He mentions 4chan lmao

https://youtu.be/uAgvcGxO7rw?si=vRe1wTgcPCdpIrle&t=3333

>i didn't even know 4chan was still a thing man
fat retards shouldn't to be allowed to have an opinion

>>24541399 (OP)
>4chan is obsessed with me I never knew that I knew never knew that!
This level of shilling will outshadow Honor Levy's schizo posting. It's embarrassing. Imagine having the contacts Max lawton has and needing to shill on here and pretend as if it's just an obsession rather than an active shilling.
Honestly, Max, I don't dislike you and wish you the best, but this is pathetic. Focus on your career.

>>24541459
>Honor Levy's schizo posting.
HONOR LEVY I WOULD IMPREGNATE YOU!!!!!!!!!!! LET ME CUM IN THAT PUSSY!!!! LET ME KNOCK YOU UP!!!!!!!!!!!! Your book was okay.

kek

>>24541399 (OP)
Walled

>>24541459
>he actually thinks max posts here
bait?

>>24541477
hello max

Every notable person in Jew York, Los Angeles, or Washington is a trust fund nigger.

Remember that the next time you're impressed by something they do. They put the cart before the horse: because of nepotism, it was always a foregone conclusion that they were going to do SOMETHING because they can make something terrible and have it promoted through their (dad's) connections or their own connections which they only have because of a lifetime of dadmoney paying for them to live in hip areas and go to hip parties and attend hip schools without having to worry about real life, or by simply using dadmoney to pay for social media signal boosting and knowing people who know how to manipulate the strings of the relevant scene/industry. Then, once they get something "recognized" (they also have enough dadmoney to keep pathetically throwing shit at the wall until it sticks, which often takes them years even despite all the dadmoney greasing the wheels), they are an established name in whatever scene/industry it is, and now all future projects have immediate credibility.

98% of people who get published or have their art shown somewhere are doing something any random aspiring writer or art major could do, but skipping the crucial first step of "actually getting organically noticed," which is 98% of the difficulty of going from aspiring writer/artist to writer/artist. The remaining 2% is just continuing to churn shit out, that's the easy part because now when you go to a publisher or gallery you already have a portfolio and they will shrug and say "I presume this is fine, sure, we'll publish you."

Layer this on itself for a few years and you have a portfolio. This is the backstory of nearly all major writers and artists in the last century. New York Jews originally used the technique for themselves, in the early century, but then it caught on generally and is now the only way to do anything in America. American culture is made entirely out of nepotism networks.

Date a rich Jewish girl from New York some time, if you randomly mention you have an invention for an automatic ass-scratcher she'll tell you she can introduce you to another Jew she knows through another Jew who could finance it, and you can bypass the usual channels that normalplebs have to go through to get a meeting with him because she'll just get you an informal in person one. Jews live and breathe this kind of behavior so much they don't even notice they do it, so they are kind of being honest when you criticize them for it and they go "What? I'm not doing anything everybody else doesn't do." They really mean it, they are serious.

Remember when what jew from argentina attacked /ourguy/ Max?

Remember when that jew from argentina attacked /ourguy/ Max?

>>24541399 (OP)
>>24541470
Very ugly

>>24541501
He's not a model, Mr Gayman.

>>24541503
I don't think anyone was confused on that point.

>>24541484
Max Lawton the greatest translator of the 21st century

>>24541477
>thinks /lit/ organically discusses writers outside of McCarthy, Dosto, Nabokov, and Joyce

>>24541567
>McCarthy
His son John shills him here.

>>24541399 (OP)
I need a bookshelf and kinda wondering what shelf this is that all youtubers have as their background

>>24541861
Ikea Kallax, I think?

>>24541484
pasta?

>>24541459
>he thinks the person namefagging as Honor Levy is actually Honor Levy
Anon...

>>24541470
>Céline shelf
>far right, second from top
Umm, is Max a chud?? Why would he have an entire shelf dedicated to Céline and in French?

>>24541399 (OP)
>1h20m interview
Nigger I ain't watching all that shit to find out what he says since you only posted a sentence fragment of his 4chan comment. Provide the timestamp you lazy pickaninny.

>>24542111
It has a timestamp. Click on "embed" and click play. or you can do it manually at 55:33

>>24541399 (OP)
Did he talk about he is actively suppressing the publication of my Jean-Patrick Manchette translation? Because of him I am unable to get my translation of Let The Corpses Tan published at NYRB, Deep Vellum, or Dalkey.

Max, do the right thing. Disband your kabal. Lift the embargo. You can't translate every untranslated novel yourself. You MUST leave some for others.

>>24542103
Max is indeed right-wing. He just has to keep the appearance of being a liberal hipster because of the nature of his line of work.

>>24541484
This is more or less true

>>24541399 (OP)
>>24541470
He says that Céline was obsessed with ballet and that in his anti-semitic pamphlets he says one of the reasons Céline despises the jews is because they didn't let him put on the ballets that he wrote. Can anons confirm? Lawton says that at 59:17

>>24541399 (OP)
What a strange phenotype.

>>24542173
looks like the dude from pink floyd

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGfUdaQseCM

>>24542180
ok that does it i'm really going to stop procrastinating and actually smoke some weed

>>24541399 (OP)
I didn’t know that about Virginia Woolf. What a cunt she was.

>>24542121
He's translating a Céline novel. What do you mean he's put an embargo on your work?

>>24542253
I read Orlando and Mrs. Dalloway and decided she wasn't very good at all. The empress has no clothes and her tits are saggy.

lmao which one of you was this?

>>24542103
He also likes Ezra Pound and Houellebecq...

>>24542519
What a fucking nepo faggot.

looking a bit fat there max you nepostitic hack
sucking up to writers will never make you an intellectual. you will always be a medicore fraud. you'd be working in mcdonalds if it weren't for your rich parents

>>24542844
From what I can tell everyone hates him here because he's about their equal in terms of potential as l'homme de lettre and living the dream they wish they had. But consider this, litbro faggots reading this; do something useful with your life

>>24542860
fuck off max

>>24542860
I don't keep up with the topic and don't really know who this guy is, that reply just seemed really self-inflated. If he's a nepo baby as others have said ho has gone into publishing, then I mean best of luck to him, better than private equity or whatever. Just seemed like a weirdly aggressive response

>>24542882
He's a nepotistic hack whose harvard mommy and daddy funded his entire existence and who only gets jobs translating novels in languages he isn't even proficient in because he knows people in the literary scene

>>24542127
>larping as a Christian
> >>24541522
Please die soon

>>24542519
>who i couldntve translated Schattenfroh without
So Matthias Friedrich translated Schattenfroh and not Lawton. Now you see

>>24542882
>>24542890
Oh, and he also trawls the internet looking for mentions of his name and butts in to defend himself
He does it both here (anonymously, as seen in this thread) and on reddit
a horrible individual. I genuinely wish the worst on these kind of people. Pseudo intellectual hacks who will never produce art on any kind and only get successful due to mommy and daddy

>>24542890
From what it looks like he just buddies up to the writers he decides to translate (theyre happy to be translated at all so why wouldnt they reciprocate) and uses that as an excuse to do sexpat shit in the countries he moves to to "learn about their culture" while he offloads the actual work to his editors, then puts up his (bought for by his parents) credentials like he's hot shit. When you read his own work (his WIP novel) you get a sense of how completely incompetent and creatively bankrupt he is. Absolute embarrassment.

>>24542928
Hes married to an ugly turkish bird (who is also a product of nepotism and directs these shitty short films which somehow receive acclaim)
now hes larping as a turk and wants to start translating turkish literature despite not even knowing the language. wonder which turkish authors cock he'll suck next
and that excerpt you posted is incredibly dire and makes me lament the fact that actual great authors will have their work cast aside to the dustbin of history while hacks like this will be lauded only because their parents know each other
fuck max lawton. hope he perishes

>>24542942
His translations suck and dont make sense too. The very first sentences in Blue Lard are a mess

>>24542952
and if you call him out he'll get your comments deleted and remind you that he totally isn't a product of nepotism

>>24542962
>this is why i work at such a clip
>i move to a country and spend several years "learning" before "translating" extremely niche novels
lol. lmao.

>>24542952
What’s the difference between an intellectual and a pseudo-intellectual? Is the real thing just better at it?

>>24542968
An intellectual doesnt basedface over a Kendrick Lamar namedrop in a book

>>24542969
what about YBG Don?

>>24542971
real hood scholars listen exclusively to Mudbaby Ru

>>24542139
This is true. That's literally what "Bagatelles pour un massacre" is about.

>>24542455
He's retranslating Guignol's Band. He's a douchebag for that. We have Londres now. There is no reason for Guignol's Band to exist anymore.

Reading about this guy is inspiring me a lot
I read in three languages in addition to English but I am by no means as well read and as skilled in any of those languages as this guy seems to be
No doubt this guy is privileged but I know I don't work as hard on my languages as I could and so I'm feeling pretty ashamed right now, if this truly is my main passion why can't I just put more effort in? Why am I so lazy?
Thanks for posting about this guy ITT, I really need to keep on working

>>24543007
This is anon pretending to be Max Lawton pretending to be an anon, or it is it Max Lawton pretending to be Max Lawton pretending to be an anon?

>>24542969
This is true, but the answer seems to have to do with the nature of egoism. Schopenhauer expresses this quite elegantly, putting intellect in opposition with the will, but Nietzsche argues well in favor of his position that this intellect is only a more controlled, a higher, more pure egoism. It must have to do, not with apparent achievements of culture, but with essential motivations

>>24543033
No I'm just an anon expressing my feelings in an exaggeratedly honest way

>>24542519
he's helping the argentine jews after all they did to him? wtf

>>24542952
the excerpt that he shared of Celine also didn't made any sense

>>24542920
>Oh, and he also trawls the internet looking for mentions of his name and butts in to defend himself
this guy seems vaguely familiar from years back but i dont remember the ugly mug

So is Max based or cringe?

>>24542519
> :) Peace and love :)
oh god im laughing so hard right now. he is so tilted

>>24541399 (OP)
>Max Lawton
who?
also why do these (weird and visibly neurotic) people act like 4chan is such a boogeyman?

>>24542860
max i think youre ok but your translations kinda suck

>>24543968
>tilted
what does that mean here?
t. esl

>>24544149
Not him but examples? Which translations suck?

>>24544158
its a gamer term for angry

>>24544254
>its a gamer term
he means gambler

He seems like a cool guy, but this interviewer sucks ass and his questions are dumb, so I can’t keep watching this shit.

>>24544317
yea, we all know max knows multiple languages, was that really needed to be asked. I wish the questions were better

>>24542962
I don't remember those threads lol

>>24541399 (OP)
As a Russian his translations are lacking.

>>24544631
can you elaborate?

>>24542103
Closer look at the shelf (from his social media)

>>24541470
>sunlight hitting the books
Max, that shit will ruin your books, you idiot! It will destroy the color of the spines and possibly the pages. And those seem like foreign editions, so not exactly something you want to see spoiled.

>>24541470
isn't he in his 30s? Why is a co-opting zoomer city-fag fashion?

I also never met someone that dressed this way that wasn't a complete midwit.

>>24544737
>écrits contoversés
Oh no no no no no
He has all the anti-semitic pamphlets published by Denoël. Not a good look Max.

>>24543507
Guignol's Band is Céline's most hard to follow work to be fair.

>>24544827
I believe he was born in 1997 or 1996.

>>24544844
He's 31, so more like 1993 or 1994

>>24544835
He doesn't like jews. You can tell it bothered him when some people said he was jewish (see: >>24544533 ). He also had beef with a south american jew on twitter (see: >>24541493). He also really likes Ezra Pound and Houellebecq. He put The Cantos and Elementary Particles in his list of favorite books.

I think I'm going to start learning Russian now
All I really know are the golden age authors but are there many soviet and post-soviet authors to be excited about?
How jarring will it be to go from Pushkin to Tolstoy to Vasily Grossman language wise?
Am I going to be able to get Russian editions which tell me that a 'Runking Troller' was the name that Petersburgians used for a type of carriage for only 3 decades during Tolstoy's lifetime? Idk why but I have a feeling texts with annotations are probably rare

>>24544149
>>24544166
His Sorokin translations and the fragments hes posted of his Celine translation are incomprehensible

>>24544737
umm based?

>>24545477
>incomprehensible
how? did you fail english?

>>24545544
What is "disgorged by torture moon gall"?
What is "occisate"? Occisate is not an English word.
How can contortions be green?

>>24545552
NTA but where's this from? "Occis" in French means a person who died violently. Same as Spanish "occiso". I guess he was trying to create a latinate neologism? I'm not familiar with the original text.

>>24545568
Guignol's Band by Celine, the original French word is "l'occisse". But why create a confusing neologism when there are a number of alternatives to use instead?

>>24545552
>What is "disgorged by torture moon gall"?
disgorged by torture, moon gall, and accursed vows

>>24545593
There are no commas in the original French version.

>>24545552
the wounds are green, I guess. what's wrong with the Sorokin translations?

>>24545599
The French version is written "vertes contorsions de blessures", green modifies "contorsions", not "wounds".
>what's wrong with the Sorokin translations?
Extremely phoned in and stilted, awkward out of place syntax

>>24545596
stylistic choice

>>24545608
>The French version is written "vertes contorsions de blessures", green modifies "contorsions", not "wounds".
you mean the part in Lawton's translation where it says "green contortions of wounds"? what should the translation be?

>>24545616
Vertes can also be translated as undeveloped, immature, or unripe, and is likely the intended meaning.

>>24545627
It also has that meaning in English.

>>24545634
But why introduce confusion? The average reader is always going to think of the color before the "not ripened" definition. French has much closer connotations to inexperience with "vertes" (think "greenhorn") than English does, where "green" is generally understood to be a sensory descriptor, referring to the color.

>>24545644
Maybe you're right. Lawton claims his 2nd best language after English is French btw. He says in the interview he can pretty much read books like a native speaker. So it's odd he makes these mistakes. The Untranslated guy also makes weird mistakes in Spanish (see: his "He leído" tweet). It makes me wonder, to what extent do these guys actually know the languages they claim? They apparently read avant-garde stuff so they must know the languages pretty well but I'm not convinced sometimes.

>>24545616
It could be wounds that contort and are green

>>24545657
The literal word for word translation would be "green contortions of wounds", the "de" (of) clearly separates contortions and wounds.

>>24545666
Yeah sorry, I realise now you're just saying what I was saying

How do you rank Céline's novels? Voyage au bout de la nuit seems like the most beloved by normies but how are the rest?

>>24545692
I read Death on Credit and his descriptions of death really got under my skin so I dropped the book. I don't man. What is the point of writing this horrible stuff. That's the thing I think about all day, I don't want to read it in books too. I hate these "miserable than thou" writers. It's just masturbation contest of misery.

True.

>>24545655
He doesn't know any of the langauges of the books he translates in any good way
He literally only gets his jobs because his mommy and daddy are harvard people involved in the publishing buisness and because he licks the toes and buddies up with "literary" figures

>>24545740
He couldn't have done those translations, if what you say would be true.

based

>>24542099
Of course I don't but go through the archives it's undeniable that she shilled here for a week.

>>24542139
This is cope like when they say the Holocaust happened because Jews ran the art-school Hitler wanted to go to.

>>24544642
>elaborate
For example, on the first page ofTelluria, Lawton grossly mistranslates the phrase "тюкaя кyлaчкoм пo лaдoшкe" as "driving his fist into his palm". The Russian verb "тюкaть" (tyukat’) is an onomatopoeia of the sound tyuk‑tyuk and is related to the noun "cтyк" (stuk), meaning "knock". However, "тюкaть" sounds more clipped and fast. It is a light, repeated striking that you could express by saying "tap‑tap". The original even uses the diminutive кyлaчoк (kulachok), which the word "fist" by itself does not convey.

In other words, the character is repeatedly and lightly tapping his little fist (not forcefully "driving" it) against his palm.

Goran is also not wiggling his feet "INTO" anything. He's already wearing his little boots and he's SWINGING his legs back and forth. And also "practiced manner" just sounds off because it draws too much attention onto itself as a phrase. I would've just cut it from the translation entirely.

The translation completely loses the sense of scale, which is why it sounds odd when Zoran smashes "his fist against the table leg". Why not the table itself? The reader does not know. And cannot know. Because Lawton's translation fails to imply to the reader that Goran is a littlun.

>>24545942
Tweet this at him. I'd love to hear his response.

>>24545942
Umm maxsisters, our response??

>>24546686
The person who made this post believes Zoran and Goran are one character instead of two, as implied by his last sentence. It is Zoran who strikes the table leg, not Goran.

In the video Max says German translators are generally better than English translators. Are there any German readers here who agree?

>>24546933
Umm antimaxsisters, our response??

>>24547431
Typo. They're both littluns.

nepo hack

>>24545942
>>24546933
The word "wander" does not feel like a movement that could be confined under a table. There is again an issue of scale here. The word, to my ears, implies some sort of a movement through an open area. It is a traversal of space. But the Russian word "бpoдить," though the "correct" literal translation, feels like something that *could* be done under a table by someone small. Because the movement is restless and intense and contained, and it matches the tap-tapping of his little fist against his palm. I.E., HE IS PACING!

Notice that Lawton needs to add "back and forth" to convey the repeated movement of Zoran, while the Russian word "бpoдить", because of the "тюкaньe" of his fist, already conveys this. You always wonder aimlessly. But you can "бpoдить" in place, back and forth, absorbed in thought. Again, this is called PACING.

>>24545942
>>24546933
The word "wander" does not feel like a movement that could be confined under a table. There is again an issue of scale here. The word, to my ears, implies some sort of a movement through an open area. It is a traversal of space. But the Russian word "бpoдить", though the "correct" literal translation, feels like something that *could* be done under a table by someone small. Here, the movement is restless and intense and contained, and matches the tap-tapping of his little fist against his palm. I.E., HE IS PACING!

Notice that Lawton needs to add "back and forth" to convey the repeated movement of Zoran, while the Russian word "бpoдить", because of the "тюкaньe" of his fist, already conveys this. You always wander aimlessly. But you can "бpoдить" in place, back and forth, absorbed in thought. Again, this is called PACING.

He's so remarkably ugly. Funny to think that, given his relative success, he's statistically one of the better looking people here. I don't wanna know what the rest of you look like.
t. Also ugly

>>24547913
Ooof. This is brutal. Can Maxsisters justify this?

>>24542519
This comment has now been deleted from the comments section lmao

>>24545616
>The French version is written "vertes contorsions de blessures", green modifies "contorsions", not "wounds".
>you mean the part in Lawton's translation where it says "green contortions of wounds"? what should the translation be?

GREEN GANGRENOUS HEMATOMAS

>>24547913
"Wander back and forth" is a synonym for "pace" in literary English, just read a couple of nineteenth century books. "Drive into" for тюкaть is more colloquial than "peck" or "tap" which sound wrong with fist in English. You could easily argue for both options. Little is already a descriptor of feet so having it before "fist" would be maybe unnecessary. Diminutives are different to adjectives. The "swinging" note is good tho. That seems like a mistake.

>>24548232
That is really not what the French says. What M*x has is what the French says, even if it is maybe under-interpreted by him.

wtf is 'vertes contorsions de blessures' then???

The language in that novel is not like realist prose and it often moves into what is close to meaninglessness. Céline is not just referring to real things.

>>24548176
I do not like his Telluria and think that you can tell it is his first translation and he is trying stuff out that does not perfectly work, but I think his work in Blue Lard and the short stories is pretty good (he is also pretty vocal about recommending those books more than Telluria online and I feel like I can tell he does not like Telluria that much either). I am interested in reading Schattenfroh with an open(ish) mind.

>>24541484
I started dating a jewish girl and within a year I met the governor. I'm not even joking.

>>24548255
>"Wander back and forth" is a synonym for "pace" in literary English
>"Drive into" for тюкaть is more colloquial than "peck" or "tap" which sound wrong with fist in English
The issue is that because "тюкaть" is translated as "drive into", this forces the whole sentence structure to change because now Lawton has to add "back and forth" to the "wandering" (which is also egregiously mistranslated). In Russian, the word "тюкaть" contextualizes the pacing as restless and repeated, and you don't need any extra qualifiers. The only way to "wander" is back and forth (i.e., to pace) BECAUSE he's "тюкaeт" his fist against the palm of his hand, which is a fast, light, and repeated action. But the sentence has a completely different meaning in English because of how it was translated.
>"peck" or "tap" which sound wrong with fist in English
No, it doesn't.
>Zoran paced under the table, tap‑tapping his little fist against his palm.

>>24548286
You have a great catch with the swinging. All the rest of this stuff is overreach and overinterpretation and a typical example of how native speakers do not understand translation (like in Nabokov's version of Onegin).

>>24548286
>>24548315
so which one of you is the native Russian speaker?

>>24548286
and your version of the sentence "Zoran paced under the table, tap‑tapping his little fist against his palm" sounds rather ESL

>>24548315
There is nothing to indicate the size of G/Zoran in the translation. In the Russian version, everything is implicitly communicated through the word choice. The translation sounds "blunt." I don't know how else to put it.
>>24548322
Remove the "little" then.
I can't stress enough that you cannot translate it as "drive into." You simply can't. The intensity is different. The meaning is different. The scale is wrong. And it's a singular action vs. a tap tap tap tap.

>>24548322
Doesn't matter. Tap‑tapping is not the problem.

>>24548338
1. It still says they're little about a billion times in the English version.
2. I think he changed the intensity of the word "drive into" for the choice that made the style more smooth. "Peck" or "tap" sounds wrong and "drive into" sounds right though it has a different shade of meaning.

>>24548342
Hey Max, big fan here. Can you tell us why you're helping the argentine jews after all the attacks against you on twitter and magazines? Thanks.

>>24548340
A lot of native speakers of languages great books are written in think they will be perfect translators because they understand every shade of meaning in the original then do horrible work because they have no sense of style in the language they translate to. I would not say I am a "maxsister" by any means and he definitely makes some dumb mistakes but it is pretty clear critics and publishers and authors like his style in English. I have a feeling the same would not be the case with any translations you would try your hand at, Mr. Tap-Tap

>>24548342
>1. It still says they're little about a billion times in the English version.
I am not asking for him to literally write "little". You're dumb.
>2. I think he changed the intensity of the word "drive into" for the choice that made the style more smooth. "Peck" or "tap" sounds wrong and "drive into" sounds right though it has a different shade of meaning.
Are you Russian? The sentence and the excerpt I posted are completely different in meaning and style. You're getting a fundamentally different experience when you read the book in English. They're not comparable. This is not how you translate books. He's butchering the language. It's awful. It's so fucking bad. Max Lawton quite literally does not understand Russian well enough to translate literature from it.

>>24548358
>he definitely makes some dumb mistakes
A paragraph into the story and there's already a glaring A1-level mistake. Good job, Max! Way to go!

>>24548365
I am Russian. I agree there is a bad mistake. But everything else you are saying is silly.

>>24548396
You are not Russian.
I have no idea how you can justify a mistake on the very first page of the book. And it's followed by equally poor translations of everything else. Maybe if Max is incapable of translating a very basic sentence, he cannot translate anything more complex either. No?
The things I'm crying about are just bad translations. They're not done intentionally. You can tell from the word choice. It's all very bad. Max does not understand the language.
And how can you say that it is a stylistic choice and then have shit like "in a practiced manner"? This reads so bad.

https://admiralfellpromises.substack.com/p/the-miseducation-of-max-lawton

Analyzing an excerpt of Max Lawton's translation of Guignol's Band.

>>24548645
Thanks for sharing. So this is how Max "translates" before an editor who knows his shit comes to his rescue and fixes his mess. Interesting.

>>24548645
Fuck, reading this, it's obvious that Lawton is not ready to even read and understand Céline, let alone translate him. Why does he insist on going after all these difficult novels? And French is his best foreign language btw (according to the interview).

This is what happens when you don't start with the classics. If you're ITT, Max, start with the Greeks, and later worry about avant-garde literature.

Isn't Guignol's Band already translated? Let me guess, Lawton hates the translation?

>>24548645
Your version sucks

>>24548685
He raped your ass, Max. Show some humility. Or do you need your Latvian boyfriend to intervene?

>>24548645
Holy shit, that ending was brutal. Ummm maxsisters, our response??

>>24548683
The original translation has issues of its own, but it was published in the 50s so its more reasonable.

>>24541470
he looks so misshapen

based for translating russian novels.
I hope someone here can translate underrated french and chinese novels too.there are so many good french and chinese novels that are still untranslated.

>>24548645
Your translation is also bad and ignores most of your criticism, especially your "green contortions of wounds" criticism. You spent so many sentences harping on about how it's actually UNRIPE only to translate it as RIPENING!!! I can only assume you're trolling at this point since you gave Lawton so much shit for missing out on subtlety, and here you are making the subtle mistake of thinking an unripe fruit is the same as a ripening fruit. Absurd.
By the way "tenaillé" almost literally means to TORTURE WITH TONGS. It's a verbing of the noun "tenaille" which means TONG. Just another reason your translation sucks.

If I have some free-time, I'll show you and Lawton how this shit is done.

>>24548645
>>24549082
One more criticism of your proposed translation. "Cachottière" is derived from "cachot" which means DUNGEON CELL. Both you and Max lose the sense of a JAILER in your translations.

>>24549090
>Both you and Max lose the sense of a JAILER in your translations.
One of "keep"s definitions as a noun is a section of a castle that is heavily fortified, defended, or hidden away.
>You spent so many sentences harping on about how it's actually UNRIPE only to translate it as RIPENING!!!
You're right. I failed to replace "ripening" with "unripe" while I was editing, it slipped me by. Amended now.
>By the way "tenaillé" almost literally means to TORTURE WITH TONGS. It's a verbing of the noun "tenaille" which means TONG.
There is no English equivalent to my knowledge that could simultaneously represent the imagery of the use of tongs sufficiently without lessening its impact and heft. Tongs could nip or pinch or squeeze or pull apart, but to follow that with "muscles in shreds" is asinine. Therefore, they are "torn" apart. Unfortunately, translations can never be perfect.

>>24549117
>coping this hard
Lol, after I finish my morning calisthenics and shower, I'm going to spend the rest of the morning translating that passage. Of course since this 4chan you'll cope and say it's bad. But deep down, you'll see you're even more incompetent than Max.
Also
>moon's torture bile
Bile is not a descriptor of torture in Céline's sentence.

>>24549135
>Bile is not a descriptor of torture in Céline's sentence.
Nor in mine. The bile is the tool of the torture. Read it like "torture-bile".
>Lol, after I finish my morning calisthenics and shower, I'm going to spend the rest of the morning translating that passage. Of course since this 4chan you'll cope and say it's bad. But deep down, you'll see you're even more incompetent than Max.
You're the one that wasn't able to identify that a "keep" can allude to a dungeon as well, while sincerely arguing that "pinched" or "plucked" or "tonged" is a suitable substitute that fits with the image of gruesome torture but okay.

>>24549143
https://collection.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk/objects/co154884/disembowelling-tongs-belgium-1401-1700
Literally googling torture tongs proves you wrong, HISTORICALLY WRONG.
No need address your other misguided """criticisms""".

>>24549157
Picrel is what most readers will imagine when coming across the word "tongs". Celine did not operate under the notion that "tongs" could be interpreted to refer to kitchen appliances, because "tongs" as we know them to be now only emerged after the publication of Guignol's Band. Then there are stylistic concerns with integrating the "tong" image into the translation. What do you propose? "Tonged", which is banal and silly? "Tortured with tongs", which is redundant? "Pulled/Pinched apart by tongs", which translates one word into four? "Torn" can be read as both verb and adjective, and is the ideal intersection between maintaining syntax and flow, and remaining faithful to the meaning. Concessions must be made in translations, I'm afraid. Unless Nabokov's Eugene Onegin with its supplementary volume of translator's notes is more your speed.
>No need address your other misguided """criticisms""".
I accept your concession.

>>24549173
>to kitchen appliances
to tongs as kitchen appliances in the form we now know them to be*

>>24549173
>cope
Look, you're retarded and wrong. It's clear to me that both you and Max have no familiarity with ancien or moyen francais, because almost ALL the words in that main paragraph are medieval in origin. YOU and Max's failure to render the paragraph in medieval language is a gross disservice to the text. This also doubles back to YOU and Max's obtuse and obstinate insistence that "cachottière" is some kind of secret keeper. SECRETS have nothing to do with that passage. As I've said, it's referring to a DUNGEON KEEPER, NO SECRETS !!! I mean did you read the excerpt??? It's about MEDIEVAL TORTURE !!! IT IS LITERALLY TALKING ABOUT A MEDIEVAL TORTURER IN A DUNGEON KEEP TORTURING PEOPLE TO GET CONFESSIONS FROM THEM (second paragraph, the one following WELL DO I KNOW IT (the correct translation btw to be in accordance with Céline's style)). THE THIRD PARAGRAPH IS ABOUT PEOPLE TURNING THE TABLES ON THE DUNGEON KEEPER TORTURER AND TORTURING HIM !!!

This is why you and Max are stupid. Neither of you were able to ascertain this with your limited knowledge of French and NON-EXISTENT KNOWLEDGE of ANCIENT and MIDDLE FRENCH.

>>24549259
For someone who does calisthenics daily, you sure seem uptight and troubled.
>As I've said, it's referring to a DUNGEON KEEPER, NO SECRETS
This is wrong. Cachottier"s" is written in plural, so it's not a "dungeon keeper" or a "torturer". It's a group of them. Which is further substantiated by the following phrase "arrogant or vile or mute... one after the other", each and every cachottier either being arrogant or vile or mute.
>WELL DO I KNOW IT (the correct translation btw to be in accordance with Céline's style)
No, that would be translated "Bien je le sais".
Celine says Je le sais BIEN, as in I know it WELL. If he intended it to be read as "well do i know it", he wouldnt have structured it that way. Literally every single person capable of understanding French will read it as "I know it well".
>THE THIRD PARAGRAPH IS ABOUT PEOPLE TURNING THE TABLES ON THE DUNGEON KEEPER TORTURER AND TORTURING HIM !!!
Wrong again. Celine's use of "votre" (votre douleur, votre langue pele) signifies that it is still you, the victim, being tortured. Only the very first sentence of the third paragraph has anything to do with fighting back. Starting with "ou bien", Celine is essentially saying "if you dont, what follows is going to be your miserable fate". This is why he ends the sequence by saying "You see the thing is serious", because he is warning the reader/victims. Why would he give such a foreboding warning to take things seriously if the majority of the passage was some sort of empowering revolution of the victims?

Anon, you are illiterate and do not know what you are talking about. Let us stop here.

>>24549280
>You're actually right
Thanks for agreeing with me dumbass.

>>24549286
Was it illiteracy or schizophrenia?

>>24549280
>UMMM ACTUALLY IT'S NOT A SINGULAR DUNGEON KEEPER IT IS A GROUP OF THEM
>SO I AM RIGHT AND YOU ARE WRONG EVEN THOUGH I SAID IT WAS SECRET KEEPERS :^)
Kill yourself. For real. All your other """criticisms""" are in the same vain, where you agree with me and then oddly insist you are right.

>>24549301
Read your post >>24549259
>a DUNGEON KEEPER
>A MEDIEVAL TORTURER
>THE DUNGEON KEEPER TORTURER
>TORTURING HIM
All missing the fact that cachottiers is plural, and the rest of that paragraph, which completely refute the idea that this is *one* keeper.
You also miss that cachot (dungeon), is derived from the word "cacher", which means to hide. Which is relevant because Celine describes these cachottiers as arrogant or mute literally right after.
Being generous, you could also interpret "secret-keepers" the same way that you can "cachottiers", where you read it as "SECRET KEEP-ers", or those in a secret castle keep, i.e, a dungeon. "Secret-keepers" is the only viable choice to fit all of these things at once.

ALSO both YOU and MAX have mistranslated "mignonnes". Maybe if you'd listen to my criticism of YOU and MAX's ignorance, you'd be able to use WIKTIONNAIRE to figure out the definition of MIGNONNE Céline is using.
In case you're too stupid to get this, WHICH YOU ARE, mignonne should NOT be translated as CUTIE.

GOOD DAY SIR! I SAID GOOD DAY!

>>24549338
What I mean to say is that both interpretations of the word are viable and valid in Celine's text, and I have tried to reproduce that in my own with "secret-keepers" as best as I could. There is no other feasible option that could carry both interpretations so succinctly. It also enabled me to use assonance like Celine did ("effrontes" and "cachottiers", "secret" and "keepers").

>>24549343
>In case you're too stupid to get this, WHICH YOU ARE, mignonne should NOT be translated as CUTIE.
I'm assuming you mean
>One of the court favourites of Henry III of France.
Mignonne is feminine. Celine writes "of the mignonnes". Do you mean to say "the graceful secret of the court favorites" makes more sense than "the graceful secret of the cuties"? When Celine, in practically every single book, lusts and salivates over young women time and time again? And why would the "court favorites" have a withered song to be found? And why would this be found in someone's heart? What relevance does a court favorite have to someone who feels miserable and persecuted by torturers? And what does Celine do when he feels miserable and persecuted by his circumstances? He seeks out young women. Cuties. Mignonnes. The single solace and invigorator for rebellion against one's torturers emerges from the heart, out of a dedication to love and desire.

>>24549082
>If I have some free-time, I'll show you and Lawton how this shit is done.
Post it. I wonder what Max is thinking rn

>>24549343
>>24549372
If you mean to say Celine meant to say "minions" instead of court favorites, this would mean that they would be listening to their own song. This implies that the victims/readers are characterized as a woman, since he used "mignonnes" and not "mignons". This also cannot be, since he uses "son coeur" (HIS heart) right before. This does not make sense whatsoever and lacks all coherence and consistency.

>>24549372
>>24549387
GOOD DAY SIR!

>>24549404
#1. How could you possibly translate that to fit the theme of the rest of the passage and to maintain syntactical faithfulness?
#2. What relevance does that have to the subject of the sentence (the victims and their hearts)? Are you meaning to tell me that these victims will be invigorated by a "female confidant of a princess" over love and a desire for "cute girls"? Where is the precedent set for this appearance of a female confidant of a princess? What potency do they have to incite change with their secret? And how would their secret be graceful?
This is all some real mental gymnastics.

>>24549382
I honestly don't have the time to do it, and it would take well over an hour to research and translate the passage to give a really good translation. That's time I don't want to spend right now as I have better things to do. But I can bullet point a few things
>As I've already said, the passage is medieval in nature and language. This needs to be reflected in the translation. (This is the biggest gripe).
>The first sentence should be something like "Well do I know it..." or "Oh boy do I know it..." to keep with Céline's style (didactic, authoritative, "I've lived through shit, so let me tell you how the world really is")
>The fact is someone of Céline's nature would not say "I know it well" in English when speaking in a didactic tone
>cachottiers: I was actually wrong about this, this is a "secret keeper" but only in the sense that it is referring to the person being KEPT in the DUNGEON, not the DUNGEON KEEPER, as the rest of the paragraph talks about them "à dégorger" "fiel de lune" and "voeux maudits"
>Also on this note, both Max and the retard anon have failed to realize "fiel" in "fiel de lune" is referring the medieval practice for humorism (THE FOUR HUMORS) and how "fiel" or "black bile" (I can already see the retard anon going BUT CELINE DIDN'T USE NOIR IN THE FRENCH!!!!) is influenced by the moon, HENCE "FIEL DE LUNE"
>The third paragraph needs have way more medieval an archaic language because it is quite literally just a bunch of descriptions of torture using medieval language
>somehow it needs to be communicated that salamander here is the mythical fire-breathing jewel-encrusted salamander and not the tiny lizard of science
>also that retard anon is completely wrong about the verb "arrimer", it's a nautical term for stowing cargo or tying a ship down to a dock, he retardedly thinks it means to lash someone with a whip WHEN IT ACTUALLY MEANS TO LASH CARGO DOWN
>So Max was right on that one lol, but he should use a way more nautical term than "tie", like "lash down"
>charpie: another medieval word, you should use flayed, if someone wanted to say that flesh was shredded or in ribbons (as both the retard anon and Max have suggested) a French person wouldn't not use "charpie"...unless they were medieval...or wanting a medieval tone
I just don't like either translation, and this other anon in the thread is retardedly stubborn. See this post >>24549419 He can't even fathom how a royal confidante could be related to torture and secret keeping or how a royal confidante could serve as a model for NOT DIVULGING YOUR SECRET and FIGHTING BACK AGAINST YOUR TORTURER. This anon is just absolutely retarded.

>>24548315
>>24548342
>>24548358
>>24549117
>>24549143
>>24549372
What is the reason these people who don't speak the language insist on translating books, and then when corrected they sneed and cope to justify their horrible translations. Just don't talk about translations when you don't know the language.

>>24549487
Also I didn't make it clear in this post that "à dégorger" means to vomit (but a bit more colorful in language so a better word should be chosen when translating) and what is being vomited up are ACCURSED VOWS and BLACK LUNAR BILE. Both Max and the retard anon do not make this clear because they retardedly refuse to switch the word order to have it make sense in English. IN OTHER WORDS disgorge should come after torture BECAUSE IT IS THE TORTURE CAUSING THEM TO DISGORGE THE BILE AND VOWS.

It's just really infuriating, especially since the retard anon is being really dense.

Max here. Thanks a lot for the criticism, guys! But oh boy can you be mean haha

Btw can you direct me to Céline's favorite ancien or moyen français books? Much appreciated!

>>24549504
>"à dégorger" means to vomit
One of the definitions of disgorge is also "to vomit".
>and what is being vomited up are ACCURSED VOWS and BLACK LUNAR BILE
How can lunar bile be black? Nowhere in Celine's text is "black" mentioned in that sentence. You also miss "sous la" ("under the"), which means the befouling evil is disgorging, or being vomited and spreading, UNDER THE fiel de lune. You are out of your depth. The bile sets the precedent, and the vomit is the character or substance of the torture. Just like the actual act of vomiting. Bile is the acid, vomit is the food mixed into it and puked up.
>The first sentence should be something like "Well do I know it..." or "Oh boy do I know it..." to keep with Céline's style
There is literally zero fucking indication of any kind of flourish of that nature. "Je le sais bien" is standard, completely normal, unmodified French: "I know it well".
>but only in the sense that it is referring to the person being KEPT in the DUNGEON, not the DUNGEON KEEPER
Cachottiers is still plural, so it can't be the PERSON (singular) kept in the dungeon. And there is still "arrogant or vile or mute", which is meant to describe the torturers, and not the victims. Why would the victims be vile?
>>Also on this note, both Max and the retard anon have failed to realize "fiel" in "fiel de lune" is referring the medieval practice for humorism
What relevance does a melancholic humor have to the passage? What relevance does it have to torture? Do victims of torture typically respond with melancholy? Is torture a melancholy affair? Is the character of the passage melancholy?
>somehow it needs to be communicated that salamander here is the mythical fire-breathing jewel-encrusted salamander and not the tiny lizard of science
but the snakes and toads remain standard I suppose? Even if we were to use the mythical interpretation of "salamander", how could you possibly translate that? You clearly couldn't.
>also that retard anon is completely wrong about the verb "arrimer"
Lashing has two definitions in English: tying down, and beating. Both fit with my translation. Though I should've made the double meaning clearer in my analysis. Amended.
>a royal confidante could serve as a model for NOT DIVULGING YOUR SECRET
But the focus is on the graceful secret, not the mignonnes. And as we have established the people keeping the secrets are the torturers.

>>24549504
FYI "lunar" would be "lunaire". "de lune" is "of the moon". So translating it thus would be unfaithful.

>>24549542
>What relevance does a melancholic humor have to the passage?
Also, what association does a melancholic humor have to accursed vows? Something so vindictive as a curse, so vile and arrogant, being vomited, characterized by poison and filth and evil, and it's to be understood as *melancholy*?

>max hasn't tweeted since friday
you guys broke him :(

>>24549487
>charpie: another medieval word, you should use flayed, if someone wanted to say that flesh was shredded or in ribbons (as both the retard anon and Max have suggested) a French person wouldn't not use "charpie"...unless they were medieval...or wanting a medieval tone
Also wrong. Being "flayed" was already alluded to when Celine wrote "écorcheries". "En charpie" quite literally means in pieces or in tatters, or, as I've opted to write, in shreds. "Charpie" comes from the word "echarper", which Wiktionnaire itself defines as "Maltraiter, détruire, réduire en charpie" (Mistreat, destroy, reduce to shreds). To render it as "flaying" is bringing in your own irrelevant extraneous interpretation.

>>24549542
"sous la torture"
Not "sous la lune"
I think that says enough about your arguments in the post and how they can all be ignored. "Fiel" in humorism is presumed to be black, and called BLACK BILE to distinguish it from the YELLOW BILE or CHOLER. The Moon is associated with BLACK BILE and not YELLOW BILE. I'm tired of dealing with your retardation. YOU ARE WRONG. The only thing you are right about is Max also being wrong. THAT IS IT. Shut the fuck up now.

>>24549597
It should be rendered as "rend" as in "rending flesh". Again, you are just agreeing with my criticisms of YOUR translation and then EX POST FACTO using my criticism to justify your choices, WHICH IS ABSOLUTELY ABSURD!

>>24549542
IN THE ENTIRE HISTORY OF THE FRENCH LANGUAGE «ARRIMER» HAS NEVER MEANT "TO LASH (WHIP) SOMEONE"
STOP ACTING LIKE YOUR EGREGIOUS MISTRANSLATION IS ACTUALLY CORRECT!!!

WHY ARE YOU SO MULE-HEADEDLY RETARDED???

>>24549632
>It should be rendered as "rend" as in "rending flesh"
I actually did use "rent" in my original draft of the translation lol. This is literally just up to personal preference or opinion.
>>24549628
>"sous la torture"
>Not "sous la lune"
>I think that says enough about your arguments in the post and how they can all be ignored
Yes, I never implied they were under the moon. My translation says "under the moon’s torture bile". I specified that it was under the moon's *torture bile*. Not under the moon. Can you read? I don't think you can.
>The Moon is associated with BLACK BILE and not YELLOW BILE
And how is that relevant to the passage? Please link how the melancholic symbolism of black bile corresponds to the subject of the passage. They have nothing to do with each other. And even if we were to integrate an overt reference to humorism, how would it be translated without completely destroying the meaning or syntax of the phrase? "Disgorging under the moon’s black torture bile"? "Disgorging under the moon’s torture black bile"? We certainly couldn't render it "lunar", because that would divorce it from the original text and therefore refute your own interpretation of it as a reference to humorism.
>>24549649
>IN THE ENTIRE HISTORY OF THE FRENCH LANGUAGE «ARRIMER» HAS NEVER MEANT "TO LASH (WHIP) SOMEONE"
I never implied that it did mean to whip someone. I only said that translating it as "lash" in English gave it an additional, thematically relevant double meaning, both tying and whipping. I failed to properly explain in my analysis how Lawton's use of "tie it down" is outshined by the more robust term "lashing", which also fits with the sentence's parallel structure, which I then revised to make it more clear to readers, and to you too, since you clearly do not understand a thing.

>>24549659
>I failed to properly explain in my analysis how Lawton's use of "tie it down" is outshined by the more robust term "lashing", which also fits with the sentence's parallel structure, which I then revised to make it more clear to readers, and to you too, since you clearly do not understand a thing.
No you didn't you were literally saying that «arrimer» translates to whipping someone.

>>24549664
>>24549659
EVIDENCE OF THE ANON'S RETARDATION: A DIRECT QUOTE FROM HIS "TAKEDOWN"
>Celine uses “l’arrime” in the sense of lashing or whipping something (which continues from the preceding image of the demon being attacked), rather than in the sense of tying something down.

>>24549659
>We certainly couldn't render it "lunar", because that would divorce it from the original text and therefore refute your own interpretation of it as a reference to humorism.
And if we did, where would "torture" fit in? Because your view of the dynamics of the scene (that the victims are somehow vomiting up accursed vows and black bile) completely ignores the fact that Celine specifies that the scene is occurring *sous la torture fiel de lune*. How can it be occurring *under the victim's lunar black bile*? It does not make any sense at all. So your conception of the phrase and what it implies and establishes is completely incoherent, so the torture cannot be characterized in the manner you say it is. The fiel de lune/bile of the moon *is* the torture.

>>24549670
>EVIDENCE OF THE ANON'S RETARDATION: A DIRECT QUOTE FROM HIS "TAKEDOWN"

>He's fabricating quotes now.
Just admit that you completely misinterpreted what I was trying to say (that "lashing" is a better word to use because of its double meaning in English and because of its parallel structure adherence) and are trying to bad faith your way out of this.

>>24549535
>Btw can you direct me to Céline's favorite ancien or moyen français books? Much appreciated!
Oh, I don't know...how about...ROMAN DE LA ROSE or ROMAN DE RENART??? Oh...gee...didn't Céline write a MEDIEVAL LEGEND called «LA VOLONTÉ DU ROI KROGOLD»??? Gee, I wonder if Céline was familiar with medieval history and language???? >NOPE SURELY HE WASN'T BECAUSE THAT WOULD MEAN MY """TRANSLATION""" IS WRONG
Enough from the clown!

>>24549685
Anon youre fighting windmills

>>24549682
Disingenuous shithead

>>24549688
In the sense of lashing, OR (you can make it also mean) whipping, rather than in the sense of TYING (much less violent) something down.

Which is why I clarified that section, because you made me notice how it can be misconstrued.

>>24548342
>I think he changed the intensity of the word "drive into" for the choice that made the style more smooth
You can't cope by saying that every incorrect translation that you make is a stylistic choice.

>>24541399 (OP)
Max Lawton incessantly checks his own Wikipedia page. And he's really mad that this thread is up. I bet he wrote the majority of it himself, too.

>>24541399 (OP)
0. Develop a legitimate interst in literature and languages.
1. Put legitimate effort into getting better.
2. Get help from parents money and connections.
3. Get some modest recognition.
4. Continue to work on your craft.
5. Promote yourself perhaps even overstating or exaggerating your skills.

The only pain points are #2(luck) and #5(hubris).

But everyone trying to take him down really sucks because that makes you a whiny little bitch which is much worse. He actually tries and actually shows an interest in the subject. WTF more do you expect? He’s human and he can’t possibly get every little nuance of a foreign language correct. Some of you on here are so pathetic. I bet some of you would kill your twin if he had a modicum of success that you didn’t.

>>24549967
Hi Max

>>24549899
lmao wtf

>>24549685
I was just asking! Chill lmao

Here is my translation. I'm the anon arguing with the mule-headed substack retard. As you can see it is superior to Lawton's and substack nincompoom.

>Well do I know it!...

>Superbly cheeky sneaks...arrogant or vile or mute...one after another...under torture disgorging black lunar bile and accursed vows all of 'em maleficent stinkers! Poisons, bleak messages...Martyred calves!...

>May each of us take on the demon! hurl yourselves, lash him down, slay him, revolt, find the song in your heart again, wilted...the graceful secret of royal confidantes...or else you perish by one thousand deaths and are then resurrected for one thousand punishments! By a very atrocious suffocation, one thousand ornamental flayings and cruel contortions of wounds, by tenaciously boiling pitch, tortured by tongs, the muscles rent, splashing about thus for three months and a day, a week in the hollow of a hot and greasy cooking pot, hissing snakes joined by puffed up toads, leprous, juicy, venomously yellow, gluttonous hickeys from salamanders, vampires repasting on the corpses of the damned, little wrigglers in your entrails that reawaken your suffering, by flaps of flesh pulled, chewed anew by licks of fire, thus from one thousand years to another, your thirst appeased only by a goatskin full of vinegar, by sulfuric acid of such power that your tongue strips bare, swells, bursts! and screeching completely pass from death into Hell torn to shreds! day after day! thus throughout time eternal...

>This thing is serious you see.

As you can see my translation differs wildly from Lawton's and the substack retard's translations at many different points. I will follow-up this post with an explanation of some of my choices and why Latwon and the substack as is wrong. The explanation may take a while to type up and post. Please be patient. Please also tweet my translation at Lawton to shame him for his idiocy and French illiteracy. If Lawton's publishing house wants to get in contact with me they can email me at williammckay_translations@proton.me

>>24550301
>Je le sais bien!...
I am adamant that Céline's style is didactic, authoritative, shell-shocked, and takes the tone of "I've live through real shit, let me tell you how the world is..." An English speaker of this character would start off a subject they know well like this.

>cachottiers
I despise both Lawton's and substack's translations of this word. It's pejorative. It implies the secrets being kept are trifles and of little importance. "Sneaks" is the best single word I could come up with so far. I still find it lacking.

>tous empuantis maléfiques à dégorger sous la torture fiel de lune et vœux maudits!
Both Lawton and substack's translations fail to make it clear that the bile and vows are disgorged under torture. They are mulishly obstinate in refusing to change the word order to make the sentence make sense in English. Earth to Lawton! English and French do not share the same syntax!!! You DO need to change word ordering from time to time.

>l'arrime
Lawton is closer than substack retard here. But Lawton should use a nautical term as arrimer is a nautical verb. Hence "lash down", a nautical term for tying something down.

>révulse
Lawton and substack have gone for the diametrically different meanings of this double entendre. "Revolt" captures both — inciting disgust and repelling/turning over.

>peines
Here Céline means punishments, torturous punishments. Lawton chooses pains, a better choice than substack retard's choice with "sorrows".

>à
In the next bit of this section every time "à" is repeated it is describing a new punishment, thus I have chosen to render it as "by" as in "death by..." Lawton and substack both failed to pick up on this nuance.

>vertes contorsions de blessures
Lawton and substack are both wrong. It is neither green nor unripe/ripening. Here verte is used in the sense of the French words "âpre, vif, ou rude", which translates to "biting/coarse, keen, or rough". Contortion already conveys "rough and coarse" to me so I chose to translate it as "cruel" to elicit the sharp, biting pain of the wounds.

>tenaillé
Lawton and substack fail to recognize this as moyen francais for being tortured with tongs in respect to the Spanish Inquisition, hence the root being "tenaille" or tongs.

>vampire repussants
One of the more egregious mistranslations made by Lawton and substack. Repussant has nothing to do with stink or smell. It's literally Céline misspelling the french verb for "to repast/to have a repast". Céline is notorious for having his own orthographical kinks in regards to words...maybe Lawton should read a La Pléiade edition of Céline...he might actually learn something...So to be clear this bit is talking about vampires having a repast on damned souls. Lawton and substack think it's talking about stinky vampires.

(1/2)

>>24550301
Wow. Pretty cool!

>>24550345
>I despise both Lawton's and substack's translations of this word. It's pejorative. It implies the secrets being kept are trifles and of little importance. "Sneaks" is the best single word I could come up with so far. I still find it lacking.
Still doesn't mention a thing about dungeons unlike "secret-keepers" lol

KNEEL

>>24550345
(2/2)
>vitriol
Translating it as vitriol is perfectly fine, but it needs a note that here vitriol refers to sulfuric acid. I don't think this is commonly known as most English speakers use vitriol to describe words.

>sucons goulus de salamandres
This is literally talking about suction marks or hickeys from the salamanders. Lawton and substack retard both missed this, because of Céline's orthographic idiosyncrasies. Céline left out the cedilla on the c.

>passez à mort de souffrance tout hurlant d’Enfer déchiqueté!
Both Lawton and substack did not under stand that this is the phrasing "passer à + [noun] + de + [noun]" meaning to pass from one state to another. So the description is of passing from death into Hell, as the person is being tortured to death only to wake up in Hell to be tortured again. Another extremely egregious mistranslation by Lawton.

>Voyez que la chose est sérieuse.
English speakers end locutions like this with the "you see" part. Perhaps you are familiar with the stereotype of 1930's American gangsters ending every sentence with "myeah shee?" This is the same thing, but in French. The French do it at the beginning of the sentence, the English at the end.

I asked an AI bot to translate it and got this:
I know it well!...

Brazen, secretive, haughty rogues… arrogant or vile or mute… one after another… all reeking with malevolent stench, spewing under the torture of moon’s bile and cursed vows! Poisons, black missives… Martyred calves!...

Let each one turn on the demon! Let them rage, bind it, slay it, recoil, and find again in their heart the withered song… the gracious secret of the darlings… or else let them perish in a thousand deaths and rise again to a thousand torments! In suffocating agony, a thousand flayings for delight, green contortions of wounds, tenacious in boiling pitch, torn asunder, muscles shredded, writhing thus for a day and three months, a week in the hollow of a greasy, scalding cauldron, entwined with hissing serpents and bloated toads, leprous, juicy, yellow with venom, greedy suckers of salamanders, repulsive vampires on the bodies of the damned, wriggling in your entrails to rekindle your pain, strips of crumpled flesh, chewed again with fiery darts, thus from a thousand to a thousand years, slaking your thirst only with a jug full of vinegar, of vitriol so fierce that your tongue peels, swells, bursts! And you pass into death’s agony, howling through the tattered Hell, day after day! Thus through eternal time…

See that the matter is serious.


Céline’s style is famously chaotic, rhythmic, and visceral, blending poetic flourishes with raw, almost apocalyptic imagery. I aimed to capture this by maintaining the cadence and intensity while ensuring the translation reads naturally in English.
The passage’s structure, with its cascading clauses and vivid, grotesque imagery, is preserved to reflect the original’s relentless momentum.
Terms like “fiel de lune” (moon’s bile) and “poix bouillante” (boiling pitch) are translated to retain their archaic, evocative quality while staying true to their meaning.
The ellipses and exclamations are kept to mirror Céline’s breathless, incantatory tone.
I avoided over-modernizing the language to maintain the literary texture, opting for words like “rogues,” “flayings,” and “vile” to echo the original’s dark, theatrical flavor

>>24550385
>spewing under the torture of moon’s bile and cursed vows!
Syntactically incorrect.
>green
Incorrect.
>tenacious in boiling pitch
Incorrect.
>torn asunder
Incorrect.
>greedy suckers of salamanders
Incorrect.
>repulsive vampires
Incorrect.
>a jug
Incorrect.
>And you pass into death’s agony, howling through the tattered Hell
Incorrect.
>tattered Hell
Egregiously incorrect.

Everything else is good. Cauldron is better than pot or cooking pot. Black missives is really good.

>>24550396
Can the "green" part be translated as "fresh"? Green as in something fresh or new, "Fresh contortions of wounds"?

>>24550419
It's pic rel. So no.

>>24550429
thanks!

>>24550301
>>24550345
All of your changes operate under assumptions and a particular interpretation projected onto the text, which is not mirrored in the text itself. All of these flourishes are entirely your own spin on what you believe Celine meant, or are otherwise interpretations that are just as valid as the substack translation.
I believe Celine's tone is more austere and grave, almost foreboding, instead of your more down to earth view. To go through all that drama in the passage just to sandwich it with casual phrases is silly.
>This thing is serious
He says "la (the) chose", not "cet (this) chose". It's certainly something but it's not what Celine wrote.
>Well do I know it
Also out of order. He would've said "bien je le sais".
>cheeky
And you're worried the secrets are going to be regarded as trifles? Cheeky is almost endearing.
>sneaks
Missing the "dungeon" aspect of the word "cachottiers" that you yourself pointed out.
>all of 'em
Also not in the original text. Celine simply says "tous" (all).
>"Revolt" captures both
So does "repel".
>cruel contortions of wounds
Good take on the phrase. I think both "unripe" and "cruel" could reasonably fit.
>tortured by tongs
Feels stilted and not descriptive enough. Though I suppose it gets the "tong" image across.
>puffed up toads
Both bloated and puffed up work, though bloated is assonant with toads.
>leprous
Also mistranslated. Celine would've used "lepreux".
>venomously yellow
Your own spin on the phrase. Jaunes à venins literally means "yellow with venoms" (note the plural, which demonstrates he likely did not mean venomously).
>gluttonous hickeys
Are the salamanders making love to the tortured? What? "Suckers" relays both the act of sucking and a connotation of insult.
>>>24550301
>vampires repasting
Good catch, although I think the idea that vampires are on bodies implies that they are feeding off of them already. Repulsive also doesn't necessarily mean stinky. If it was "repugnant" that you took objection with, then fair game. But "repulsive" can be regarded as "contemptible" or "abhorrent", not "stinky".
>little wrigglers
Celine does not use the word "little". Wrigglers already implies littleness anyways.
>by flaps of flesh pulled
The original text implies nothing about the flesh being pulled.
>chewed anew
Very good choice actually, fits and flows much better than "remasticated".
>by licks of fire
"Darts" feels more sharp, like teeth. Tongues (that lick) cannot chew.
>by sulfuric acid of such power
Incoherent. With vitriol of such ardor denotes the extent of the hate at hand, sulfuric acid feels out of place and irrelevant.
>strips bare
Awkward phrasing
>swells
Celine uses "bouffis"/"bouffle" twice. There is no need to switch it to swells.
>into Hell
I think both interpretations work, especially with the connotation of "shrieking from Hell" entailing "hellishness".

>>24550431
Wtf, are you Lawton? Pay me $1,000 dollars for my consulting work. I posted my email with my translation.

>>24550433
>He says "la (the) chose", not "cet (this) chose"
Yes, my mistake it should be "The thing".
>Also out of order
This is why you're not good at translating. You don't have to autistically keep word order. Also "bien je le sais" means something like "Yeah I know it."
>Cheeky is almost endearing.
Effronté and Effrontérie mean cheeky/cheekiness.
>Also not in the original text. Celine simply says "tous" (all).
Again, you don't have to be autistically rigid when it comes words, readability in English is a good thing.
>(note the plural, which demonstrates he likely did not mean venomously).
It's plural because toads is plural you fucking dolt. English doesn't have fucking plurals like that. If I were to say the toads were venomously yellow or the toad was venomously yellow, the phrase venomously yellow doesn't need to pluralized like it does in French.
>Are the salamanders making love to the tortured?
The word is sucon, which is a hickey, love-bite, etc.
>The original text implies nothing about the flesh being pulled
Froissé can mean pulled (as in pulling a muscle or straining a muscle) and makes way more fucking sense in the context of flesh.
>Incoherent
Vitriol is literally the word for sulfuric acid. Use a dictionary for once in your life.

>>24550433
>de lèpre
Literally: of leprosy
Leprous (definition): of leprosy.
Again, READABILITY IS KING. Stop with your retardation, please. I am begging you.

>>24550345
Repasser means to iron or to pass by again or to come back. What is the verb for “repast” you say he misspells instead of this being a strange spelling of repoussant? Idiot… You cannot attack someone for mistakes then have weird mistakes and terrible misinterpretations yourself. Also the wounds could be green, why would you take the 9th definition down and say “cruel”? But your idea of “repussant” is the gravest stupidity. Un repas is used as a noun. Or maybe the vampires are “ironing” in a weird spelling!

>>24550434
maybe ;)

lawton.max at gmail dot com

>>24550600
>why would you take the 9th definition for green
Because we all agreed "green contortions of wounds" sounds incorrect. This is a hint Céline is not using the main definition of green.
>your idiotic repasser diatribe
Repusse is the third person conjugation of repaître. Just as the french write écartant (PRESENT PARTICIPLE) from the verb écarter so does Céline derive a PRESENT PARTICIPLE of REPUSSANT for the verb REPAÎTRE.

Now, get out of my ear dude. You're probably just Max and you are currently seething at my translation outshining yours and showing just how lazy and awful you are at translating French (YOUR BEST LANGUAGE TO TRANSLATE FROM !!! )

>>24550636
No French person in the fucking world would hear repaître here before repoussant.

>>24550645
>the idea that the vampires are feasting on bodies is ludicrous
This is the argument you are making.

>>24550649
The idea that the vampires are repugnant is also ludicrous? If you can argue for your interpretation, then a misspelling of repoussant is also possible my friend

>>24550659
>>24550649
>>24550645
According to deepL the sentence is "Vampires reborn in the bodies of the damned"
You're all wrong and AI will take your jobs.

Lawton's translation differs very little from the existing translation...One has to wonder why Lawton is building his case for the existing translation on this snippet, when Lawton's is objectively worse...

>>24550716
Isn't that the same trick he tried to pull with Atay's Tutunamayanlar? He was working on a re-write of the existing translation and added his name as a co-translator.

This is all narcissism on Max's part.

>>24550734
Yes. Exactly the same trick he pulled with the Turkish translation. The difference here though is the existing translation gas been published by NDP for some fifty plus years. But yes, Lawtob typically claims the existing translation is bad and poorly done simply because it's not his. He is able to get away with this because he is college chums with the current owner of Dalkey Archive, so Dalkey Archive will back Lawton and his translation, no matter how superfluous or subpar it is. It should also be noted that NDP published Guignol's Band I, but Dalkey published Guignol's Band II (London Bridge). No doubt that with this moved Dalkey is trying to secure the market on both parts of Guignol's Band. They can retire their old translation and market the ever so fashionable Max Lawton translation of BOTH PARTS!!! NOW YOUR EDITIONS WILL BE MATCHING AND FROM THE SAME PUBLISHER!!!

>>24550743
Yep. All true. Max said it himself. He said the main reason he's translating Guignol's Band despite the existing translations is because he wants them to have only one translator (conveniently him lol). Slimy bastard.

>>24548645
has this been share on twitter?

>>24551002
shared*

>>24550636
Also who said it was “repussants” in the first place? Look at the book itself. It says “repoussants”

>>24550464
>readability in English is a good thing
You also don't have to add in words that were not there, making the whole sentence read awkwardly. "All that befouling evil" is perfectly readable
>you don't have to autistically keep word order
Sounds like you're just being contrarian now because you insist on your interpretation
>venomously yellow
So both of our renditions of the phrase work and make sense, although mine is more faithful on a word by word basis.
>hickey
Fair enough, I was thinking of it in terms of "sucoir", literally "sucker"
>Froisse
Froisse can also mean crumpled. In fact the vast majority of its definitions center around "being crumpled" rather than pulled. You're really reaching with this one.
>vitriol
Yes, vitriol meaning sulphuric acid is carried over into English as well, while also having a much more conventional interpretation of "passionate hatred". To change vitriol to specifically say sulphuric acid is retarded and devoid of all aesthetics.

>royal confidantes
Well put. I think this might be the better translation. I concede on this point.

>>24550474
De lepre can just as easily be translated "with leprosy". Again, if Celine wanted to say leprous, he would've said lepreux.

Damn. Translating from French to English is a bitch. Who would've thought. But faggots still say "English is le part latin, it's easy!" (even Lawton in the interview) when vocabulary is just not enough, you need actual skills.

>>24550301
Also "superbly cheeky sneaks" just sounds stupid at face value. Awful translation. Feels like I'm playing Stalker.

>>24551107
>superbly cheeky sneaks
sounds like something out of monty python hehe

>>24548321
occisate me daddy~~

man celine sure was a world-class hack because all three of these translations read like absolute garbage

>>24549967
>WTF more do you expect? He’s human and he can’t possibly get every little nuance of a foreign language correct.
I cannot overstate how bad his translations are. In most cases, AI translations do a better job than he does at capturing nuance and the original style of the author. As a native speaker, this is really apparent

>>24550301
>>24550433
>>gluttonous hickeys
>Are the salamanders making love to the tortured? What? "Suckers" relays both the act of sucking and a connotation of insult.
Here, as in many other points in that anon's translation, you could always find better alternatives, eg.:
>greedy sucklings of salamanders

>>24551457
I think gluttonous fits with the theme of the passage better, but "sucklings of salamanders" is a good substitution. It's got a less hateful connotation to it than "suckers" with its double meaning, but is probably the more faithful word for "sucon" because of its connotations of (uncomfortable) intimacy. It really does amount to personal interpretation and preference I suppose.

>>24550667
I know you're joking but DeepL is really bad for translating nowadays. They did something to their model that messed it up. It used to be really good just two years ago. It's not even that ChatGPT outpaced it, it feels like they ruined their own model.

>>24551461
Also I like "salamander suckers" because salamander could also be interpreted as an insult, as in calling the torturers reptiles or lizardpeople lol

>>24551031
The blog retard made a typo. So I blame him. I was doing it all based off his blog.

>>24542173
Prehistorical.

Sorokin is so fucking vulgar. It's not worth translating.

>>24552008
poopoo peepee
the USSR was weird and complex
poopoo peepee

>>24552210
I gave him a chance, saw Max talking about and translating him, started reading Day of the Oprichnik and every page contains sex, rape, strong language or other vulgarities. Yes, I understand that this is part of life, but I don't have to read about it on every fucking page.

>>24552216
Pomo types like Lawton have this weird fixation on sex and vulgarity as if its still subversive and not completely contrived and trite

>>24552256
Also with other writers. Tried Bolano after I saw Max talking about him, same vulgar trash.

>>24552265
What did you read? I don't remember him being that vulgar. There were vulgar parts but not really every other page like Sorokin. Sorokin is a special case.

>>24552265
I think 2666 is one of the very few instances where that kind of vulgarity is justified, because it's meant to be something like an assessment and confrontation of the excesses of the worst parts of humanity... and by humanity I mean south americans. But writers or works that are able to handle it as well as 2666 did are very few and far between.

>>24552270
The spirit of science fiction

>>24552274
It's been a while but I don't remember any South Americans other than Amalfitano who was Chilean.

>>24552279
That wasn't a book meant to be released. It's an old abandoned project his greedy ex-wife dug out from his old computer. Sadly, this is the cost of publishing this kind of things.

>>24552289
my bad i meant latinx...

>>24552298
ah, you're a /pol/tard, never mind.

>>24552309
Its a joke take it easy

>>24552335

>>24544737
>all untouched
like pottery

>>24541399 (OP)
As someone who has no taste for modernist experimentational crap, I'm glad this guy can translate what he likes and people give him money to do it.

Estoy ebrio pero quiero decir mi opinión. Max lawton apesta. Y Laiseca y su mierda de libro Los Sorias también apesta. Que mundo de mierda. Cuándo volverán los buenos escritores? Ya basta de Aguinis, mujeres y malas copias de Bolaño.

>>24541399 (OP)
>>24542180
>>24551939
>>24542173
He looks like an octoroon.

>>24552710
Chat what is a octoroon? Lel

>>24552721
1/8 black

>>24544737
I would kill for all those books.

how can I learn medieval french?

>>24552790
Sleep with max.

>>24552812
But he clearly doesn't know it. An anon above BTFO him.

>>24552821
The anon above's translation barely included any of the medieval stuff that he brought up lol so bringing up the medieval stuff is basically meaningless just cool footnote material

>>24552845
Whatever you say, Max. Did you suck Andrei's cock today already? Remember, he made you.

>>24552849
u can read anon's translation for urself man

>>24552783
All you need is rich parents to give you a trust fund anon

>>24544835
>Not a good look Max.
Speak for yourself. This makes Max seem based.

New Lawton translation for 2026. This time it's an Italian book.

>>24553338
He can't translate French at all. I can only imagine how awful his Italian is.

>>24553338
>Like a photo-negative of Franz Kafka or Virginia Woolf
What an absurdly meaningless sentence. Kafka and Woolf are not similar in any meaningful way. This sentence tells me nothing except the writer has no idea what they are talking about.

>>24552783
You can buy all of those on abebooks for very cheap...

>>24553345
Gotta love this shitty marketing gimmick that every publisher especially Dalkey uses right now
>the [language/place] [author/book]
>the Italian Moby Dick
>the Mandarin Ulysses
>the Aramaic Burroughs
>the Polynesian Nietzsche
or some other equally contrived name-recognition ploy. So fucking stupid and shameless

>>24553338
>Max's bio text is longer than the authors
Don't you miss the days where translators weren't pushed onto your face by the publishers and you didn't even know about their life? I miss those days.

>>24553360
Yes, that's a retarded trick and so ingrained in publishing culture.

>>24553338
why does Deep Vellum copy everything Impedimenta publishes?

>>24553381
Nepotism
It's all nepotism
Everywhere

>>24553338
And Schattenfroh in August by the same publisher. Ah, to have those connections.

>>24544871
Houellebecq is a philo-semite

>>24553338
Why is Max Lawton's name in the same size font as the authors?

>>24553404
Michael Lentz is a talentless hack. Gimmicky bullshit

>>24553406
True, he's a jewloving boomer, but I meant this to indicate Max's right-wing literary leanings.

>>24553412
Really? I haven't read it yet.

Reminder that we are now mentioned in Max Lawton's wikipedia page:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Lawton

>>24553423
He's got a passage in Schattenfroh where he describes taking dumps that "feel fatherly, like encountering Mann" or "feel like Kafka" or some shit. It's just so contrived.

>>24553414
I don't know much about this guy but he seems to be more interested in transgressive fiction rather than right-wing authors per se

>>24553444
He's interested in avant-garde literature, that's why he stole his taste from Andrei from the Untranslated. But he's a raging antisemite of old Anglo and Austrian stock. He's just more subtle but the signs are there.

>>24553409
And why is it on two different lines. Looks so sloppy.

new max lawton tweet just dropped

Who

>>24554292
kill yourself

>>24541399 (OP)
Who is this and why should I care?

>>24553436
So as vulgar as all other contemporary novelists? Fuck it then.

>>24555098
The author's an awful poet too lol you can look up some of his stuff and its just nonsense (in German and especially in English, of course)

>>24555104
Bro, what is this trash?
https://www.lyrikline.org/de/gedichte/vielleicht-ist-es-so-vielleicht-ist-es-aber-auch-nicht-so-801/
https://www.lyrikline.org/de/gedichte/schoenheit-794?showmodal=da

>>24555109
this is the guy lawton hails as a genius btw

I smell a Jew. Max Lawton is in this thread. Everyone stay vigilant.

You're on thin ice, Max. And I didn't post the substack article either btw.

>>24555636
Max Lawton is antisemitic.

BUMP

little interest in this but he responded in r/TrueLit.
you are giving /lit/ a bad reputation

>>24555636
it's over...

>Ermes Marana is a counterfeit translator who claims to translate the works of Silas Flannery. In reality, however, Marana may be translating other books instead or perhaps inventing new books from scratch for the translations he is hired to do. Marana is a mysterious figure that the Reader hears a lot about—he’s always at the center of conspiracies and travels around the world to avoid being found
Is this really what If on a winter’s night, a traveler is like?
I've been meaning to read it but damn, I'm excited to read it now

>Also you are participating in a public-harassment campaign against me on a Nazi website and you can't even reveal your identity online because you would be fired from your job or kicked out of your school for being a ringleader in such a hateful discussion.
>Spare me the soapboxing. I repeat myself: may the world never see your true face.
Lmao
Seriously, I hope this Max Lawton guy knows that this harassment campaign is very likely led by 1-2 autistically fixated individuals here.
Most people do not care.

>>24556824
>Seriously, I hope this Max Lawton guy knows that this harassment campaign is very likely led by 1-2 autistically fixated individuals here.
>Most people do not care.
Yeah often these are brainbroken NEETs that have all the time in the world to do this shit.

'Tis not a nazi website tho Maxime, so chillout with that point or you will get more autists from here on your back

https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/barneyfag-lee-goldson
Btw if you want to know the level of autism this place is capable of, read this
Also yeah it's not a nazi website

>>24556834
>Btw if you want to know the level of autism this place is capable of, read this
I expected worse. What are the most infamous 4chan lolcows or doxers?

>>24556803
>here's the version I made after seeing the superior translations on /lit/
Yikes...not a good look Max...

>>24556809
>Max refuses to use 4chan (because NAZIS) so he browses on warosu
Interesting.

>>24556803
He should publicly respond to my critique of his Russian. Cocksucker.

>>24556803
>>24557353
What a bitch
https://www.reddit.com/r/TrueLit/comments/1m16o5j/the_miseducation_of_max_lawton/

>>24557361
I just saw this. He did respond. Thank you OP for bringing it up!

He just points to a wiki page. He has no actual understanding of the Russian language. He must be translating by reference to a dictionary. "Wander" and "бpoдить" are not the same. The words are similar, but not the same. And here especially they're not at all alike. Like I already said, there is a bit of restlessness in "бpoдить" which "wander" lacks completely. Just try to pronounce the actual words yourself. It sounds more restless. And it reminds me of "бyбнить" (bubnit'), which is to grumble, and something you could do while PACING around. And which I imagined the character doing.

When I read the original Russian passage from Telluria, I get a very real understanding of the movement of the character under the table. And like I, again, already said, this is totally missing from Lawton's translation because he mistranslated both "бpoдить" and "тюкaть", the latter of which fully contextualized the pacing around. It's a repeated, light, tapping. But Lawton translated it as forcefully driving" a fist into a palm. How does this happen? You just can't translate like this if you know the language at all.