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Neal Stephenson does a good job of presenting that sort of attitude in Cryptonomicon: "I don't like the word 'addict' because it has terrible connotations," Ro
by leggomylibro 8y ago
Neal Stephenson does a good job of presenting that sort of attitude in Cryptonomicon:
"I don't like the word 'addict' because it has terrible connotations," Root says one day, as they are sunning themselves on the afterdeck. "Instead of slapping a label on you, the Germans would describe you as 'Morphiumsüchtig.' The verb suchen means to seek. So that might be translated, loosely, as 'morphine seeky' or even more loosely as 'morphine seeking.' I prefer 'seeky' because it means that you have an inclination to seek morphine."
"What the fuck are you talking about?" Shaftoe says.
"Well, suppose you have a roof with a hole in it. That means it is a leaky roof. It's leaky all the time--even if it's not raining at the moment. But it's only leaking when it happens to be raining. In the same way, morphine-seeky means that you always have this tendency to look for morphine, even if you are not looking for it at the moment. But I prefer both of them to 'addict,' because they are adjectives modifying Bobby Shaftoe instead of a noun that obliterates Bobby Shaftoe."
- skosch 8y agoStephenson is great, but just for the record, the claim that Germans understand "süchtig" as "seeking" goes too far. Süchtig is the adjective to Sucht (addiction), not to Suche (search), and although the etymological link is clear, there's nothing romantic or compassionate about the word.
- canhascodez 8y agoThanks: I'm sure I would have gone a long ways before discovering anything more about the context of that statement. However, I note that Stephenson does seem to have described this as a loose translation. Is the German word used as an adjective, or is that also an issue of translation?
- skosch 8y agoSüchtig is an adjective, yes, and 'seeky' is actually a sensible literal translation. But just like the word addicted, it carries the connotation of a destructive obsession, not just a tendency-to-seek-out, and it is just as obliterating a word as its English equivalent.