Umberto Eco's Mouse or Rat

Umberto Eco's Mouse or Rat: Translation as Negotiation was published in 2003. It is a collection of essays that circumscribe Eco's thoughts, reflections and attitudes to translation. Focusing on the subtitle of the book, Eco focuses on the eternal controversy associated with translation: what is universal among the languages of the world that makes the activity of translation possible versus what is idiosyncratic to each language/culture, making translation a constant process of loss verging on impossibility.

"Translation is a phenomenon which does not concern the relationships between two languages or linguistic systems - except in the rare cases in which one asks native speakers or interpreters how they would translate a given term in their own language .... Rather, translation is a process that takes place between two texts produced at a given historical moment in a given cultural milieu." (p. 25/6)


Interesting Reviews:
1. The Guardian: http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2004/jan/04/referenceandlanguages.umbertoeco

Core Concepts: Meaning, Equivalence & Fidelity

Translation as an activity and as a field of study has its foundation deeply rooted in the concepts of meaning, equivalence, and fidelity. These are terms that are elusive in their definitions, and have throughout the ages produced different attitudes and approaches to translation.  

A Book on Emotions

I'm at the moment working on translating a book on the psychology of emotions. What I've covered so far has been quite informative. Did you know that our experience of emotions manifests itself in physiological changes? If we are happy, sad, angry, anxious, frightened etc, we'll find a change in our heart-beat rates, breathing rates, sweating, etc. But there is also a reversed correlation: influencing our facial expressions and body-posture can affect some of the emotions we experience.
Makes you wonder, doesn't it?

Dialects and slang can present hurdles for dubbing and subtitling

A very interesting article:

http://www.courier-journal.com/article/20110724/SCENE03/307240016/Dialects-slang-can-present-hurdles-people-doing-subtitles-dubbing?odyssey=mod|newswell|text|Home|p

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A very interesting interview with Translator David Bellos:

http://mygengo.com/about-us/blog/david-bellos/   (added: 29/04/2012)

For starters

Translation is a wonderful activity! You negotiate between texts, languages and cultures, going back and forth, experiencing that feeling of being "impregnated" with an idea, an expression, a concept, a notion, feeling it on the tip of your tongue (or is that rather the tip of your fingers!) - but then ALAS!

I'm a lecturer at the English Department, Faculty of Arts, University of Alexandria - Egypt. I entered the world of translation when I was still a kid. My mum - of German origins - always needed me to help her out communicating with the world in Arabic. I was soon living between the two worlds, combining them, juxtaposing them, translating one into the other.
There being no German Department at the University of Alexandria, I joined the English Department when I finished high-school. My bi-dimensional world of languages grew into a tri-dimensional world. I started translating professionally from English into Arabic and back. Soon I found publishing outlets for my work, especially shorter literary works translated from English into Arabic. I had launched on a long journey of establishing myself a name!
Today I have a number of books that carry my name as translatress on the market. Indeed, my work with and in translation has also steered my research interests into new areas: Translation Studies and Theories.

This blog is intended to give a record of my work, thoughts, ideas, queries ... I also invite anyone and everyone with the slightest interest in translation to join in.

Have a great time blogging,
Laila C. Helmi