A Visit to the New York Public Library

Alexander Rainof

As you might already know, Charlotte these last few weeks has been a devoted bookworm at the New York Public Library (http://www.nypl.org/). Being in a library generally inspires thinking in those fortunate enough to find themselves in such wonderful surroundings. Charlotte, a strong believer of "When in Rome do as the Romans do", found herself pondering why the French, in three proverbs or sayings which she deemed somewhat unfortunate, linked spiders and time of day to what can only be considered capricious fate: araignée du matin, araignée du chagrin (spider in the morrow, spider of sorrow), araignée de l'après-midi, araignée de l'ennui (spider in the afternoon, spider of problems and gloom), araignée du soir, araignée de l'espoir (spider in the evening hope is abringing). Having translated these sayings into English, and somewhat pleased with both the rhyme and the somewhat archaic use of "morrow" meaning "morning", Charlotte turned her thoughts to the importance of proverbs to the culture of each country in particular and consequently to translators and interpreters in general.

Thus, aware that the proof of the pudding is in the eating, Charlotte decided to make hay while the sun was shining and, knowing that the early bird gets the worm, remembered that a sequence of interesting links at the NYPL lead to a world of proverb related URLs. In fact, if one selects from the NYPL Home Page, under The Research Libraries, the link to the "Science, Industry and Business Library" (SIBL), it will connect the proverb seeker to eight new links. Access the fifth link from the top of the list, "Patents and Trademarks at the New York Public Library" and from there select "International Patent, Trademark and/or Copyright Sites." This in turn will produce a variety of links, of which the eighth, under "Individual Country Sites" will access the Japanese Information Home Page (http://www.ntt.co.jp/japan/). Here, one's patient search is rewarded with a glorious Home Page which is a must for the Japanese language translator and interpreter. It has links to the Japanese National Anthem which can be downloaded together with Sound Machine which is also provided, to a clickable map of Japan from which every major university in the country that has a home page can be reached, to the Diet and the Prime Minister's residence, to the text of The Constitution of Japan, to weather information for Japan, and last but not least, under "Cultures and Customs", to the Kotowaza (Japanese proverbs) link developed by Tim Duncan (http://www.aiai.ed.ac.uk/~timd/kotuwaza/kotuwaza.html).

This site already has 45 proverbs listed in Romaji (Roman alphabet equivalents of the Japanese kanji) which can be selected individually. When selected, each proverb is given in Japanese ideographs, followed by a Romanji transcription, a literal translation, a clarification regarding the real meaning of the proverb and an equivalent English proverb if available, and finally by notes about the cultural and/or linguistic and grammatical background of the proverb and by photographs or illustrations. For instance, "iwanu ga hana" means literally "not speaking is the flower", and the meaning of the proverb is given as "some things are better left unsaid" or "silence is golden." The notes provided state that -nu is a negative ending like -nai. "Yabo wo tsutsuite hebi wo dasu" which translates literally as "Poke a bush, a snake comes out" is shown to be the Japanese equivalent of "Let sleeping dogs lie" and is usually abbreviated to "Yabu hebi da" or "Yabu hebi ni naru." "Saru mo ki kara ochiru", meaning literally "Even monkeys fall from trees" has two possible English equivalents, discussed in the translation and the notes: "Even experts make mistakes" or possibly also "Pride comes before a fall." In some cases, such as "Toranu tanuki no kawa zan'you", or "Count the skins of badgers which haven't been caught" or "Don't count your chickens before they have hatched", an additional link is provided for "tanuki" (an animal found in Japan, similar to a badger or a raccoon, and rich in symbolic and iconographical meanings in Japanese culture) whic, when selected, presents the viewer with a magnificent photograph of a "tanuki." "Neko ni koban", meaning literally "A coin to a cat" is equivalent in English to "Pearls before swine." A koban is an Japanese gold coin. "Nakitsura ni hachi" or "A bee to a crying face" is the Japanese equivalent to "When it rains, it pours." In one instance, with the proverb "Ningen banji saiou ga uma", the Chinese tale about a man named Sai, on which the proverb is based, is summarized in the notes, so that the reader can understand how "Humans everything Saiou horse" in fact means "Inscrutable are the ways of heaven."

All too often, translators and interpreters have come to grief when faced with highly idiomatic and culturally encoded structures such as proverbs that really connot be translated unless the idiomatic equivalent is known in the target language. However, those fortunate enough to have discovered the Nihon-no-Kotuwaza site, will find at the end of the list of Japanese proverbs that can be accessed individually, twelve more links under the heading of "Further links", most of which are indeed the treasure at the end of the rainbow:

"The '96 Tokyo International Proverb Forum" discusses papers given during said Forum held in Tokyo October 24 and 25, 1996. Abstracts of the papers given in paremiology (the study of proverbs) and paremiography (the collection of proverbs) by scholars from the US, Korea, Russia, France, China, Germany, Japan, etc. can be downloaded. Collections of Swahili, Kurdish and Tamil proverbs can also be downloaded.

"Japan Links" provides access to numerous Japanese press links, often available in both English and Japanese. Such is, for instance, the "Japan Times", which covers the whole prior month of articles on a day by day basis, and which is only a couple of days behind the current date.

"Proverbs Relating to the Game of Go" tends to be somewhat technical, but of great interest, no doubt, to Go experts.

"Russian Proverbs" is somewhat disappointing, as it gives the proverbs only in English, without the original from which they have been translated.

"Romanian Proverbs" refers the browser to the digital publlication "De Proverbio" at the University of Tasmania, which will be discussed later, under the last link in this group.

"Chinese Proverbs" is listed, but could not be accessed, and not for lack of trying on several occasions.

"French Proverbs" is both poor and fraught with mistakes. Don't bother.

"Dutch Proverbs" just as their Chinese counterpart cannot be accessed.

"Proverbs from Slavic Languages" leads to the Department of Slavic Languages at the University of Pennsylvania. Even though there are only a few links posted at that site, one of them, under"Slavic Related Links", however, is the REES Web link (the acronym stands for Russian and East European Studies). It leads the browser to the University of Pittsburg and to hundreds of Slavic links (http://www.pitt.edu:81/~cjp/rees.html). These URLs cover language (and, of course, proverbs), literature, music, art, culture, government, etc. One can also access from this site the home page of numerous East European countries such as Albania, Armenia, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Latvia, Macedonia, Moldavia, Romania, Russia, Ukraine, Yugoslavia, etc.

"African Proverbs" (http://www.demon.co.uk/africa/proverbs/docs/proverbs 1.htm) provides a fun list of proverbs, such as: "The desobediant fowl obeys in a pot of soup" (Benin - Nigeria), "When two elephants fight it is the grass that suffers" (Uganda), or "One should never rub bottoms with a porcupine" (Akan).

"Proverbs from Around the World" and "Annoying Clichés." "Proverbs from Around the World" provides 290 entries from numerous countries, but all alas in English, without the source text available. "Annoying Clichés" has 96 English language proverbs listed.

Last, but not least, "Further Proverbs" refers the fortunate browser directly to a wonderful site, the De Proverbio (An Electronic Journal of International Proverb Studies) URL, at the University of Tasmania in Hobart, Australia (http://info.utas.edu.au/docs/flonta/DP,1,1,95/index.html). This is one of the richest sites relating to proverb studies. Under the heading "The Masters" numerous articles by Wolfgang Mieder (A Professor at the University of Vermont and a leading scholar in paremiology) can be downloaded, including an exhaustive bibliography of paremiological publications. Under the heading "Books", Theodor Flonta (Professor in the Italian Department at the University of Tasmania and the Editor of "De Proverbio") has an excellent list of English-Romanian proverbs and a fun list which he has edited of Italian proverbs compiled by the sixteenth Century Siena scholar Antonio Vignali.

This concludes today's web on the WWW in Charlotte's Corner. Please remember that a byte in time saves nine, so we would be most grateful to all of you if you were to share with us any useful URL you may have discovered. We will try to include them in Charlotte's Corner, and will most certainly give you credit for your contribution. Please send your information, or any questions you may have, to Dr. Alexander Rainof, either by mail (1021 12th street, #101, Santa Monica, CA 90403); by e-mail; or by fax (310-395-1885), or through my Web site which has an e-mail link. With your help, Charlotte's Corner will be terrific.

Editor’s note: This is the second of two parts.