tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1756517342568508484.post6466900047093636848..comments2023-03-21T19:45:03.561+00:00Comments on Globe On My Table: Tahar Ben Jalloun - This Blinding Absence of Light - طاهر بن جلون - globeonmytablehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08609128836118306664noreply@blogger.comBlogger10125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1756517342568508484.post-18172558834930988342018-12-30T14:43:20.396+00:002018-12-30T14:43:20.396+00:00when i wrote that piece in arabic about the book i...when i wrote that piece in arabic about the book i assumed that this was the start of a new era of reading a book in translation from arabic each month, followed by thinking and writing about it in arabic. so a major step forwards towards what i expect to be able to do easily soon. well, that did not happen at all. this was the only review/comment piece i have written. my life went in a different direction that summer and this beautiful hope and plan has gone for the moment.<br /><br />in its place is studying shami, levantine spoken arabic, but even that is so demanding that i am not sure how to gather the energy to continue. globeonmytablehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08609128836118306664noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1756517342568508484.post-78101629217450726632016-10-29T06:35:46.547+01:002016-10-29T06:35:46.547+01:00In*In*globeonmytablehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12403764185979458147noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1756517342568508484.post-75019977587097977382016-10-29T06:35:22.904+01:002016-10-29T06:35:22.904+01:00I find it so beautiful and natural, my shift from ...I find it so beautiful and natural, my shift from French into English, turning on the one French word which is spelt in exactly the same way in English.<br /><br />My mother's text messages morph from French into English mid-phrase. I love that. I love the way we use little snippets of French on my family because we can.globeonmytablehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12403764185979458147noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1756517342568508484.post-59005356746926345332016-09-10T22:27:27.879+01:002016-09-10T22:27:27.879+01:00I was in such trouble trying to write in English f...I was in such trouble trying to write in English for that section 3 that I resorted to French. Here is my paragraph:<br /><br /><br /> Alors - j'ecris pour comprendre cette enfilade d'histoires. La voix du recitant me donne les vies des prisonniers des un moment ou la mort commence a s'annoncer dans leur vie. La coeur de chaque homme dans ce trou prive de toute lumiere se revele dans sa traversee unique de la vie a la mort. Les vies de tous les hommes nommes ou decrives avec soin se debouchent a la mort, et chaque mort donne quelque chose de nouveau a l'histoire de leur vie, quelque chose inexplicable, unpredictable, undeniable, I don't have a word for this, it is so very important, the completing of each life.globeonmytablehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08609128836118306664noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1756517342568508484.post-72731467711937936212016-09-10T22:19:35.753+01:002016-09-10T22:19:35.753+01:00The process now involves a simple English version ...The process now involves a simple English version plus a more explanatory English version. <br /><br />Section 3 was originally unclear in my Arabic. So this is my English explanation:<br /><br />3.<br /><br />أكتب الآن لأفهم هذه القصة. فيها يصف الراوٍ حياتات السجناء حتى الموت في سجن دون النور. فكل حياة تكمل من موتها. وكل مرة يسمي رجل, فحقيقةً سيموت قريباً.<br /><br /><br />I am trying to say this:<br /><br />I am writing now in order to understand the story =<br /><br />By asking myself to write about this book, I am making myself find the most important aspects of it, I mean the ones which mean the most to me. Then I make myself express that in Arabic, but all I can use are very simple words.<br /><br />In it the narrator describes the lives of prisoners as they come closer to and meet death in that dark prison =<br /><br />I came to realise that every time the narrator named or described a fellow prisoner this indicated that he was now in the run up to death. Naming him marked him out. Every person had an individual way of living and also of deteriorating mentally and physically until death.<br /><br />Each life was completed by death =<br /><br />I mean that the manner of each person's path towards death and the details of the actual death in the book reflect how in real life these elements seem to me to be an essential part of their whole story, even if the events are not reflective of their values or in any way deserved. <br />globeonmytablehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08609128836118306664noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1756517342568508484.post-42419628397144024132016-09-10T22:10:47.221+01:002016-09-10T22:10:47.221+01:00I am tidying up this post, so the untidy notes are...I am tidying up this post, so the untidy notes are going here now:<br /><br />...<br /><br />This is the section with corrections: أكتب الآن لأفهم هذه القصة. يصف فيها الراوي انتهاء حياة السجناء في السجن دون يرو النور. فكل مرة تنتهي حياة رجل .<br /><br /> So all the rest is relatively ok,.<br /><br />....<br />1. 1st section<br />جامعة محمد الخامس<br />Don't write 5 or V, but use the word for fifth.<br /><br />Drop the إنه<br />I don't know why.<br /><br />شارك is correct<br />I think this is the form III, the one with alif after the first letter, not the form I I guessed at.<br />Wehr says this means to take part in an event with other people p547<br />http://arabic.desert-sky.net/g_vforms.html<br />oh joy, all the forms explained :) why has this taken sooooo long to find<br />and it's not particularly memorable either, i will have to write my own version......<br />[oh, x used instead of kh, that's truly wierd]<br /><br />الطلاب<br /> I got alif lam back to front here, oops<br />look at all these changes of font<br /><br />ضِدَّ - didda<br />means 'against'<br />إحتجاجات ضِدَّ الحكومة = protests against* the government<br /><br />كان جندي <br />= he was a soldier, I don't know what I was thinking when I put something else entirely, ??<br /><br />في الجيش لسنة ونصف<br />in the army for a year and a half = actually an exact translation, very rare in arabic :)<br />no idea why i didn't put the* army, probably because I am so used to arabic speakers missing out the the, so I take those errors as my infallible guide to writing arabic, lol<br />i drop it in english myself now, who needs the anyway?<br /><br />...<br />1. 2nd section<br />باللغة الفرنسية - i forgot the entire ending to French<br /><br />لجريدة - in (the) newspaper<br />ل - this conveys all sorts of connecting meanings - li<br /><br /> الف وتسعة مئة وواحد وسبعين<br />The numbers<br /><br />إلى فرنسا<br />no ال needed<br /><br />ليدرس الطب <br />to study medicine, use imperfect after ل - li<br /><br />الطب النفسي و الاجتماعي<br />add ال before each of the words psychology and sociology<br />the medicine the mental/of the mind and the social/of the social<br /><br />جامعة السوربون <br />University the Sorbonne = The Sorbonne<br />ال again<br /><br />...<br />globeonmytablehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08609128836118306664noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1756517342568508484.post-58562296213331624922016-08-22T16:36:23.462+01:002016-08-22T16:36:23.462+01:00This what I actually wrote about what it's lik...This what I actually wrote about what it's like:<br /><br />I am trying to describe to myself the feeling of disappointment when the one thing I was really trying to and wanted to convey hasn't worked and is in fact jumble. It's like walking along and going smack-bang into a shut glass door. I'm being sort of bounced back into my own head. The opposite of communication, the opposite of smug success. Feeling foolish, bah, that's it, just stupid and a bit sad. No, sadder than that. But not actually distraught.<br />globeonmytablehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08609128836118306664noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1756517342568508484.post-74097699546681586412016-08-13T20:13:50.862+01:002016-08-13T20:13:50.862+01:00Ok, all looked at, but I have now lost my English ...Ok, all looked at, but I have now lost my English and French rewriting of the 3rd section. The Arabic was sadly not comprehensible - how disappointing is that? It's always the most crucial bit which doesn't work. Now it's my turn to know what that feels like, horrible.globeonmytablehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08609128836118306664noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1756517342568508484.post-79735743917272603922016-08-09T00:10:16.893+01:002016-08-09T00:10:16.893+01:00This will take a long time. I looked at the first ...This will take a long time. I looked at the first section this evening and it took ages, what with wandering around in the dictionary and working out what each word means. Yes, I wrote the original, but it's not my natural level, it's several steps beyond that. And the corrected version is sort of from Mars every so often. I mean I have never heard the word 'didda' before in my life! Nor any variation of it either. I thought it was an error until I found it in the dictionary.globeonmytablehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08609128836118306664noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1756517342568508484.post-59214986474178957082016-06-30T01:21:32.378+01:002016-06-30T01:21:32.378+01:00There are other corrections, but I can't deal ...There are other corrections, but I can't deal with all that now. I'll look at them carefully when I can.globeonmytablehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08609128836118306664noreply@blogger.com