Pro bono translation work

[John Cataldo Wright]

While I can't speak to the merits of Meyer's "Twilight" novels, I must say 
that one might object to the term "crap" being applied without explanation 
to the work of Professor Tolkien, a scholar and translator.  An 
established and still growing body of literary criticism finds depth and 
value in his fiction.  Tolkien was a philologist, and his interest in 
constructing languages was the seed for much of his imaginative work.  He 
said on this topic "Nobody believes me when I say that my long book is an 
attempt to create a world in which a form of language agreeable to my 
personal aesthetic might seem real. But it is true."

I understand that Tolkien's private passion for constructed languages and 
his novel "The Lord of the Rings" may not be agreeable to everyone's 
personal aesthetic.  This novel, however, brings to its readers' attention 
matter concerning register, the difficulty of translation, and the unique 
qualities and requirements of each language.

"Strider sighed and paused before he spoke again. 'That is a song,' he 
said, 'in the mode that is called ann-thennath among the Elves, but is 
hard to render in our Common Speech, and this is but a rough echo of it." 
(Book One, "A Knife in the Dark")

"Real names tell you the story of the things they belong to in my 
language, in the Old Entish as you might say. It is a lovely language, but 
it takes a very long time to say anything in it, because we do not say 
anything in it, unless it is worth taking a long time to say, and to 
listen to." (Book Three, "Treebeard")

One could join many other examples to those two.  I would guess that the 
broad appeal of "The Lord of the Rings" has increased awareness of the 
importance of translation.

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