Re: Translation of Logh.
Walter Amos (amos@sedl.org)
Thu, 15 Jan 1998 09:28:35 -0600 (CST)
On Thu, 15 Jan 1998 wami@cuhk.edu.hk wrote:
> Though I am not going to translate the novel, I am also going to
> talk about the gender issues and sexuality about this novel in another
> course. So, can some here can suggest me some ideas about that?
> Thanx.
Well this is a kind of interesting point, (which maybe might provoke some
interesting discussion on this list) - that in fact there are almost no issues
of gender and sexuality in the novel since there is almost no sex. It may be
worth remarking on that Reinhard and Kircheis, while repeatedly being
described as physically beautiful, are almost totally asexual.
There is really only one sex act in the course of the entire series (SPOILER
WARNING FROM HERE ON!) when Hilda "comforts" Reinhard, but that is less an
act of passion as of desperation. Yang marries Frederica, but that feels less
like a match based on mutual affection as simply "he had nothing better to
do".
In this regard I think Tanaka writes a lot like Isaac Asimov, or like I did in
High School. Senior Year for a class project I wrote a script for an SF
movie, and at the end as an after thought I realized that after focusing on
all the spacefleet generals, emperors, and so on, I had not written any
characters I thought of as women. After the fact I decided there was no
reason some of the characters couldn't be *played* by women, but there was
nothing explicitly "female" about them. This seems to have happened to tanaka
with regard to the manga version - faced with the complaint that he had too
few women in story, he OK'd changing Adrian Rubinsky into a woman, Adriana
Rubinskya! Though I can't read the manga in detail, I'd be willing to bet
that her way of thinking and acting isn't fundamentaly different though.
I suppose this point could be made into a *gender* issue though. How do male
versus female authors handle writing male or female characters? And is a
character's way of thinking independent of his or her sex? Can you make
Rubinsky or Reinhard or any other character a female without changing their
actions and have it be believeable?
> p.s. I remembered some of you here can read or speak German, am I
> right? Since I am learning the language, can someone here be my
> German pen-pal, so that I may have the chance to practise the
> language. Thank you.
I don't know how many others on the list know some German, hopefully someone
more fluent than me, but I can write and speak it to a certain extent. I had
it in high school and a year at University, but it has been a long time since
then so there are many fine grammar points I am sure I have forgotten
(adjective endings and subjunctive case, and the like) But I'd be willing to
give it a try if you like.
==============================================================================
"Zu jeder Zeit, an jeder (sic) Ort, bleibt das Tun | Walter Amos
der Menschen das gleiche..." - Galactic Heroes II | amos@sedl.org