I read it. I like yours and second translation. But I never liked the word "Metamorphosis". The definiton in Oxford dictionary says "A change of the form or nature of a thing or person into a completely different one". So the use is correct, but I never liked it. I mean... even Kafka could use the word "Die Metamorphose" instead of "Die Verwandlung". "verwendelt" could also be simply translated in the first sentence as "transformed". But I get it that "metamorphosed" is more accurate. "Monstrous" is also bothering me. Yours, "immense" is much better. "Monstrous" would probably be the right word if the story was through Grete's POV.
I agree, and also, somehow, monstrous doesn't give the impression of Gregor's size to me. I always imagine him being extremely big. I've actually managed to find (@thirdwind, you might be interested in this too) a photo of Nabokov's copy of this story, with his hand-drawn corrections and notes, he seems to have thought one troubled dream makes more sense, and ... yeah, I certainly agree with him. So, if we change the translation of the name, to 'The Transformation' we get: That is the most accurate rendition of the first sentence I think it's really possible to make. Nabokov's notes on the first page of the story can be found here. That's actually quite fun. I might see if I can do more of the story when I get the time.
Definetely. For example, look at this picture: That is monstrous, right? Do you know what that is? A worm under a microscope. A small creature, but quite monstrous. This might be an overreaction, but I just want to say I agree with you; monstrous doesn't necessarily mean size. If Gregor in his bug-from covers a photo of a lady we can assume he is big as A4 page, at least. I don't know, I always pictured him bigger than 1 meter (in length, since he's a bug) I like this. What do you say we make our own translation?
That's not a bad idea actually, I would certainly be interested in a translation collaboration. Would make things much easier.
So I Took A Look (It's Capitalizing Things On Mobile Sorry) At The German Translation During Class Because It's Not Like I Actually Do Work, And The Grammar Is Easy. But The Vocab May Be Difficult. I'll Be Having GoogleTranslate Up While I Read This. But It'll Be Fun.
It's not a 'translation' the story was originally written in German. Google translate is also pretty bad for phrases or sentences, but it's good for individual words if you get stuck.
Yes, google translate is bad for phrases and sentences. However, sometimes it can be very useful with sentences if you don't understand the whole sentence or even paragraph. If you put the whole sentence in google, it will provide you with a rough translation, thus giving you a context or an idea what the incomprehensible paragraph/sentence is saying.
My grammar is fairly good (writing longer sentences trips me up but I'm slowly getting it), but I'd be using Google Translate for words. The grammar didn't look too bad so it'd only be for words. So far Google Translate has done well for me in school for words, so I'll keep with that. Other translator apps are less user friendly for me at least. I'll be taking a look at the book when I get a chance.
