Jumping Into the Pond (Jordan)

     I enjoyed reading about Carpenter's struggles in translating various Japanese onomatopeias. Although I wasn't familiar with all of the cases she talked about, the text had me wondering about certain onomatopeias that I am familiar with, such as the difference between waku waku and doki doki. I wondered what I would answer if someone who was learning Japanese asked me what the difference between these two words is. After disclaiming that I'm no expert and that what I say should be taken with a grain of salt, I would provide what my idea of each word is. The first difference that I feel when conceptualizing each word is that doki doki can be associated with both feelings of love and fear. It's meant to sound like the sound of a beating heart. Waku waku makes me imagine the anticipation of something about to happen. Carpenter's description of these words was similar to what I would have said. Carpenter compared translation to coloring in a coloring book. She compared the outline the author provides to the translator and the act of translating as coloring it in. As a translator, you absolutely must use the outline provided to you, but the responsibility of giving it life is up to you, as the outline is colorless when it's given to you. Based on my interpretation of this comparison, it appears Carpenter feels like she has great freedom when translating. You can "color" it in any color you want, and she even says "you could put a little tree over here" if you thought it was necessary. She described the rules that bind you as "joushiki". Basically, as long as adding something or changing something seems reasonable it's free game. I suppose determining what is reasonable and what isn't is the challenge.