Thread: и чём бы это ни было

translate to English please, as in the sentence: И чём бы это ни было. другого выхода у нас нет.

My guess is: "Whad'da we do, there's no other way out."

Bad prase, IMHO...
Whatever it turns out/happens to be, we have no other way out.

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Originally Posted by Siriusly

translate to English please, as in the sentence: И чём бы это ни было. другого выхода у нас нет.

My guess is: "Whad'da we do, there's no other way out."

I think that phrase is not quite correct. The correct variants are:

"И что бы то ни было, другого выхода у нас нет." - "Whatever happened, there is no other way out"

"И чем бы это ни было, другого выхода у нас нет." - "Whatever it was, there is no other way out"

Originally Posted by charlestonian

Something is wrong with this phrase...

This is the exact wording of И.В. Оранского from Гарри Поттер и Философский Камень
Росмен 2006

Does anyone know if Harry Potter and the Half-blood Prince has been translated and published, legally, into Russian yet?

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Originally Posted by Siriusly

Originally Posted by charlestonian

Something is wrong with this phrase...

This is the exact wording of И.В. Оранского from Гарри Поттер и Философский Камень
Росмен 2006

Does anyone know if Harry Potter and the Half-blood Prince has been translated and published, legally, into Russian yet?

Yes, it has. But the translations of these books have a bad luck in Russia. Be careful with them!! - http://met-at-ron.narod.ru/bagomot.html

Originally Posted by Ataklena

But the translations of these books have a bad luck in Russia. Be careful with them!! - http://met-at-ron.narod.ru/bagomot.html

It's unbelievable:

Ron rolled his eyes at Harry.
Рон игриво стрельнул глазками в Гарри.

Ginny used to fancy Harry, but she gave up on him months ago.
Джинни сохла по нему, но уже несколько месяцев, как отсохла.

Yes, it's very funny, I laughed a lot. Though I think in some cases they are nitpicking too much.

Originally Posted by Friendy

Yes, it's very funny, I laughed a lot. Though I think in some cases they are nitpicking too much.

Are you saying that the Russian translations of these Harry Potter books are not good, accurate, realistic...? If so, why?

Originally Posted by Siriusly

Are you saying that the Russian translations of these Harry Potter books are not good, accurate, realistic...? If so, why?

They say the translators were paid too little (say, just $1000 per book, and that's for the books that became bestsellers all over the world!) So, for example, one of the translators (who is a professor in a university) told her students (as a task for a seminar) to translate whole parts of the book she was supposed to translate (I think it was "HP and the Goblet of Fire"). As a result, in different parts of the same book even some names can be written in a different way, let alone the style or grammatical accuracy.
There are a lot of books which were very well translated from English into Russian (of course, much less than before the perestroika), but HP is not among them.

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Да не за что.. И это еще цветочки. Вот пример из "Кубка Огня":

Глава четырнадцатая
The Unforgivable Curses
Непростительные заклятья

Cледы работы участников литвиновского семинара.

В этой главе рассказывается о том, как Гермиона основала общество для защиты прав домовых эльфов. По-английски оно называется Society for the Promotion of Elfish Welfare — Общество развития эльфьего благосостояния. Сокращенно S.P.E.W. spew по-английски значит рвота. Как же перевела это Литвинова? Пристегните ремни. Гражданская Ассоциация Восстановления Независимости Эльфов — Г.А.В.Н.Э. Тринадцать страниц спустя, на стр. 229 оно, несомненно волшебным образом, превращается во В.З.А.Д.Э, а еще дальше — обратно.

Если хотите еще посмеяться (или поужасаться) - http://www.tolmachi.by.ru/4.html