Translation is a cultural exchange.

Báo Thanh niên•26/06/2023

Translators not only need to be proficient in foreign languages but also understand the culture to translate accurately according to the context and content of the text. Phrases like pho, ao dai (traditional Vietnamese dress), or traditional folk music are mentioned more than once when discussing Vietnamese culture and have become popular with international friends. Therefore, when using them, it's best to leave them in their original Vietnamese form and add some explanations. If anything is unclear, you can add illustrative examples with images. For instance, the Cambridge Dictionary already provides a detailed explanation of pho , one of the most popular dishes in Vietnam.

'Một đời người một rừng cây' có lời tiếng Anh, Pháp: Dịch thuật là sự giao thoa văn hóa - Ảnh 1. — A type of soup from Vietnam, usually containing noodles (long, thin strands made from flour, water, and often eggs) and a small amount of meat.

Music lovers are surely familiar with the song "Autumn Dies ." The song was set to music by composer Phạm Duy, based on the original French poem "L'Adieu" by Guillaume Apollinaire, beautifully translated by poet Bùi Giáng.

J'ai cueilli ce brin de bruyère

L'automne est mort souviens-t'en...

(We plucked a cluster of heather flowers)

Remember that autumn is dead...

The harmonious blend and emotional resonance between poetry and music touched the hearts of listeners. Those proficient in foreign languages and familiar with the cultures of both France and Vietnam found the translation truly moving, ensuring that the poetry remained faithful to the original, capturing the author's true intentions, and when elevated by music, created a deeper and wider impact.

According to musician Vu Duc Sao Bien in his study "Kim Dung in My Life" : Translator Han Giang Nhan, despite his profound knowledge of classical Chinese, still carefully used dictionaries when translating Kim Dung's martial arts novels into Vietnamese. When encountering difficult words, he would pause to look them up in the dictionary before continuing the translation. Because of this careful approach, readers always feel a romantic and poetic spirit in the poems and verses of the works, as he both adhered closely to the original text and creatively added a touch of Vietnamese literary depth. Reading Do Muc's poem "Khien Hoai," one can see its extreme elegance and unique soul, no less impressive than the translations by Tan Da and Tran Trong Kim.

Wandering aimlessly through the martial world, resuming drinking spree.

Love is like a lightness in the palm of the hand.

A decade of the Yangzhou dream

The brothel owner was known for his immoral and dissolute lifestyle.

Therefore:

I've been wandering the world for so long.

Being together with the little ones

Ten years later, the Yangzhou dream awakens.

Having a reputation for being a womanizer, I feel sad thinking about it.

In his memoir "The Writer Returns to the Village ," writer Nguyen Quang Sang recounted a humorous story related to the translation of his novel " The Monsoon Season " into Russian. Initially, someone translated it as "The Cholera Epidemic Season"! This was unacceptable, so they had to ask the writer and translator Marian Tkachev, who was very proficient in Vietnamese and had translated works by Nguyen Tuan and Nguyen Hong into Russian. "The Monsoon Season" was translated into Russian as " Northeast Wind, " using the correct terminology from meteorologists while maintaining literary merit. Fortunately, Sang was in Russia at the time, making it easy for him to discuss unfamiliar terms in the work with Tkachev, such as the American helicopter, which Sang had written as "carp, scad"!

'Một đời người một rừng cây' có lời tiếng Anh, Pháp: Dịch thuật là sự giao thoa văn hóa - Ảnh 2. — The article *"A Lifetime, a Forest of Trees"* has English and French translations and was published in *Thanh Nien* Newspaper on June 23, 2023.

Translation is not simply about transferring language; it must help people understand more about the national culture. In other words, the translator should have creative freedom within the limits of the original text to create an ideal translation for the public. The guiding principle of translation culture should be understood as: Understand the audience – empathize with the translator's own interpretation – express it in a way that the reader/listener can feel. The goal is to translate in a way that is expressive, faithful to the original, and retains the author's intent. The ultimate effect of a translation is that the reader/listener accepts and understands it on the same wavelength as the author and translator.

* Upon reading the article "A Lifetime, a Forest of Trees" with English and French translations in Thanh Nien Newspaper, issue dated June 23, 2023.

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