Урок тринадцатый

Публицистические тексты уже затрагивались нами ранее. Продолжая разговор о них, следует сказать, что они, с одной стороны, могут быть нацелены на определённую аудиторию, а с другой стороны, откровенно говоря, бывают заказаны некоторой организацией или конкретными людьми. Это, впрочем, не отменяет того, что в публицистическом тексте ставится и выявляется животрепещущая проблема чаще всего социального характера.

При работе с подобными текстами переводчику зачастую приходится учитывать не только целевую аудиторию текста, но и точку зрения автора, а также понимать, кто или что стоит за ним.

Упражнение 1. Прежде чем выполнять задания к тексту, найдите в нём все неизвестные вам слова, подумайте над наиболее сложными для перевода выражениями.

As Russians say, manners maketh the British late

Time. It’s now so precious that we will happily spend an absolute fortune making all the things we do faster, simply so we have time to do more things.

A decade or more ago, if you were suddenly consumed with a need to watch some online footage of a cat falling over, it took about a minute for your internet to load the film. This was a minute none of us could spare. Then we got the idea of watching it on the go. Luckily a conglomerate of international mobile phone companies had paid the British government £22bn for something called 3G. This meant people had to wait only five seconds to see a cat falling over, and for a while we were all very happy.

But then we all realised that in the modern world five seconds is far too long. So now phone companies have paid a further £2.3bn for 4G, a service that delivers hilarious animal-related accidents almost instantaneously.

We see the same thing going on in lifts. We need a button that closes the doors when we’re ready to go because we simply cannot wait four seconds for them to close by themselves. Rightly so. Two lift journeys a day could waste eight seconds. Which in a working week is 40 seconds. In a time frame that vast we could have watched six cats falling over. And an amusing helicopter crash.

It’s strange, though. We fume in traffic jams and curse when people on pavements walk too slowly, yet we are prepared to waste hours and hours of every day gurning and engaging in idle chitchat with people we don’t know.

The British middle-class obsession with good manners means we feel obliged to discuss the weather with our postman and our holidays with our hairdresser. We write ridiculously long thank-you letters to people we’ve already thanked verbally. In business emails we use words that aren’t necessary simply because we feel the need to be polite, and if we want directions we always start out by saying, “Excuse me. I hate to be a bother but...”

I bring all of this up because I’ve just spent a week in Russia where manners don’t seem to have been invented. When a hotel receptionist needs your passport, she doesn’t say, “Would it be possible to see your passport for a moment, sir, if it isn’t too much trouble?” She says, “Passport”. And if you can’t find it within three seconds, she says, “Now!”

When you order a dish from a menu that isn’t available, there’s no tiresome hand-wringing explanation from the waiter. He just says, “It’s off”.

It’s the same in what we call polite discussion. You don’t dress up counter-arguments with subtle innuendo. Russians just say, “You’re wrong” and move on. Here’s one conversation I had:

“Jews are running the world.”

“I hear what you say, but I don’t think that’s the case.”

“You’re wrong.”

“But there are plenty of examples...”

“I said, ‘You’re wrong.’”

Being British, it’s all very upsetting. But after a while I started to realise that being impolite saves an awful lot of time and costs you nothing. When someone is wasting your evening with their harebrained nonsense, just tell them they are wrong and walk away. When you are in a butcher’s shop, don’t bother with small talk. Just say, “Two chops” and wait to be told the price. When someone is dawdling on the pavement, push them out of the way. And in a bar, don’t try to catch the barman’s eye. Just shout what you want from the back of the queue.

Back at Heathrow, the immigration official was very chummy. “Been away long?” he asked politely. I saved two seconds by not bothering with an answer.

I felt terrible. Guilty as hell. But that’s the curse of being British. That’s why we need 4G and buttons that close the lift doors, and high-speed rail links. Because they free up more time for writing very long thank-you letters and making small talk with the milkman.

Задания

1. Разделитесь на две группы и переведите текст, исходя из следующих требований: 1) текст предназначен для сайта журнала, известного своей русофобской направленностью и односторонним обличением реалий российского общества; 2) текст предназначен для сайта журнала, стремящегося в мягкой форме обоснованно и объективно описывать происходящие события и выражать мнения.

2. Проанализируйте средства передачи смысла текста и выполнения «заказа» в разных группах. Какими другими средствами переводчик может при необходимости расставлять нужные акценты?

Упражнение 2. Прежде чем выполнять задания к тексту, найдите в нём все неизвестные вам слова, подумайте над наиболее сложными для перевода выражениями.

A Visit from Tech Support for Hillary Clinton

TECH SUPPORT: Hi, Secretary Clinton? I’m Liz, from tech support. Your assistant said that you needed help getting Outlook on your phone?

SECRETARY OF STATE HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON: Oh, hi. Great. Come on in.

TECH: This shouldn’t take too long. Are you working on a Blackberry or an iPhone?

CLINTON: God, who knows. I have so many devices these days.

TECH: Really? How many?

C.: Two.

T.: That shouldn’t be a problem. So let’s get Outlook fired up here. O.K. Hmm. It looks like you haven’t set up an account yet?

C.: I’ve been using my hdr22@clintonemail.com address.

T.: Most State Department employees prefer to use a state.gov address.

C.: I don’t know that I would describe my role here as “employee.”

T.: Right. Well, it’s sort of a best-practice thing. We can make sure that all your correspondence is secure this way, and it’ll make it easier to comply with FOIA requests.

C.: Why would there be a FOIA request?

T.: You’re right. There won’t be. But I like to say you can never be too careful.

C.: I guess. Liz, between you and me, I’m not really a big e-mailer. I pretty much only use it for stuff like planning Chelsea’s wedding and chatting with my yoga instructor about whether we should impose sanctions on Iran.

T.: It’s still good to get this set up. Go ahead and connect your device to the computer.

C.:…

T.: You can use that U.S.B. portal.

C.:…

T.: Here, it’s just this cord. O.K., I’m noticing that you have a lot of documents just saved to your desktop. It’s really safer to save them directly on the State Department server.

C.: I’ll be sure to do that.

T.: That way they’re password-protected. And again, FOIA.

C.: I’m less worried about that than you are.

T.: You’re the boss! O.K., next go to “Settings.”

C.:…

T.: It looks like a little gear symbol.

C.: Oh! There it is.

T.: Then to go to “General.”

C.:…

T.:…

C.:…

T.: It’s down next to–

C.: I got it, all right? Jesus.

T.: Follow the prompt for e-mail.

C.: I’m not seeing it.

T.: It’s right there next–

C.: Please don’t point. I’ll never learn that way.

T.: O.K., sorry. Keep scrolling.

C.: Is it under Bluetooth? What is Bluetooth?

T.: No, it’s–

C.: Do I need to be in Dropbox?

T.: What? No. Just click e-mail.

C.: Got it!

T.: Great. Let’s get you rolling with a username and a password. Feel free to really be creative here. Some people use their pets’ names, or the name of their high school.

C.: How about just “password”?

T.: That’s sort of not ideal.

C.: O.K., how about “Benghazi”?

T.: Perfect. It’s hard to spell and it doesn’t have any special significance.

C.: So I’m done?

T.: Not quite, but we’re close. Now input your username and password.

C.: I am. It’s not accepting “Benghazi.”

T.: Hmm. That’s O.K. This is a known issue. Let’s try “retrieve password.”

C.: I’m hitting it but nothing’s happening.

T.: Do you mind if I take over?

C.: Fine. But I won’t learn.

T.: Here’s the problem. It needs a number. Can we do a different password? Maybe “MrsPrez16”? That’s good, right?

C.: That’s terrible, but I don’t care.

T.: Hey, Madam Secretary, I get that this is frustrating. Believe me. Just remember that we’re on the same team here.

C.: Sorry. UGH. I put in “MrsPrez16” and it’s rejecting that too!

T.: You know, it’s probably because you’re not using a trusted wifi network. O.K., go back to Settings.

C.: You know what, I’m just going to stick with my personal account. No one is going to care.

T.: You’re probably right. Honestly, this system is so clunky; I’ve been forwarding stuff to my Gmail since 2006.

C.: Can you get me set up with a Gmail?

T.: I’m really not supposed to.

C.: Fine. But while you’re here, could you help me change my Facebook picture? I want to use this one.

T.: Oh, nice! You look so badass texting while wearing sunglasses.

C.: I know.

T.: Meme alert!

C.: Right.

T.: Girl, I’ll probably make that my profile picture, too. Or at least my Twitter avatar.

C.: Please don’t call me “girl.”

T.: It just makes you look like such a tech-savvy, feminist icon.

C.: I am that.

T.: Totally. O.K., here you go. It’s all set. And don’t worry about the e-mail thing.

Задания