Fever Pitch (Book Review)

What do Jay Z, Osama Bin Laden, and the Queen of England have in common? If your answer is an English football club based in north London that wins trophies almost every (nine years, having not won the Premier League since the 2003-04) season, then congratulations!— you are a true believer. To the uninitiated, Arsenal F.C. is one of the most popular sports teams in the world, with a fan base said to number 100 million.

And of course, when more than one in every 100 people on the earth today is a ‘Gooner’, as the Arsenal fan is called, there are bound to be contradictions aplenty. Where else, but in a football club, could an American rapper, a Saudi terrorist, and a Germanic royal, lay their vast cultural differences aside and congregate in the house of worship that is Emirates Stadium? Before masterminding the downfall of the Wild West, Bin Laden was said to attend Arsenal matches at Highbury, where, presumably, he cheered on The Arsenal (whose founding members worked in a munitions factory that built weapons during the world wars for the British Army, which in 2003 invaded Afghanistan in the hope of bringing him to justice) and compared opposition players to turds.

Although football is not the most popular sport in this country, those lonely souls who follow it know that it is the greatest game in the entire universe. What other sport stirs up such strong sentiments in its spectators? Such was the passion that one Kenyan had for Arsenal that when his team was losing to Manchester United in a Champions League semi-final in 2009, he went home and hanged himself. Of course, while most fans aren’t willing to show that level of dedication to the cause, it remains to be said that outside of religion and nationality, few other communities inspire such undying commitment in its members. I mean, where else— but in pubs and stadiums— do you see full-grown men burst into song (and tears) every week?

Which brings us to Nick Hornby’s Fever Pitch. The autobiographical novel talks about Arsenal from the perspective of the author himself, who seems to regard the club as an intimate lover. After his parents divorced when he was young, he found in Arsenal a community to belong to. From 1968 onwards, he would religiously attend every match at the home ground, sharing in the team’s joys and sorrows as if doing so were his life’s purpose. It is obvious from the first page that Hornby’s fixation is disturbingly unhealthy: as a kid he used to know the names of the wives and girlfriends of the 1971 Double-winning Arsenal team. And on one occasion, while attending a match with his girlfriend,  so engrossed was he in the action that when she suddenly fainted, he failed to help her out. Unsurprisingly, the pair broke up not too long afterwards.

If truth be told, the 1992 novel now seems a little dated. In the freewheeling casino that is today’s Premier League, the idea of fans grumbling about players earning a hundred quid a week sounds remarkably quaint. But some things never change; and Hornby’s understanding of the irrational impulses that drives the sports fan (crazy) is stunningly accurate. His offbeat sense of humour and characteristically English self-deprecation also makes this book both the best and the worst book to read on the bus. You don’t have to like football to enjoy this book. In fact, the less you know about Arsenal, the more you’ll laugh.

Harry Potter chez les francophones

Today in class we were asked to translate a passage from J.K Rowling’s Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. This passage appears towards the end of the novel, where Harry is working his way through the third challenge of the Triwizard Tournament. Amidst a hedge maze, Harry comes across a sphinx who bars his passage to the maze’s centre, where the Triwizard Cup – and wizarding glory – awaits. The sphinx tells Harry that she will let him go past her if he manages to solve her riddle; but should Harry fail to solve it, she will attack him. Alternatively, Harry may choose to turn around and take a more long-winded way to the maze’s centre, so as not to hear the riddle and get it wrong. But Harry being Harry, he opts to take up the challenge. So the sphinx asks him the following riddle:

First think of the person who lives in disguise,
Who deals in secrets and tells naught but lies.
Next, tell me what’s always the last thing to mend,
The middle of middle and the end of the end?
And finally give me the sound often heard
During the search for a hard-to-find word.
Now string them together, and answer me this,
Which creature would you be unwilling to kiss?

---

So here’s my attempt at translating it into French:

Penses d’abord à un symbole dont les usages sont vastes,
qui est l’Alpha d’un système et au milieu d’une phrase.
Puis, dis-moi la chose pour laquelle on ne paie,
qui réchauffe la peau et qui vient du soleil.
Puis, donnes-moi le verbe qui peut décrire bien celle
qui, s’ouvrant les poumons, trouve le souffle vital.
Ces fragments combines, et puis réponds à ça:
Quel créature embrasser tu ne préférais pas?

***

Back translation:

Think first of a symbol whose usage is vast,
the Alpha of a system and in the midst of a phrase.
Then, tell me the thing for which one doesn’t pay,
which warms up the skin and comes from the ‘soleil’.
Then, give me the verb which perhaps depicts she
who, opening her lungs, finds the breath of ‘la vie’.
So combining these fragments, do respond now to this:
Which creature would, preferably, you not like to kiss?
 

---

The answer of the riddle is, of course, spider. But in translating the riddle, it would make little sense to keep the word ‘spider’ as it appears in English. For one thing, unless the francophone reader has an acquaintance with English, the word ‘spider’ is unlikely to elicit the mental image of an eight-legged creature. Moreover, even if one were to recognise the word, it is not exactly easy to translate the request appearing in the first two lines, the answer of which is ‘spy’. The French equivalent is ‘espion‘ (from whence comes ‘espionage’), which could not, in any case, spell out the word ‘spider’.

So it makes more sense to use the French word for spider, araignée. But with this word, it thus becomes necessary to change the three requests in the riddle. So I’ve tried my best to create a riddle that hints at ‘araignée’, using imagery that departs from the ones in J.K. Rowling’s riddle, but which serves the same function of pointing towards a spider. 

 

In Imitation of Dante

Later on, I tried my hand at translating the poem into English, albeit by breaking the rules of terza rima:  

In Imitation of Dante (English version)

When from the midpoint on life’s way I had strayed,
A desire to know this vast world, I’d betrayed, 
I found myself lost, in dark woods, and afraid. 

So great was my rue that came after the sin,
And now, the fear that thrives under my skin
Recalls that dim choice I had blindly let in. 

Through the years I have dreamed of the lights from afar,
In a container of pain, where my noble hopes are
To touch Paradise, from whence comes the original star.

—

The English translation was by far the easiest one to complete, not only because English is my native tongue, but also because in the language, monosyllabic words are plentiful. In comparison, French has a fair number of monosyllabic words, but is much less flexible when it comes to verb conjugations – in fact, verbs take up so many syllables that one has to take some liberties with the literal meaning of the original poem simply to fit in enough ideas:

 

Pour imiter Dante

Quand je suis parti du milieu du chemin de notre vie,
Un désir de connaître, de ce forêt, le monde j’ai trahit,
Je crevais d’être perdu et de mourir de trouille.

Si grands sont les remords nés de cette vie!
Et la peur qui demeure sous la peau, sans merci, 
Me rappelle du choix si aveugle que j’ai pris.

Après des années de rêver des lumières jolies,
De ce conteneur de douleur, pour mes espoirs je prie:
Que le Paradis je touche ait les étoiles qui brillent.

 

—

If the French version was difficult, it was the Italian translation that was a real struggle for me. Perhaps my Italian vocabulary is rather limited; but in any case, the way in which Italian words are stressed makes finishing lines with monosyllabic words nearly impossible. I also had to alter Dante’s words to render more faithful this Italian translation of my first poem. 

 

Per imitare Dante:

Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita, mi han visto
desiderare conoscere il mondo, anche se tristo, 
per una selva oscura mi ritrovai, insisto! 

Grand’è il rimorso che da ‘sta vita è venuto;
E ora, la paura che sotto la pelle – aiuto! –
Mi ricorda della scelta che ho fatto senza lutto. 

Dopo anni di sognare di luci sì belle,
Di dove ogni pena fa muovere le vele,
Toccherò il Paradiso in cui brillano le stelle.

The Comic Divinity

When from the way of all life I had strayed,
Un désir de connaître le monde j’ai trahit,
I found myself lost, in thick concrete, and afraid.

Si grands sont les remords qui ont suivi mon ‘oui’!
E ora, la paura che fiorisce sotto la pelle
Me rappelle du choix si aveugle que j’ai pris.

Attraverso gli anni sognavo delle luci sì belle
While serving my sentence in this bétonnière here;
Ma conoscerò il Paradiso appena avrò visto le stelle.

Of space & men / Lolita

“So what’s the point of going to France if you’re going to study English?” I pondered while catching the metro and making my way to Clignancourt. Of course, it was not as if I wasn’t taking courses in French. Indeed, my Philosophy course was so intensive that I actually found myself needing English-language courses – and if only to lighten the study burden I was then bearing. As I quickly found out, the Université Paris-Sorbonne sure knew how to throw exchange students into the deep end. What it had lost in prestige, it more than made up for in homework.

On Thursday mornings, I would turn up to an American history class, which was entitled, of all things, “Of Space and Men”. At the university, many history lecturers had been re-invented as English lecturers, and hence gave history lectures in English. This policy proved a boon to students studying English, but it was also a godsend to international students like me. But while lecturers had a good grasp of English, for native English speakers, it was clear where proficiency ended and comedy began.

At the time, my lecturer was a true history-buff who had developed an encyclopedic knowledge of the United States. He was also gay, and had a manner about him that put common flamboyance to shame. While lecturing to the class in English, he would speak in a way that I can only describe as a cross between an overworked Swiss CERN scientist and a 19th Century English drag queen. It is one thing to break free of the accent ascribed on oneself by one’s mother tongue; but to go so far as to adopt the speech conventions of subcultures – now that is another thing altogether. For in expressing the identity with which he was most comfortable, he would at times gaze at the class and flutter his eyelashes, as if he were advertising Chanel No. 5. I once even saw him after class sitting on a wall, wriggling his legs back and forth like a hyperactive Humpty Dumpty.

To be fair, I hold Lolita* in high esteem, and hope not to say a bad word about him. He cared about his students, and marked our work much more generously than other lecturers I came to know. He also knew English to a high standard, speaking with an eloquence that I could only dream of. But there was no doubting the fact that he had a unique way with words – and one of which he was not in full control.

Since my course was about immigration to the United States, my lecturer would describe the peoples who made the journey across oceans in search of better lives. While being careful to distinguish between nationality and ethnicity, it was still amusing to hear Lolita* talk about “people of Arabian origins”, as if “origins” were a standard term. And for what reason did many people of various origins come to America? It was “to flee persecutions.” Why have one persecution, after all, when your complex can house a whole series of them?

Other linguistic faux pas he would commit had to do with transcribing locutions from French to English. Though English and French have many expressions and words in common, when it comes to some phrases they are an ocean apart. When Lolita said, “They don’t want to put into brackets the fact that the Indians lived in poor conditions,” it was clear he was thinking of the French “mettre entre parenthèses“, a locution closer in meaning to “downplay” or “set aside”. Then again, with a teacher that twice remarked that “Pennsylvania has nothing to do with pencil”, anything was possible.

At times, Lolita would gallicise his speech, granting an aura of childlike innocence to words that normally evoked anything but sweetness. While aiming to use the word ‘influx’, he ended up saying, “the infloo of fresh blood stirred mainstream reaction and resentment.” On other occasions, his mistakes were simply of his own making: The “numerous supremacists” became the “numb-erist suprem-massists”; the United States legitimised racial segregation by implementing “Jim Crow Lows”; pronouncing silent h’s, he told us that “Jamestown was named in h-onour of the king”; Hawaii became “Ha-why?”

I think what made Lolita so memorable was the fact that he represented a Paris that foreigners seldom ever see. Not all Paris is chic, after all – a fact he himself noted when he said that 18th century Paris was ‘filthy’. But to have for a lecturer a man who did not shy away from all-out goofiness was both refreshing and an unforgettable highlight of my trip.

* Not his real name

Thoughts on language 2

Vowels are like round floatation aids. With an abundance of vowels, Italian words become so buoyant that if they were to find themselves under 70,000 fathoms of water, they would soon enough rise to the surface, sending the saddest of thoughts out on a high note:

Io sono al terzo cerchio, della piova

etterna, maladetta, fredda e greve;

regola e qualità mai non l’è nova.

It is impossible to say two or more English words at the same time. Try to say “cat” and “dog” simultaneously, and you’ll probably end up saying either “cidog” or “dicat”. Since oral communication takes place in time, when one pronounces a word, one must necessarily pronounce each of the word’s syllable in order. To do otherwise risks compromising the intended understanding of the word.

In contrast, a written word can be understood in a fraction of a second simply by glimpsing its outline. Written words have a definite beginning, because someone must write them down; but once written, they can exist for as long as the material on which they are written exists, during which they may be read and interpreted an infinite number of times.

Many so-called rules of English grammar are followed without any real justification. It is perfectly fine to end sentences with prepositions if one has to. And there is nothing wrong with beginning sentences with ‘because’, ‘and’, and ‘or’. Nor is it wrong to boldly split infinitives, since the ‘to’ isn’t even part of the infinitive.

Each language has its own flavour. Since English phonetics are different from French ones, if one were to pronounce the French word “merci” as one would say the English word “mercy”, would this be equivalent to pronouncing the English “thank you” as “thonk you”? How do you measure the distance of vowels from one another?

Words are like the courses of a meal. If words were seen in terms of their size, a good sentence would contain hors d’oeuvres, appetisers, mains, salads, soups, deserts, and after-dinner mints. Why settle for monosyllabic hors d’oeuvres, when you can have a full course dinner?

Though translations can faithfully capture meaning, they cannot always imitate the ‘sound’ of words. The aesthetics of languages depend largely on the phonetics that make them up. Even if an aesthetic sensibility is subjective by definition, it is a truism that “crème brûlée” sounds much more delicious than “burnt cream”.

Thoughts on language

Words are like leaves falling from trees. When mother tongue words, as crisp pohutukawa leaves, fall from trees, you can catch them and hold onto them for as long as you wish. In doing so, you come to understand the tree’s nature even if you never learn anything about the tree’s underlying biology. In contrast, foreign words are like flimsy oak tree leaves that flutter about in the wind. You often have to go out of your way just to get hold of one; and even when they’re in your hand, if you aren’t careful, the wind will blow them away again, leaving you bereft of understanding the tree with which you’ve devoted your time. Just as an oak tree can never be turned into a pohutukawa, a second language can never become one’s first language; that being said, one may spend so much time with the oak that one’s familiarity with it eventually surpasses that with the pohutukawa.

Languages are critical to the health of the human ecosystem. Without a language to keep the soil in place (i.e. basic cognitive functions), humans are susceptible to the nefarious effects of dust bowls. In other words, one who neglects one’s language neglects oneself.

Foreign Language study is probably the only university discipline in which an infant holds an advantage over an adult. Since the brain is more plastic in a human’s early years and gradually solidifies over time, a four year old child of average intelligence has a better chance of picking up French than does a middle aged Doctor of Philosophy. It goes without saying that sexagenarians who want to learn a second language are in for interesting times.

People say that the French are proud – if not arrogant – about their language. Tourists to France often complain that French people treat with disdain whosoever cannot speak French. However the case can be made that when it comes to the practice of speaking a language, anglophones are the most unapologetically inflexible. While Parisians may not feel comfortable about speaking a second language, they may at least have a basic understanding of English. On the other hand, try speaking French in the middle of Auckland, a city whose locals can’t be bothered to take second languages at school, and see how far that takes you. The same experiment can be attempted in any number of cities where English is the dominant language, with similar results to be expected.

Tourists from countries where English is not the dominant language who visit other such countries often communicate with locals in English. English-speaking tourists who visit countries where English does not dominate speak English; they do not have to adapt to the country since it’s the country that adapts to them.

Language dominance breeds arrogance; and arrogance breeds complacency.

English speakers face an usual paradox: given English’s status as the world’s lingua franca, English speakers who go out of their way to learn another language are praised for their efforts. The flip side, of course, is that because English is the lingua franca, many English speakers don’t see any reason to learn another language, and so they never reach the stage of being praised for trying to do so.

Native speakers of any other language who learn English to a high level of proficiency are never praised for their efforts because they are simply seen as doing what is necessary to get ahead.

Words are like Lego pieces: they need to be joined together to convey a meaningful idea. If a preposition is, for whatever reason, unsuitable to end a sentence with, one can get around the issue by putting a noun in its place.

Poesia in trois tongues

Il poeta che scrive in tre lingue o più
‘sta poema speciale sin capo che coda
è sempre in cerca di parole più giuste,
vuote di senso e proprio di moda.

Le poète qui écrit en trois langues ou plus
ce poème spécial sans raison ni rime
doit constamment chercher les mots les plus justes
pour feindre une profondeur mieux que sublime.

The poet that writes in three proud tongues or more
this poem unique, without reason nor rhyme,
is always in search of the right words to share
some senses both pleasing and dull at a time.

Il poeta che scrive in tre lingue o più
ce poème, qui n’avait ni raison ni rime,
s’efforce à tout moment de faire des bons mots
that happen to be less profound than they seem.