Translation versus paraphrase

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BarryJ
Posts: 176
Joined: 03 May 2014 03:33
Location: Gunnison, Colorado, USA

Translation versus paraphrase

Post by BarryJ »

I wrote a free paraphrase of http://www.cpdl.org/wiki/index.php/Wie_ ... orgenstern; I would rather call it a "paraphrase" rather than a "translation" because I took some liberties with the text to get it to fit the meter, including ignoring some German words, and inserting English words not in the German. I thought to create the Template:Paraphrase to cover this possibility, but I'm beginning to have second thoughts, especially since I now see that a lot of texts called "translations" are in fact metrical paraphrases. Also, the maze of templates and categories behind Template:Translation is a little overwhelming -- I thought (naively) that creating just one little template would do the job, but I'm not sure it deserves the full-blown treatment. And it would involve evaluating a lot of "translations" and changing them to "paraphrases", which I'm not sure would be helpful.
So, what I would like to do is delete the Template:Paraphrase (and Category:Paraphrases), then call my paraphrase a translation. I would then label it somehow as a "metrical paraphrase" or something like that. Leave the Translations system the way it is.
Barry Johnston
Gunnison, U. S. A.
carlos
Site Admin
Posts: 1870
Joined: 19 Aug 2008 15:26
Location: São Paulo, Brasil

Re: Translation versus paraphrase

Post by carlos »

Hi Barry,

Indeed, there are lots of paraphrases currently labeled as "translations" on CPDL. There are also texts with literal and less-literal translations (but not to the point of being a paraphrase, I guess). I agree with you that maybe it's not worth to indicate these nuances via different templates.

If you decide that the template and associated category should be deleted, please let us know here or by editing those pages and adding {{subst:delete}} at the top of them.

Regards,
Carlos (talk)
CPDL Administration
BarryJ
Posts: 176
Joined: 03 May 2014 03:33
Location: Gunnison, Colorado, USA

Re: Translation versus paraphrase

Post by BarryJ »

Thanks, Carlos.
I have changed Template.Paraphrase on the text page to Template.Translation, and marked the template and category for deletion, as you suggested.
Barry Johnston
Gunnison, U. S. A.
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