On Mon, 24 Mar 2003, Philip Hart wrote: #On Mon, 24 Mar 2003, Jim Laubacker wrote: # #> I just finished Issola, which I enjoyed greatly. However, one word near #> the end caught my attention - Vlad said 'Okay'. I know this is just a #> translation of what Vlad said in Dragaeran, translated into Easterner, #> then translated into English. However, Vlad would never say 'okay'. #> Would it be possible for the translator to choose a different term in #> the future? # #I'm surprised you noticed this particular four-letter-word (when other #such are conspicuously absent from the Vladiad) and not "hissy-cow", which #struck me as likely coming from one of those #computer-translation-of-English-to-Russian-to-Albanian-to-English chains - #I think it's right that a translated narrated text have these sorts of #"problems" on occasion - compare Vlad occasionally quoting Morrolan as #saying something like "It mislikes me" and sometimes saying "That bites" #- well, not the latter, but anyway speaking colloquially. I'm surprised that anyone's surprised. We all speak in different styles, or "registers", in different circumstances. Sometimes I'll throw an archaism, and often I'll use a foreign expression, simply because I feel like it. -- Dr. Whom, Consulting Linguist, Grammarian, Orthoepist, and Philological Busybody a.k.a. Mark A. Mandel