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> The battle of Alesia marked the end of Gallic independence in France and Belgium. Well, not entirely... One small village of indomitable Gauls still holds ou
by davidw 7y ago
> The battle of Alesia marked the end of Gallic independence in France and Belgium.
Well, not entirely... One small village of indomitable Gauls still holds out against the invaders.
- lukas099 7y agoWho?
- michaelt 7y agoThis is a quote from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asterix https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asterix - the best selling French/Belgian comic, first published in 1959, translated into 111 languages, and adapted into 13 films. "The year is 50 BC. Gaul is entirely occupied by the Romans. Well, not entirely... One small village of indomitable Gauls still holds out against the invaders. And life is not easy for the Roman legionaries who garrison the fortified camps of Totorum, Aquarium, Laudanum and Compendium"
- m_t 7y agohttps://www.asterix.com/en/ https://www.asterix.com/en/
- the_af 7y agoAnd life is not easy for the Roman legionaries who garrison the fortified camps of Totorum, Aquarium, Laudanum and Compendium. [1] [1] let's not get into this particular can of translating worms :P
- boudewijnrempt 7y agoThe interesting bit about that is that "Alesia, and nobody knows where it is" as a theme in Asterix is actually biting satire on Vichy France. Very little in Asterix, until Goscinny died, is about Gauls and Romans, it's pretty much all about taking the mickey out of contemporary France.
- the_af 7y agoAbsolutely. But this was a surprise to me. I don't speak French and I read Asterix in my native Spanish as a young kid, I loved it to bits, and of course all modern and French-related jokes flew way over my head. Add to this that the Spanish (mis)translation got most of the jokes wrong, especially the puns. Some jokes were rendered nonsensical because the translator gave up and simply provided a literal translation. That Asterix can be badly translated and still be loved by a kid who can't read French or understand politics is a testament to how good the comic was.
- tripa 7y agoGood translators manage to bring in jokes of their own.
- the_af 7y agoI know. I'm saying the Spanish translation of Asterix is known to be problematic, because the translator often made no effort (as in "this is too hard, I'll just translate this literally, even though it was a phonetic joke in French that gets lost in Spanish"). In recent years there was an attempt to provide a more idiomatic and careful translation to Latin American Spanish, but it was poorly received, because people like me who loved Asterix as kids were already used to the original nonsensical translations and were appalled when jokes and names of characters got "changed"! So it's a lose-lose situation at this point.
- ivanhoe 7y agoOn the subject of Alesia: https://www.pipelinecomics.com/asterix-v11-asterix-and-the-chieftains-shield/ https://www.pipelinecomics.com/asterix-v11-asterix-and-the-c...