![]() ![]() The woman on the other side or at a little distance is aval, and a woman far away is uval. In Tamil, the woman standing close to you is ival. ![]() I thought to myself, “If a mouse speaking like an American and dressing like one can be normal for an American child, why not Hanuman and Ravana?” But I also understood how easily we accept the ten heads of Ravana, the snakes crawling on Shiva’s body, Mahavishnu sleeping on a snake bed, and Krishna eating kilos of fresh butter.Īpart from meanings translation also involves perspectives in terms of distance. She told me, “Please don’t tell him horror stories of men with ten heads and monkeys that cross oceans and speak like humans.” I told her I had told him one of the epics of India. The next day his mother asked me if I had told him some horror stories. Many years ago I remember narrating the Ramayana to a four-year old American child to put him to sleep. The images of these flowers evoke different memories in us not just of the flowers but also of the qualities and the emotions they evoke. And we have fish-eyed and lotus-faced women and sometimes some men have lotus feet. Translated directly into English as “rain-eyes”, the eyes would lose their beauty. In Tamil we sometimes describe eyes as “rain-eyes”, which are considered the most beautiful. But when you translate it into English it has to be a warm hand, or the meaning would change. In a hot country like ours if someone touches you with a cool hand it is exciting. I also understood that what we were dealing with was not just two languages but two different cultures. Translating an Indian language into English was a similar effort, I felt. Idaikadar said that writing the aphorisms stating such profound truths in two lines was like piercing a mustard seed and pushing seven oceans into it. It also made me realise that translation was an effort similar to how a critic named Idaikadar described Thirukkural, a book of aphorisms based on moral codes and ethics written by Thiruvalluvar more than two thousand years ago. Around 1990, Lakshmi Holmstrom translated one of my stories for the Inner Courtyard collection and working with her was an experience that I enjoyed. So translating ideas into English in a creative exercise was something that was not even remotely a part of my efforts at expression. I assumed that it was only a tonal variation like very often it is in Tamil. I rewrote the sentence and instead of a full stop put a question mark: “The crow is sitting on the tree?” and so on. I could not believe that the English language could be so easy. We got a series of sentences like “The Crow is sitting on the tree” and were told to convert them into interrogative sentences. In the 5th standard we had to deal with English grammar. I told him, “But Appa, I have improved I got a zero last time and now I have fourteen marks!” My father, who thought it was the duty of every South Indian to master English, was rather upset. In the second exam I got 14 marks out of 100 and was quite pleased with myself. In the 4th standard, in my first exam in English, I got zero marks and had to kneel in the class for a few days for this shameful performance. I thought only in Tamil and translating my thoughts into English was not an easy effort, especially when it came to English language exams. English was really a foreign language for many years. I studied in Tamil medium till the 6th standard. ‘Neeyat’ review: A by-the-numbers murder mystery.Foxconn withdraws from Rs 1.5 lakh crore venture with Vedanta to make semiconductors in Gujarat.This play by Cyrus Mistry records the travails of a Parsi family in a crumbling Mumbai mansion.Delhi High Court sets aside Centre’s order revoking academic Ashok Swain’s OCI status.Why are rural elections in West Bengal so violent?.In web series ‘Kohrra’, a murder leads to an investigation into relationships.So he devoted his life to helping its farmers Sam Higginbottom wanted to help India.No mafias or rogue doctors – the organ trade is a more sophisticated operation.Entrepreneur Rajesh Jain suggests ways to build profitable businesses without external funding.Watch: ‘Jawan’, starring Shah Rukh Khan.Can graves be an important key for understanding the ideology of the Indus Valley Civilisation?. ![]() Watch: Odisha’s first AI-powered virtual news presenter ‘Lisa’ debuts on local news channel. ![]()
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