Advent Sundays have been always very special in our family and I have written about this before (here, for example). And so we naturally gathered around the wreath tonight, got the sweets, the coffee and tea and read a story.
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Now the challenge is of course to read a story in German and translate it at the same time to English. Some stories are simple and this can be done rather easily. But not “Zuviel Weihnachten” (Too much Christmas) by Dino Buzzati. Jeez! Now, I have to assume that this was already a German translation from Italian, and a poor one at that. That does not help. But the story itself (the donkey and the ox from the crib in Bethlehem come back to earth as ghosts to see what Christmas means today) is poorly devised, terribly written translated into German and leaves the reader puzzled and dissatisfied.
I tried to make the best out of it.
Long, story babble like:
»Jedes Jahr mache ich einen Sprung hinunter. Ich habe einen besonderen Passierschein. Aber ich denke, du wirst auch einen bekommen, denn nach allem könnten wir zwei wohl auch auf etwas Anerkennung Anspruch erheben.«
»Weil wir das Kind damals mit unserem Atem wärmten?«
»Komm, beeile dich, wenn du nicht das Beste versäumen willst. Heute ist Heiliger Abend.«
»Und mein Passierschein?«
»Sofort gemacht, ich habe einen Vetter im Paßamt.«
Der Passierschein wurde bewilligt.
I translated:
The ox asked: »How do we get to earth?«
And the donkey said: »Don’t worry, dude, I got this.«
(Seriously: this whole crap with the Passierschein, i.e. an access pass, is completely useless and does not add anything to the story… I didn’t know Buzzati’s storytelling before, but this example sure does not encourage me to read more)
Anyway.
Oh, not to forget: we were reading the story when the phone rang. It was Bernhard.
Leo: Hear that, Oskar? That’s uncle Bernhard.
Tatjana: Uh-oh… true. He’s an uncle now!
Leo: Yep. But you know what? You can make him a grandpa!
There was a suspiciously long, shocked silence at the other end of the line.
Bernhard: …
That was actually my highlight of the evening :)
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Image may be NSFW.Clik here to view.
