Niklas Dornes, Interpretation Track, Year 4

I once had to translate the sentence “…and so I began my meditative journey” into Chinese. Of course, all the words I knew for “meditation” failed me. 打坐型的旅程？禪坐旅程？禪定型的旅程？冥想型的旅程？沉思型的旅程？When translating, one quickly realizes that one cannot simply swap out words. Instead, the broader arc of meaning has to be considered. And yet, the human brain seems almost hard-wired to fall into precisely this “equivalence trap”. This may be partly because that trap often works deceptively well between similar languages. In German, for example, the sentence above can simply be translated as “…und so begann ich meine meditative Reise” — and it works perfectly well. In that case, one does arrive at a successful translation by switching out the words. And for decades, if not centuries, the dictionary has been a loyal and reliable companion to translators working between European languages. An English–Mandarin dictionary, by contrast, is much less trustworthy and useful than an English–German one.

Be that as it may, I can confidently say that over the years, I have become fairly good at deverbalizing the source text first, holding its “pure meaning” in my mind (“mentalese”) and then reverbalizing it in the target language based on that very meaning without regard to the form of the original: recklessly rearranging sentences, slashing them in half, finding expressions that capture the meaning even when none of the words remain “the same” according to dictionary logic (while, of course, still remaining faithful to the function and spirit of the source text).

Armed with this understanding and skill, I entered the GPTI program. Here, particularly in simultaneous interpreting (SI), a new problem presented itself. Not only do I have to translate meaning without having the time to carefully think through how to de- and reverbalize it in the target language; I also have to start producing something before the full meaning has even been presented — that is, before the speaker has finished his or her sentence. How am I supposed to keep interpreting from the layer of meaning when that meaning has not yet fully unfolded? In this setting, the temptation to translate words instead of meaning becomes even stronger. In fact, in some instances, it is the right thing to do. Sometimes we do have to unload and start rendering the words, even if we have not yet fully understood. The trick, however, is to view this as an occasional necessity, not as a change in principle.

And yet, as an analytical and methodical person by nature, I tend to get captured by the linguistic side of things — not only by words, but also by sentence patterns. After all, this “material” layer of language naturally appeals to the analytical mind, whereas the ephemeral layer of “meaning” often eludes analysis. What can capture this elusive meaning, however, is a functioning intuition.

My classmate Kiryl is a virtuoso at this. He is my role model for accessing meaning even before the language is fully available. (Funny enough, the two of us — the only students in the class whose native language are neither English nor Chinese — ended up in the same cohort.) Previously, I still thought I could make up for missing linguistic information by analyzing patterns: “If the speaker’s sentence starts like this, I can begin speaking by using pattern X in English, even though I do not yet know what he is going to say next.” In other words, I tried to compensate for missing meaning by relying on fixed linguistic tactics. What’s more, whenever I did not understand a Chinese word, I would think: “I see. Before I can interpret solidly, I simply have to learn even more Chinese words.”

Kiryl, however, showed me that one does not have to give up the principle of “translating from the meaning layer” simply because the full linguistic picture has not yet been provided. Meaning can be somewhat complete — and partially accessible — even before it has been fully articulated. The trick is to use all available channels to (re)construct that meaning, not just language. These include:

1. knowledge of the world;

2. pre-existing knowledge of the field;

3. knowledge of what the speaker has already said;

4. tone, gestures, facial expressions, and body language;

5. the ability to vibe with the speaker — a kind of “mind-to-mind transmission”;

6. strong anticipation based on all of the above;

7. and, most importantly, the ability to access all these channels at the same time.

There has to be a general openness that allows one to draw on each of these layers whenever it becomes necessary and appropriate.

I remember a passage we once interpreted on cross-strait relations. The Taiwanese speaker mentioned 大陳島之役. When reflecting on my performance afterwards, I asked myself: “How in the world was I supposed to understand that? How was I even supposed to know that 役 here was 役 and not 意, or any other ㄧˋ for that matter?” Kiryl, however, simply knew the campaign. He was not startled by the term because he is deeply interested in politics and political history. This example perfectly highlights the difference between the two approaches described above. Needless to say, I was very impressed.

If one approaches SI in this “meaning-centered” way, the speaker’s linguistic output becomes only one doorway to meaning among many. It remains the main thread, of course, but it is by no means the only one. Instead of trying to fix the issue through methodological tricks, one should stick with the same principle that also works in written translation: stay with the meaning, not the words. The difference is simply that, in SI, one has to expand the sources from which meaning can be accessed.

(This article appears in GPTI Newsletter Issue No. 87.)