這樣的譯者被機器取代也不足惜
——新書《後人類時代：虛擬身體的多重想像和建構》

兩位資歷夠嚇人的譯者，一個是英國文學博士、外語教授，曾獲翻譯獎，一個是人工智慧博士、資訊管理學教授，結果共同端出的翻譯，在全書序幕的前幾小段（見於博客來試讀第一頁）就至少有如圖標出的三處翻譯問題：

第一個是糟糕的不知所云的詞彙「實體事實」，把 embodied reality 的 reality 翻成「事實」(facts)！？

接著是省略原文造成曲解，漏掉 from 還能造句瞎掰，中文也不通（「無形的、流體的一小步」，亂加頓號）。

最後一個則顯示他們不懂 for all practical purposes 這一不算罕見的片語的意思，也不覺得寫出的譯文怪怪的，讓人一看大概就知道有鬼。

這十之八九預示著，一本看似很有趣的書又就此糟蹋了。

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噗浪網上有讀者如此評論中譯：

// 問題有幾個：
1. 翻譯有明顯錯誤。我（和讀書會的朋友）一邊讀一邊在吐槽。朋友很快就指出一個很明確的問題：他×的你第一頁就把Star Trek 翻譯成星際大戰了啊，這是要人怎麼讀。我還留意到書裡面的某些小細節被誤譯了。讀書會期間我們都在笑要不要時報找我們來勘誤修訂這本書，然後時報付錢給我們……
2. 翻譯很不通順。原文用了很多術語。先不論某些術語翻譯得很奇怪，原文沒用術語的地方，你總也不能按照語意翻譯吧……這根本就是直譯。
3. 書的內容很深。原文其實也很深，朋友投訴這本喜歡亂拋術語，例如將能指和所指（索緒爾的東西）上綱上線到打字機的鍵和字的關係，就讓我們想了三十分鐘還想不到是能怎麼解讀。但這就不是譯本的問題，而是原文的問題咯。

總結：想讀的，請自己去找電子書或者買電子書。紙本書翻譯得極差。我不知道這書怎麼可能獲得台灣科技部贊助，或者通過審核，或者如翻譯者在序言之內說得那麼費心力。我們只讀了兩章就已經決定放棄。
這本書是研究科幻小說和後人類的題材。但請不要去讀中文版。已經在讀原文，覺得原文寫得非常有詩意，某些地方甚至很幽默，而中文版只是將文章放入機器轉譯而已。 //

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後人類時代：虛擬身體的多重想像和建構
HOW WE BECAME THE POSTHUMAN: Virtual Bodies in Cybernetics, Literature, and Informatics
原文作者： N. Katherine Hayles
譯者： 賴淑芳, 李偉柏
出版社：時報出版
出版日期：2018/07/10
語言：繁體中文

作者簡介

凱瑟琳．海爾斯（N. Katherine Hayles）

　　N. 凱薩琳．海爾斯寫作本書時任加州大學洛衫磯分校教授，現任杜克大學英文系「詹姆士 ．杜克」講座特聘教授(James B. Duke Professor)。她擁有化學及英文高等學歷，著有《我的媽媽是電腦：數位主題和文學文本》，並編輯《混沌與秩序：文學和科學的複雜動態》，皆由芝加哥大學出版。代表作《後人類時代:虛擬身體的多重想像和建構》(HOW WE BECAME THE POSTHUMAN: Virtual Bodies in Cybernetics, Literature, and Informatics）已成為文學、人類學、社會學與媒體學等研究領域崇奉為經典之作。

譯者簡介

賴淑芳

　　國立中山大學外國語文學系教授、高雄醫學大學醫學系（醫學人文暨教育學科）合聘教授。英國格拉斯哥大學英國文學博士，曾獲梁實秋文學翻譯獎、台大文學翻譯獎。學術專長為十九世紀英國文學、文學科學、文學翻譯，目前教授維多利亞小說、臺灣文學外譯等課程。

李偉柏

　　英國愛丁堡大學人工智慧博士，國立中山大學資訊管理學系教授。研究領域為人工智慧、仿生系統、資料探勘，目前教授人工智慧、資料探勘等課程。

推薦人

林永隆（清大資工系講座教授、科技部AI創新研究中心辦公室主持人）
李奭學（中研院文哲所研究員）
李蔡彥（政大資工系教授）
賴俊雄（成大外文系特聘教授）
呂佩穎（高醫大醫學系教授、醫學與人文科主任）

In part one of the interview on my blog I posted yesterday, I mentioned how my mother supported me to pursue my interest in art in my early years. I'm forever grateful to her. This is a portrait that I did for her in Hong Kong and below is an introduction of the painting and my mother in an oil painting collection to be published in China in the near future.

***
Mother 75x47cm 1982 Hong Kong
母親 75X47CM 1982 香港

In 1960, during my second year at the Affiliated High School of the Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts while I was home for the winter break, I made an oil painting of my mother. That painting was unfortunately lost during the Cultural Revolution. After my graduation, I was assigned to Zhaoqing City in Guangdong Province, which was very far away from my hometown in Hunan. I only received 12 days a year for family leave including the travel time, so my trips home to Hunan were always rushed affairs with little time for painting. It was not until the 1980s that my mother, siblings, and I were all finally reunited one by one in Hong Kong. By that time, my mother was 72 years old. Two years later, we moved to slightly larger rental accommodations and I found time to paint this portrait of my mother.

1960年冬，我正在廣州美術學院附中二年級的寒假吧，趁假回家時為母親畫過一幅油畫像，可惜文革中丟失了。畢業後工作分配在廣東省的肇慶市，離湖南老家太遠，每年探親假連路程也才12天，因而，回湖南探親都是行色匆匆，少有時間作畫。直到1980年，母親與我們兄弟姊妹先後抵港，重新團聚。此時母親已高齡72歲了。再過兩年，我們搬租到稍大的房子，我才抽空為母親作了這幅畫像。

After I came to Taiwan, I happened to mention the tragedy of my parents caused by the cross-strait standoff to Mr. Liu Shaotang, the president of Bibliographies Publishing. Liu expressed his sympathies as well as his admiration for my mother because she managed to raise us all by herself despite everything that she went through.

我到台灣後，有一次與「傳記文學」社長劉紹唐先生談起父母在這海峽兩岸對峙中的悲慘遭遇時他深表同情與感嘆。並直說你母親真是了不起，經歷那麼多苦難，獨力將你們撫養大，真是很偉大。

My mother was born in Taoyuan County, Hunan. She attended the Zhounan Women's School in Changsha and, to escape from an arranged marriage, fled to Shanghai where she enrolled in the Daxia University. After that, she married, had children, and suffered through China's modern history. It was not until the mid-1980s that she was finally able to travel to Taiwan to sweep my father's tomb. When she passed away in 1994, we fulfilled her final wish by laying her to rest alongside my father.

母親，湖南桃源縣人，早年去長沙念「周南女校」，之後為逃婚獨赴上海唸「大夏大學」，結婚、生子，經歷中國現代史中一切苦厄。直到八十年代中才得以到台灣為父親掃墓。1994年，她老仙逝，我們將她與父親合葬，完成她老最後的願望。

My mother was a good and honest woman filled with compassion. She often taught her children that "integrity is the foundation of personal character." She was well-versed in ancient literature and wrote with a neat, beautiful hand. She frequently reminded me of the need to re-read my letters to ensure that they were "fluent and made sense", and to use well-accepted phrases rather than making up unfamiliar terms. How I miss her!

母親善良、誠實，富于同情心，經常教育子女：忠厚為人之本。她古文好，字端正、秀麗。常告誡我寫信要複讀一遍，要『文從字順』。遣詞造句不要自己生造，要約定從俗……啊，我的母親。

In part one of the interview on my blog I posted yesterday, I mentioned how my mother supported me to pursue my interest in art in my early years. I'm forever grateful to her. This is a portrait that I did for her in Hong Kong and below is an introduction of the painting and my mother in an oil painting collection to be published in China in the near future.

***
Mother 75x47cm 1982 Hong Kong
母親 75X47CM 1982 香港

In 1960, during my second year at the Affiliated High School of the Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts while I was home for the winter break, I made an oil painting of my mother. That painting was unfortunately lost during the Cultural Revolution. After my graduation, I was assigned to Zhaoqing City in Guangdong Province, which was very far away from my hometown in Hunan. I only received 12 days a year for family leave including the travel time, so my trips home to Hunan were always rushed affairs with little time for painting. It was not until the 1980s that my mother, siblings, and I were all finally reunited one by one in Hong Kong. By that time, my mother was 72 years old. Two years later, we moved to slightly larger rental accommodations and I found time to paint this portrait of my mother.

1960年冬，我正在廣州美術學院附中二年級的寒假吧，趁假回家時為母親畫過一幅油畫像，可惜文革中丟失了。畢業後工作分配在廣東省的肇慶市，離湖南老家太遠，每年探親假連路程也才12天，因而，回湖南探親都是行色匆匆，少有時間作畫。直到1980年，母親與我們兄弟姊妹先後抵港，重新團聚。此時母親已高齡72歲了。再過兩年，我們搬租到稍大的房子，我才抽空為母親作了這幅畫像。

After I came to Taiwan, I happened to mention the tragedy of my parents caused by the cross-strait standoff to Mr. Liu Shaotang, the president of Bibliographies Publishing. Liu expressed his sympathies as well as his admiration for my mother because she managed to raise us all by herself despite everything that she went through.

我到台灣後，有一次與「傳記文學」社長劉紹唐先生談起父母在這海峽兩岸對峙中的悲慘遭遇時他深表同情與感嘆。並直說你母親真是了不起，經歷那麼多苦難，獨力將你們撫養大，真是很偉大。

My mother was born in Taoyuan County, Hunan. She attended the Zhounan Women's School in Changsha and, to escape from an arranged marriage, fled to Shanghai where she enrolled in the Daxia University. After that, she married, had children, and suffered through China's modern history. It was not until the mid-1980s that she was finally able to travel to Taiwan to sweep my father's tomb. When she passed away in 1994, we fulfilled her final wish by laying her to rest alongside my father.

母親，湖南桃源縣人，早年去長沙念「周南女校」，之後為逃婚獨赴上海唸「大夏大學」，結婚、生子，經歷中國現代史中一切苦厄。直到八十年代中才得以到台灣為父親掃墓。1994年，她老仙逝，我們將她與父親合葬，完成她老最後的願望。

My mother was a good and honest woman filled with compassion. She often taught her children that "integrity is the foundation of personal character." She was well-versed in ancient literature and wrote with a neat, beautiful hand. She frequently reminded me of the need to re-read my letters to ensure that they were "fluent and made sense", and to use well-accepted phrases rather than making up unfamiliar terms. How I miss her!

母親善良、誠實，富于同情心，經常教育子女：忠厚為人之本。她古文好，字端正、秀麗。常告誡我寫信要複讀一遍，要『文從字順』。遣詞造句不要自己生造，要約定從俗……啊，我的母親。