mispronounced in translation

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DaveAgain
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mispronounced in translation

Postby DaveAgain » Thu May 19, 2022 4:47 pm

I'm currently reading Henri Troyat's un si long chemin.

As a teenager he was given the job of translating some Russian stage sketches into French, it turned out that the Russian actors couldn't pronounce "u", so he had to rewrite avoiding "u". :-)

Les premiers résultats furent déprimants, car j'avais compté sans le fait que mes textes français seraient dits par des acteurs russes. Or, certains sons n'ont pas leur équivalent dans les deux langues. Ainsi, la lettre "u" n'existe pas en russe. On prononce "iou". L'acteur russe chargé de réciter ma petite poésie s'obstinait à dire "le miourmioure diou riousseau". Devant ce désastre, Nikita Balieff m'ordonna de récrire le tout en évitant d'employer une seule fois la voyelle "u". Ce fut un excellent exercise.
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Le Baron
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Re: mispronounced in translation

Postby Le Baron » Thu May 19, 2022 5:10 pm

At that rate the actor probably ended up sounding like the policeman from 'Allo 'Allo.
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