Chinese Fun for Everyone ..!

ALTAVISTA'S BABELFISH PROGRAM is a classic. How can I possibly put into words the entertainment it has given me today. (English words, at least ...)

Here as testimony to the undying poetry inherent in computer translations between Chinese (traditional) and American English are some renditions from the World Canon of Great Literature:--

ALL UNHAPPY FAMILIES resemble one another, but each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. Everything was upset in the Oblonskys' house. The wife had discovered an intrigue between her husband and their former French governess, and declared that she would not continue to live under the same roof as him.

所有怏怏不樂的家庭互相類似, 但各個怏怏不樂的家庭是怏怏不樂的用它自己的方式。一切被弄翻了在Oblonskys 的房子裡。妻子發現了陰謀在她的丈夫和他們的前法國家庭女教師之間, 和宣稱, 她不會繼續居住在屋頂下和他一樣。

All unhappy families mutually similar, but each unhappy family is unhappy uses it way. All were overturned in the Oblonskys house. The wife had discovered the plot in between hers husband and their former French family female teacher, with declared, she cannot continue to live and he is same under the roof.

From Anna Karenina (Leo Tolstoy, Maude translation).

My favourite modern poet is Sylvia Plath. Here's what Babelfish makes of Winter Trees. I give the original first.

The wet dawn inks are doing their blue dissolve.
On their blotter of fog the trees
Seem a botanical drawing —
Memories growing, ring on ring,
A series of weddings.

濕黎明墨水做□他們的藍色溶化。在霧他們的吸墨紙樹似乎一張植物圖畫- 記憶生長, 圓環在圓環, 一系列的婚禮。

The wet daybreak ink makes □their blue color dissolve. A their blotting paper tree plant drawing - memory grows as if in the fog, ring in ring, a series of wedding ceremonies.

That's pretty good, actually ...

Last but by no means least, here's an all-time cracker:--
Translation 1st this time, for full-on entertainment ...

Yes, or is not: That is the question:
Whether ' tis nobly does suffer
the crude fortune suspension cable
and the arrow in the brains,
or adopts the arm opposition trouble sea,
with finishes them by the opposition?

I honestly did not tinker or adapt the above in any way, that is what Babelfish made of Shakespeare. Only the new line layout is mine.

Oh what the hell. Here's the entire Shakespeare passage: been put thru Babelfish & doubleback again...

Yes, or is not: That is the question:
Whether ' tis nobly does suffer the crude fortune
suspension cable and the arrow in the brains,
or adopts the arm opposition trouble sea,
with finishes them by the opposition?
Death: Sleeps; Does not have;
And by the sleep said we end the heartache
and 1,000 natural vibrations, the flesh and blood
are the heir to, '
tis completes reverently is wish'd.
The death, sleeps; Sleeps:
Accidentally to vainly hoped for that,
Ay, has the friction;
Perhaps for is dying that sleep any dream
to come when we towed this to curl at the point of death,
had to give us to pause:
Has makes the disaster that longevity the respect;
Can bear the whip for who and despise the time,
oppressor's mistake, arrogant person's railing,
the love which despises, the legal detention,
the office arrogant severe pain and abandons
is unworthy achievement that patient merit,
when he perhaps his quietus does with bare bodkin?
Who meets the fardels burden,
dies loo the sound and sweats in the weary life,
but under that something dreading after death,
the undiscover'd country
does not have the traveller from bourn to come back,
the puzzled wish and causes us rather to bear
these is ill we to have the ratio to fly
to other person of us knew is not?
Thus the conscience is the coward we completely;
And resolution local color thus
is sicklied o'er and the idea pale cast,
and the great marrow enterprise and the moment
result in the deviation by theirs
tidal current rotation this respect, with loss motion name. -
Is soft now you! Fair 奧菲 Li Asia!
If the insect, possesses my sin remember'd in thy orisons.

So there!!

是, 或不是: 那是問題: 是否' tis 高尚在頭腦裡遭受粗暴的時運吊索和箭頭, 或採取胳膊反對麻煩海, 和由反對結束他們?

To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them?

What more can I say?