Breasts and Eggs — About the Translation

There are two versions of this story. The first version, 「乳と卵」(Breasts and Eggs), was published December, 2007 and won the Akutagawa Prize in 2008. Several years later, Mieko Kawakami rewrote and expanded the story, publishing it as a new book titled 「夏物語」(Summer Stories) in 2019. The English version of this book, although named as Breasts and Eggs, is actually based on the second version, Summer Stories.

The first time I read this story, it was the Chinese version. I usually prefer the Chinese translations of books written by Japanese and Korean writers because we share similar cultures, at least in many respects, which means less context and information would be lost in translation, although there are, of course, exceptions, especially when it comes to the language itself, nuances of words.

I’ve found several interesting examples while comparing the English version, the Chinese version, and the original Japanese version of this story.

English translation

So I’ve been eating eggs for my whole life. But today I learned that women have “ova,” as in “oval,” which literally means egg. How is it possible I knew about sperm first? ”

…

I was just thinking about the different ways to say you hate something. You can call it disgusting, repellent, revolting. I looked up “disgusting” in the dictionary. The “dis” part means undo, and the “gust” part means taste. I guess that makes sense.

Original Japanese

卵子にはなぜ、子という字がつくのかというと、それは精子、に子という字がついているから、それにあわせただけなのです。

…

いや、という字には厭と嫌が あって、厭のほうがほんまにいやな感じがあるので、厭を練習。厭、厭。

A direct English rendering

The reason why the character,「子」(which usually means “child”), is attached to the character, 「卵」(ovum, or egg), is that the character,「子」, is in the word,「精子」(sperm), and it is simply adapted to that.

…

The kanji of 「いや」(to detest, to dislike, to hate) can be either 「厭」or「嫌」. 「厭」 gives more feeling of disgusting, so I’ll practice writing it. 「厭」, 「厭」.

The point of the first paragraph is that the character, 「卵」, can mean ovum or egg by itself, but usually, we will use 「卵子」 in Japanese (and also in Chinese) while referring to ovum, adding another character, 「子」, after「卵」 . According to Midoriko, who writes this paragraph in the novel, the character,「子」, here is completely meaningless, and the only reason that we are adding it into the word, 「卵子」, is because that there is a 「子」in「精子」which means sperm.

I don’t think this is true, by the way, but it makes sense that Midoriko would make such a judgment in that circumstance. But now, let’s go back to the topic of translation.

While it is easy to translate these paragraphs to Chinese because those characters and words mean the same thing in Chinese, you can tell that the English version of this paragraph is not quite the same as the original text, since it’s hard to explain what the author means without using kanji.

The second paragraph is something more subtle. The hiragana of the two kanji characters, 「厭」and「嫌」are both「いや」, pronounced as “iya”. Both of these two kanjis mean to detest, to dislike, and to hate. I don’t think there is any strict difference between these two characters, but 「厭」, at least to Midoriko, gives more negative feeling, and that’s why she has repeated this character multiple times.

The original text is simple but powerful. At the time, Midoriko was pretty upset about her physical changes during adolescence and her relationship with her mom. She felt trapped in her body — unable to move, control, understand, or speak. All these negative feelings, confusion, frustration, conflicts, and fear caused her unbearable inner turmoil. So she wrote a lot. She wrote to communicate with her mom and herself. Language means so much to her, and that’s probably why there are plots about looking up words in dictionary repeatedly in this story.

English translation

I was wondering about the “men” in “menarche.” Turns out it’s the same as the “men” in “menstruation.” It means “month,” which comes from “moon,” and has to do with women and their monthly cycle. Moon has all kinds of meanings. In addition to being the thing orbiting the earth, it can involve time, or tides, like the ebb and flow of the ocean. So, “menarche” has absolutely nothing to do with “men.” So why spell it that way? What happened to the “o”?

Original Japanese

それでちょっと気になって、初潮って言葉を調べてみた。初潮の初、は、それは初めて、ということでわかるけど、うしろにある潮っていうのがようわからん。それで調べたら、いろんな意味があることはあって、たとえばそれは、月と太陽の引力の関係で、海水が満ちたり引いたり、動くこと、ということらしい。ほかには、いい時期、というようなことも書いてあった。ただいっこだけわからんのが、愛嬌、で、それで愛嬌という言葉を調べたら、商売で客の気を引く、とか、好ましさを感じさせる、とかそういうことが書いてあった。なんでこれが、股のところから血が初めてでる初潮っていうのに関係あるようなふんいきで書かれてるのかさっぱりわからん。むかつく。

A direct English rendering

I was a little curious and looked up the word「初潮」(menarche). The「初」in「初潮」means “the first time”, and I can understand that part. But what I couldn’t get is the「潮」after it. I looked it up and found that it has many different meanings. For instance, the movement of sea caused by the gravitational pull of the moon and the sun, rising and falling alternately, is called「潮」(tide). Besides this, it also means “a good time”. The only meaning which I can’t figure out is「愛嬌」. So I looked it up and it said things like “to attract the attention of customers in business” and “to be desirable“. I have no idea why this is being written in a way that makes it sound like it has something to do with menarche, when blood first comes out from the crotch. It's annoying.

To be more specific, 「愛」means love, and 「嬌」means attractive or seductive. 「愛嬌」 is usually used to describe the cuteness and charm of a women. It means the same thing in Korean. While Chinese doesn’t have the exact same word, the two characters 「愛」and 「嬌」have similar meanings in Chinese. The same goes for「初潮」, although there’s no direct connection between「愛嬌」and「潮」in Chinese. So simply by quoting these words, Chinese readers could understand what the author is saying.

At the same time, I like the English version of this paragraph as well. It’s interesting that although it is not literally the same as the original text, it still makes so much sense and conveys similar ideas.

Midoriko was angry at those who are super excited about a girl reaching her menarche because they believe that menstruation makes a female a real woman and women should be thrilled about having the ability to get pregnant due to menstruation. So the idea that there might be some connections between the word「初潮」 and the word「愛嬌」made her irritated.

It is annoying, especially when you realize how many women have experienced period shaming at the same time. They want you to believe that you should be proud of being able to get pregnant but had better never talk about your menstruation in front of others since it’s dirty, ashamed, and indecent. I guess every female, no matter which country she’s from, could understand and feel how ridiculous it is. That’s probably why this paragraph makes sense no matter which language it's been translated into.

Mieko Kawakami is one of my favorite writers that I read last year, and she’s also one of the reasons why I restarted my study in Japanese. No matter how hard the translator tries, there will always be something missing in the translation.

I don’t think I can fully understand the author despite my best efforts, since something is inevitably lost when the author translates their thoughts and feelings into words. But for those whom I love, I wish to read in the same language in which they think, so that I can at least get a bit closer to the world they have seen.

These are just two examples from the first half of the story. I’ll probably write more about the rest of the story in the future.

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Additional comparison notes

English version

“Now even Makiko was out of words. That much was clear to me; and watching them exploding in my face, I found myself speechless as well. I had no words. There was nothing I could say. Nothing for me to say. ”

Original Japanese

ああ、いま現在、巻子も緑子も、言葉が足りん。わたしは思った。そして、こんな近くでふたりのやりとりを見ているわたしにだってもちろん言葉は足りず、言葉が足りん、足りん、足りんと頭のなかでくりかえすだけで、言えることが何もない。何にも言えることがない。

Chinese translation

唉，在這當下，卷子和綠子都窮於言辭啊，我心想。而且，這麼近距離看著兩人互動的我，當然也窮於言辭，窮於言辭，言辭、言辭，這兩字直在腦袋裡打轉，什麼話都說不出來。什麼話都說不出來。

輸入「JINX」，文字顯示出來，出現「人們認為與因緣有關的事端，原本指不吉祥的事。」的說明。我接著再輸入「因緣」，這次，狹長的螢幕排滿了句子，瞬間變得漆黑一片，「事物誕生的內在原因為因，外在原因為緣。讓事物、現象起滅的諸多原因，或是事物、現象的起滅。前兆。」我凝神念出來，綠子不時點頭，縮起下巴。然後帶著深思的表情拿走電子字典，按了幾個鍵輸入文字。

「ジンクス」と入力してみると文字が表示され、「因縁のように思う事柄。本来は縁起の悪いことをい う」という説明書きが出た。わたしはつぎに「因縁」を入力した。すると今度は狭い画面がいっしゅん 真っ暗に見えるくらいに長文がずらずらとひしめき、「事物を生じせしめる内的原因である因と外的原 しようめつ 因である縁。事物、現象を生 滅させる諸原因。また、そのように事物、現象が生滅すること。縁起」。

“jinx [jiŋ(k)s] n. 1. an enigmatic instance of bad luck 2. a curse or spell that causes bad luck. —vt. 1. to negatively change the course of fate.

That made me want to look up “fate.” The definition was so long it nearly blacked out the small screen, but this is how it started:

fate (fāt) n. 1. the development of events beyond a person’s control. See DESTINY.”

「你看，『綠』和『緣』這兩個漢字很像呢。既然如此，下一個就來查查『緣』吧。喔——，原來如此，下一個查旁邊的『怨恨』。你看，這個字看起來就感覺得到怨恨，真糟糕。可怕，怨恨就是恨，懂了。但是它比『恨』這個字好像多了兩倍，可以說是威力還是殺傷力吧。來讀例句。『挾怨殺人』，有聽過，常有這種事。那接下來查『殺人』，……

「ほれ、『緑』と『縁』ってよう似てるな、漢字が。ほんならつぎは『縁』を調べてみようやないの。 あー、なるほど。そしたらつぎは、隣の『怨恨』。見てこの、見るからに怨恨っていう感じの字面。や ばいな。こわいな。怨恨とは恨み。なるほど。しかし『恨み』って書くよりも倍になる気がするな、パ ワーというかダメージが。例文読みます。『怨恨による殺人』ね。あるよね、ありがちよね。そしたら つぎは『殺人』。

“Hey, check it out. The character for ‘destiny’ looks a whole lot like ‘green.’ How about ‘fatal’? Okay, it says that it originally meant ‘destined by fate’ and ‘ominous,’ but it can also mean ‘causing death.’ As in ‘a fatal accident.’ …