Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2008 January 2

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January 2

oya ai ehema ahuwe

German-English translation needed

Can someone please translate this phrase to English? Thanks in advance. "Er will es dann nicht fahren lassen; und wirket weiter, weil er muß." —Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.252.21.26 (talk) 06:06, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

It's from Faust I (225-230): "Was heute nicht geschieht, ist morgen nicht getan,/Und keinen Tag soll man verpassen,/Das Mögliche soll der Entschluß/Beherzt sogleich beim Schopfe fassen,/Er will es dann nicht fahren lassen/Und wirket weiter, weil er muß." Taylor's translation reads: "To-morrow sees undone, what happens not to-day/Still forward press, nor ever tire!/The possible, with steadfast trust,/Resolve should by the forelock grasp;/Then she will ne'er let go her clasp,/And labours on, because she must."--K.C. Tang (talk) 08:22, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

In case anyone gets confused about pronouns, in German, Entschluss is masculine, so it's referred to with the masculine pronoun er. In the English translation, the translator has decided to personify Resolve as a feminine, so it's referred to as she. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 08:27, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Grab his glossy lock before it's too late ...

As a possibly unnecessary further clarification, "Resolve" is the subject and "The possible" the object of the phrase. Once Resolve has seized the possible, he/she/it will not let it go. (The literal translation of Schopf as "forelock" is a bit curious, as beim Schopfe fassen is common idiom.)  --Lambiam 14:21, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

How would the idiom as a whole be translated? Corvus cornix_talk 19:21, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

The most common idiomic phrase is "eine Gelegenheit beim Schopf packen/fassen" which can be translated as "to seize an opportunity" or "to seize a chance". "Jemanden beim Schopf packen" means "to grab somebody by the hair". Schopf in this context means a shock or mop of hair, not just the forelock. ---Sluzzelin talk 19:29, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Correction: "forelock" isn't completely off. Apparently, the idiom might be derived from Kairos, "Greek god of the favorable opportunity, who had to be seized by his mop of hair, when hurrying past — in the back he was close–cropped." [1] ---Sluzzelin talk 19:39, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

The German article on Kairos has the same etymology mentioned by Schlüsselchen in the post above. As a spot of OR, I also remember my Latin teacher (who also spoke Greek) giving this explanation - grab the chance / Kairos by the forelock as he weasels past - mumblety years ago. --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 22:38, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

I believe K. C. Tang is quoting from Anna Swanwick's excellent translation, first published in 1850. Xn4 11:28, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Latin Sentence

Please translate this sentence for me: "quadam spirituali conversione in semetipsam revocata est." --Omidinist (talk) 07:16, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

"She was called back into herself by a certain spiritual conversion". Adam Bishop (talk) 09:06, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Thank you, Adam. And happy new year.--Omidinist (talk) 09:45, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, you too! That sentence is apparently from Matthew of Aquasparta, and it is quoted in a footnote in a German book on Google books, if you want to read the whole paragraph. The subject is not really "she", but some other feminine noun. Adam Bishop (talk) 21:03, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Kanji name trend?

When I was searching kanji for names in an online dictionary, I saw some pronunciations for the names were actually romaji English versions of the kanji's meaning, and some of the ones I found were: 花 hana as "Furawa" (flower), 舞 mai as "Dansu" (dance), 愛 ai as "Rabu" (love), 好 kou as "Raiku" (like), 心 kokoro as "Haato" (heart). Another interesting pronunciation I found was 星 hoshi as "Sutera" which I assume is romaji for the name "Stella" which like 星 means "star". I've heard of English names like Alice being recreated using kanji for A, Ri and Su but I've never heard of new pronunciations being created for kanji names to sound like English words and names. Is this a new naming trend in Japan? How popular is it? --Candy-Panda (talk) 10:46, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

See last paragraph of Ateji for what Wikipedia seems to have on this... AnonMoos (talk) 12:24, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

I don't think any of this is 'official', but it does happen to an extent for trendy sound language. I don't think it would be used for personal names very often, but it is quite common to use a non-conventional pronunciation for characters when they are part of a name (see Japanese name). Steewi (talk) 00:03, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

It seems that sutera might just as easily be an attempt at "star" as at "stella" (which is barely even an English word). Tesseran (talk) 07:58, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

please translate to spanish. thank you

please translate this to spanish:

to the man who has always helped me in many ways and in many times, a man who has stayed a true friend. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 210.213.84.62 (talk) 16:03, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

"Al hombre que siempre me ha ayudado, de muchas formas y en varias ocasiones; al hombre que siempre ha sido un amigo sincero".

Or "...al hombre que se ha mantenido un amigo sincero". Pallida  Mors 16:38, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

muchisimas gracias, mi amigo! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 210.213.84.62 (talk) 16:46, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

¡De nada! Pallida  Mors 21:17, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

World's biggest English sentence

Are there grammatical rules that limit the conceivable size of an English sentence or are they usually just limited in size for reasons of intelligibility? Is it possible to construct a grammatically flawless sentence which is also 2000 words long? ----Seans Potato Business 17:58, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

It's possible to go beyond that: a sentence of 13,955 words. Aecis^Brievenbus 18:03, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

I could go on and on and on... Clarityfiend (talk) 18:18, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

(I know that you know that)²³²⁶ this sentence has 13,960 words. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 18:33, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

It's quite easy to construct a grammatically flawless sentence which is as many words long as you like. "The names of some of the people who have articles in Wikipedia are: Oscar Wilde, Napoleon Bonaparte, Nelson Rockefeller, (here add as many names as you want) ... and Nicholas Parsons". This obviously includes a list of names, which is limited only by the size of one's imagination. In a list, names or items can be concatenated ad infinitum as long as they're separated by commas, without violating any rules of grammar. Now, constructing a very long sentence without loops or lists or any other "artificial" devices - that's a tougher question. -- JackofOz (talk) 21:23, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

See also Recursion#Recursion in language Steewi (talk) 00:07, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

See Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo for a fun example. --Sean 12:10, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

The following sentence has a pattern that can be endlessly expanded meaningfully:

I know that he knows that I know that he knows it, but does he know that I know that he knows that I know that he knows it?

Any limitations are pragmatical, not grammatical.  --Lambiam 12:35, 3 January 2008 (UTC)