AN EINEM TAG

IN NOVEMBER
TRI1112 Commentary project

Daphne de Craecker
David Edgley
Laura Isla Navarro

CONTENTS
1.

TRANSLATION ..................................................... 1

1.1.

SOURCE TEXT - AN EINEM TAG IN NOVEMBER ............ 1

1.2.

TARGET TEXT IN A DAY IN NOVEMBER ................... 2

2.

COMMENTARY .................................................... 3

1.TRANSLATION
1.1. SOURCE TEXT - AN EINEM
TAG IN NOVEMBER
Es war ein nettes Wochenende mit Freunden und htte nicht in einer Tragdie
enden mssen, wenn sie aufgebrochen wren, als Holger Notktter seine Frau Elke
das erste Mal daran erinnerte, dass er am nchsten Morgen um sechs aus den Federn musste und sie noch vierhundertachtzig Kilometer Heim- fahrt vor sich hatten.
Das war am Sonntagnachmittag um vier.
Angekommen waren sie am Freitagabend, zu spt und zu mde, um noch lange
mit Biggi und Bob beisammenzusitzen und sich zu unterhalten. Aber dafr hatten
Elke und ihre Freundin den ganzen Samstag und den halben Sonntag Zeit. Der
ursprnglich geplante Ausflug nach Hamburg fiel ins Wasser. Wer lief denn
freiwillig bei Nieselregen und Khl- schranktemperaturen ber die Reeperbahn?
Holger wre gerne gelaufen, wenigstens mal gucken, wenn man schon in der Nhe
war. Er war noch nie in Hamburg ge- wesen und hatte seine Wetterjacke dabei.
Bob htte sich wohl ebenfalls lieber auf den Weg gemacht, statt sich den ganzen
Samstagabend das Geplapper der Frauen anzuhren. Aber da Bob den beiden
nicht widersprach, hielt Holger um des lieben Friedens willen ebenfalls den Mund.
Holger Notktter war dreiundvierzig, Elke achtunddreiig. Sie waren erst seit elf
Monaten miteinander verheiratet. Fr beide war es die zweite Ehe. Und Holger
war fest entschlos- sen, es diesmal besser zu machen. Seine Ex hatte ihm oft vorgeworfen, er nhme zu wenig Rcksicht auf ihre Bedrfnisse, ehe sie ihre Sachen
packte und zu ihrem neuen Freund zog. Sohn und Tochter nahm sie mit.
Holger behielt die Vierzimmerwohnung in Hppesweiler, einem Gutshof, der
zwischen der Kreisstadt Bergheim und der Kleinstadt Herten im nrdlichen RheinErft-Kreis lag. Auer dem imposanten Gutshaus und einigen landwirtschaftlichen
Nebengebuden gab es dort drei gepflegte Mietshuser mit je sechs Wohnungen,
die grozgig geschnitten und dennoch erschwinglich waren. In den meisten lebten
Familien. Fr Kinder war Hppesweiler ein Paradies.

1.2. TARGET TEXT IN A DAY

IN NOVEMBER
It was a nice weekend with friends and it would not have to finish in a
tragedy, if they had to go, when Holger Notktter reminded for the first time
to his wife Elke that he had to be the next morning at six out of the bed and
and that they still had a way of 480 km remaining in view of them.
That was at four on Sunday afternoon.
They arrived on Friday evening, so late and so tired, but to top up, they sat
and talked for a long time with Biggi and Bob. Although Elke and her friend
had still the whole Saturday and Sunday. The original planned excursion to
Hamburg did not take place. Then, who travels freely with drizzle and a
freezing temperature along the Hamburger Reeperbahn street?
Holger would have walked nicely, and at least had a look, when he was
already nearby. He had never been before in Hamburg and had his raincoat
there. Bob had likewise got used to the way, instead of spending the whole
Saturday evening listening to the women chattering. But there, Bob did not
contradict both women, and stayed mum for the sake of peace and quiet.
Holger Notktter was forty-three years old, Elke thirty-eight. For both two
this was their second marriage. And Holger was absolute determined that
he was going to do it better this time. His ex had him often reproached that
he takes too little consideration on her necessities before she packed her
things and moved to his new boyfriend. She took their son and daughter
along.
Holger kept the four room apartment in Hppesweiler, an estate that laid
between the district capital of Bergheim and the town of Herten in northern
Rhein Erft Kreis. Besides the impressive estate house and some
agricultural outbuildings, there you could find three sophisticated tenements
of six apartments each that despite being spacious were still affordable.
Most of them are dwelled by families. For their children, Hppesweiler was
a paradise.

2.COMMENTARY
The suspense in which this 2014 novel An einem Tag in November
is wrapped all along its plot, invites the readers to live moments of
excitement that will animate them trying to find replies to questions
normally generated in this kind of books.
In spite of this excerpt that we previously translated does not offer
much information about the main facts of the text, right from the
start, Petra Hammesfahr wanted to emphasise that sensation of
thrilling through allocating the literary space in the month of
November, where the cold weather is starting to act up, and
conditioning the readers humour. Apart from that, Germany is the
scenery, visible not only in the characters names (Holger
Nrkotter, Elke), but when German cities and districts such as
Hamburg or Hppesweiler are mentioned. Moreover, it would be
interesting to point out as well that the author uses her work for
showing personal details. Having done some research, we could
find out that she is in a second marriage and currently is living in
Rhein Erft Kreis.
It is worth mentioning that despite the thrilling plot, there are as
well moments where it is allowed to burst out laughing. We are
able to see in the fourth paragraph, when one of the most common
stereotypes among women and men comes to light. Bob prefers to
disappear instead of remaining listening to the women chattering.

Personally, we think that in some occasions the style is slightly

complicated with regard to the sentence structure that is generally
the main rendering challenge. Proof of this is shown in the first line
of the third paragraph, Angekommen waren sie, the participle is
moved to the beginning of the sentence for stressing that event.
Another matter was the adoption of certain verbal forms
complicated for English speakers such as the Konjuktiv II.
Another element we perceived was the drastic change in the last
two paragraphs. The adventure of this four friends group was
being told when suddenly we receive a sort of biography about
Holger Notktter. This does not affect to the translation at all, but
somehow shocked us while we read it.
Taking into account all these factors, the translator must be aware
of applying a terminology that although evokes to feelings of
coldness, should also instil the own beauty that characterize all the
literary texts. In some cases, we found necessary the application
of the transposition. For instance, the phrase In den meisten lebten
Familien was turned into the passive as Most of them are dwelled
by families.
In addition, another prominent goal is trying to transport all the
German context of these lines without deforming it into an English
one. This might be sometimes tricky due to the existence of
concepts that are present in the Germanic culture that necessarily
has not to have to exist in the Anglo-Saxon manners. Example of
that difficulty is the debate of if translating or not the original name
of cities of regions. On one hand, it would be good maintaining

the original term for giving a more genuine atmosphere to the

novel, but on the other hand, if we are working for a foreign group
that already has a specific word for the region, we should use it
so that they can understand it completely. This time we had not too
many problems because the mentioned places did not have
possible translation in English, so we just borrow them.
The adaptation was also important when we worked with the
collocation grozgig geschnitten. The literal translation did not
really function, so doing some research we conclude saying that
this term corresponds to spacious.
Of course, we had to deal with idioms as um des lieben Friedens
leben for the sake of the peace and quiet too. So, obviously
the equivalence was key here.
We could not finish this commentary without alluding to how
complicated the translation of the sentence wenigstens mal
glucken was. We are still not very sure with our work in that part,
but anyway we tried to solve it by a literal translation and at least
had a look.
Once having introduced this thriller and having done a scheme of
the main difficulties, we just have to finish saying that we
interpenetrated very well as a group. Each one did a translation
and got main ideas for creating the final commentary. After that,
we met and saw all the conclusions. Finally, we created the
translation that, in our humble opinion, is the most suitable,

although as we said before we are not fully convinced. We hope

that we can overcome these little problems as our course elapses.