. Believe me, I didn’t do it aus Pflichtgefühl, but for fun. But now it’s getting late. I don’t want to do this so long, I end up mit zusammengekniffenen Augen. (That one’s a tongue-twister as well as a cool word.) Zum Bett! Until next week, if all goes well…