[Sca-cooks] (Yet) another translation question: cooking hard versus cooking well

[Julia Szent-Gyorgyi]

Henry of Maldon writes:
> So my answer, in short, is that when it is apparent from the context what
> was meant by the word, a translation should only address what was meant [...]

Thank you for that succint summary. You're saying that if I figure out
what the author meant by a word or phrase, I should just convey that
meaning in English to the best of my ability, and not worry so much
about layers of interpretation.

I think I have been overthinking it, especially whenever there are
words that have changed meaning. I get these Princess Bride moments in
reverse: "You keep using that word. You do not think it means what I
think it means."

(But I know very well that languages never match up in their groupings
of concepts for naming purposes. I've been bilingual almost as far
back as I can remember, but while I enjoy the challenge of
translation, I could never be an interpreter: that sort of real-time
overlap-hunting never works for me.)

So, _kemény_ will be "hard", "well", "thoroughly", "crisp", and "firm"
(thank you to whoever suggested that one), as I deem best.

Have any of you (besides Glenn) tried anything from the Transylvanian
cookbook? How have the translations worked for you? I keep noticing
that the professional translator's solution to the hard words was to
simply omit them, making an already rather laconic work seem downright
tight-lipped...

Julia
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