atrocious translation of theory of poker

fatheaddy · #1 12-31-2006, 12:35 AM

As my first language is german, as a Holdem newby I waited for the german traduction of 'theory of poker', after I read 'No limit holdem theory and practise' in english with no special problems in understanding it (oh! I mean the book itself, i does not pretend to master all its concepts!). Obviously it was a big mistake to wait for the german version of theory of poker! I'm serious! This traduction is garbage! I found a lot of clearly wrong or highly missunderstundable sentences, impossible wordstructure, and sometimes a strange use of english words instesd of logical german ones ( Idont talk about common english words used in the pokerworld as raise, fold, check, an so on).

I read in german pokerforums that mr.Kalhamer, the translater of Sklanskys Book, have already wrote own pokerbooks, the rating there is miserable!

So please 2+2, next when you plan to translate one of your books in german, try to chose somebody addequate!

Bet-and-win88 · #2 12-31-2006, 05:46 AM

True, if you read just a few pages of Kalhamers junk it should be obvious that the translation would be garbage. Any german reader who wants to read ToP should read it in german, independend of his english knowledge.

SwissPoker · #3 01-03-2007, 06:55 PM

[ QUOTE ]
Any german reader who wants to read ToP should read it in german, independend of his english knowledge.

[/ QUOTE ]

I totally disagree because of two main reasons:

1. Reading original text is always more accurate than any translation
2. Poker lingo evolved out of english language and not german

I'm Swiss and speak and write german fluently. Recently, I started reading my first german poker book. It's a terrible read and I have yet to make it through the book.

To my personal opinion, translating poker books in german is only possible by a sensible translator also being a skilled poker player. The translator has to understand every single idea before he can possibly manage to translate ToP. Thus, he must have a strong understanding of ToP. Frankly, I doubt that Mr. Kahlhamer has an in-depth understanding of ToP. He probably learned alot from translating or hallucinates to have learned alot from that process.

I bet it's easier to read ToP in english for most german speaking people than to get the picture out of a mediocre translation.

GermanGuy · #4 01-03-2007, 07:54 PM

The question is: are they going to try?

If people ask me how to improve playing poker I always try to steer them towards GSHE and this site. The answer I mostly get is: can't I just copy a preflop-chart?

As a foreign language teacher I always think it is a great idea to start reading things in a foreign language that actually interests you. So people should try to read strategy books in English, many won't, however.

exec · #5 01-03-2007, 09:13 PM

Damn, i got it yesterday, $39 for nothing!

elwoodblues · #6 01-03-2007, 03:06 AM

[ QUOTE ]
found a lot of clearly wrong or highly missunderstundable sentences, impossible wordstructure, and sometimes a strange use of english words

[/ QUOTE ]

Are you sure it was a poor translation? [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

Mason Malmuth · #7 01-03-2007, 03:47 AM

Hi fatheaddy:

I sure hope you're not correct. But I don't speak German. However, we will soon have other books of ours translated into German and it will be a different publisher, so I'm pretty sure it will be different translators as well.

Best wishes,
Mason

fatheaddy · #8 01-03-2007, 11:53 AM

[ QUOTE ]
Hi fatheaddy:

I sure hope you're not correct. But I don't speak German. However, we will soon have other books of ours translated into German and it will be a different publisher, so I'm pretty sure it will be different translators as well.

Best wishes,
Mason

[/ QUOTE ]

Well... My german is far bether than english, as you could read. Im nearly sure the text was first translate with software and obviously there were some corrections after that, but as I wrote it, they are insufficiant, sometimes wrong (and i mean wrong, i read it in english in between!) and after all I think ToP is important enough to work on it properly, means no use of traductionsoftware at all. At least the german release date was shifted many times and I ask myself what was their problem? Obviously the traduction as a whole, it is a patchwork, no coordinated traduction. As soon as I have the courage to open the german ToP again, I will show some examples of what I mean. Ok, ok... I'm very happy that in future 2+2 Books will be translated by someone else and I'm happy to get some of 2+2 books in german at all. Beside thanks for your great books, helping me improving my poker-abilities.
Again sorry for my horrible english [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img]

Mason Malmuth · #9 01-03-2007, 11:02 PM

Hi fatheaddy:

It just so happened that we received copies of the book today and the printing looks pretty good. But again, none of us at Two Plus Two speak German so I can't comment directly on the translation.

Best wishes,
Mason

SwissPoker · #10 01-04-2007, 06:17 AM

Hi Mason,

It's certainly bad you can't evaluate the quality of the translation. But that's like doing business blindfolded. Please do yourself a favor and find a highly skilled german speaking poker player you trust is skilled enough and understands ToP. Let him read the book and do whatever it takes to get an honest opinion on the translations quality.

It was my job to translate technical material from english to german while I worked for a trading system software company in Zuerich, Switzerland. To my opinion, good technical translations are a difficult undertaking. It's already difficult to present complex material as simple and clear as possible. To translate technical material requires at least to fully understand it in order to reformat it by means of linguistic leveling.