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Jun. 9th, 2013 08:44 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beer_good_foamyPosted a couple of thoughts over at the
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upupa_epops asked:
Buffyverse, translations. Have you ever seen Buffyverse in any other language? Tried to translate anything? Wrote fic in another language? I'm very curious about other people's experience with Buffyverse language in translation.
Just a brief idea I think I've posted someplace else before: I've watched Buffy in three languages - English, German (dubbed) and Swedish (subtitled). Some really odd voice actor choices and translations aside (the Swedish subtitler once has Spike describe Andrew as a "pimp" rather than a "ponce", which... would be a completely different show), what's stayed with me is the titles.
See, the original title Buffy, The Vampire Slayer really encapsulates a lot about the story (I wrote more on that here). It's the story of Buffy, who is a vampire slayer. You have a silly name, you have monsters, and you have the promise that the girl with a silly name will kick monster ass.
The Swedish title comes out Buffy och vampyrerna - Buffy And The Vampires - which not only makes it sound even more like a kids' show, but also misses a couple of key points: the fact that Buffy slays vampires (notably, one TV critic wrote a very critical essay about the show despite clearly never having seen a second of it, since she was convinced that Buffy was a vampire herself), and the fact that Buffy is the focus of the show. By giving Buffy and "the vampires" equal weight, it becomes just a show about vampires. (Which, in fairness, is how some people see the show; I know I always cheered for Jerry over Tom.)
The German title, on the other hand, is more interesting: Buffy, im Bann der Dämonen - Buffy, Under The Demons' Spell. While it screws up in another way, indicating that Buffy is the victim (which in a way she is, with the whole structure of the show piled up against her from the get-go, though hardly a passive one) and of course leaving out the word "vampire" altogether, it highlights something about the show that I like: that the various demons are used as metaphors to highlight the very real issues she has to face. There is a spell that she has to break out of, bit by bit - not just a cheap monster show.
Of course, the Germans screw up the title of Angel instead - Angel: Jäger der Finsternis. How the hell does one hunt darkness, pray tell?
ETA on second thought: Just that I've previously said that the English title implies a question - the very idea that someone named "Buffy" slays vampires, and that there's just one of her. The German title does the same, even more so even; it's not the same question, but both questions adress the core idea of the show. The Swedish one? Not so much.
wheatear asked:
Sci-fi fandoms: do sci-fi shows tend to present an atheistic or theistic universe? Discuss the differences.
This is a very interesting question. I guess there are (at least) two ways of looking at it:
1) Whether or not there are gods in the story. Which gets muddled a lot since sci-fi is full of examples of Shermer's Third Law - "Any sufficiently advanced extraterrestrial intelligence is indistinguishable from a god." Where do you draw the line there, how do you define "god" when there are multiple and varying levels of "exaltedness", for lack of a better word? Are the beings in 2001 gods? Are the aesir in Thor just aliens? When the Magratheans in Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy create heaven and earth, are they gods or just overpaid architects? The Doctor in Doctor Who is often referred to and even worshipped as a god, and as an effectively immortal member of a race far beyond human capabilities he might as well be. Yet The Doctor also goes out of his way to never accept a mystical explanation (even if he sometimes finds himself making up technobabble just so he doesn't have to call it magic). Everything is science to him, things may be unknown, but not unknowable. There's always a causality. Which brings us to
2) Whether or not the story itself is atheistic or theistic. Which is also a bit muddy, but to take two examples, Firefly and Battlestar Galactica.
Joss Whedon is an outspoken atheist, but moreover he's also an existentialist - and Sartre argued that god's existence is basically irrelevant. Firefly is his big existentialist manifesto, with all the characters basically locked in a room floating around "in the black" and forced to define themselves. Firefly tackles religion, but not God; man's belief is real, and several of the main characters (Book, Inara, Jayne) are believers, whereas others aren't; belief is considered powerful, but it only affects the acts of the person believing or not believing - Book can't call down a bolt of lightning or heal the lame. It's also pointedly one of the few sci-fi shows to never even hint at the existence of any other life form anywhere in the universe. No aliens, no gods, no robots, no mirror universes... just us. Firefly isn't straight-up atheistic since it never actually attempts to disprove god (what would be the point? A truly atheistic work wouldn't bring up gods at all), but the closest it comes to theism is to admit that belief itself exists. Is theismism a word?
Gods explicitly exist in Buffy alongside vampires, demons and werewolves, but they're knowable. Buffy can't claim to be an atheist since she's actually punched at least one god square in the face, but when asked if she has information on God's existence, she just shrugs. The few characters that are shown to actively believe in God The Father (Riley, and oddly enough Spike) never make a huge deal of it and it doesn't change who they are. The characters have to deal with the world they can see - the world they can't see and which doesn't affect them is irrelevant. Whereas the Powers That Be in Angel skirt much closer to being gods, simply by virtue of moving in mysterious ways and almost never interfering - to the point where you could just about argue that they're not powers at all, and have more in common with Greek stage machinery than any actual pantheon.
In BSG, on the other hand, God's clearly an active player in the story. We're explicitly told that things happen simply because it's part of God's plan. We see his agents work on screen even if we never see the man himself. Yet we never know why he does what he does or what it's supposed to achieve, why it's necessary, who he is. The world works according to a script. The cast itself is full of people of various faiths - polytheistic humans, monotheistic cylons, and the odd atheist - but they all have a relationship to religion, and their actions are motivated by their belief, but ultimately they're not responsible for the outcome - God is. Whereas characters in Whedon's shows can simply choose to ignore the existence or non-existence of god, BSG characters are forced to have an opinion (even the atheist Bill Adama is happy to play along to achieve his goals).
To add to whateilowyn said above, the Star Wars 'verse has a very interesting concept that goes along with the Force: the idea that there's a balance to be had, that there's one ideal way for the world to work where everything and everyone is in their right place (physically and metaphysically), and that any aberration from it causes problems. While that idea is not theistic in and of itself, it still takes for granted that there's a certain predetermined way in which the world should work, which implies a man with a plan (and possibly a canal). Whereas works like Firefly don't assume that: the world simply is, and people's actions determine what they make of it.
So to cut short my rambling, I'd say there are very few sci-fi works that are explicitly atheistic and few that are explicitly theistic (at least that stick closely to any existing religion). However, most of them are written by people wanting to comment on some aspect of society, so...
And funnily enough, just as I posted this, this article popped up in my RSS feed:
The Guardian: Does God have a place in science fiction?
ETA on second thought: The above may have come across a bit strident, I didn't intend to equate "atheist" with "rational" and "theist" with "irrational", or imply that "theistic" works inherently include gods moving in mysterious ways and that that's the one difference. But of course the original question is a bit more complex than it looks at first; aside from works explicitly written to convince others (such as Left Behind or His Dark Materials) most writers don't let only their religious belief or lack thereof dictate how the story works, there are more factors at work and defining a story only by that isn't quite fair. I do think it would be interesting, the death of the author notwithstanding, to take a closer look at how different sci-fi/fantasy/horror stories treat the concept of faith and gods depending on the writer's personal opinion. Of the writers mentioned above, at least two (Adams and Whedon) are outspoken atheists, yet they write stories where gods figure - and are occasionally even portrayed as quite sympathetic, if not perfect.
Also, there's something here about the difference between fantasy and sci-fi - as muddled as the line gets, I think there's something to the old Rod Serling quote: “Fantasy is the impossible made probable. Science Fiction is the improbable made possible.” That would make a lot of sci-fi essentially fantasy with rocketships - Doctor Who, for instance. Getting back to the original question, and assuming that one of the key characteristics of a god is the ability to perform what you might call miracles, that would mean that sci-fi is inherently non-theist (as opposed to atheist) and fantasy inherently (duh) fantastical (as opposed to theist). But again, that's a much longer subject...
There's a lot of other interesting questions and posts there, and some interesting replies to my posts as well which I won't copy here without permission. Go check it out!
FREE-FOR-ALL META COMMENT-A-THON!
(click on the picture)
upupa_epops asked:Buffyverse, translations. Have you ever seen Buffyverse in any other language? Tried to translate anything? Wrote fic in another language? I'm very curious about other people's experience with Buffyverse language in translation.
Just a brief idea I think I've posted someplace else before: I've watched Buffy in three languages - English, German (dubbed) and Swedish (subtitled). Some really odd voice actor choices and translations aside (the Swedish subtitler once has Spike describe Andrew as a "pimp" rather than a "ponce", which... would be a completely different show), what's stayed with me is the titles.
See, the original title Buffy, The Vampire Slayer really encapsulates a lot about the story (I wrote more on that here). It's the story of Buffy, who is a vampire slayer. You have a silly name, you have monsters, and you have the promise that the girl with a silly name will kick monster ass.
The Swedish title comes out Buffy och vampyrerna - Buffy And The Vampires - which not only makes it sound even more like a kids' show, but also misses a couple of key points: the fact that Buffy slays vampires (notably, one TV critic wrote a very critical essay about the show despite clearly never having seen a second of it, since she was convinced that Buffy was a vampire herself), and the fact that Buffy is the focus of the show. By giving Buffy and "the vampires" equal weight, it becomes just a show about vampires. (Which, in fairness, is how some people see the show; I know I always cheered for Jerry over Tom.)
The German title, on the other hand, is more interesting: Buffy, im Bann der Dämonen - Buffy, Under The Demons' Spell. While it screws up in another way, indicating that Buffy is the victim (which in a way she is, with the whole structure of the show piled up against her from the get-go, though hardly a passive one) and of course leaving out the word "vampire" altogether, it highlights something about the show that I like: that the various demons are used as metaphors to highlight the very real issues she has to face. There is a spell that she has to break out of, bit by bit - not just a cheap monster show.
Of course, the Germans screw up the title of Angel instead - Angel: Jäger der Finsternis. How the hell does one hunt darkness, pray tell?
ETA on second thought: Just that I've previously said that the English title implies a question - the very idea that someone named "Buffy" slays vampires, and that there's just one of her. The German title does the same, even more so even; it's not the same question, but both questions adress the core idea of the show. The Swedish one? Not so much.
wheatear asked:Sci-fi fandoms: do sci-fi shows tend to present an atheistic or theistic universe? Discuss the differences.
This is a very interesting question. I guess there are (at least) two ways of looking at it:
1) Whether or not there are gods in the story. Which gets muddled a lot since sci-fi is full of examples of Shermer's Third Law - "Any sufficiently advanced extraterrestrial intelligence is indistinguishable from a god." Where do you draw the line there, how do you define "god" when there are multiple and varying levels of "exaltedness", for lack of a better word? Are the beings in 2001 gods? Are the aesir in Thor just aliens? When the Magratheans in Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy create heaven and earth, are they gods or just overpaid architects? The Doctor in Doctor Who is often referred to and even worshipped as a god, and as an effectively immortal member of a race far beyond human capabilities he might as well be. Yet The Doctor also goes out of his way to never accept a mystical explanation (even if he sometimes finds himself making up technobabble just so he doesn't have to call it magic). Everything is science to him, things may be unknown, but not unknowable. There's always a causality. Which brings us to
2) Whether or not the story itself is atheistic or theistic. Which is also a bit muddy, but to take two examples, Firefly and Battlestar Galactica.
Joss Whedon is an outspoken atheist, but moreover he's also an existentialist - and Sartre argued that god's existence is basically irrelevant. Firefly is his big existentialist manifesto, with all the characters basically locked in a room floating around "in the black" and forced to define themselves. Firefly tackles religion, but not God; man's belief is real, and several of the main characters (Book, Inara, Jayne) are believers, whereas others aren't; belief is considered powerful, but it only affects the acts of the person believing or not believing - Book can't call down a bolt of lightning or heal the lame. It's also pointedly one of the few sci-fi shows to never even hint at the existence of any other life form anywhere in the universe. No aliens, no gods, no robots, no mirror universes... just us. Firefly isn't straight-up atheistic since it never actually attempts to disprove god (what would be the point? A truly atheistic work wouldn't bring up gods at all), but the closest it comes to theism is to admit that belief itself exists. Is theismism a word?
Gods explicitly exist in Buffy alongside vampires, demons and werewolves, but they're knowable. Buffy can't claim to be an atheist since she's actually punched at least one god square in the face, but when asked if she has information on God's existence, she just shrugs. The few characters that are shown to actively believe in God The Father (Riley, and oddly enough Spike) never make a huge deal of it and it doesn't change who they are. The characters have to deal with the world they can see - the world they can't see and which doesn't affect them is irrelevant. Whereas the Powers That Be in Angel skirt much closer to being gods, simply by virtue of moving in mysterious ways and almost never interfering - to the point where you could just about argue that they're not powers at all, and have more in common with Greek stage machinery than any actual pantheon.
In BSG, on the other hand, God's clearly an active player in the story. We're explicitly told that things happen simply because it's part of God's plan. We see his agents work on screen even if we never see the man himself. Yet we never know why he does what he does or what it's supposed to achieve, why it's necessary, who he is. The world works according to a script. The cast itself is full of people of various faiths - polytheistic humans, monotheistic cylons, and the odd atheist - but they all have a relationship to religion, and their actions are motivated by their belief, but ultimately they're not responsible for the outcome - God is. Whereas characters in Whedon's shows can simply choose to ignore the existence or non-existence of god, BSG characters are forced to have an opinion (even the atheist Bill Adama is happy to play along to achieve his goals).
To add to what
eilowyn said above, the Star Wars 'verse has a very interesting concept that goes along with the Force: the idea that there's a balance to be had, that there's one ideal way for the world to work where everything and everyone is in their right place (physically and metaphysically), and that any aberration from it causes problems. While that idea is not theistic in and of itself, it still takes for granted that there's a certain predetermined way in which the world should work, which implies a man with a plan (and possibly a canal). Whereas works like Firefly don't assume that: the world simply is, and people's actions determine what they make of it.So to cut short my rambling, I'd say there are very few sci-fi works that are explicitly atheistic and few that are explicitly theistic (at least that stick closely to any existing religion). However, most of them are written by people wanting to comment on some aspect of society, so...
And funnily enough, just as I posted this, this article popped up in my RSS feed:
The Guardian: Does God have a place in science fiction?
ETA on second thought: The above may have come across a bit strident, I didn't intend to equate "atheist" with "rational" and "theist" with "irrational", or imply that "theistic" works inherently include gods moving in mysterious ways and that that's the one difference. But of course the original question is a bit more complex than it looks at first; aside from works explicitly written to convince others (such as Left Behind or His Dark Materials) most writers don't let only their religious belief or lack thereof dictate how the story works, there are more factors at work and defining a story only by that isn't quite fair. I do think it would be interesting, the death of the author notwithstanding, to take a closer look at how different sci-fi/fantasy/horror stories treat the concept of faith and gods depending on the writer's personal opinion. Of the writers mentioned above, at least two (Adams and Whedon) are outspoken atheists, yet they write stories where gods figure - and are occasionally even portrayed as quite sympathetic, if not perfect.
Also, there's something here about the difference between fantasy and sci-fi - as muddled as the line gets, I think there's something to the old Rod Serling quote: “Fantasy is the impossible made probable. Science Fiction is the improbable made possible.” That would make a lot of sci-fi essentially fantasy with rocketships - Doctor Who, for instance. Getting back to the original question, and assuming that one of the key characteristics of a god is the ability to perform what you might call miracles, that would mean that sci-fi is inherently non-theist (as opposed to atheist) and fantasy inherently (duh) fantastical (as opposed to theist). But again, that's a much longer subject...
There's a lot of other interesting questions and posts there, and some interesting replies to my posts as well which I won't copy here without permission. Go check it out!
