Bilingual editions

Did we come to any conclusion about bilingual editions?

http://www.librarything.com/author/auehartmannvon

Several of the works here include Middle High German/Modern Editions.

In fact, several not so marked might also be bilingual.

I combine bilingual editions.

>2 LolaWalser: I'm inclined to do the same. However, I'm always unsure what to do if one of the languages is latin or ancient greek

I'd combine those too. After all, somebody combined a bunch of my Greek or Latin bilinguals with living languages. (I don't mind!) It's true not all indicate in the title both languages, and sometimes modern and ancient Greek titles coincide.

I personally think they should be combined with the ancient language editions, which - by LT rule - should not be combined with modern translations. But I'm not that particular about it either, and will usually let it slide if somebody combines otherwise.

5> The problem is, from the cocktail party observation, the question is whether the modern language is a crib for understanding the original language or is it being read as a modern language edition that happens to have the original language there, possibly for occasional reference? For a lot of series, I think there's enough of the latter around to make combining it questionable.

in this case, I'm likely to go with "benign neglect"...

I'm not going to combine the old language &/or bilingual editions... but if someone combines them (accidentally or on purpose) I'm not going to separate them either.

Is the current consensus for living languages to combine bilingual and single-language editions? That makes sense to me, but I would like to confirm no problems have developed with this over the years.

>8 aspirit:

Maybe I'm missing something, but translations are normally to be combined (with other translations, or with the original). A bilingual edition should be combined.

The debatable case is, as Nicole mentions, where it's an ancient language text with a translation. I'd probably favour them being combined with the ancient language editions on the reasoning that we're keeping ancient languages separate because they have a separate social standing from modern languages. Providing a translation on the facing page doesn't really alter that, imho.

As an aside, I think modern Latin editions should be combined. This pops up in Catholic stuff, where even new works are often published in Latin. But I'd extend it to Harrius Potter and Winnie Ille Pu too.

>9 gabriel: The debatable case is, as Nicole mentions, where it's an ancient language text with a translation. I'd probably favour them being combined with the ancient language editions on the reasoning that we're keeping ancient languages separate because they have a separate social standing from modern languages. Providing a translation on the facing page doesn't really alter that, imho.

It's about the readers, though, which is why I would merged them with modern language editions or keep them separate. The little green/red books whose name escape me are bought as modern language editions at least as often as ancient.

(Sorry; time is short.)

But I'd extend it to Harrius Potter and Winnie Ille Pu too.

I vehemently disagree with this. People who read Latin editions of Winnie the Pooh and Harry Potter have very distinct reading groups from the larger masses that read modern language editions there of.

>10 prosfilaes:

It's about the readers, though, which is why I would merge them with modern language editions or keep them separate. The little green/red books whose name escape me are bought as modern language editions at least as often as ancient.

I think it's also about the books themselves, the purpose of is to provide readers reference to the original language. I'm sure some readers just read the translation, but some (perhaps most) are used as intended, and I don't think an unscientific guess about the proportions would help us decide a policy.

I vehemently disagree with this. People who read Latin editions of Winnie the Pooh and Harry Potter have very distinct reading groups from the larger masses that read modern language editions thereof.

I do think there's a significant difference between original works in an ancient language, and translations into that language, but this certainly isn't a hill on which I wish to die on. My point was mainly that I don't think it makes sense to separate a Latin printing of, say, a papal encyclical from a French or German one. This is a project I've been working on, and I've been combining all language versions (and many Latin versions were already combined before I went at it).

>11 gabriel:

I don't think it makes sense to separate a Latin printing of, say, a papal encyclical from a French or German one.

I think, though, that that is an unusual situation. Latin being the language of the Catholic Church, encyclicals will be simultaneously printed in modern languages and one ancient language, and the discussions around them will not differ depending on which language edition one owns. But, as an example, people who own the Iliad in ancient Greek are likely to be classicists, whereas those who own it only in translation are probably not, and they will be having different conversations about it (Tim's "cocktail party" test).

I'm not sure where I stand on bi-lingual editions.

I'm going ahead with combining bilingual editions with single-language editions for modern works. These are English/Spanish, Cree/English, Korean/English, and similar dual language combining with editions in English, Spanish, French, German, etc.

If objections arise later, we can figure out the separations afterward.

>12 lilithcat:

I don't think I'm familiar with Tim's cocktail party test, but it sounds interesting.

>11 gabriel: The Loeb Classical Library, and similar series, don't have a purpose of just providing the original language, though. If that were true, they would just provide the original language. They're targeting people who use the original but need the fallback of a translation, or people who can't read the original, but want to get a feel of it. I don't know about the Latin side, but the Loeb's are, I believe, the only in-print English translation of several ancient works.

Without any type of guess about use, the combination of two separate LT works should be separated from both of them. I see including them with the translations as keeping the hardcore original language readers separate from the more general group of classics readers.

Combining modern Catholic publications in Latin with their modern translations is not something I have strong opinions about, but I don't see a problem with it. It strikes me as very different from modern translations into ancient languages, which don't remotely share the same purpose.

>13 aspirit: Those are two works that would be combined anyway, and publishing the same LT twice in one volume shouldn't theoretically matter. The English/Spanish type stuff would be cutting it more narrow than the LT system is good for, IMO. I wonder about whether Cree should be combined with major modern languages, but the very things that make that a question also make largely moot. If there is a Cree Cat in the Hat, and users who have it want it separate, I'd argue for it. Are there actually any Cree/English works published in only one language? Or, better yet, in Cree, English and Cree/English editions? Most of such languages are down to some local use, if lucky, and a few reprinted anthropological papers.

>16 prosfilaes: Are there actually any Cree/English works published in only one language?

Yes, actually, one of those works inspired my question.

We Sang You Home by Richard Van Camp

I've also combined the English, Cree/English, and French editions of Stolen Words by Melanie Florence.

>17 aspirit: arguably, Stolen Words is bilingual in every edition, as each contain Cree phrases. It's the primary language(s) that differ.

An example you might've been asking about is a translation from a language in wider use into one with a small population of fluent readers. I don't know that I can find one. My guess is the small presses that so much as think of publishing in a First Nations language put their efforts into original content that's difficult to market in the mainstream, not bothering with the expense of securing translation rights to widely popular works.

>10 prosfilaes: It's about the readers, though, which is why I would merged them with modern language editions or keep them separate. The little green/red books whose name escape me are bought as modern language editions at least as often as ancient.

I understand that line of reasoning, but it's speculative. For example: I have two different editions of http://www.librarything.com/work/1303744. As far as I'm aware, there are no modern editions that only have it in the original medieval Latin. So I bought the second one to have access to the dead language text, and I only occasionally use the translation offered by it. (Though it can be interesting to compare various translations, of course).

Seeing them combined is not a hill I would die on though.

>18 aspirit: I was talking about works written in Native American languages that get translations, so I guess that is an example.

For the translations from English or French into languages like Cree, I don't think translation rights are that big. Esperanto started with Shakespeare and Alice in Wonderland, and there's lots of public domain works that are popular and valuable. But on one hand, the fact your audience virtually all knows English undercuts some of the sales value, plus translations bring their own flavor and culture with them, and I'm sure that many Native peoples aren't looking to strengthen the English flavor in their language.

>18 aspirit: a 'bilingual edition' is generally understood to be one that includes a text and its translation, not one that includes phrases of a second language in the general text.

>21 MarthaJeanne: yep.