Heroine| 4.2 Found in Translation

HEROïNE

STUDENT MAGAZINE OF LITERARY AND CULTURAL ANALYSIS

Year 4 nr. 2

Found in Translation

colophon Year 4, Volume 2 2016-2017 Text editors: Dianne Teunisse, Anna Sbitneva, Laura Pannekoek, Eveline Mineur, Awethu Kakaza, Nina Huis, Carlota Font Castelló, Noura Borggreven.

Image editor and design: Kat Lybanieva Illustrations: list on p. 47 With special thanks to Fabula Rasa.

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Contents Editorial

the editors Translator Chain multiple authors Wachtend op de veerboot/ Waiting for the Ferry Eveline Mineur Pieter`s First Day Without Words Jack Caulfield A Pell Nua/To Naked Skin Carlota Font Castelló La Vida Plana/ The Plain Life Carlota Font Castelló Instructies Voor het Vertalen van Gevoelens Joep Harmsen Beneath the Orange Tree Eveline Mineur Nordvest Simon Roy Homergasten the guest: Federico Gobbo Με τον μπαμπά/ With dad Dimitris Kotis The Adaptations Of Sherlock Holmes Julia Neugarten The Third of February Kat Lybanieva Words Can`t Think Carlota Font Castelló Untranslatable Glossary the editors

4 5 10 12 20 21 22 23 26 27 30 34 38 42 44

Editorial Words define us. We use them to describe what we like, what we don’t, how we feel. We give nicknames to the ones we love (and usually the ones we hate); we turn to words when we need help. Often specific expressions become an intimate language with our friends, our family – one that receives a unique meaning through use. At other times a simple word hides bigger narratives, collective memories of a nation or any kind of identity group. We built any philosophical argument with words; we use words when we fight with our partners. Words can be lyrics; words can be the name of an art piece. Words are our daily life. However, what happens when one of these words, part of our identity and part of our everyday life, cannot be translated? What happens if it has different connotations? What is lost in translation? What is found? We hope this issue finds more than it loses, and that the works presented in it help you grasp the difficult, sometimes daunting, but extremely interesting world of language and translation. ~ the editors

•5

An Experiment // The Translation Chain

A mouth, an ear, a mouth, an ear... The game of passing a whispered word around in a circle does not require many attributes.

Broken telephone, Russian scandal, Grapevine and Chinese whispers are a few of the many names of this game that is played by children worldwide. Tensely trying to receive and send in the best way you can, the real appeal of the game lies in the comparing afterwards. How big is the difference between the original word and the final outcome? Where exactly did it go wrong? Who irrevocably transformed the original word? When we take the formula of this game and expend it, make one word into one hundred thirty-three, and use players that speak multiple tongues, the game turns into an experiment. Does the essence of an English fragment remain throughout six subsequent translations? None of the participators have seen any other version than the one they were meant to translate, thus all mistakes were happily copied. The result of this experiment can be found on the following pages, but might be captured in one sentence: retelling a tale is more complicated than it seems.

A humble bow to our translators: Kat Lybaneva.......English into Russian Anna Sbitneva........Russian into Dutch Joep Harmsen........Dutch into Spanish Greta Maroni.........Spanish into Italian Zoë Dankert............Italian into French Anaïs Ribeyre.........French into English Original text by Laura Pannekoek

6•

Translator Chain How many translators does it take to change a lightbulb?

The reader is baffled, confounded even. Nevertheless, it sparks a strange sensation of familiarity amidst madness. ‘This must be a joke!’ is what the reader deduces from vague shards of memories – recollected past encounters with a question of the sort. Therefore: ‘It needs a witty answer!’ they conclude. The reader, though not a translator by profession (yet), translates. A cycle of meaning, lost and found and then lost again, ensues, the words turn and tumble – feast on each other with treachery until, in the hullabaloo of interlinguality, they simply iterate elusive semantics.

Then, the reader answers: One, although it would depend on the context, of course. One, initially, but two – three – four – five – six – would make the whole affair a lot more gezellig.

Цепь Переводов Сколько потребуется переводчиков, для того чтобы поменять лампочку? Читатель стыдливо сбит с толку. И тем не менее, вопрос вызывает странное ощущение фамилиарности посреди безумия. ‘Это же шутка!’ приходит читатель к заключению, вызванном расплывчатыми осколками воспоминаний от столкновений с похожим вопросом. Следовательно, ‘Нужен остроумный ответ!’ решает он. Читатель, хотя он (еще) не переводчик, переводит. Цикл значений, затерянных, найденных и вновь потерянных пращается, слова выворачиваются и перемещиваются - предательски кидаясь друг на друга, пока, в хаосе множества языков они не имитируют неуловимую семантикую И так, читатель отвечает: Один, хотя конечно же это зависит от контекста. Один, сперва, хотя два- три- четыре - пять- шесть сделали бы это занятие намного уютнее.

•7

Vertaalketting Hoeveel vertalers zou je nodig hebben om een lamp te vervangen? De lezer zijn verstand is beschamend neergeslagen.

En toch roept de vraag een vreemde gewaarwording van vertrouwen op ten midden van de krankzinnigheid. ‘Dat is toch een grap!’ Zo komt de lezer tot de conclusie, die is opgeroepen door wazige fragmenten van herinneringen van een aanvaring met een soortgelijke vraag. Daarom besluit hij: ‘Een scherpzinnig antwoord is nodig!’ De lezer, hoewel hij (nog) geen vertaler is, vertaalt. De cyclus van betekenissen, van verlatenen tot gevondenen en opnieuw verlorenen draaien om zich heen, de woorden wrikken zich los en verplaatsen zich, terwijl zij zich verraderlijk op elkaar werpen, totdat zij in de chaos van het merendeel van talen ophouden de ongrijpbare semantiek te imiteren.

En dus antwoordt de lezer: Eén, hoewel het natuurlijk afhangt van de context. Allereerst, één, hoewel twee, drie, vier, vijf of zelfs zes deze bezigheid veel gezelliger zouden maken.

Cadena de Traductiones ¿Cuántos traductores se necesitaría para cambiar una bombilla? La mente del lector se abate con vergüenza. Y, sin embargo, la pregunta evoca una sensación extraña de confianza en el medio de la locura. ‘¡Esto es una broma!’ Así, el lector llega a esta conclusión, que se evoca por fragmentos borrosos de recuerdos de una colisión con una pregunta similar.

Por eso decide: ‘¡Se demanda una respuesta aguda!’ El lector, aunque (aún) no sea traductor, traduce. El ciclo de significados, de abandonados a encontrados y nuevamente perdidos se giran alrededor, las palabras se arrancan y se mueven, mientras que se lanzan sobra la una a la otra, hasta que entre el caos de la mayor parte de los idiomas dejan de imitar la semántica escurridiza.

Entonces la repuesta del lector: ‘Uno, aunque depende naturalmente del contexto. Primeramente, uno, aunque dos, tres, cuatro, cinco y incluso seis harían esta actividad mucho más entretenida.’

8•

Catena di Traduzioni

Di quanti traduttori si avrebbe bisogno per cambiare una lampadina? La mente del lettore piomba nella vergogna.

Eppure, la questione evoca una strana sensazione di fiducia nel mezzo della follia. “Questo è uno scherzo!” Così, il lettore giunge a questa conclusione, che, con una domanda simile, evoca ricordi frammentati di una collisione offuscata. Per questo decide: “Si tratta di una domanda arguta!” Il lettore, anche se (ancora) non è traduttore, traduce. Il ciclo di significati, da abbandonati a ritrovati e nuovamente smarriti viene capovolto. Le parole si muovono arrancando mentre si scagliano l’una contro l’altra, fino a quando non si arriva al caos, dove la maggior parte delle lingue non riescono a imitare la semantica sfuggente.

Così la risposta del lettore: “Uno, anche se naturalmente dipende dal contesto. Prima uno, ma due, tre, quattro, cinque e anche sei renderebbero quest’attività molto più divertente”.

Chaîne de Traductions

De combien de traducteurs avrait-il besoin pour changer une ampoule? L’esprit du lecteur tombe en la honte. Pourtant, la question rappele une sentiment bizarre de confiance au coeur de la folie. “C’est une blague.” Ainsi, le lecteur arrive à concluder qu’une question identique evoqué des souvernirs fractionnés d’une collision nébuleuse. C’est pour celle-la qu’il decide : “Il s’agit d’une question spirituelle !” Le cycle de signifiés, abbandonés et retrouvés et de nouveau perdus aura détruit. Le lecteur, même s’il n’est pas (encore) un traducteur, traduit. Les mots se meuvent boitant pendant que ils se jetent l’une sur l’autre, jusqu’a quand il n’arrive pas au chaos, ou la plus grande parte des langues ne réussissent pas à imiter la semantiqué echappant.

Et ainsi le repond du lecteur : “Une, même si ça dépend naturellement du contexte. D’abord une, mais deux, trois, quatre, cinq et aussi six renderaient cette activité beaucoup plus amusant.”

•9

Chain of Translation How many translators do you need to change a light bulb? Shame invades the reader’s mind. However, the question recalls a weird feeling of confidence in the heart of madness.

“This is a joke.” Thereby, the reader is able to conclude an identical question evoked by the fractured memories of a nebulous collision. This is the one he chooses: “This a spiritual question!” The cycle of signifiers, abandoned and recovered and once again lost will be destroyed. The reader, even if he is not (yet) a translator, traduces. Limping words move while they throw themselves against each other, until they don’t reach chaos, or the languages’ larger part does not succeed in imitating the semantics that escape them.

Thus the reader answers: “One, even if it naturally depends of the context. First one, but two, three, four, five and even six would make this activity way more enjoyable.”

10 •

Wachtend op de Veerboot

Waiting for the Ferry

In mist gedoopte heuvels dichtbegroeid met groen was het eerste dat ik zag van China.

Green hills, their feet enveloped in white was the first of China I set my eyes upon.

De paden op mijn eiland bezaait met rode blaadjes, sikkels scherp als sneetjes of streken rode verf.

Small red leaves scattered across the island, sharp as cuts or brush strokes of red ink.

Ik zag Hong Kong in de schemering: tientallen vierkante lichtjes in torens die grijs versmelten met lucht en zee.

I saw Hong Kong at dusk: thousands of sparkling squares in towers blending grey with sea water and air.

In de tempels gevuld met kolkend sandelhout stroomt het licht voorzichtig tastbaar tussen dakspanten.

In its temples filled with incense swirling round light timidly pours in through slits in the roof and becomes solid

by Eveline Mineur

by Eveline Mineur

Eveline Mineur • 11

Het geelbruin opdwarrelen bij elke stap die ik zet, rottende stervruchten en de laaghangende geur van jasmijn.

Faded yellow flutters upwards with every step I take, rotting starfruit and the low-branch smell of jasmine.

En hoe ik me ̶ mijn vingers glibberig van het garnalen pellen ̶ liet vertellen dat ik houd van je nooit zo veel betekent, als in je eigen taal.

And how – my fingers slippery since I was peeling shrimps – someone said I love you never means as much as in your mother tongue.

Maar vooral:

But most of all:

Hoe de zon hier nooit wegzakt in een messcherpe horizon, maar in een vage wattenzachte of simpelweg verdwijnt.

How the sun here never sets in a razor sharp horizon but in a vague cotton softness or simply disappears.

12 •

Pieter`s First Day Without Words

by Jack Caulfield

One day Pieter awoke and found that he could no longer understand a word of what anyone said to him. It had been coming for some time—for the past weeks, months, perhaps years, he had found himself encountering more and more words he must surely have known previously, but which were now nothing more than arbitrary syllables. He would pore over his dictionary when he encountered these words, but find himself unable to even attach the sounds to letters. The pages seemed to melt before his eyes. Still, until now it had only been an occasional absence—a word here and there gone but generally the overall effect quite clear.

Now the whole façade of comprehensible

language dropped away before his eyes— there was not a single word, phrase or sentence of which he could confidently tell you the meaning. The whole thing was void.

The first he noticed of it was upon stepping into the street. He lived alone, in rented accommodation, and never saw the landlord, so there was no opportunity for conversation before he stepped out into the world. Today, as on any other day, he showered and dressed and left the house without eating breakfast. A habit he had never picked up. He first took notice of his wordlessness, in fact, not during a conversation that involved him, but one between passers-by. He caught only a few words of it—he could not tell what language was being spoken. This in itself was nothing; many people in his neighbourhood spoke other tongues and would rather speak in them than use the local language. To be unable to tell the difference between the

countless languages of which one knows nothing—this is no catastrophe. But here was the oddity: he could not tell with any confidence whether they were speaking his own language.

Now, this is by no means unheard of.

One encounters a person with a strong and unfamiliar accent, and can’t be certain whether they are speaking one’s own language or another of which one knows nothing. It is impossible in certain cases to tell. But these men did not seem foreign, or—and Pieter shamed himself for making such a crude distinction—not the kind of foreigners whose languages he would judge to be totally beyond the pale of comprehension. They spoke reasonably slowly—the shapes of the words, at least, should have been quitepossible to make out—yet he could not even have told you whether they were speaking his own language. Still, this had only been a brief encounter—he had heard not more than

Jack Caulfield • 13

twenty words, and, he reasoned, there were certainly vastly more than twenty words in even one’s own language that one could be expected not to know.

With this enfeebled reasoning, Pieter could not convince even himself.

Climbing aboard the bus to work, Pieter encountered an obstacle. The bus driver spoke to him in quite the same way as usual, except that today the words were, of course, incomprehensible. At first he was able to dodge the issue; the driver knew him, and his stop, and Pieter knew the fare. He placed it in the tray without comment. But while counting the change the driver continued speaking, and Pieter had no way of knowing whether he had done something wrong, paid the wrong amount perhaps, or whether it was simply small talk. It surely couldn’t be anything important, he reasoned. He mumbled something without even attempting to form words, and nodded for good

measure. The driver looked at him strangely; he fancied he was still waiting for a meaningful response. Instead, Pieter backed away, taking longer than he should have to break eye contact, and made for a seat towards the back.

Now the situation was beginning to bewilder him. What was he to do when he reached the office? He could not possibly function in this state. His peers would treat him as a laughing stock, or worse, an object of pity. It was true that Pieter had never attached much sentimental value to words, but finding himself suddenly without them, he began to consider for the first time the glaring practical issues with the lack. He did not miss inchoate, or whilom, or picaresque, but without phrases like indeed, quite well, and you?, good day, etc.,he felt naked.

He found himself relieved that no-one took the seat beside him on the journey; any attempt at conversation would have

been futile. But as quickly as he had felt this relief, he disowned it—surely now was the time to resolve the issue, to sit down with someone and persevere to understand their words while they were still insignificant, before his arrival at the office raised the stakes to unconscionable heights. This back-and-forth in his head made little difference; the bus was quite empty aside from him, and cruised past all other stops, seemingly making straight for the office.

Though bemused by this circumstance, naturally Pieter could by no means broach the topic with the driver. Besides, he had larger concerns.

They were leaving behind the grey confines of the urban and beginning upon the winding road to the office, which stood a little distance from town on a large hill.

The approach, which curved from side to side in a regular pattern to mitigate the sharp incline of the hill, was bordered on either side by grass, but grass carefully

14 • Pieter`s First Day Without Words

kept short and obedient, presumably by gardeners employed by the office. The effect, especially on an overcast day like this one was turning out, was somehow more dispiriting than a total absence of nature. Above this towered the office itself, which Pieter watched now with disquiet.

The building was stark white, and on brighter days than this stood out quite impressively against the sky. It had eight storeys, and owing to its already raised position, reached a far greater height than anything else in town. The bus pulled up outside the office, and Pieter stepped out.

The air, despite the colour of the sky, was uncomfortably warm and sticky. Pieter felt patches of sweat beginning to gather in his armpits and staining his white shirt.

He would make a bad impression before opening his mouth. He saw a couple of men, workers of some kind, standing side by side outside the office, looking down at something Pieter could not see for their

legs. He was not sure of the position of these men, beyond having always called anyone of their approximate class by the nebulous term ‘workers’. Lacking this determining word, now, he felt distinctly uneasy in their presence. Not that they had noticed him so far, but on his way to the office’s entrance he would have to pass by these men and felt somehow that this passage would constitute a menace to his being.

In the event, they of course posed no real threat, but it could not be said that Pieter passed them entirely without incident. As he approached, one of the workers, the one further from him, turned to the other. This also being the direction from which Pieter was approaching, it was unclear to him when the man began to speak whether he was addressing his fellow worker or Pieter himself. Pieter considered it highly unlikely that this man should be talking to him, but in the absence of

certainty and in a state of confused agitation, he decided it was best to approach and see what it was that the man was gesturing so insistently towards. He came up behind the two men and tried to stand between them, surmising only when they made no move to part for him and give him a clear look at the object they were so fascinated by, that he was not the one who had been addressed. Both men were considerably taller than him, obscuring his view, and yet he remained curious upon what object they could be so intent.

Without really knowing why, he gripped each man by the shoulder and lifted himself up, standing on the tips of his toes to peek over. Neither man, as Pieter might have expected if his mind were not in such disarray, took kindly to this. The man on his right turned to glare at him, while the left instinctively span around to see who was touching him, dislodging Pieter’s grip. At the same moment, enough good

Jack Caulfield • 15

sense returned to him to tell him not to touch strangers without warning, and he let go with his right hand too. He would have made an apologetic gesture had the sudden movement of the man on his left not concluded with a shoulder-barge which threw him off-balance, sending him tumbling backwards onto the muddy ground. The large men looked down at him with a mixture of pity, annoyance and surprise. One of them was saying something. The other reached out to help Pieter up. He tried to decline the man’s help, but in the end he was dragged up against his will. The other man concluded whatever he had been saying and Pieter nodded blankly to acknowledge it. The men turned back to the patch by the wall. Over their shoulders a minute earlier, Pieter had briefly seen the object of their apparent fascination: dog shit. A patch of dry old dog shit. He hurried away, as if fleeing a crime scene.

Upon entering the front doors of the office itself, still off-balance from the previous confusion, Pieter found himself facing another unexpected scene. His boss—or the man one step above him on the ladder, the man he had always thought of as ‘boss’, though the word had now vanished along with his name—was standing a little way into the large foyer, off to the right of the door. Why should his boss be waiting at the door for him?

Was he that late? He glanced instinctively at his watch but found it quite unreadable.

Numbers too, then. Before he could take in anything else from the room, Pieter felt his boss’s hand grasping his shoulder, firmly but without any anger he could detect. He was saying something to Pieter, his voice warm and inviting, not cold with censure. Pieter tried to say something, to excuse his lateness and his confusion. The words that came out of his mouth didn’t sound like anything, nor was he sure what

he had intended them to sound like. The boss seemed to take them in his stride, acting as if he could understand Pieter when Pieter could not even understand himself. Only now did he begin to notice the loose circle of his colleagues gathered around the entrance, all looking at him with the same encouraging pleasant expressions as the boss. An excited buzz of conversation had risen within this crowd.

They were seemingly impressed with what Pieter had said. He wanted to ask them what it was that was so impressive.

The hand on his shoulder began to steer him further into the room. Pieter felt that he ought to be responding to the stream enthusiastic words still being directed his way. He opened his mouth again, but this being greeted with a friendly shushing gesture from his boss (which seemed to say don’t say anything yet; we have something to show you), he abandoned the attempt.

He could understand this much. At the

16 • Pieter`s First Day Without Words

reading of gesture, body language, he was finding himself more proficient today than usual. Like blind people who find after the loss of their sight that their hearing improves as if to compensate, he thought.

Then he told himself to focus, to try to understand. He would not get through on body language alone.

Pieter allowed himself to be steered towards the lifts, trying to focus on the shape of the words and phrases bombarding him, will them into coherence. The group gathered around the entrance, made up of the familiar faces of women and men to whom he had once been able to attach names, at least for the most part, followed as the boss guided him onwards.

In fact, the whole office appeared to have an interest in whatever this was. The man from the reception desk stood up and joined the group as they passed, without a word but with a look of keen interest.

Though this small group could not be

the office’s entire staff, Pieter did not see anyone else during the journey who did not immediately join them. There were too many of them for a single lift, but by some strange fortune both opened at the same time, and everyone crowded in. Pieter and the boss—naturally—stuck together.

Silence prevailed in the lift; this much had not changed.

Both groups stepped out on the third floor. Pieter accepted being led to an unclear destination. The boss continued to talk, though in brief bursts now—he had evidently run out of things to say.

Pieter had been able to make no sense of any of it. Now and then one of the crowd following them would flit to the front of the group to address something to the boss, at which he would chuckle. Pieter thought he could still identify a chuckle.

He would sometimes join in, not knowing whether this was appropriate but meeting little resistance to his doing or not doing

so. He was finding that it did not matter much what he did.

At the end of one corridor the group halted, and Pieter thought the destination must finally have been reached. The boss swung open the door they were facing with his free arm (the other, his left, had remained on Pieter’s back, gently guiding him, the whole time). The door creaked as it swung open, and Pieter found his curiosity increasing; he wished desperately that his words had not chosen today to desert him, or that his boss had not chosen today to surprise him, if that was what this was.

Overwhelmed by events, he had not yet begun to posit a connection between one oddity and the other, nor accepted the possibility that his words might not be restored the next day.

The room beyond the door, it transpired, was empty but for a messy pile of desks and chairs in one corner. The floor was coated with dust. The room was basi-

Jack Caulfield • 17

cally unremarkable except for its capacity to induce a strong sense of claustrophobic unease. The window opposite the door was its only source of light, and this was unusually small, its tiny pane dirty almost to the point of opacity. It was set impractically high in the wall. A smashed lightbulb hung from the ceiling in the middle of the room. The room could not have been designed according to the architectural conventions of the rest of the office.

Pieter let himself be guided in, wondering what he was missing, while those who could manage (the room was small even without proper furnishing) filed in behind.

The boss began talking again in the same soft urgent tones. Pieter nodded and tried to smile and eventually made a noise he hoped would pass for assent.

At this the boss guided him back out of the dingy room, once again assuming for them a position at the head of the crowd and leading him—somewhere

else. Pieter had assumed there was only one stop on this tour (that was the concept Pieter had now begun to attach to what was happening, even if the word itself remained absent). Instead, it went on in the same fashion in which it had begun.

Pieter was led through a maze of corridors (and why should it be, suddenly, a maze?

He had worked here for several years, and thought to know his way around well enough. Had his sense of direction vanished with his vocabulary?) to a series of destinations of unclear import, intermittently spoken to by his glowing, effusive boss, who seemed to understand or pretend to understand everything Pieter said in return, and not to mind his incoherence. All the while followed by this crowd of sycophants—though really, he had no reason to believe their enthusiasm was anything but sincere—bobbing their heads, gazing as they ought to have gazed at an important and respected visitor. They

looked expectantly at him all the while— and yet they led him not to the most interesting or worthwhile attractions in the office, but to the unsightliest—a malfunctioning coffee machine that sprayed a brown liquid onto the ground; a clogged toilet; a wall of windows on the fifth floor, from one of which the glass was entirely missing. All these things they pointed at and watched him and smiled and spoke in the language he no longer understood, waiting as if for magnanimous comment or polite applause.

A long time passed in this fashion; Pieter, no longer able to read his watch, nevertheless felt certain it was four or more hours. A sort of tranquillity came over him as the morning (and, he had to assume, part of the afternoon) wore on.

He was seeing parts of the office he had previously had no reason to venture into, though he could not fathom what interest they were intended to hold for him now,

18 • Pieter`s First Day Without Words

or why so much of the place should be in such evident disarray. Yet his input did not seem to matter, or rather its specific qualities did not—he was clearly an indispensable part of things, however little it seemed to matter that he was, as he must surely be, talking nonsense. After it had gone on long enough, the experience became homogenous, one patch of mould began to resemble another, the creaking of the doors blended into one long drone, and Pieter found himself able to drift carelessly through the process. A sort of tranquillity in bafflement.

When the tour ended, it took him a few moments to realise that it was over.

The boss had clapped him on the back and the crowd begun to disperse, drifting off in various directions, an excited buzz rising around him as they began to talk amongst themselves. Still in a contented daze, Pieter did not at first recognise where they had stopped. Then for a few seconds after

recognising the room he was in, he searched for its name. Nothing. He shook his head. He knew the function of the place, its reason for being there, but somehow words continued to escape him. A large room, a space with tables and chairs and trays and food, he thought, though not in these words, not in any words. He was working by shapes, faint blurry concepts which without labels to determine them were drifting apart, turning incoherent.

I will eat, he thought, or: I want to eat.

Without words the distinction between a statement of desire and one of decision was a more subtle one than he could hold in his mind. He thought: I eat. He ate. He picked up a tray, then there was food on it, then not. He stood, at a certain moment within the previous he had sat down, and now he sat up stood up. People were around him, at the tables, the other ones and possibly his own. People were.

Talking. He tried to hear whether they

were saying good things about Pieter.

He thought something had changed in their tone though he didn’t know the words and he became sad for a moment.

The doors came towards him, he went towards the doors, he was in the corridor and then another, corridor corridor, two and then three, he walked from place to place. Concepts deserted him, the big ones and then the little ones and then the big ones. He passed through a room and then another, rooms plural, he began to miss picaresque, he began to think the tour had not done him good, in the room(s) people were pointing and talking, talking and pointing, he tried to think of the concept of ridicule but could not remember it, he tried twice. He was in another room which was a corridor, of this much he was certain, the corridor was a room, a small room with a big window, a cubicle or foyer. It was getting dark though he was certain it was still lunchtime, he spent a

Jack Caulfield • 19

long time staring at a clock in a dark room, or a short time, who can say, he spent a time and then he was elsewhere, outside, though in darkness and without words, he was without words he remembered, it was difficult to distinguish between them, outside and inside. He tried to remember the way home, he tried to remember the concept of home. Water leaked from Pieter’s eyes and he laughed, that water should do such a thing. Dry old dog shit.

Pieter shamed himself for making such a crude distinction. He remembered these thoughts and pictures but without words to pin them down they drifted away, what does that mean, dry old dog shit? Not what does that mean, but what means that? He tried to remember where one was meant to sleep, how one was meant to sleep, how one was meant. Chronology deserted him.

Pieter took off his clothes, first his underwear and then his trousers, his socks and then his shoes, his hat, had he a hat? Pieter

took off his clothes and lay down under a tree, he thought this was correct, yes, he knew it, the ground was wet, Pieter took off his clothes and lay down under a tree and waited for sleep, Pieter took off his clothes and lay down under a tree and waited for his second day without words.

20 •

A Pell Nua

by Carlota Font Castelló

To Naked Skin

(translated from Catalan)

by Carlota Font Castelló

A pell nua, calor i fred.

In naked skin, warmth and cold.

Un tremolor tímid, un contacte valent.

A shy shivering, a brave touch.

En fils de mitges paraules cada silenci un bes.

In threads of words every silence a kiss.

Amb els ulls tancats el món s’ha estès.

With closed eyes the world has stretched.

En dolor, plaer.

In pain, pleasure.

• 21

La Vida Plana

by Carlota Font Castelló Els penya-segats d’aquest racó són escarpats.

Quan hi ets al cim et precipiten.

No al mar, no al cel; ni a les roques tallants o a l’escuma blanca.

Però caus, caus i mentre t’allunyes veus que estàs sol.

Busques i no trobes, t’adones que no tens res en tu i no tens els altres.

El xoc de les ones amb les pedres t’arrossega, et porta i t’abandona al mar gris que t’envolta, et cenyeix fort, quasi t’ofega.

Per un segon els ulls s’omplen d’imatges que s’esborren i deixen les nines buides, veient com passa.

La vida plana.

The Plain Life

(Literal translation from Catalan)

by Carlota Font Castelló The cliffs in this place are steep.

When at the edge they plunge you.

Not to the sea nor the sky; or the sharp rocks and the white foam.

Still you fall, fall and while drifting away you see you’re alone.

You search and don’t find. you realize you have nothing inside and no one around.

The clash of the waves against the stone draws you, carries and leaves you in the grey sea which wraps you, clings to you, almost drowns you.

For a second your eyes fill up with images that vanish and leave your irises empty, seeing it passing.

The plain life.

22 •

Instructies voor het vertalen van gevoelens

by Joep Harmsen

Indien u niet over gevoelens beschikt – een onderbuik is geen gevoel maar een lichaamsdeel – bespaar u de moeite om verder te lezen, deze instructies zijn niet voor u. Graag verwijs ik u door naar een alexithymiespecialist. Voor de rest, de gevoelige types, let nu goed op. Angst, vertwijfeling, blijdschap, boosheid, eenzaamheid, verliefdheid, extase, melancholie, ontroering, heimwee en vertwijfeling; dit zijn geen gevoelens maar woorden: ons doelmedium. De bron, die wij klotsend in ons binnenste meezeulen en waar we ons altijd van bewust zijn: dat is gevoel.

Op de eerste plaats maakt een gevoel zich fysiek kenbaar: een versnelde hartslag, het uitscheiden van traanvocht, stijging van de lichaamstemperatuur, verslapping van de spieren; de lichamelijke verschijningsvormen zijn legio. Daarnaast resoneert een emotie in het hoofd en schiet het van synaps naar synaps, totdat het – vaak gefragmenteerd –aanbeland in ons taalcentrum. Hier blijven er woorden aanplakken als vliegen aan een kleefstrip.

Onvolmaakte woorden, idiosyncratische woorden.

Hoe omschrijft u dat gevoel op zo’n wijze dat uw gesprekspartner het ook begrijpt, dat wil zeggen, zich precies voor kan

stellen wat u voelt? In principe is dit onmogelijk, maar elke goede vertaler ziet een onmogelijkheid, een onvertaalbaarheid, als een uitdaging. Na jarenlange studie stel ik de volgende procedure voor: Ten eerste begint men met het meervoudig nuttigen van verschillen alcoholische dranken. Hierdoor zal eerdergenoemde klotsende bron stijgen naar het oppervlak en zo het oraal uiten van gevoel bevorderen.

Vervolgens probeert men de gevoelens te vangen in metaforen, hoe vergezochter hoe beter. De vervreemding die dit oproept bij de toehoorder zal de empathie, en daarmede het begrip, bevorderen. Krachttermen zijn hierbij aan te raden. Vergeet niet luid en duidelijk te spreken, schreeuwen is toegestaan.

Hierna dient men een pauze te nemen. Dit moment kunt u optimaal benutten door nog een ad fundum aan de lijst toe te voegen. In het geval dat de toehoorder deze pauze kaapt door zich te roeren bent u gedispenseerd van enige aandacht.

Zijn woorden zijn vrijwel altijd verspild. Herhaal vervolgens voorgaande stappen tot u naar tevredenheid uw emotie op tafel hebt gelegd of desbetreffende kastelein u uit zijn etablissement schopt. En onthoud: maak van uw hart geen moordkuil.

• 23

Beneath the Orange Tree: The Importance of Dutch Education Abroad

by Eveline Mineur The evening air is soft, the canopy of leaves that kept us cool during the day keeps the mosquitos close at this hour.

The young people gathered around the plastic table come across as a regular Greek group of friends but, if you would ask them, you would find out most of them have an English, Danish or Dutch parent. Although they have been raised on the Greek island Rhodes, currently half of them live in the country their mother has left behind around thirty years ago.

To give their children the advantage of feeling at home in both languages and cultures, bed time stories were read from Jip and Janneke, and holidays led back to the Netherlands, where milk tasted

different and dinner was served in the late afternoon rather than around nine in the evening. What has made the difference between a half-Dutch young man feeling less Dutch than a tulip and one who followed his further education in the Netherlands and can now actively make use of his dual nationality, is the availability of Dutch education abroad.

As in other countries, the demand for Dutch education arose from the GreekDutch families living on the island Rhodes.

In 1989 a school was founded, offering lessons in Dutch language and culture in the late afternoon, after the hours of the Greek day school. The teaching programme follows that of other Dutch schools, so children are able to continue their Dutch education without having fallen behind upon return to the Netherlands or Belgium. Like all NTC1 schools the Dutch School on Rhodes brings its pupils to the level of the Certificate ‘Dutch

as a Foreign Language’, which is accepted by nearly all Dutch educational institutions. Hence, this creates the possibility for children from Rhodes, and from all over the world, to continue their education in the Netherlands.

Since before the founding of the Dutch School on Rhodes the Dutch government has financially supported NTC schools. For around 200 Dutch schools in 78 countries, the government funding consisting of 400 euro per pupil a year was, besides the tuition fees, a necessary income to pay for teaching hours, teaching material, exams, the building and cultural activities. Unfortunately, the cuts on education expenses originating from 2013 have in 2016 resulted in a complete stop of financial support for Dutch educaNederlandse Taal en Cultuur, Dutch Language and Culture

1

24 • Beneath the Orange Tree

tion abroad. The Dutch State Secretary for Education, Culture and Science explained this budget cut with the suggestion of raising tuition fees and requesting an increased contribution of employers.

However, since only part of the children concerned is abroad because of a decision made by their parent’s company, the latter suggestion offers no complete solution.

And raising tuition fees might even have the opposite effect: instead of the gain of income, schools will see a decline in the number of pupils.

Despite a pressing petition and an addressing of the issue in the House of Representatives, NOB2 will have to make

Stiching Nederlands Onderwijs in het Buitenland, Foundation for Dutch Education Abroadwhich used to be responsible for distributing the subsidies

ends meet with a drastically reduced budget. If the course of Dutch governing does not change, Dutch schools abroad will have to find other ways of financially supporting themselves. While supporting Dutch education abroad is in the interest of the economic wellbeing of the state, since the disappearance of this education abroad will have an considerable impact on the Dutch foreign relations. Employees with families will be more likely to refuse a post abroad because their children will not be able to continue their Dutch educa-

tion. What effect will a reduced number of Dutch people working abroad have on political and business relations with other countries?

To help children express themselves in the languages of both their parents and to help them experience a connection with both cultures is, therefore, not the only reason for supporting Dutch education abroad. In addition to the personal and the economic aspects, there is another element that can have a direct influence on the state, namely the so-called ‘ambassadorship’3 of these 13,0004 Dutch children across the world. They and their parents are the ones that give people from other countries an idea of what the Netherlands and its inhabitants are like.

2

3 4

Source: the website of NOB Source: NOB in cijfers anno 2013

Eveline Mineur • 25

They are the links to the Netherlands that people abroad encounter in everyday life.

To go back to the group of friends beneath the orange tree, all of them have visited each other’s country at least once. One of them, a Greek-Dutch young man, considers working in Denmark, while his Greek friend will soon visit him in the Netherlands. While the evening air lowers to a comfortable temperature, they talk lively about the places they left behind for the summer, in the language they have in common. These young people are aware of the differences between their countries and appreciate and make use of their ability to switch between them.

With eye on the elections of the Dutch House of Representatives in March, raising this topic now is important. The ongoing disappearance of Dutch schools abroad is a consequence of budget cuts on education which Dutch voters are most likely unaware of. Even though it is

an essential part of Dutch education in general and a crucial investment in solid international relations. With this in mind, I ask you to consider contributing to the continued existence of the Dutch School on Rhodes via the website below, and thus giving a signal to the Dutch government to rethink the course of Dutch education.

Dutch Language and Culture School of Rhodes: http://www.ntcrhodos.com/ new/page.php?2 Crowdfunding for Dutch education: http://geefonderwijs.nl/

For the sound of Danish flies and street corners, men in bomber jackets and city lights, listen to the recording of Simon Roy reading the Danish version of his poem: https://soundcloud.com/simon-roy/nordvest-poem/s-cVrgf

26 •

Nordvest

by Simon Roy Danish version (original)

English version (translated)

Mænd i dynejakker i grupper på gadehjørner

Men in bombers in groups on street corners

Fluer i lyset luner sig på lamper

Flies warming their bodies on bulbs

Livets længde ændres i opfattelsen af tiden

Life’s length changes in the perception of time

Lukker og slukker dagen mens

Closing off the day while

Fluer i dynejakker kontrollerer byens lys

Flies in bombers control the lights of the city

• 27

Homergasten

the guest: Federico Gobbo In Homergasten we ask a guest contributor about a personal favorite in the realm of literature, theatre, film, TV, or otherwise. For this volume we interviewed lecturer Federico Gobbo, who discusses fictional languages, mainly Klingon from ‘Star Trek’ in this essay titled ‘Klingon, the Latin of Hollywood languages’

In 1993 I was in my first year of Media Studies at the University of Torino, Italy. The world was changing rapidly: the Berlin Wall and the Soviet Union fell, and a new technology: the World Wide Web arose. I have always been fascinated by the capability of human beings inventing languages for artistic purposes. During my early childhood I was already familiar with Tolkien’s languages of the MiddleEarth, and after reading The Search of the Perfect Language by the semiologist Umberto Eco, I got interested in Esperanto. Thanks to my father, the CEO of a small company who worked with IBM technologies in the 1990s, I could navigate the Internet – mainly through a textbased browser, called gopher –looking for my favourite topics of interest. That year I came across the Klingon Language Institute primitive website. How could a language of a fictional universe such as Star Trek be similar to the Accademia

della Crusca, the institution that guards and monitors Italian for centuries? That was my question then. So, I delved into the topic and studied the Klingon language and its purposes, even if I was not a Trekkie (and still I am not).

What I came across was a completely new phenomenon. Klingons, the most important alien race in Star Trek, already appeared in 1967, but they did not have a full-fledged language until Paramount Pictures, the owner of the copyright behind Star Trek, hired a professional linguist: Marc Okrand. This happened because fans were unsatisfied about how the Klingon language was spoken by the actors in the films. For that purpose, in 1984, for the occasion of the third Star Trek film, The Search of Spok, Okrand wrote a grammar and dictionary of this ‘alien’ language – hence Klingon in truth is structurally a humanalien language. The basic principle followed by Okrand was

28 • Homergasten

simple: take American English as a point of reference, and choose all the linguistic traits you need from a wide variety of American English languages. For instance, the basic word order of Klingon is OVS (that is: Object, Verb, Subject), unlike English and several other prominent European languages. This shows how Klingon functions as an alien language.

What happened then was a surprise to both Okrand and Paramount Pictures.

Trekkies wanted to speak Klingon, not in the Star Trek universe, but in real life.

They needed words such as ‘chocolate’ or ‘deodorant,’ which are completely out of scope of the Klingon culture. A new edition of the Klingon dictionary was published. At its acme, in the year 2000, 19 persons could speak Klingon fluently, while less than one hundred in total had some command, according to aMA thesis on the subject by a Swedish student, Yens Wahlgren – himself a fluent Klingon

speaker – who interviewed them.

Klingon was the first language of its kind: Hollywood languages. Later Marc Okrand planned several other languages, notably Atlantean for Disney animated movie Atlantis.Other two major players came out in 2009: Paul Frommer’s Na’vi, made for James Cameron’s Avatar movie, and David J. Peterson’s Dothraki, made for the popular HBO TV-series Games of Thrones. The latter, in particular, became the most prominent alien language inventor ever, and recently (2015) he published a book on the art of language invention.

The destiny of Klingon, and similarly of any Hollywood languages, are bound to the fortunes of the diegesis they live in: in other words, they live as long as the fictional universe lives. In fact, after the closing of the classic Star Trek series, the interest in the Klingon language dropped down. Even if the reboot of the diegesis

through the new film series gave the occasion to revitalize the Klingon language, Klingons almost disappeared from the plots. A notable exception is found in Star Trek: Into Darkness (2013) where there is an entire dialogue in Klingon: Lieutenant Nyota Uhura (Zoe Saldana), herself a non-native speaker of the language, here once uses the language. Too marginal for a relaunch.

Klingon has become the Latin of Hollywood languages. The covert rule is that all human alien languages that came afterwards should not be too similar to Klingon. And the destinies of Klingon were well taken into account while launching a fan base of the freshly new invented language. By now, the most successful is Dothraki. David J Peterson transformed his hobby into a job: while working in close relation with studios in Hollywood and abroad, he was able to invent several other languages, for the purposes of the

Federico Gobbo • 29

show and in some cases, for the fan base too. All these Hollywood languages have as their ancestor Klingon, the first alien language spoken by humans – in other words, they are, with an oxymoron, alien human languages.

So, what is the next step in language invention for the purposes of art? A novelty came out in the last months. In fact, a truly alien language can be seen in the recent film Arrival (2016) – interested readers can have a glance reading at Stephen Wolfram’s blog post on November 10, 2016, without spoilers. The difference is that these alien creatures are not physically similar to human beings, therefore the physiology of the sounds they use for communication cannot be reproduced by human beings, neither diegetically (in the world shown plot) nor extra-diegetically (in the real world). The linguist who dealt with that alien language had to think another way to communicate with the

aliens (and I say no more, as I do not like spoilers).

After decades of somnolent days in the field of language invention, a new Renaissance started since 2009, thanks to Hollywood, capturing the attention not only of specialists, but also of the public. My students tell me that after these films the field of language sciences in general, and linguistics in particular, is more respected by their friends who study ‘nobler’ sciences such as computer science or maths. Moreover, for writers of fantasy or science-fiction literature, inventing a language for their diegetic worlds is an option worth a serious consideration.

Graphic novels such as The Arrival (same title!) by Shaun Tan has a secret alphabet, a part of language invention that always captures the imagination of anybody, children included, who seem to invent secret languages spontaneously at a certain age, according to anecdotic evidence.

I think that in the near future the arts and crafts of language invention will be considered a distinct form of art, like: painting, photography, cinema, and so on. However, no new linguistic invention can supplant Klingon in its role of being the first successful Hollywood language, a beautiful heritage of creative multilingualism of the 20th century.

30 •

Με τον μπαμπά/With dad

by Dimitris Kotis

The reason I am writing this is a game.

A soccer game to be more precise. It is not about the match itself, but rather about what it means in my relationship with my father. You see, it all started when I wanted to book tickets for a game between Ajax and Panathinaikos for the UEFA Cup. While doing this I came to a realization: that these two teams meant something to me as a pair of opponents, because of my father. I wanted to write about the first time my father and I watched these two teams together. However, soon I realized that I had spent 500 words on such a detailed description of an evening that it seemed dry, more like a report. So instead of making a detailed account of that night

and the events that followed, I decided to focus on the different moments in order to describe that experience I shared with my father.

I remember the wooden frame of the television and the clang noise it made when you opened it.Then the distinct sound of his “Ciao”, a blue Piaggio motorbike, followed by my father coming in holding a humid bag of souvlakia. His blue work jacket with the Coca Cola and 3E logos stitched on it seemed almost black because of the rain outside. I can also see my mother sitting on the couch reading. She had taken on the role of the away-supporter, more as a default than by choice since she was the only “Dutch” person around. My brother had already gone to bed while I was trying to show interest in a game just so I could stay up late on a school night. I remember my father teasing my mother about Kluivert and Davids saying: ‘Δες εδώ ένα Oλλανδό! Ε

Λίντακι?’ As he did so his face would light up. Then like the Greek saying goes: his moustache laughed with him, following his facial expression. I remember him jubilant and shouting GOOOAL!! when his team Panathinaikos scored a few minutes before the final whistle. My mother and I exchanged a look and stared at him in surprise, since such outbursts of emotion were rare with him. For my father this was the night his team made the first step towards the final. For me it was the night that Ajax was introduced into my life.

The decision to become an Ajax supporter came after careful deliberation of course, or after as much critical thinking as an eight year-old could muster anyway. I figured that since my mother was Dutch and my Father Greek, I could afford supporting a club from both countries. It is funny how we end up supporting a team. In most countries this depends on the province or city you come from. In

Dimitris Kotis • 31

Greece however, with the five top teams coming from the two largest cities and the rest of the league teams being small to non-existent, you pretty much choose a team at random. The bizarre thing is that it then becomes a life commitment.

Nobody really changes teams as they grow up. They might stop following soccer but they would never switch teams. So at the age of nine, I committed to this Ajax team from Amsterdam even though I barely knew anything about them.

This sudden commitment must have seemed so random two weeks later, when the two teams met again. I celebrated every time Ajax scored, defeating Panathinaikos 0-3 in the end. Now that I think about it many years later, my father must have thought it childish, maybe even annoying, considering that for him the dream of seeing his team reach the final was crushed. To add insult to injury, his son was supporting the opposite team like

a zealot, a team which he didn’t even know existed up until two weeks prior. Before the game ended he stood up; he had seen enough. Tomorrow he had to get up early once again to go to work. He took a last sip from his coffee that had been standing on the cupboard since the afternoon. He came to my side of the couch, kissed me on the head and said, ‘Έλα Mιμάκο μου,

πήγαινε και εσύ για ύπνο, είναι αργά.’ You see, he wasn’t angry or sad his team lost.

He didn’t mind that I was happy and celebrating his loss. No, he acted as a father: overlooking his young son’s enthusiasm and naivety.

My naivety became dedication as I embarked on a quest to gather as much of Ajax as I could. Back in the 90’s you

32 • Με

τον μπαμπά/ With dad

couldn’t just Google something or look it up on Wikipedia; the internet was still in its cradle. My grandmother would sometimes bring me some small trinkets when she would visit: key chains, little flags, stickers and the like. Ironically though, most of my initial information about the team I got from my father. Whenever the team was mentioned in the newspaper (which was rare) he would bring it to my room and say, ‘Έλα να, ο Ajax σου!’, or he would leave it at the kitchen table for me to find the next day. I still have some of those clippings, wrapped religiously with plastic and placed somewhere in a drawer back home. However, most of the information I gathered came in verbal form, either directly or through his recollections of events.

One of those recollections which stuck with me throughout the years, was of the European Cup Final of ‘71 between Panathinaikos and Ajax at Wembley. He

told me he was still at sea at that time, on a merchant ship heading to Japan, and how he and the other sailors gathered closely around a transistor radio to hear the game’s broadcast. Nikos the cook had taken the liberty of “borrowing” some beers from the officers’ supply for occasions like this.

My father used to speak fondly of that cook. He said that he always saved him an

extra piece of pastitsio or lasagna and then joke that the crew would die of starvation in the middle of the ocean because of my father’s excessive eating. Giannis the radio man was the translator, being one of the few in that smoke-filled room who spoke English. ‘What is he saying?’, they would ask him again and again. ‘I don’t know ρέ μαλάκα! There is a lot of interference

Dimitris Kotis • 33

and the engine room’s noise doesn’t help either.’

Sometimes I try to imagine him how he was back then. He must have been around twenty, no wife, no children. He wasn’t my father as I knew him. He was just a kid with his whole life in front of him. The thought that twenty years later he would be sitting at home watching yet another game between these two teams, in front of a television with his son, probably never crossed his mind. Now I am sitting behind a computer typing these words, planning to book the tickets online. I am going to watch the game live, between my Ajax and my father’s Panathinaikos. This time there won’t be the smell of souvlaki in the air. There won’t be a clang noise as we turn on the TV or the characteristic sound of his Ciao as it approaches our house. He won’t be teasing my mother about Kluivert and he won’t get up at the end of the game to kiss me and tell me to

go to sleep. It won’t be like the semifinal of ‘96. No, this time he will not be there.

I don’t know what the game of 2016 will be like. I don’t know what moments, what memories that evening will create.

I cannot know what the future holds. Just like he didn’t know what the future had in store for him, during the finals of ‘71, when he was listening to the game in a smoke-filled room with the engine roar covering part of the broadcast, while he sailed somewhere in the Pacific. What I do know is that on the 24th of November I will be watching our teams, our match.

And even though he won’t be at the ArenA with me, this game is part of my memories of him, part of our moments; it will be about me and him. I would still be watching the game, με τον μπαμπά.

34 •

Adaptations of Sherlock Holmes

by Julia Neugarten

My favourite type of translation is adaptation. What’s more exciting than transposing a well-loved story from one medium to another? What’s more dangerous? When turning a novel into a film or a historical figure’s life into a musical, creative masterminds run the risk of disappointing a group of rabid fans or just grossly disfiguring their source material. Whenever someone manages to avoid these pitfalls, I am in absolute awe of them, and that’s exactly what I was on Sunday the 15th of January, 2017.

Perhaps I should explain, for the uninitiated: the 15th of January was the date the last episode of Sherlock season four aired. Quite possibly it was the last

episode ever. BBC TV series Sherlock has been enchanting audiences since it first aired in 2010. It has engendered a fervent, dedicated fandom and launched leading men Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman into stardom. The show is an adaptation of the detective stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, published between 1887 and 1927, mostly in The Strand Magazine. These stories were all short, written from the perspective of Sherlock Holmes’ closest friend, Doctor John Watson. They were accounts of the shenanigans Holmes and Watson got up to as a duo of consulting detectives in London.

Each and every time, Holmes caught the bad guy by applying his own, watertight brand of logic. The stories, at the time, were a sensation, and their avid readership is still often cited by those attempting to trace the history of fan culture.

Thus, it is not surprising that Steven Moffatt and Mark Gatiss, the exceptio-

nally talented writers of many an episode of Doctor Who, endeavored in 2010 to adapt the Sherlock Holmes stories for television. Almost immediately Sherlock became the greatest thing television viewers had ever seen, and looking back on that first, brilliant episode, A Study In Pink, it isn’t difficult to fathom why. Sherlock incorporated innumerable clever little elements from the stories by Conan Doyle, yet also fit in seamlessly with the landscape of contemporary television. After all, it had been Sherlock’s unparalleled intelligence, combined with a sense of immediacy, which had made him into a success the first time. Thousands of readers were beguiled by the idea of a criminal underworld, right there with them in London.

People were mesmerized by the notion that one could enter a conspiracy just by intercepting some correspondence or entering a tiny flat in Baker Street. The 2010 adaptation succeeded in conveying

Julia Neugarten • 35

that same sense of accessibility, as though someone powerful was trusting you with a great secret, and the secret was called Sherlock.

The plots of the original stories relied heavily on modern technology: an intercepted telegram, a well-phrased riddle or a decoded piece of information was often central to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s stories. Modern day Sherlock has done a remarkable job of adapting this characteristic, going so far as to display text messages on screen and visualizing the digital age in new and surprising ways. I know of few shows, except perhaps Mr. Robot, that are equally aware of the social ramifications of technological developments and do such a brilliant job of portraying them.

Upon first encountering the show, viewers didn’t know what to do with themselves. I myself was included in

the flabbergasted masses. The show, which consisted, remarkably, of three 90 minute-episodes, completely blew our minds.

The acting was superb, the writing incredibly clever, and everything about the execution shone with glamour and beauty.

Worst of all, the cliffhanger at the end of season one was enough for me to lose weeks of sleep over. I was hooked.

Of course, in the two-year period that elapsed between seasons one and two, I had to find an outlet for all of the “feels” Sherlock and John were giving me, and their adaptation made itself useful once more. The fan community welcomed me with open arms, as it had done, in a much more furtive fashion, for my fellow fangirls in the 19th century. I was pulled into a web of semiotic analyses, far-fetched interpretations, close readings of the original stories and conspiracy theories it will probably take me years to escape from.

Everywhere I turn, I see gay subtext. And

36 • Adaptations of Sherlock Holmes

I’m not alone.

Incredibly, there is no end to the process of adaptation. Sherlock has inspired over 90.000 works of fanfiction on the Archive Of Our Own, the most popular website within the fan community. Some ofthese are slices of life, barely a 100 words long, others are novel-length or part of an even longer series. Then, more recently, I read Anne Jamison brilliant exploration of fan culture: Fic: Why Fan-fiction Is Taking Over The World, and I came to a new understanding of the cleverness of adaptation. What I love best about the Sherlock fandom, and any fandom really, is the way it has brought people together to form new and surprising international friendships. However, the fan-works themselves are also something of a marvel.

Jamison, an associate professor of English at the University of Utah, makes special mention of The Sensa-

Julia Neugarten • 37

tion Of Falling, a piece of novel-length fanfiction by an author named ‘greywash’ that makes innovative use of embedded images and audio files to further its plot and display the many ways in which text messages and emails, those technologies intended to make life easier for us, indeed complicate matters and lead to new and surprising types of misunderstandings. The use of adaptation is twofold: not only does it engage a large community of readers and viewers and help them work through complicated emotions regarding the source material, it also helps to shape the ways in which narrative will be conveyed in the future: social and digital media have become inextricably entwined with more traditional modes of storytelling.

What fascinates me is how adaptation begets adaptation. The original stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle seem to lose their sacred significance in the face of this never-ending process. I promise you there’s wonderful Sherlock fanfiction out there that can be enjoyed

without you knowing the first thing about the original stories, or even about the TV show. Somehow, in an attempt to keep things current and add a dash of diversity, Sherlock Holmes has become lost in translation. I think it’s safe to say that the Sherlock Holmes fandom is here to stay, joining great ones like Harry Potter and Star Trek in the annals of fandom history.

Adaptation has immortalized the Baker Street Boys.

38 •

The Third of February

by Kat Lybanieva

The waiting room was packed with people, even though it was quite late.

I was leaning against the wall blankly staring at Sasha’s face, that was starting to turn green. I was still stoned and not sure how real anything around me was, so I glimpsed at Rens. He was pretty spaced out, but normal, not green. I found it quite funny, the longer I looked at Sasha the more he reminded me of Gena the Crocodile from this old Russian cartoon I used to watch when I was a kid called “Cheburashka”. After a quarter of an hour that seemed like eternity, the voice on the speaker finally called out our number and I unenthusiastically followed Rens and Sasha inside.

We were having drinks at some bar, when Eleanor suddenly remembered that Sasha lives right around the corner. She invited him to join us, he seemed reluctant at first but came down anyway. Right away, something about him seemed off: Sasha was really out of focus and didn’t know what was happening, but we figured since he just got back from Carnival weekend on the neighboring island he could still be hungover. A couple of hours later though, he started to feel sick and told us that he wasn’t feeling well so he took some painkillers before he left.

When Eleanor’s father came to give her a lift home, he asked to be taken to the hospital. Rens and I got worried, it was pretty obvious to us what had happened, so we took him to the emergency room.

We entered a tiny white ward, a lady doctor in front of a computer told us to sit down.

“So, what exactly bothers you,” she

said.

“I took Tylenol, Oxycodone, Demerol, Paracetamol, Benadryl and cough syrup,” Rens and I exchanged awkward looks.

I was really impressed that Sasha was able to pronounce all those names in his current state.

The lady doctor stopped typing and looked at him in a complete stupor.

“Why?” “I…I was feeling sad.” She noticed he was feeling uncomfortable talking about it so she asked if he wanted us to leave.

“No. I took three pills of Tylenol around noon, Oxycodone maybe two hours later, four pills of Demerol half an hour after that, then two table spoons of Benadryl, three pills of Paracetamol and two more table spoons of cough syrup” “That’s it?”

“And alcohol.”

The lady doctor filled in some paper work and left the room. She came back

Kat Lybanieva • 39

with another doctor who brought in a stretcher, they told Sasha to lie down and wheeled him out of the room. Rens and I quietly dragged along. We suddenly found ourselves in a huge hall with loads of doctors and nurses moving around, shifting between patients. It felt like we were in a theatre and someone had just removed the curtain. Nothing was still and nothing felt real, it was as if everyone was just playing a role and the patients were some weird props. It struck me that I had been in that hallway before, a year ago when I had broken my foot and I was riding around the place in a wheelchair. I also remembered that my father worked at the hospital and it was generally a bad idea for me to show up there. I stood next to a curtain hoping that I wouldn’t be seen from the hall.

The doctor wheeled in an IV and continued asking Sasha questions. I wasn`t paying attention. Just then I had realized

he was wearing a Teen Suicide T-shirt and burst out laughing. The doctor gave me a judging look, told us to stay quiet and left the room. While I rushed to draw the curtain, Rens started inspecting the room we were in.

“I wonder if they have any codeine in here” he murmured.

“The fuck do you need codeine for?”

“You can sell that shit, it’s pretty expensive.”

“For fuck’s sake can you stop we are at a fucking hospital,” I started freaking out.

I was getting really paranoid that one of the doctors would recognize me and tell my father. “I’m gonna get into so much shit if anyone finds out I’m here, can you PLEASE stop attracting attention.”

Rens looked back at Sasha.

“Yo dude, how are you feeling?”

“Branches fall off trees just like leaves do.” he was blankly starring at the ceiling above him.

When the doctor came back he asked Rens to stay with Sasha overnight to ensure he wouldn’t do anything dangerous. It was already past midnight so Rens called me a cab home and said he would take care of Sasha. As I was leaving the ward, I was surrounded by beds occupied by old, disabled people. They were everywhere.

Most of them looked deformed and were making strange noises. I could feel anxiety and disgust rising in me, the air felt heavy with sickness, so I stormed out of the hospital as fast as I could.

I came back the next day to visit, when Rens had already gone home to sleep. At the entrance to the ward I ran into Sasha, who didn’t look like Gena the Crocodile anymore, his mother and Eleanor, who was visiting. They were going to the cafeteria for lunch so I followed them down.

I had met Sasha’s mother once before, but she didn’t remember me. She thanked me for taking care of her son and insisted

40 • The Third of February

Kat Lybanieva • 41

for paying for everyone’s food. Sasha got grape juice. As soon as we started eating, his father came. He worked at the hospital, at the labs, which was pretty ironic because of all the substances he found in his son’s blood. But they weren’t angry at him, just sad. Everyone was eating in silence; we didn’t really know what to say. Sasha’s mother looked heartbroken, his father didn’t show much emotion. On our way back up Eleanor told me that Sasha and Rens had to stay the night in the hallway, because there wasn’t enough space in the wards. Returning there was very intimidating, the smell of sickness and old people infiltrated the place. All of us stood awkwardly around Sasha’s bed in silence for a few more minutes. Eleanor brought him a coloring book, crayons and stickers to cheer Sasha up and his mother thought she was his girlfriend and that made her smile a little bit. Thankfully soon we had to leave to be in time for our

bus and Sasha’s parents took him home that evening. The ward was still filled with faceless, deformed people.

42 •

Words Can`t Think

by Carlota Font Castelló

‘Your lips are red.’

‘I know.’

‘What’s wrong?’

‘Nothing’s wrong.’

‘You always have red lips when you bite them. And you bite them when something’s on your mind.’

‘I always bite my lips.’

‘Where is she?’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘She left?’

‘What was she supposed to do?’

‘You don’t understand…’

‘I remember. I remember everything.’

‘No, you don’t. Memory doesn’t work like that.’

‘I remember you.’

‘I remember you too. Usually too much.’

‘Do you want to walk with me?’

‘No.’

‘I would never have imagined you listen to this kind of music.’

‘Good.’

‘You’re a complicated puzzle.’

‘I think you should listen to this song.’

‘Which one?’

her.’

‘She left.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘I should have told her.’

‘Didn’t she know?’

‘Probably. But I should have told ‘Tell her now.’

‘I can’t.’

‘Don’t be sorry.’

‘It’s just… when you said you didn’t want to… I got scared.’

‘Why?’ ‘Because it hurt. And that means I can get hurt if you don’t want me anymore.’

‘I know. But don’t I have the same fear?’

Carlota Font Castelló • 43

‘Dance? Now? No way.’

‘This is a date right?’

‘Yes.’ ‘Well you should know that, for a date not to be boring, you must dance.’

‘What are we dancing to, then?’

‘What do you think?’

‘Just a little bit. I’d like to show you something’ ‘What is it?’

‘I did it, I opened a café.’

‘I’m not surprised, I always knew you would.’

‘I named it Beast of Burden.’

‘Want to go on a date with me pretty girl?’

‘Dressed like this?’

‘Obviously.’

‘Okay, let’s go. You can’t change either though.’

‘I wouldn’t dare.’

‘I don’t know what to do.’

‘I can’t help you with that.’

‘I never said goodbye.’

‘She will be back.’

‘How can you be sure?’

‘This is her home now.’

‘You’re good at this.’

‘Thank you.’

‘I usually hate it when people try to cheer me up.’

‘Why?’

‘I have in my mind exactly what I want them to say, but they never do.’

‘You should always tell me what you’re thinking.’

‘That’s impossible. Words can’t think. Words are just a poor imitation of everything.’

‘Then- ’ ‘Then it’s nice when you surprise me.’

‘I can’t sing.’

‘Me neither. I wish I could sing.’

‘That doesn’t mean we can’t try… in the shower?’

‘Want to try now?’

‘Okay.’

‘Do you know the lyrics already?’

‘I know I’ll never be your beast of burden…’

44 •

The Untranslable Glossary

Schadenfreude German (Dutch: leedvermaak), a feeling of joy when hearing of or seeing the troubles of others.

Hija Albanian, a sort of shadow. When a child has its father’s physical features, we might say it has its mother’s hija, which comes close to facial expression.

Estrenar Spanish/Catalan, to use something for the first time, for example new clothes.

Fika Swedish, a break during which you drink something warm and eat pastry. Both a noun and a verb: to go for fika, what did you have for fika? We fika’ed yesterday.

Llepafils Catalan, literally ‘thread licker’. Someone picky with food and without much appetite. The closest English translation would be ‘fussy eater’.

Træls Danish, a word that expresses mild irritation, but can be used in many situations. “The day was træls because of the rain.”

Gezellig Dutch (Danish: hyggelig), adjective that expresses a cosy/ enjoyable situation, usually in the company of others.

Sobremesa Spanish, time spent after a main meal, usually lunch, conversing with friends or family without getting up from the table.

Toska Russian, a refined kind of boredom. One is bored not by lack of appealing stimulants but by the very things that are supposed to be interesting: creativity, wit, intelligence, history, the universe.

Cafuné Portuguese, the act of going with your fingers through someone’s hair, in a loving, tender manner.

• 45

Fernweh German, literally ‘farsickness’. A longing for places you’ve never been. The opposite of homesickness.

Abbiocco Italian, the feeling after a rich and abundant lunch.

Usually it provokes sleepiness and grogginess.

Dellhu tqil Maltese, a person who is always the first one to be noticed or caught when a group of people does something wrong.

Roughly translates to “scapegoat”.

Waldeinsamkeit German, the feeling of being alone in the woods. Not negative, rather a positive feeling of being surrounded by nature.

Culaccino Italian (Dutch: waterkring), the stain left on a table by a moist glass. Usually a round stain where the wetness of the bottom of the glass has soaked into the wood.

Tartle Scottish, to hesitate in recognizing a person or thing, as happens when you do not remember someone’s name.

46 •

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• 47

llustrations Nina de Jonge: cover, p. 19, p. 40 Iris Mathilde van der Werff: p. 2, p. 26, p. 31, p. 32, p. 33, p. 36 Kat Lybanieva: p. 4, p. 9, p. 35, p. 36, p. 41, p. 47 Tiffany Tang: p. 10, p. 11 Albert Planas: p. 20, p. 21 Zep de Bruyn: p. 22, p. 27 Esmee Koemans: p. 24

Layout by Zep de Bruyn and Kat Lybanieva

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