Tuesday, August 02, 2005

Harrius Potter et Philosophi Lapis

No, I didn't buy it for myself. But someone else did! (And it was a confirmed anti- that suggested it ;) ). After spending about two weeks on the first two sentences, I realized I was translating a word with a meaning that made absolutely no sense and that's why my sentence didn't either.

[For interested parties, I was trying to figure out how "uti" could be used as "ut" (which it can) if there was no subjunctive in the sentence and if it was right next to "neque" (which negates it). It just made absolutely no sense! But then I realized that "uti" was really the infinitive of the verb "utor" and suddenly the world was right again.]

The moral of the story? Look beyond your comfort zone. Sometimes things don't make sense 'cause you're trying to force circles through square holes. Stop, take a good look, and try to see the picture another angle. Sometimes you just have to turn over the puzzle piece before it'll fit onto the puzzle.

8 comments:

CJ Srullowitz said...

are you really going to try to get through it in, lulei demistafina, french?

BarbaraFromCalifornia said...

Wow! That is quite an undertaking!

I admire you and wish you the best here.

smb said...

Harry potter in french, that's interesting :)

Keren Perles said...

Lol - y'all, that ain't French. It's Latin!

Eli7 said...

Well, despite my anti-Harry Potter leanings, I'm glad that you got a cool lesson out of it ;)

TRW said...

Thanks, Stx! I didn't get to the blog 'till now, but yes, it's Latin. And yes, it's hard...

Samuel J. Scott said...

Just saw your comment on my circumcision post -- thanks! I had a rather lengthy reply.

I checked out your blog, and it's got some interesting posts. So I added you to my blogroll, if you don't mind.

(Sorry, I read HP -- but not in Latin. So I don't have anything relevant to say to this post...)

TRW said...

Thanks! And welcome!