![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Jul. 28th, 2013 06:53 pmCross-posting this from my tumblr, because I thought this was really interesting. I've been slowly back-translating the Japanese musical version of Les Misérables (which is in itself a translation of the English lyrics) song-by-song, and posting them to tumblr, although if anyone's interested, I can start cross-posting those to here.
Surprising discovery of the night: Japanese!Eponine has slightly girlier speech (or…erm…song) patterns than Japanese!Cosette.
Also surprising: Japanese!Valjean switches his personal pronouns back-and-forth from gender-neutral, plain vanilla “watashi" to the more aggresively masculine “ore." It’s “watashi" when he’s talking to Fantine or Cosette and while he’s dragging Marius through the sewers. It’s “ore" when he’s talking to Les Amis or Javert, and during “Who Am I?"
Disclaimer before I launch into thinky things: I am not a linguist, nor am I fluent in Japanese. I’ve picked up a good bit of both through classes and my own continuing interests, but totally feel free to politely tell me if I’m effing this up.
Generally, it seems to be “watashi" when he’s showing his kinder, gentler side, and “ore" during his more fierce, intense moments. The contrast really shows up in one line that gets echoed in two places in the musical. At the end of “Who Am I?" is the big, “Who am I? Two-four-six-oh-ooooonnnnne!" line. Then, in “Valjean’s Confession," Valjean again asks, “Who am I?" to which Marius responds, “You’re Jean Valjean."
In Japanese, however, Valjean’s question isn’t exactly the same both times. In “Who Am I?" he asks, “Dare da? Ore wa ni-yon-roku-go-saaaaaaann!"* In Valjean’s Confession, it’s “Dare da? Watashi wa …" which Marius then finishes with “Jean Valjean."
In the first song, the question is being asked by a man who is in great conflict with himself, and has been dealing in depth with the memories of his time in prison, a place that required the toughness implied by using “ore" just to survive. On the other hand, the man who sits down and talks with Marius, telling him his history, has been transformed by his time with Cosette into someone who loves and is loved in return, and he has this love in mind as he talks to Marius. So it’s “watashi," the less egotistical and possibly more submissive pronoun.
There’s probably some more stuff to be said as well about Valjean, the character whose identity is constantly in flux throughout the story (Hugo seemed to love playing the “Who is this mysterious new character? Ha! I got you! It’s Valjean!" game) and how appropriate it is that a character whose very identity changes several times also changes his personal pronouns — the only character in the musical that I’ve noticed doing so.
*Those who can count to ten in Japanese might note that this spells (numbers?) out 24653, not 24601. The change was probably made because, while you can fudge “roku" (six) into one syllable, “zero" (yes, it’s the same in Japanese) doesn’t work like that, and trying to dramatically hold out “ichi" (one) just sounds dumb.
Surprising discovery of the night: Japanese!Eponine has slightly girlier speech (or…erm…song) patterns than Japanese!Cosette.
Also surprising: Japanese!Valjean switches his personal pronouns back-and-forth from gender-neutral, plain vanilla “watashi" to the more aggresively masculine “ore." It’s “watashi" when he’s talking to Fantine or Cosette and while he’s dragging Marius through the sewers. It’s “ore" when he’s talking to Les Amis or Javert, and during “Who Am I?"
Disclaimer before I launch into thinky things: I am not a linguist, nor am I fluent in Japanese. I’ve picked up a good bit of both through classes and my own continuing interests, but totally feel free to politely tell me if I’m effing this up.
Generally, it seems to be “watashi" when he’s showing his kinder, gentler side, and “ore" during his more fierce, intense moments. The contrast really shows up in one line that gets echoed in two places in the musical. At the end of “Who Am I?" is the big, “Who am I? Two-four-six-oh-ooooonnnnne!" line. Then, in “Valjean’s Confession," Valjean again asks, “Who am I?" to which Marius responds, “You’re Jean Valjean."
In Japanese, however, Valjean’s question isn’t exactly the same both times. In “Who Am I?" he asks, “Dare da? Ore wa ni-yon-roku-go-saaaaaaann!"* In Valjean’s Confession, it’s “Dare da? Watashi wa …" which Marius then finishes with “Jean Valjean."
In the first song, the question is being asked by a man who is in great conflict with himself, and has been dealing in depth with the memories of his time in prison, a place that required the toughness implied by using “ore" just to survive. On the other hand, the man who sits down and talks with Marius, telling him his history, has been transformed by his time with Cosette into someone who loves and is loved in return, and he has this love in mind as he talks to Marius. So it’s “watashi," the less egotistical and possibly more submissive pronoun.
There’s probably some more stuff to be said as well about Valjean, the character whose identity is constantly in flux throughout the story (Hugo seemed to love playing the “Who is this mysterious new character? Ha! I got you! It’s Valjean!" game) and how appropriate it is that a character whose very identity changes several times also changes his personal pronouns — the only character in the musical that I’ve noticed doing so.
*Those who can count to ten in Japanese might note that this spells (numbers?) out 24653, not 24601. The change was probably made because, while you can fudge “roku" (six) into one syllable, “zero" (yes, it’s the same in Japanese) doesn’t work like that, and trying to dramatically hold out “ichi" (one) just sounds dumb.
