Ask Marilyn - from Parade Magazine

She doesn't really answer the question, which is about rhyming. The correct answer would be that it depends on the form poetry takes in the target language. Chinese poetry can rhyme, but Japanese poetry does not, being expressed in syllable form, as in haiku (5-7-5 syllables).

Hebrew poetry shows the providence of God in its form of parallelism, which can be translated into any language while keeping its parallel form.

 

Careful there, pardner!

 

Here is a Japanese haiku poem I wrote many years ago that illustrates the form, three lines of 5 syllables, 7 syllables, 5 syllables:
今の花、
春の最初の
恵みです

Translation into English while keeping the 5-7-5 form:
A flower today,
The first one I've seen this Spring.
It is a blessing.

So a Japanese haiku poem can be translated into English fairly easily: I got it into the three line, 5-7-5 syllable format in English. However, English poems are almost impossible to get into haiku form.

For example, think of the little Ogden Nash poem: "If a panther calls, don't anther." No way to make that a haiku, or get it to rhyme in Japanese!

 

Ancient Hebrew poetry may not rhyme, but even in prose there are many plays on words. The latter are usually not translatable from language to language.

It was pointed out to me only today that Jesus basically said of Nathanael, “Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom is no Jacob!” (See John 1:47.) But one would still need to know the story of Jacob to grasp the allusion.

 

Good point.

However, I'm not sure about this illustration. If we knew what Jesus said in the original Aramaic, it might be true that He said "Jacob," meaning "supplanter." However, we have it in Greek, where the word is dolos (δόλος), meaning "a bait or contrivance for entrapping, fraud, deceit, cunning, guile" (Mounce's lexicon, accessed in e-sword).

 

We have it in Greek, but are you claiming Jesus spoke to Nathanael in Greek? If not, then it's a translation already.

 

Right. But what word did Jesus use in the Aramaic? We don't know that, except that it could be translated with the Greek word dolos, which does not mean "Jacob" or "Supplanter."

 

Yes, perhaps it could have been a more oblique reference, but still to Jacob in the act. See Genesis 27:35f LXX.

 

Nothing on here rhymes
Many here are not Baptists
baptist board is nuts

 

I take that challenge. Not knowing Japanese, I will not be able to make it rhyme in that language. However, here is Nash's poem as a haiku:

A panther growling.
Discern if he is calling.
If so, answer not.

 

You may have been misled by a scholar outside his field. Happens to us all.

The bit presented is a misremembrance of the tail end (pun intended) of a poem.

But the challenge would be to capture the lines, wordplay and all, into Japanese haiku.

 

I'm impressed! The only thing I would change is making "answer" into "anther," preserving a little of the humor of the original poem.

In Japanese:
The English one syllable word "If" is moshi (若し) is in Japanese, two syllables. Or it can be done as a two syllable particle added to the verb, nara (なら).
There are no articles in Japanese, so you can' translate "a."
"Panther" is a kind of leopard, hyou (豹), or transliterated, pansaa (パンサー).
."Calls" is two syllables, yobu (呼ぶ).
"Don't" can be done with a one syllable literary word added to the end of "call," na (な).
"Answer" is four syllables in Japanese, kotaeru (答える).

As can be readily seen, Japanese uses more syllables than English to say the same thing. This is just one thing that makes it hard to get English poetry into Japanese.

 

The burning question is why converting English poetry into Japanese haiku should be considered good translation.

And again, this is not the whole poem, but only the tail end, butchered.

 

OK, you and JoJ (and Nash) have inspired me, though still not in Japanese.

Should a panther ring,
Best not fail remembering:
There’s no anthering.

 

Only if one can make a profit from it. But then it is de rigueur for poets to be poor.

How poetic!

 

Most of the world's poetry doesn't rhyme, but is meter and alliteration, and perhaps verses beginning with succeeding letters (Psalm 145) or stanzas with same beginning letter verses (Psalm 139). In English it is possible to do so much rhyming because of its multiple origins and chaotic pronunciations.