Reading Wednesday ✧

[yuuago]

I'm still reading the Kalevala - been taking my time with it on account of being busy and whatnot - so this entry will be brief. And it's still Bosley's translation, which I've mentioned before, I'm not crazy about (though it isn't that bad, really). Next time I read this, it'll be Kirby's translation, and that might be sooner rather than later because I'm pretty curious about the differences. (Note to self, it's on Gutenberg here: Vol1, Vol2)

Anyway. A few random thoughts-

✧ I'm not sure if it's a quirk of the translation or what, but some of the descriptions of Lemminkäinen in the version I'm reading make it sound like he has a dark-coloured handlebar moustache, and ever since I noticed that I can't help but imagine him looking like Dorian from Dragon Age: Inquisition. :D I've never played DA:I, but this amuses me way too much. 'cept, from what I've heard via osmosis, Dorian is a relatively decent dude, whereas Lemminkäinen is a JERKFACE and also kind of an idiot, so there's a disconnect there.

✧ The Christian flavouring in Bosley's translation continues to annoy me. It's like, the moment I noticed it, I couldn't STOP noticing it. I mean, okay, it's not like that kind of thing doesn't have a presence in the text itself - the Marjatta cycle, for instance - but Bosley's text weaves it into everything and it's just, blah.

✧ Lemminkäinen's mom seriously deserves a better son, poor lady. Seriously dude, she brought you back from the dead and then you CONTINUE to ignore her good advice, what the hell?!

✧ So, there's one part where Väinämöinen needs to go to Tuonela again in order to get A Thing to rebuild his sledge. And the first time he went down there, it was a huge ordeal and he barely got out of it alive. But the second time he just... gets up and goes. To the land of the dead. And comes back three lines later like it's no big deal. ??? Yeah, okay, sure mate.

Comments

[ruuger]

some of the descriptions of Lemminkäinen in the version I'm reading make it sound like he has a dark-coloured handlebar moustache

:D I have to say that doesn't ring a bell (though admittedly it's been literally decades since I read Kalevala), but if you remember which verses it was, I can check what the original says.

[yuuago]

Don't you just love it when DW doesn't deliver reply notifications. -_-

Anyway! It's probably a combination of my own imagination and... odd translation choices. But who knows. There are an awful lot of things in this edition that make me go "What".

It's a phrasing that pops up a lot, but here's an excerpt from near the beginning of Runo 27 (starts around line 40? Ish?) that emphasizes it twice:

There wanton Lemminkäinen
he twisted his black whiskers
that were the colour of pans

... And this brings to mind like, imagery from old-timey cartoons, of literal mustache-twirling villains. xD Which is probably not the translator's intention.

[ruuger]

Hmmm... that's actually very interesting. I looked the verse up and I'm not entirely sure what it means in Finnish either :D

The original is "Siinä lieto Lemminkäinen murti mustoa haventa, kattilaisen-karvallista." It mentions black hair and "pan-like hair" (the latter is the part that I don't get at all), so I can kinda see where that part of translation comes from, but I suspect there might be a cultural issue here and the original text really means 'dark' hair, which in Finland would be maybe a shade darker than American blond :D I'm not sure what 'haven' means here, though it feels more like beard or hair in general, and I have no idea what the verb is so I can't say if he's twirling it or not :D

(this has actually gotten me so curious that I'll have to check some modernised version of Kalevala the next time I visit the library)

[yuuago]

Interesting! So, probably dark, but not quite the image this translation comes to mind.

I've heard before that the non-modernised version can be difficult to read, and I'm not quite sure I understand why - is it just written in a very archaic version of the language, or somesuch?

[ruuger]

I think the biggest problem is that the meanings of words have changed. Like in that verse, for example, I can understand every word separately but they make absolutely no sense put together :D

'Musto' is probably the old spelling of 'musta' (black), but knowing that word meanings have changed, plus since all the old paintings depict Lemminkäinen with fairly light hair, I suspect that it has meant simply dark(er than average). Or the verb 'murti' could be the past tense of 'murtaa' (break), except that makes no sense here.

Plus as the kuusi palaa meme shows, Finnish can be a very context-heavy language, and since the average modern reader won't know the context mny of the words in Kalevala, they will have difficulties reading it.

[dhampyresa]

Lemminka is such an idiot, omg.

I feel like Vainö going to the land of the dead like it's nbd is thattotallyhappened.jpeg tbh.

[yuuago]

HE IS. Oh my gods. This guy is like a trainwreck, I just can't look away.

And IA re: "thattotallyhappened.jpeg" It's like... suuuuuuure you did it. Sure.