(urth) OT: French translations

[Jerry Friedman]

--- On Wed, 8/5/09, Gwern Branwen <gwern0 at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 9:49 AM, Jerry
> Friedman<jerry_friedman at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > --- On Wed, 8/5/09, gwern0 at gmail.com
> <gwern0 at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >> Hi everyone. This is a rather
> >> off-topic request, but bear with me. I'm
> desultorily
> >> learning myself some French this summer, and I've
> decided
> >> that since I'm only really interested in reading
> French (and
> >> not so much in speaking or writing it), that the
> best thing
> >> to do would be to simply translate some large
> French work
> >> into English and learn as I go*.
> >
> > Si tu m'avais posé la question, je t'aurais dit que
> c'est
> > complètement fou.  Mais tu te connais á toi-même,
> et moi
> > je ne te connais pas.
> 
> Ouch. It seemed like a good idea to me - if I want to read
> French, then the logical direction is French->English,
> not vice-versa....

What I was thinking of as crazy was taking on a large
work and giving yourself the extra task of putting it
into good English, instead of just reading something
that interests you.  However, I may have underestimated
your knowledge of French.

> > I don't know any, but have you tried searching for
> "Gene
> > Wolfe" on French-language pages (using Google
> Advanced
> > Search, for example)?  Or searching http://www.amazon.fr/ ?
> 
> Amazon has a very impressive selection of Wolfe works - I
> was expecting to see Book of the New Sun at most, but I see
> Fifth Head of Cerberus, New Sun, Long Sun, Wizard-Knight,
> The Island of Doctor Death (strangely, it's just 'L'île du
> docteur Mort et autres histoires'. Maybe the publisher
> didn't get the joke.), the Book of Days, Peace... But same
> objection as with Brunians.
...

I seem to have left out my point.  I was hoping you could
find an essay on Wolfe or a review of one of his writings.
And I didn't realize you wanted a free text.

Jerry Friedman