nachrichten aus absurdistan zitiert drei Übersetzungen ins Deutsche von den ersten zwei Sätzen von “Madame Bovary”, zunehmend länger.

bq. Wir waren im Arbeitssaal, als der Direktor eintrat, ihm folgten ein Neuer
in ziviler Kleidung und ein Schuldiener, der ein großes Pult trug. Wer schlief, wachte auf, und jeder erhob sich, als sei er in seiner Arbeit gestört worden:

Die dritte Übersetzung, von Ernst Sander, ist etwa dreimal so lang und enthält viel mehr Details. Oder gab es eine längere Fassung des Romans in Französischen? Wenn nicht, ist es ehr überraschend.

Die Quelle scheint “Der Rabe 47” (1996) zu sein, aber eine Übersetzung ist von 2003, also kann das nicht stimmen. Dank an Kai Becker von der pt-Liste.

Die englischen Übersetzungen scheinen durchweg kürzer zu sein:

bq. We were at preparation, when the headmaster came in, followed by a new boy dressed in “civvies” and a school servant carrying a big desk. (tr. by Alan Russell)

bq. We were studying when the headmaster came in, followed by a new boy, not yet wearing a school uniform, and a monitor carrying a large desk. (tr. by Mildred Marmur)

bq. We were in the study hall when the headmaster walked in, followed by a new boy not wearing a school uniform, and by a janitor carrying a large desk. (tr. by Lowell Bair)

bq. We were in study-hall when the headmaster entered, followed by a new boy not yet in school uniform and by the handyman carrying a large desk. (tr. by Francis Steegmuller)

praegnanz.de ist ein Weblog (Textpattern) von Gerrit van Aaken (dies zumindest großgeschrieben) hauptsächlich über Typographie, zum Beispiel eine Kritik des Harald-Schmidt-Logos. Es gibt auch Aufsätze über Typographie im Web, wie bitte abstand halten.

(Via Wortfeld – einer der Anderswo-im-Netz-Links)

Yesterday I threw some boilerplate into Google. I thought there was a mistake in the text, and this search often finds similar sentences that throw light on the defective text. I put a lot of words in, even though I know Google doesn’t search many. But yesterday, all my words were underlined as a search header!

But I am afraid I didn’t believe it till I read it in Language Log… Google’s ten-word limit has been raised to thirty-two.

Mark Liberman followed this with a report on some problems in Google’s Boolean search, but I’m not going to read about them.

In einer deutschen Genealogie-FAQ gefunden:

bq. Januar: Hartung, Ianuarius, Jänner, Jenner, Eismonat, Erster Monat
Februar: Hornung, Februarius, Feber, Harnung, Regenmonat, Taumond, Schmelzmond, Narrenmond
März: Lenzing, Martius, Lenzmond, Windmonat, Frühlingsmonat, Merz
April: Ostermond, Aprilis, Grünmonat, Ostermonat, Osteren, Wandelmonat, Apprell, Launing
Mai: Wonnemond, Maius, Wonnemonat, Blütemonat, Blütenmonat, Weidemonat
Juni: Brachmond, Brachet, Iunius, Brachmonat, Wiesenmonat, Rosenmonat
Juli: Heuert, Iulius, Heumonat, Heuet, Heumond
August: Ernting, Augustus, Erntemonat, Hitzmonat, Augst, Augstmonat, Eichelmond
September: Scheiding, Herbstmonat, Fruchtmonat, Herpsten, 7ber, 7bris, VIIber
Oktober: Gilbhard, October, Weinmonat, Wynmonat, 8ber, 8bris, VIIIber
November: Nebelung, Wintermonat, Reifmonat, Nebelmonat, Windmonat, 9ber, 9bris, IXber
Dezember: Christmond, Christmonat, Julmonat, Julmond, Wolfmonat, December, 10ber, 10bris, Xber

Gilbhard indeed!

LATER NOTE: Native American full moon names
According to Wordlab, we have the Full Wolf Moon tomorrow. More names here:

bq. January 25, 5:32 a.m. EST — The Full Wolf Moon. Amid the zero cold and deep snows of midwinter, the wolf packs howled hungrily outside Indian villages. It was also known as the Old Moon or the Moon After Yule. In some tribes this was the Full Snow Moon; most applied that name to the next moon.

It’s very urbanized here in Fürth, but there is some snow on the cars, and a couple of dogs tied up outside the supermarket have been barking.

Abnu of Wordlab kindly draws my attention to a Wikipedia article entitled Heavy metal umlaut. This is about gratuitous diacritics in the names of rock bands.

bq. A heavy metal umlaut is an umlaut over letters in the name of a heavy metal band. Umlauts and other diacritics with a blackletter style typeface are a form of foreign branding intended to give a band’s logo a tough Germanic feel. They are also called röckdöts. The heavy metal umlaut is never referred to by the term diaeresis in this usage, nor does it affect the pronunciation of the band’s name.

Many examples and links are given.

bq. David St. Hubbins (Michael McKean) in the film This Is Spinal Tap opined, “It’s like a pair of eyes. You’re looking at the umlaut, and it’s looking at you.”

The Economist currently has an article on using the Web as a language corpus. It quotes Language Log, where the whole article is given too (this link should remain functioning).

bq. Search engines, unlike the tools linguists use to analyse standard corpora, do not allow searching for a particular linguistic structure, such as “[Noun phrase] far from [verb phrase]”. This requires indirect searching via samples like “He far from succeeded”. But Philip Resnik, of the University of Maryland, has created a “Linguist’s Search Engine” (LSE) to overcome this. When trying to answer, for example, whether a certain kind of verb is generally used with a direct object, the LSE grabs a chunk of web pages (say a thousand, with perhaps a million words) that each include an example of the verb. The LSE then parses the sample, allowing the linguist to find examples of a given structure, such as the verb without an object. In short, the LSE allows a user to create and analyse a custom-made corpus within minutes.