Wish all German books were translated to English (was: Jagdgeschwader 5 - Volume 3)

[Sergio Luis dos Santos]

Originally Posted by Eric Mombeek

We are enthusiasts, losing a lot of money by doing these books, but we became rich with the contact, the friendship, the trust that we found by the veterans who told us what they lived. What an experience!
Regards
Eric

You said all in a few words !!
Hugs from Rio Eric,

[chuck1945]

The comments about possibly losing part of the story when it is translated has a humorous sideline to me. Several months ago I got the Polish publisher Kagero's booklet on the F2A Buffalo. Kagero's format is to present the text in both Polish and English. The book starts with an account of the Buffalo flown by Marine pilots during the Battle of Midway. There is an extensive quote from one pilot's combat report which of course was originally written in English. The publisher had translated the report to Polish and then instead of reverting to the English version for the English text, translated the Polish back to English. Needless to say something was lost in the translation.

[John P Cooper]

Eric,

Thank you for the rapid reply!!! I am very glad to hear the reason why you are writing books! History and truth lost is a very sad thing – I am sure you agree!

I guess living in the United States so far from Europe creates many challenges in culture and language but it is the interests that we have in common that can be used to unite us for a common goal.

Maybe it is the time for authors like yourself to band together and form an independent publishing house aided by people like myself and those on many forums to support you not only by buying the books but in other way - (think out of the box!).

I know I am going out on a limb here with this suggestion but I feel this can be done. I know I am just a person in a far away country whom you only know via cyber space but I think and feel my point is a valid one. What are your thoughts on this – certainly it can not be new idea?
I will close for now but let me say again I commend you on your point of view about the purity of work.

Sincerely

John

[FrancisM]

Hello all,
well I agree with Eric in all respects but I actually started out with an English version of my book (Sea Eagles). This sold out and although I worked on updating it with another publisher, this never materialised for several reasons.
I'm aware that the book was well received, so there's certainly a market for an updated and revised version.
So I'd always wanted to do a German version and eventually had the possibility to produce it myself, so this is "Die Jäger der Graf Zeppelin".
I'd given the German veterans and families copies of the English book but knew they couldn't read it as such. Giving them a German edition was the most satisfying part of all.
Well following this I've had one or two people ask for an English version, not more than that. However I can't do it, even if many more people asked. I have a cellar full of German language books so there's no space for more, quite apart from the financial question.
When I started serious research I realised that without a knowledge of German I'd never produce anything that I'd be satisfied with so I enrolled in evening classes and made trips to Germany. It wasn't easy, it needed a lot of effort, but it was well worthwhile.
Despite being a native English speaker I still prefer the original accounts over my translations, although I'm no language expert. I agree with Franek's points here, its easy to lose information in a translation.
If you want to read about the German Luftwaffe you have to learn at least some German in order to understand the basic terms, taking it that bit further is easy and essential if you want to get more out of it.

Francis Marshall

[Jukka Juutinen]

Well, let´s have a reminder: what if the person is interested in (but has no intention to do archival research or interview anyone!!!) e.g. Polish, German, Chinese, Japanese, Russian, Hungarian, Rumanian, Czech, French and Serbian history. Do you really suggest that the person must learn all these languages? Do you really think such suggestion is based on any kind of reality??? How many of the board members speak at least 10 languages fluently? Anyone???

[Ruy Horta]

Jukka,

To answer your question bluntly...YES.

If you really want to have the possibility to further your study you should ideally learn the proper language(s). At one point most of us will have to accept limitations.

Translated work is a luxury, not a given, if you fail to understand that basic premisis it is no use to continue arguing the point.

You will have to learn dutch or have access to people who can translate material for you, if you wish to study WW2 operations of the Dutch AF.

Face it there are more languages than english.

[Juha]

Hello,
Meimberg's Feindberührung is translated to Finnish, the title is Viholliskosketus, and it's a good book as Ruy wrote. On the general subject, I never learned German in school but managed to read some PzD unit histories because it was and still is the only option. There are no English editions on those unit histories of the PzDs which fought mostly on the Eastern Front. That was years ago and my German skills are nowadays very limited so nowadays I bought rarely books in German, some of Prien's Jagdfliegerverbände der deutschen Luftwaffe 1934-1945 now and then and the reason is that it takes me at least 4 times longer to read a German book than a book in English. And nowadays the time is the limiting factor to me. There is more than enough good and interesting books in English and I still buy books faster than I managed to read them even if my daughter does, and has already done for some years, her best to stop that (mal)practice. Every time she found out that I have bought a new book she gives me a through scolding.

Juha

[Jukka Juutinen]

Juha, I have read the Finnish translation of Meimberg´s book. It was decent, but I have decided not to buy any of these Koala translations as long as the translator Hannu Valtonen keeps interjecting his PC agenda on almost every page of the translations. HV has competely misunderstood his work.

[Ruy Horta]

Jukka,

You seem to have some big issues.

1. You demand translations
2. Available translations must pass your approval

Perhaps you should change hobbies?

[Jukka Juutinen]

Issues? Sure! Or do you think it is the duty of the translator to comment on an author´s views by constantly interjecting his own comments (a little bit like "author: the sun was shining beatifully" to which the translator adds "this shows how extreme the author is". These kind of comments are virtually everywhere in Hannu V´s translations. So, I do have issues. If I want to read Rudel´s memoirs, I read Rudel´s memoirs, not any Schröderian pamphlet.