My life in recent weeks has been completely dominated by my work. This isn't really a bad thing, because I really like my job. I remember I used to ask my stepfather nearly every day how his day at work was, and at some point he advised me that work was work, and not something one does for enjoyment. That never really sat well with me, but fortunately I have a couple of hobbies that can double as jobs in a pinch, so since I graduated from high school, I've rarely had the experience of having to go to a job I don't enjoy to get the bills paid. My current job is among the best I've ever had; lots of freedom to do my own planning and design, interesting problems to solve, and fun co-workers.
My work is excellent, as I say, but the heavy schedule that proceeded the first public unveiling of our software last weekend left me without much time for other things. The bits of the day that I could salvage were largely spent reading. I have not forgotten the 50 Book Challenge, oh no!
And so I present my next book. Ich bin dann mal weg, by Hape (pronounced hah-peh - short for Hans Peter) Kerkeling. Fortunately, this excellent book is available to my English-only readers, translated under the title I'm Off Then: My Journey Along the Camino De Santiago, which basically gives away the entire plot.The book follows Hape Kerkeling, a hugely successful comedian, as he walks the Camino de Santago, a traditional pilgrimage route across Spain. The route itself is far less important to the story than Kerkeling's insights into his own character and into the people he meets along the way. I expected the book to be funny, and I did laugh out loud in places, but the narrative was surprising to me as a fan of Kerkeling's comedy for its earnestness.
My reading of I'm Off, Then was inevitably affected a great deal by my familiarity with Kerkeling, who I've followed since shortly after I arrived in Germany. His voice creates such a sense of intimacy with the reader, though, that I doubt his lack of celebrity in the eyes of a reader unfamiliar with his comedy work would detract in any way from the story.
If any of you read this book in English, please do let me know one thing: how does he tell the language-based jokes? To understand every joke in the book, you need to have at least passing familiarity (as many Germans do) with English, French and Spanish, and I'm really curious how that humor comes across - especially the places where he quotes English-speakers in English to humorous effect.
Hi Benjamin-- I'm the English-language translator of Hape's book, and I'd be happy to answer any questions.
ReplyDeleteAll best,
Shelley Frisch
Hello Dr. Frisch -- How unexpected and delightful to hear from you! And how kind of you to offer to answer my questions.
ReplyDeleteOn consideration, I think I have about a thousand questions I'd love to ask about your translation of I'm Off, Then and your approach to translation in general, but seeing as your a guest here I'll try to contain myself and reduce the list to three. If you are so gracious as to answe them, I'll of course repost your answers to the front page for the edification of my many, many (read: approx. 20) readers.
1) There were several places where I felt like the mixing of languages was important to the feel of the scene -- most memorably when he stops in the path and tells Anne "I do not want to have sex with you! I am gay!" There were also scenes with snippets of French and Spanish that, in my memory, were not always translated. How did you approach this aspect of the text?
2) One of the most memorable characters in the book has the nickname 'Schnabbel'. What did you call Schnabbel in the translation, and how did you arrive at that choice?
3) How did you handle scenes that assumed a certain amount of knowledge about Kerkeling's career? The one scene that stands out in my mind in this sense is the story of the French woman who thought Kerkeling could not possibly be as important as the German commedian she knew of who had once pretended to be the Dutch Queen. Did you add information that was not present in the original in cases like this?
Thanks for dropping by my blog, I look forward very much to hearing back from you!
Benjamin
To answer your question, Benjamin, I don't recall those aspects of the humor, so perhaps they are lost in translation. Regardless, I enjoyed the book and Kerkeling's humor, as much of it as was translated.
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