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I was in a book shop today with a Japanese friend and came across a Japanese version of Da Vinci Code. I was amazed to see that it is split into 2 books eek.gif , each 1800 yen. So you have to buy 2 books @ 3600 yen to get it.

 

Are all Japanese versions of western books such a massive ripoff?

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A people's history of united states by Howard Zinn was 3books in Japanese.

When I translate from English to Japanese, usually it needs more pages.

What do you think, Ocean?

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Apart from the obvious "getting money" issue, why don't they just make a bigger book? How can they get away with this!

It's a bit mad to ask people to buy 2 books, for 1 story isn't it.

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I wonder how they get the "flavor" right. Watching Japanese subtitles of English-language movies, you'll see "Damn, you bet yo sweet ass, mo-f***aa!" translated as "Hai".

 

How can you put that kind of slang or response that suggests a character type into a language where no such character has ever existed?

 

There must be a thousand variants of this translation problem.

 

Naturally, this works the other way: stuff translated into English from other languages is probably stripped of much of what gave it color and pleasurable idiom in its own language.

 

Every language has its own peculiarities than can be turned to creative use. In English, we have a vocabulary larger than most Romance or Germanic languages, because historical factors resulted in the incorporation of both into modern English, and gave us two words for many things--the Anglo-Saxon word, which often has a lower, earthier connotation, and the Romance-origin word, which thanks to the Norman Conquests and similar social factors that cast the invading French as upperclass sages and put the native people in the role of servants, butchers and oafs, often has a higher, more "intellectual" connotation. Here's some examples.

 

GERMANIC ROMANCE

pig pork

sweat perspiration

smell odor

Bush Chirac

 

I wonder if there is a similar doubling of vocabulary in literary Japanese. Even just learning to count in basic courses one learns about the "native" Japanese word and the Chinese variants, and there is the constellation of on-yomi and kun-yomi.

 

Hats off to translators, this sounds like a really hard job to do right.

 

\:D

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I suspect this is a question of marketing and people's preferred size of book, rather than one of space consumed by text.

 

I've not read many Japanese novels, but at least some of Murakami Haruki's Japanese originals (Sheep Chase, End of the World, etc) are in two volumes sold separately. The books themselves are physically very small, as indeed most Japanese paperbacks seem to be. Maybe it's for jacket pockets on trains. Despite being published in two (actually inexpensive) volumes, those particular novels are short. I think I got through the single-volume translation of Sheep Chase twice on a Korean Air flight to the UK (16 hours?). FWIW, Murakami writes in a very Western style, so I don't think much is lost when he gets translated.

 

If anything, English text is far longer than Japanese. e.g.

 

首相

Prime Minister

 

If you have to translate a chart with formatting into English, this can be a big pain. This rarely appears in my work, but is a well-known problem in the business.

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I would have thought a publishers preferred way of getting more money than a readers preferred size of book. I've seen them too - both are really small, it could be the same same front size just twice the number of pages easily.

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Ive bought and read Japanese books and eventhough you have to buy two books generally speaking, theyre cheap. Like 300-400 yen each. Thats not bad. And if you wanna buy em cheaper go to a Book Off and get books in japanese for 100yen - thats what I usually do.

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Having sat in on marketing decisions regarding book size, I can vouch that function and customer preference are often less of an issue than the obvious 'we can charge more for two books than for one'.

 

Which, of course, is not to say that it's always the case. Given the role of management 'intuition' here, I wouldn't be surprised if market research (ie project manager takes sample to lunch, tries to fit it into his jacket pocket and can't, decides all book readers would appreciate the book in two halves at twice the price) leads to some of these decisions.

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Yes it was hardback. Both of them quite small. But the thing was, who in their right mind buys just half a book, that just doesn't make sense. They could have split it into two and sold them both together if it was important to keep some kind of size (weak!), selling them separately doesn't make much sense.

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Sorry, but this is all just the same as tiny bags of salt, tiny packages of spaghetti, tiny packs of chocolate, tiny broccoli, tiny glasses, tiny tables and tiny apartments.

 

It's all been proportionately downsized, get it?

 

I wonder how the average local would feel if all the sinks in the country topped out around mid-thigh, all mirrors were placed below eye level, and all sofas hit around mid-calf?

 

Erm...probably about like I feel now. And then there's the thrill of having to pay double price for half-sized stuff.

 

Yes, this is one of those things about living here.

 

I wonder if there is a country where everything is too big for foreigners?

 

\:D

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I know what you're saying there, but I think splitting a novel in two is a bit different from having small packs of spaghetti. And where's the spaghetti rings in tomato sauces. Whats with that? \:D

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Nice one, Scouser!

 

And FYI, Mogs used to keep 2 somewhat smaller girlfriends, just like that book that had to have 2 volumes where only 1 formerly did the trick. This may be the only smart iteration of this doubling thing so far!

 

\:D

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 Quote:
Originally posted by badmigraine:
Sorry, but this is all just the same as tiny bags of salt, tiny packages of spaghetti, tiny packs of chocolate, tiny broccoli, tiny glasses, tiny tables and tiny apartments.

It's all been proportionately downsized, get it?

I wonder how the average local would feel if all the sinks in the country topped out around mid-thigh, all mirrors were placed below eye level, and all sofas hit around mid-calf?

Erm...probably about like I feel now. And then there's the thrill of having to pay double price for half-sized stuff.

Yes, this is one of those things about living here.

I wonder if there is a country where everything is too big for foreigners?

\:D
Maybe we should include their thinking capapcity in that as well. Very narrow minded... :rolleyes:
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And then there's the thrill of having to pay double price for half-sized stuff.

 

I had a cake today that must have been, no kidding, 4cm x 4cm and about the same height. And I bet it cost 400 yen. wakaranai.gif

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  • 1 year later...

Going back to my first posting on this thread.

 

I was in the bookstore today and noticed that the Da Vinci Code is now selling in 3 PARTS (not the 2 it was before)!?! You have to buy 3 books to get "the book".

 

eek.gif

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Ah, but sometimes the Japanese get it right.

 

Lord of the Rings for example was written as 9 seperate books, although they always get bundled into 3 books (fellowship/two towers/return of king) in English. In the Japanese edition, they have retained Tolkiens intention and published it as 9 volumes! LOTR on amazon.co.jp

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