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eyestrain
06-22-2011, 01:53 AM
I'm new and still don't know forum etiquette very well. Please take care of me.

I am translating 羽化 from the Turn A Gundam OST. Most of the lyrics have come together.
The problem area:

「過去を輝く愛をしまい込んだ闇夜は糸を我が身に巻いて頬 濡らした。」


過去を輝く愛を
しまい込んだ闇夜は
糸を我が身に巻いて
頬 濡らした

Kako wo kagayaku ai wo
shimaikonda yamiyo wa
ito wo a ga mi ni maide
ho nurashita


Though I understand the meaning of the individual words, the many をs confuse me.
My pieces currently go like this, "The dark night that stowed away the glimmering love" "wraps my body in thread and wets my cheeks".
This leaves out 過去を and I can't figure out how to put the pieces together.

Many thanks for any views or advice. If anyone wants to see the rest of the translation I'd be happy to post it for revision before submitting.

supensaa-kun
06-22-2011, 12:10 PM
Yes, Japanese can be a bother with relative clauses. I'll try to help, although I'm not used to talking grammar mumbo-jumbo in English, so bear with me


The subject of this sentence is 過去を輝く愛をしまい込んだ闇夜, of which the core is 闇夜. Everything before that is a relative clause to it (i.e. a clause that modifies the noun), as indicated by the rentaikei verb + noun construction. We'll look at that part later. In the rest of the sentence there are two finite verbs belonging to it (巻いて and 濡らした). So the core sentence is 闇夜は巻いて濡らした.


You got the following part right, but I'm going to give some explanation either way, in case it might help you to better understand it.

As my teacher continuously says, a verb or clause ending in a verb with the ~て form, followed by another verb or clause, can generally mean two things: a coordinating conjunction or a weak causality.
Such a coordinating conjunction in Japanese can often be translated as "and" in English, and describes two actions done, often in that order. E.g. (私は)本を買って家に帰った, I bought book and returned home (or: after which I returned home).
An example of the weak causality case is 夏の夜は暑くて眠れない, summer nights are so hot that I can't sleep.

As in your translation of this part, in the sentence in question it is the coordinating conjunction, meaning the core sentence is structured 闇夜は: (1)巻いて (2)濡らした, and translates "the dark night wraps and wets". Adding the objects in yields:
闇夜は:
1. 糸を我が身に巻いて
2. 頬 濡らした

The dark night:
1. wraps my body in thread
2. wets my cheeks


Now for the hard part: the relative clause. An example of a relative clause in English is "the man who wasn't there" in which the noun man is modified by the relative clause who wasn't there. In Japanese relative clauses end in verbs in rentaikei (e.g. dictionary form, ~た, ~ない), followed by the noun. For example:
山田さんが買った本は安かった。
The book which Yamada-san bought was cheap.
Here the core sentence is 本は安かった, "the book was cheap", in which "the book" is modified by 山田さんが買った, "Yamada-san bought". The nasty part about Japanese is that it is common to use a relative clause inside of a relative clause. For example:
僕にいつもカレーパンをくれる山田さんが買った本は安かった。
The book bought by Yamada-san who always gives me curry bread, was cheap.
Here 山田さが買った is relative to 本, and 僕にいつもカレーパンをくれる is on its turn relative to 山田さん. Or, if you divide the sentence as such:
((僕にいつもカレーパンをくれる)山田さんが買った)本は 安かった。
The book (bought by Yamada-san (who always gives me curry bread) ) was cheap.
Note such constructions can largely be translated word-for-word in backward order:
本 - The book - (start of clause) - that - 買った - was bought - 山田さんが - by Yamada-san - (start of clause) - who - くれる - gives - カレーパンを - curry bread - いつも - always - 僕に - to me.
Now, if we do the same with your sentence:
((過去を輝く)愛をしまい込んだ)闇夜

闇夜 - The dark night - (start of clause) - that - しまい込んだ - stowed away - 愛を - love - (start of clause) - that - 輝く - shines - 過去を - the past.
Be sure to check whether the noun is the subject or the object of the clause. It seems from the examples I gave that it is determined by the presence of the particle が or を in the clause. If there is a noun marked by が it is the subject, and the noun the clause relates to is the object. Similarly, if there is a noun marked by を it is the object, and the core noun takes the role of subject in the construction. For example:
(山田さんが買った)本
The book that was bought by Yamada-san
(本を買った)山田さん
Yamada-san who bought a book

Sorry for for the long explanation (Holy cow, it's huge! :0), but I hope this helps you understand the underlying grammar and apply the knowledge in future translations. I hope it wasn't too confusing! :/

eyestrain
06-22-2011, 06:34 PM
No, not at all, your patient explanation and use of clear examples was extremely helpful in reminding me of my grammar lessons. It's been so long since I've properly studied sentence structure that most of my translation starts with gut instinct, which often leads to tremendous confusion in the 'polishing' process.
My initial instincts in this case were right, but I was lost in forgotten technicalities. Thank you for your quick and very helpful reply.

If I understand correctly, a more accurate translation would read, "The dark night that stowed away the love that brightens the past wraps my body in thread and wets my cheeks."
For 輝く - as "glimmered the past" sounds wrong, I thought maybe 'brighten', or 'illuminate'. Though I don't want to stray too far from the shimmering feeling of 輝く.

I'm encouraged by your response. I'll post the next few lines for feedback.

霧が東に流れて
月の光に抱かれた
目を醒ませ 住み慣れた殻を脱ぎ
羽根ひろげて空へと舞い上がれよ

The mist flowed eastward
and embraced in the moon's light
I woke, grew used to living, cast off my shell
My wings unfurl and I am whirled high into the sky


Thanks in advance.

animeyay
06-24-2011, 06:09 PM
Guess I'll leave this to supensaa-kun...

supensaa-kun
06-24-2011, 08:03 PM
Guess I'll leave this to supensaa-kun...
アイ・サー!


If I understand correctly, a more accurate translation would read, "The dark night that stowed away the love that brightens the past wraps my body in thread and wets my cheeks."
Yes, that is right.


For 輝く - as "glimmered the past" sounds wrong, I thought maybe 'brighten', or 'illuminate'. Though I don't want to stray too far from the shimmering feeling of 輝く.
And I had the same thought with 輝く. I wanted to go with illuminate too, but that would have been 照らす, so I went with something more literal, albeit awkward, in my explanation.


霧が東に流れて
月の光に抱かれた
目を醒ませ 住み慣れた殻を脱ぎ
羽根ひろげて空へと舞い上がれよ

The mist flowed eastward
and embraced in the moon's light
I woke, grew used to living, cast off my shell
My wings unfurl and I am whirled high into the sky

There are some grammatical constructions in here that I want to point out.

First, note that 抱かれた is passive. 抱かれる does not mean "to embrace", but "to be embraced ". Compare:
[B]先生は僕をほめた - the teacher praised me
僕は先生にほめられた - I was praised by the teacher
So 月の光に抱かれた would literally be "was embraced by the moon's light".
Conjugation and examples of passive form: [link] (http://www.guidetojapanese.org/causepass.html#part3)
More in-depth explanation of passive form: [1] (http://ezinearticles.com/?Passive-Voice-Part-1---Learn-to-Speak-Polite-Japanese&id=1805971) [2] (http://ezinearticles.com/?Passive-Voice-Part-2---Learn-to-Speak-Japanese,-Naturally&id=1802177) [3] (http://ezinearticles.com/?Passive-Voice-Part-3---Learn-to-Speak-Japanese,-Politely-and-Naturally&id=1799418)


Next, 目を醒ませ and 舞い上がれよ are in imperative form (Japanese: 命令形, meireikei, "command form"). Like "Come here" and "Stop!" in English. So they have to be directed at a "you", and can't be performed by an "I" (except maybe when talking to their self). So, for example, 目を醒ませ would be "awake!", not "I woke".

Finally there's a relative clause you didn't notice: 住み慣れた殻, literally "the shell that [you] got used to living in".

So the final two lines would, at least literally, translate to something like: "Awake! Take off the shell that [you] got used to living in, unfurl [your] wings and fly up high to the sky!" You should probably rephrase that a bit to make it presentable, though.



One last educational note about 脱ぎ, it is in renyōkei (the "conjunctive form" or "pre-ます stem"), which is sometimes used instead of the ~て form for a coordinating conjunction, especially in written Japanese. So it is part of a list of actions. In this case:
1. 住み慣れた殻を脱ぎ
2. 羽根ひろげて
3. 空へと舞い上がれよ
The same renyōkei form in used in compound verbs, such as 住み慣れる, 舞い上がる, and as a stem for ~ます forms (食べます, 聞きます, etc.)

eyestrain
06-25-2011, 11:00 AM
Pardon me posting again so soon, but I feel fairly confident about this translation and plan to submit it. First I present it to you senior translators and defer to your superior judgement. I am uncertain about bolded lines. Also curious if not preserving line-order is considered sloppy or unattractive. That is to say, the English on each line not matching the Japanese on its equivalent line. For example, the first stanza is literally
そして眠り続けた (and so I continued sleeping)
幾億の年月を (for many hundreds of million months and years)
長い夢を見ていた (watching a long dream)
森の中で (in the forest)
But I have ordered the English in what I consider more cohesive grammar, which breaks the 'symmetry' between the Japanese and English.
And so I continued sleeping
watching a long dream in the forest
for many hundreds of millions of months and years

Do you think this is undesirable?
Thank you for your time and feedback.

==========

羽化 (Emergence (of an insect from a cocoon))

そして眠り続けた
幾億の年月を
長い夢を見ていた
森の中で
And so I continued sleeping
watching a long dream in the forest
for many hundreds of millions of months and years


過去を輝く愛を
しまい込んだ闇夜は
糸を我が身に巻いて
頬 濡らした
The dark night that stowed away
the love that brightens the past
wraps my body in thread
and wets my cheek

霧が東に流れて
月の光に抱かれた
目を醒ませ 住み慣れた殻を脱ぎ
羽根ひろげて空へと舞い上がれよ
the mist flows eastward
and embraced in the moon's light
I woke, grew used to living, cast off my shell
My wings unfurl and I am whirled up into the sky

揺れ動くような
哀しみに踊らされても
僕はこの生命
最後まで紡ぐだろう
羽根を傷めても
大地に倒れる日まで
はばたけ 運命を超えて
Even if manipulated by sadness
as if to tremble
I will spin this life until the end
Even if my wings are damaged
until the day I fall to the vast earth
I'll flap my wings and cross through fate

生まれ変わっても
時がどれほど過ぎても
心に愛あれば
ふたたびめぐり逢える
花は咲きほこり
優しく迎えるだろう
はばたけ 運命を超えて
Even if born again
No matter how much time passes
if there is love in our hearts
we'll be able to meet fortuitously once more
A flower blooms, flaunting
I will go to kindly greet it
I flap my wings and cross through fate

Datenshi
06-25-2011, 05:12 PM
I'll leave the grammatical technicalities to the better equipped and nitpick a bit. My two cents.

On the topic of preserving line order, my own feeling is that the structure in the original is like that for poetic effect, so it might be better to preserve it where you can. My logic for thinking so is that the original lines could have easily read;

>そして幾億の年月を眠り続けた
>森の中で長い夢を見ていた

which would have been clearer more grammatically, but the writer decided to invert the phrases for effect. The fact that the original Japanese is rather convoluted in the first place seems to indicate that it's supposed to be read that way.

>目を醒ませ 住み慣れた殻を脱ぎ
>羽根ひろげて空へと舞い上がれよ
>I woke, grew used to living, cast off my shell
>My wings unfurl and I am whirled up into the sky

1) 「住み慣れた」 is on 「殻」, as in 「住み慣れた殻」 ("the shell you've grown used to living in").

2) I think you missed the 「醒ませ」 and 「舞いあがれよ」, which makes the sentence a command. Also, the fact that the end of the first line reads 「脱ぎ」 (not 「脱ぐ」, which would implicate a full stop), should give you the hint that the second line is a continuation of the first line (as in, 「住み慣れた殻を脱ぎ...空へと舞いあがれよ」).

It might be helpful to think of the lines like this;

目を醒ませ
+
(「住み慣れた殻を脱ぎ」 and 「羽根ひろげて」)空へと舞い上がれよ

"Awaken, cast off the shell you've grown used to living in,
Unfurl your wings and whirl up into the sky"

>はばたけ 運命を超えて
>I'll flap my wings and cross through fate
超えて is always a difficult word to translate. My vote in this case is "transcend fate".

>花は咲きほこり
>優しく迎えるだろう
>A flower blooms, flaunting
>I will go to kindly greet it
Again, I think it's more natural to assume that the second line is a continuation of the first line (i.e. 「花は咲きほこり、優しく迎えるだろう」), in which case 1) the subject of 「咲きほこり」 and 「優しく迎える」 are both the flower, and 2) 「だろう」 here means both 「咲きほこるだろう」 and 「優しく迎えるだろう」.

"A flower will bloom,
and kindly greet us"

eyestrain
06-25-2011, 07:07 PM
You're absolutely right about the grammar. I appreciate you pointing that out. I recognized the command form but have had some trouble determining the subjects of this song. There is obviously the speaker, "I", a flower (anthropomorphized), and the mention of what I assumed to be an ambiguous third party (who they will meet again).

The command was difficult for me because I wasn't thinking about "You", the listener of the song. Thinking about it in this way, the words become much more romantic, as if singing to a lover one will part ways with (making "you" and the third party into the same subject).

I appreciate all of your help. I try my hand at translating these songs because I love them, but my level is still very low, so my understanding of the intended meaning often feels foggy at best. Your assistance helps.

Attempting to match more closely, I redrafted my translation:


そして眠り続けた
幾億の年月を
長い夢を見ていた
森の中で
And so I continued sleeping
for many hundreds of millions of months and years
watching a long dream
in the forest


過去を輝く愛を
しまい込んだ闇夜は
糸を我が身に巻いて
頬 濡らした
*The dark night that stowed away
the love that brightens the past
wraps my body in thread
and wets my cheek

霧が東に流れて
月の光に抱かれた
目を醒ませ 住み慣れた殻を脱ぎ
羽根ひろげて空へと舞い上がれよ
The mist flowed eastward
and was embraced in the moon's light
Wake up, cast off the shell you've grown used to living in
Unfurl your wings and be whirled up into the sky

揺れ動くような
哀しみに踊らされても
僕はこの生命
最後まで紡ぐだろう
羽根を傷めても
大地に倒れる日まで
はばたけ 運命を超えて
Even if manipulated by sadness
as if to tremble
I will spin this life until the end
Even if your wings are damaged
until the day you fall to the vast earth
flap your wings and pass through** fate

生まれ変わっても
時がどれほど過ぎても
心に愛あれば
ふたたびめぐり逢える
花は咲きほこり
優しく迎えるだろう
はばたけ 運命を超えて
Even if born again
No matter how much time passes
if there is love in our hearts
we'll be able to meet fortuitously once more
A flower will bloom
and kindly greet us
Flap your wings and pass through fate


* In this case I didn't know how to grammatically structure the sentence to maintain the same order as the Japanese.
** Transcend seems correct, but I am drawn back to my original translation (from a previous, unposted draft)

animeyay
06-25-2011, 07:53 PM
>長い夢を見ていた watching a long dream

You wouldn't really say "watch a dream" in English... "I had a long dream" might sound better here.


>過去を輝く愛を The dark night that stowed away
>しまい込んだ闇夜は the love that brightens the past
>糸を我が身に巻いて wraps my body in thread
>頬 濡らした and wets my cheek

This entire stanza should be in the past tense or perfect tense.


>僕はこの生命最後まで紡ぐだろう I will spin this life until the end

If you don't like "spin", "weave" would be another option.

eyestrain
06-25-2011, 09:14 PM
Thank you for catching my mistakes. It is so tempting to write "watching a dream"... I love the idea of sitting within the theater of one's own mind, watching the dream.
But in areas like this my English needs as much work as my Japanese sometimes.

animeyay
06-26-2011, 09:26 AM
eyestrain
Hahaha yea, sometimes I catch myself translating 夢見た as "I saw a dream", which kinda has a different meaning than "I had a dream", and still different from "I watched a dream". I like your imagery, though, "sitting in a theater watching a dream". =D

Out of curiosity, where in Japan did you live, and where do you live now?
I'm not trying to poke my nose into others' personal life, of course. I just like to learn more about members. =)

eyestrain
06-26-2011, 05:58 PM
Of course. I lived in Hokkaido. Do you know 伊達市?あそこにAET教師として働いて、一人暮らしをしていました。 教育委員会とインターンシップでい ろんな小学校と中学校に回って、学生と話すの仕事でした。あの時に日本語の会話がよく練習をできましたが、 読み書きはあまりしなくて、アメリカに帰っている間に読み書きも喋り方ことも大分忘れてしまいました。けれ ど最初から日本語が結構下手ですので、皆さんの指導が大変感謝します。

animeyay
06-27-2011, 08:33 AM
eyestrain
北海道?ごめんよ、北海道なら札幌しか知らない…でもいいね!
AETってJETに似てるプログラムなんでしょうかね。
私も一応日本で留学したけど、遊んでばかりいたwwww
では、ここでごゆっくり。=)