Where is Ray Vecchio when I need him?

[primroseburrows]

Hey, O Wise Friendslist, do any of you speak Italian? If so, could I get a rough translation of this article? I'll make you virtual doughboys. Don't send me to Babelfish, because I can't bear to read their translations.

Honestly, I'll try to make a real post again someday. For now, I'm off to non-LJ friend Sandra's house with my brand-y new S&A S3 DVDs. Eeeee!

P.S. peacey, I will be around later on tonight. Most likely not until after ten. *hugs*

Comments

[newleaf31.livejournal.com]

Thanks! It's been about 12 years since I boned up on my Italian, but apparently despite myself, a decent amount managed to sear itself onto my brain cells when I was in college. :p

[revbiscuit.livejournal.com]

Well done! I was going to volunteer, but you've done a splendid job already. You had a few ?? along the way, and I sense you may be curious.

Ciò si è dovuto soprattutto al susseguirsi delle più svariate forme di regime politico
That was mostly due (si e' dovuto = has been due itself *g* - it's reflexive) to the various succeding? (the forms succede/follow? themselves, it's reflexive again) forms of political regimes.

Do you know, I have suddenly realised why my English construction is so unnecessarily complicated. This sort of stuff scars you for life.

The fourth power is the media. I have seen it translated as the fourth Estate before now. Incidentally, Il quarto potere is also the title for Citizen Kane, but I don't think they're talking about that here.

per il proprio tornaconto means to one's own ends. I'm struggling with the English here. Fare tornare i conti means balancing the books, look at it in that sense. Creative accounting of a moral kind, if you will.

Le azioni di Intelligence sono sempre meno chiare addirittura a chi dell’Intelligence fa parte e non c’è spazio per alcun ripensamento, per alcun valore che non sia quello del successo a ogni costo.
The actions of Intelligence are less and less clear even to those who belong (far parte) to the CIA and there's no room for any rethink, for any value that isn't that of success at all costs.
Or something. I may have made up 'rethink'.

grazie a un montaggio alternato portato all’estremo.
Alternato refers to montage here. It's probably a cinematic term. I don't know what it means, but I'd translate it as "thanks to an alternate montage taken to the extremes." Maybe that would make sense to someone who understands this stuff.

“se nessuno segue le regole si gioca sempre ad armi pari”
If no-one follows the rules, we're on an equal playing field.

Spregiudicati means uninhibited, but in a negative way. Unethical.

Hope you don't think I'm being pernickety, because I can't get over how quickly you could translate all that. I just thought you may be curious about some of the things that were puzzling you. Having said that, my English for them is probably wonky. *g* But hey, the power of LJ. Between us all we'll get there!

[newleaf31.livejournal.com]

Oh, wow, thank you for this reply! I'm a total language GEEK, and you're exactly right, I was curious about the parts I couldn't make sense of. I'm glad to see that several of those parts involved idioms... always tough! Reflexive and subjunctive forms were always the verbs that killed me, and alas, it seems they still do. :p But translating this was really excellent practice, and I really enjoyed it. Thanks again for clearing up my ?? places! You've given me some new vocabulary and helped me understand some tough constructions. :D

[primroseburrows.livejournal.com]

Jeebus, woman, how many languages DO you know? Thank you, thank you so much for doing this! You seriously rock so hard the neighbours complain. *dances you around*

Could I share this with my mailing list? I haven't even read it yet, I wanted to fangirl you first. Reading's next. *does tarantella*

I really want to learn more languages. Broken Spanish does not count as Something I Know. They're offering French and German this fall at the local community college. Hmm.

[newleaf31.livejournal.com]

Jeebus, woman, how many languages DO you know?
Thirteen, wow, how I need a life.

Anyhoo, you're welcome! :D Sure, totally share it -- Italian's one of the languages that I feel reasonably secure in, and revbiscuit says it's a decent rendering, so I won't be fearing that some Italian will read it and go, "WTF? Was this translated by monkeys?"

Languages = much fun! The key is finding what you're comfortable with. For myself, I can learn to read, and at least to some degree write, any language in the world, no problem, but learning to SPEAK and understand SPOKEN languages makes me really, really anxious. So I hated the German (for speakers) class I took, but really enjoyed the French (for readers) class. Also, French, like Italian, is a very user-friendly language for English speakers. Lots of cognates and logical (for English speakers) grammatical forms. Paradoxically, German is (IMO) a real beast, despite the fact that English is itself a Germannic (as opposed to, say, Romantic, like Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Romanian, etc.) language. And given your Canada fetish? I'd look into that French class, chica!

[primroseburrows.livejournal.com]

Oh, I love languages! I've been told I have a good ear for them. mr_t00by was once told by a native German that his accent was indistinguishable from a native speaker. So I figure if I take German he can help me. Amd I LOVE Italian.

And given your Canada fetish? I'd look into that French class, chica!

See, that's the problem. I don't want to learn Parisian French. So I have to ask the professor if he's down with the Québécois. And maybe, and I know it's a pipe dream, but maybe even teh Acadian.

[newleaf31.livejournal.com]

YOU HAVE OUT-LANGUAGE-GEEKED ME. Two different kinds of French you would like to know? Neither of which are the "official" French? Yes, you have out-geeked me. *prostrates self*

[revbiscuit.livejournal.com]

I'm a total language GEEK

Me too. I know exactly how you feel. ::is geeky with you::

[newleaf31.livejournal.com]

Gah, I love it when I meet other language geeks! Non-language-geeks just never understand. But really, they don't know what they're missing!

*joins in geeky songfest*

...because the only thing more exciting than Canadian politics is discussing it in Italian!

[primroseburrows.livejournal.com]

Woah, this is like, a cooperative club of interpreters translating geeky reviews of geeky political films. Geeky Canadian political films, specifically, which makes it even geekier. Because, think about it. Someone wrote an article about Canadian politics in Italian. Next up? An article about Italian politics (that Parmalat milk scandal, maybe) written in Canadian. I'll translate. My written Canadian's pretty good. ;)

Addendum, which is Latin and therefore kind of Italian

[primroseburrows.livejournal.com]

Oh, and thanks for all your help, dear. ♥

Re: ...because the only thing more exciting than Canadian politics is discussing it in Italian!

[revbiscuit.livejournal.com]

Yay for geeky Canadian films! You know though, it just occurred to me, any take on Italian politics would spawn something like the Lord of the Rings. *g*

::sings:: "Weee're all geeeeeks togetheeeer!" *g*