Musing on names in translation

Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry! Only post two and I've already broken my own rule. In my defence, I've been hugely busy and allowing myself to only procrastinate the really important things with the marginally less important things. Am thankful that I didn't offer my first-born to the blogging gods should I break the rules, otherwise we could end up with a tricky Rumpelstiltskin situation down the line and if I remember my Brothers Grimm correctly, that did not end well. Although that was mostly for Rumpelstiltskin himself...

ANYWAY.

Matilda and Harry Potter

During a recent work experience placement with a children's publisher, I received very beautiful French editions of two of my favourite children's books: Matilda by Roald Dahl and Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone by J.K. Rowling. I have wonderful memories of reading Matilda as a child, although I hadn't read it for many years, and I am a fully paid-up member of Potterheads Anonymous so I was delighted when a tidy-up in the publicity corner unearthed these two books, and since no-one else nearby at the time spoke French I didn't have to fight anyone for them. They are part of a series called Bibliothèque published by Gallimard Jeunesse last year to celebrate their 40th anniversary. The series aims to build up a library of classic and contemporary literature, both original works in French as well as works in translation, accessible to children and teens, and features a range of other titles such as The Life of Pi by Yann Martel, Hemmingway's Old Man and the Sea and Kensuke's Kingdom by Michael Morpurgo. A really ecclectic mix. 

Matilda cover image

From an aesthetic point of view these books are beautiful. They have a "soft-touch" dust jacket, and lovely heavy pages, whilst the gorgeous cover illustrations by someone called Antonin Faure are shiny and lightly embossed. As someone who particularly loves illustration, and can't imagine Roald Dahl's words without Quentin Blake's pictures, I'm pleased to note that the books retain their original illustrations internally, and Faure has incorporated Blake's classic image of Matilda reading sitting on a pile of books into the cover image too. 

 

The thing that I found particularly interesting, and really the point of this post, was the way certain names and words have been translated. In Matilda, the Wormwood family have become the 'Verdebois', Miss Trunchbull is 'Mlle Legourdin' whilst Miss Honey is rather jarringly 'Mlle Candy'. I understand the first two changes; as French-sounding words they flow better, especially when read aloud (important in children's books) and, whilst not literal translations of their English counterparts, they convey similar meanings: 'bois' meaning wood, and 'le gourdin' something like the club or bludgeon. However, I just can't get on board with Mlle Candy. It irked everytime I came across it when reading, and although perhaps candy is more familiar an English word than honey to French children, I just can't understand why, having gone to the trouble to give others very French names, the powers-that-be stuck with Mlle Candy.Why not even Mlle Miel? 

Harry Potter cover image

There are similar examples in Harry Potter too. The translation of the title to 'Harry Potter à l'Ecole des Sorciers' (Harry Potter at the School of Wizards) initially bothered me, but then I remembered that the Americans also altered the title, and they weren't even translating it into a different language! Within the story, since many of Rowling's words and names have been made up, there's quite a difference. For example Hogwarts becomes Poudlard, the four houses are Gryffondor (Gryffindor), Poufsouffle (Hufflepuff), Serdaigle (Ravenclaw) and Serpentard (Slytherin). Three of these are fairly self-evident but I can't explain the name for Ravenclaw. Claw in French is 'griffe' so perhaps it was decided that going with literal translation would have been too close to Gryffindor? 

In terms of the characters themselves, most of the main ones in the first book all retain their English names: Harry, Ron, Hermione, Dumbledore, McGonagall etc. Except Snape. Whose name is Severus Rogue. Severus. Rogue. WHAT? Now, I am a particularly big fan of Snape. I loved his character development; like Dumbledore, I always trusted that he was ultimately good and '"After all this time?" "Always"' will never fail to bring tears to my eyes. And I just don't think this name fits. Without taking into consideration that the alliteration of Severus Snape is something that I'm sure was carefully thought out by Rowling, the surname Rogue seems to do Snape a disservice. The closest translation in English to the French word Rogue is 'arrogant', and whilst Snape is depicted as many things (cold, bitter, sarcastic...) I don't think he's really arrogant. 

However, despite some issues with the translation of names, these books remain two of my favourites, and in the same way that it is nice to break up some Serious Grown-Up Reading (I do do some, I promise) with a bit of YA fiction, or a picture book, it has been nice to break up reading for my French 21st Century novel course with two stories that I know and love. Now I'm just seeing how long I can hold out before buying more in the series, because I think they'd look especially pretty all together on my bookshelf... 


p.s. apologies for terrible quality of these photographs. They really do not do the loveliness of these books justice...