if lateral paraphrases are a bit beyond you
Posted: Mon Feb 10, 2014 7:35 pm
I like the idea of lateral paraphrases but have found that they are still a bit beyond me. Instead I have tried taking a Greek sentence and while keeping as far as possible the same syntax utterly change the meaning.
This is what I did with Lysias 1.7
In this sentence the husband tells the jury that his wife was at first the perfect wife but the point things began to go wrong with his marriage was the funeral of his mother. He will tell us in the next sentence that this was because it was he took his wife to the funeral and she was seen there by her future lover.
(I have to suspect if we were to hear the story of the wife, the husbands treatment of her is a more likely cause)
This is what I think the above says
In the early times, O' believers, of all he was the most violent and a deadly general and harsh and unflinchingly he killed the enemy, then blood flowing onto the hills of Dhali, all good things that have happened to us is caused by the flowing [of blood].
Doing this does seem to work in that you have to get far more up and personal with the syntax than just translating.
This is what I did with Lysias 1.7
In this sentence the husband tells the jury that his wife was at first the perfect wife but the point things began to go wrong with his marriage was the funeral of his mother. He will tell us in the next sentence that this was because it was he took his wife to the funeral and she was seen there by her future lover.
(I have to suspect if we were to hear the story of the wife, the husbands treatment of her is a more likely cause)
By contrast I imagined a Buddhist believer explaining how Asoka changed from a warlord to a man of peace. You recall that he was so horrified at the blood shed during his invasion of the Kalinga region that he from then on turned away from violence.ἐν μὲν οὖν τῷ πρώτῳ χρόνῳ, ὦ Ἀθηναῖοι, πασῶν ἦν βελτίστη: καὶ γὰρ οἰκονόμος δεινὴ καὶ φειδωλὸς (ἀγαθὴ?) καὶ ἀκριβῶς πάντα διοικοῦσα: ἐπειδὴ δέ μοι ἡ μήτηρ ἐτελεύτησε, πάντων τῶν κακῶν ἀποθανοῦσα αἰτία μοι γεγένηται.
λοφοι Δαυλια=Dhali hills. The bloodshed at the battle there led Asoka to turn to a policy of peace.ἐν μὲν οὖν τῷ πρώτῳ χρόνῳ, ὦ πιστεύοντες, πάντων ἦν βιαιότατος: καὶ γὰρ στρατηγὸς δεινὸς καὶ τραχὺς καὶ σχετλιῶς τοὺς πολεμίους ἀναιρῶν: ἐπειδὴ δὲ τὸ αἷμα κατήχησε τοὺς λόφους τοὺς Δαυλιας, πάντων τῶν καλῶν ῥεῦσαν αἴτιον ἡμὶν γεγένηται.
This is what I think the above says
In the early times, O' believers, of all he was the most violent and a deadly general and harsh and unflinchingly he killed the enemy, then blood flowing onto the hills of Dhali, all good things that have happened to us is caused by the flowing [of blood].
Doing this does seem to work in that you have to get far more up and personal with the syntax than just translating.