Talk:Mat (profanity) - Misplaced Pages

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"citation needed"

As I stated in my edit comments, I translated the original Russian verse. Therefore, I believe the "who translated" tag needs to be removed.--Harald Forkbeard (talk) 23:15, 27 July 2015 (UTC)

Please click on the link which constitutes the tag and learn the rule. -M.Altenmann >t 02:39, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

Sorry, I don't follow you. Can you please be more specific what you are looking for.

Again, the situation is: someone has inserted the question 'who provided the translation'. I responded: I did. This is the truth, please see the editing history. What else is missing?--Harald Forkbeard (talk) 03:07, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

If I understand correctly, you are looking for a third party source to confirm that I actually provided the translation. In this case, you will be waiting a long time, as I crafted the text out of my head. No witnesses. Again, I am a bilingual person who does this for a living. --Harald Forkbeard (talk) 03:10, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

NO. I need a third party source which published the translation. (Did you bother to read the wikipedia policies after all? But at least you started thinking in the right direction.) Now let me make one step further and explain what is the problem in your case, which is also an advice how to resolve the problem. Normally there is no problems with adding a literal translation, because, after all, we add information from various sources in various languages and the translation is always involved. This is not so in the case of a poetic translation, because it involves a liberal poetic interpretation and modification by a wikipedian, which is a strict no-no in wikipedia; don't even try. Therefore if you want to help the readers to understand a poem, please provide word-by-word translation, accompanied with the text in which the words are placed in the proper syntactic order. This is how it is done in works in linguistics. It is a completely different story if you provide a published translation. Such text usually has its own encyclopedic value and will not be questioned. -M.Altenmann >t 04:14, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

Yes, I read the policy. However, I can't see a way to provide a third party source for my own translation. Do you have a suggestion?

If there is no published source, then it is inadmissible for wikipedia. -M.Altenmann >t 06:19, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

You must be a single-language person, with zero experience of translating from foreign languages. There is no way you can relay a verse in Russian into English verbatim and hope to make sense to an English reader. The two languages are simply too different. --Harald Forkbeard (talk) 04:39, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

That's not true. As I said, linguists do this all the time. (Unless the poem makes no clear sense, pretending to be something elevated.) Puns and cultural allusions can be explained in footnotes. -M.Altenmann >t 06:19, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

By the way, even Google Translate is smart enough to make sense of the poems in question:

So, I will not pay you:

But if you're just a whore,

Know this: it's an honor to be considered

Acquaintance with Junker's dick!

(needs polishing, but basically the idea is clear)

By the way, Poruchik Rzhevsky was much more elegant and less pompous: Gusary deneg ne berut! -M.Altenmann >t 06:26, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

Can't comment on Rzhevsky. I still like my rendition better as it captures the original Russian in spirit, not in verbatim word. The judgment call on my poetic license is just that, a matter of personal opinion. By the way, the original Rusian verse is well sourced. --Harald Forkbeard (talk) 16:53, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

Nobody challenges the Russian verse. And precisely the personal opinion does not count in wikipedia. I challenge your claim that your rendition captures the spirit of the original. Challenged information is verified exclusively via references. No references — bite the bullet. -M.Altenmann >t 05:19, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Altenmann and Harald Forkbeard, Hi to both of you. Harald asked me at my Talk page to take a look here; he and I edited at Sageworks article and maybe more in past, but we don't have a huge connection. About whether a translation can be included in Misplaced Pages if the translation itself is not sourced, well I believe of course yes. There are lots of articles brought in from other languages' Wikipedias all the time. I was invited to do that in past, through a way that requires admin privileges though which I don't have. There must be documented procedures for that. So M.Altenmann you must not be familiar with these practices? I have to run now but can look for documentation links later. And from what I've understood quickly from M.Altenmann's comments, I gather there is a high-quality standard for translation of poems and other stuff where the translations' wording is really really important. I was not aware of this kind of thing, am interested to browse about it later. Seems like you two are coming from quite different but legitimate perspectives. I advise: don't edit war at all further...it is not worth risk of this becoming an issue at wp:ANI or wp:3rr, where generally everyone loses. Please leave whatever version is in place right now when you first see this note from me (and be honest with that), I suggest. I am sure some further discussion will resolve this to everyone's satisfaction. Bye for now. --do ncr am 22:54, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

I'm back. I have only started reading your comments and links provided with them, here at Talk:Mat (Russian profanity) and at User talk:Harald Forkbeard#Mat. But already I have to say that IMO citations are needed to improve the article. I don't know yet about how the translation should be addressed, but I have some basic questions and comments: can either or both of you respond to these?

Question 1. The article was translated by Harald Forkbeard, from what source? I am assuming you translated it from the Russian language Misplaced Pages, is that right? Or was your source some other document in the public domain? (If the material is not in the public domain, does its copyright status allow it to be republished? Can you please provide a link directly to it? I don't see the source indicated in credits within the article and I don't see it indicated here on the Talk page. It should be indicated, to give credit to the Russian wikipedia article's writers (or whomever), and there are standard ways to do so. Perhaps credit was indicated in edit summaries but I have not looked for those. Again, what is the source?

--do ncr am 04:14, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

The source is the original publications by the respective 19th century Russian poets. This is clearly stated in the article. Another editor inserted the Russian verses, please check the history for details.--Harald Forkbeard (talk) 02:28, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Comment 1: Example of standard way to give credit to other-language wikipedia article: I know that the English language wikipedia's coverage of historic monuments in France is largely by translated articles, and browsing I find one: Fort de Queuleu. See its section Fort de Queuleu#Attribution as an example of giving credit within the article. I think there also is a template giving credit that should be included at the top of the Talk page (similar to mention of an AFD discussion), I believe, although Talk:Fort de Queuleu does not show any. Then looking at the history of edits...ah, I see that it was editor Acroterion who did the translating (I'm not surprised, I knew that he translated a lot of these). Note he started with the actual French language page (including its edit history), as of this 27 March 2010 version en francais. In this edit he imported the article from the French wikipedia to the English wikipedia, with edit summary "28 revisions from fr:Fort de Queuleu: importing for translation". Oh, maybe he moved it to MediaWiki, because in the next edit he moved it to his own userspace, with edit summary "moved MediaWiki talk:Fort de Queuleu to User:Acroterion/Fort de Queuleu: move to userspace for translation". Then in many edits he did the translation work, and eventually moved it to English wikipedia mainspace with summary "moved User:Acroterion/Fort de Queuleu to Fort de Queuleu: move to article space with histry". That created this first all-English version of the article with the original French-language editors' being given full credit by the history of edits. There's not an explicit credit given in what displays in the article, nor at the Talk page (though I think a Talk page template perhaps could/should). Acroterion's contribution of translation is visible in the edit history however. If this article is republished by some outside publisher, then by terms of the Misplaced Pages copyright, the republisher must indicate credit to the authors by listing them or pointing to the edit history. (I hope and expect the process that Acroterion followed then, or an updated process, is written up somewhere in Misplaced Pages space, will look for it. ) Please comment: do you agree this is a reasonable process? --do ncr am 04:14, 29 July 2015 (UTC)
(Comment 1-B) Note the Mat (Russian profanity) article was started differently; it began with this first draft in English. I gather that User:Harald Forkbeard later added material that he translated from the Russian language wikipedia article, adding it in one or a few chunks. And I gather that the original Russian language editors' edits are NOT included in the edit history. Well, actually this probably could be remedied: a history merge could be done (by an administrator like Acroterion who has experience in this area) which would put the entire Russian language edit history into this articles edit history, just before Harald Forkbeard's edits. And that would give appropriate attribution of the Russian wikipedia writers' work. And a bilingual person would be able to compare the Russian language writing to the English language translation provided by Harald Forkbeard (and they could agree or disagree that the translation was done well, and perhaps make refinements). That would be great, right? --do ncr am 04:14, 29 July 2015 (UTC)
Comment 2: About that 2003 New Yorker article mention. What is most immediately jarring for me in the current version of the article, is that sentence about the 2003 New Yorker article: "A detailed article by Victor Erofeyev (translated by Andrew Bromfeld) analyzing the history, overtones, and sociology of mat appeared in the 15 September 2003 issue of The New Yorker." Huh? What this does is assert some importance for mat, because mat was subject of a major article. But, technically, what is the source for this assertion? Is this a Misplaced Pages editor's interpretation of The New Yorker article? (I am not sure if that would be okay or not; i suspect Altenmann would then object, right?) Did some later-published article summarize Erofeyev's work in this way? (in which case the writer of that later article should be credited). And what is most obvious: Shouldn't the New Yorker article be used as a source for material in this article, instead? Does anyone have this article? It sounds important. Can someone get it and share it by email to the currently interested editors (actually I could probably do that)? By the way, what's funny is that the sentence was in the original, very first edit of the article in 2004!!! User:Chris Rodgers's version of the sentence was exactly: "A detailed article by Victor Erofeyev (translated by Andrew Bromfeld) analyzing the history, overtones, and sociology of mat appeared in the September 15, 2003 issue of the New Yorker." Hah! I bet Chris Rodgers had read the article, but perhaps didn't have a copy of it to use it more, and NO ONE ELSE SINCE THEN has ever obtained it. (@Chris Rodgers:, who edited as recently as April 2015.) IMO, at this point the sentence is "unsourced" and has been that way for 11 years, and it should be deleted! After 11 years, I no longer trust wikipedia editor CR's interpretation that the New Yorker article is so important (it perhaps was important then, but since no one here has read it for 11 years I don't think it is generally important to know about that article in order to understand mat). Also someone should jolly well get the New Yorker article and use it properly! --do ncr am 04:14, 29 July 2015 (UTC)
Question 2: Creativity in translating Is the issue here that Harald Forkman exercised some creativity in translating a poem, rather than providing simply a word-by-word translation? At least some creativity is encouraged by wp:TRANSLATION; is this a case of too much? --do ncr am 04:29, 29 July 2015 (UTC)
Yes, creativity is the issue. Creativity is original research. Either you provide a faithful translation, or it is your fantasies. YOu seem to completely ignore my explanation. I am not against translation, so your long expose above is wide off the mark. As I explained, I am completely in favor of faithful, verifiable translation. I don't care about poetic skills of a wikipedian. I care about cultural traits of the original text. The translations given delivered a completely false picture about the origin. And no, I will not explain why I think so, not my job. It is the duty of the challenged wikipedian to provide proof when challenged. And you know what kind of proof is accepted in wikipedia. -M.Altenmann >t 05:08, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

No way will we ever agree on the 'faithfulness' of my translation. First off, you are not qualified to comment on it. I stand by my translation as conveying the spirit and the cadence of the original. --Harald Forkbeard (talk) 02:33, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

If you believe the translation to be off base, please provide your own alternative, let's discuss it on the merits. If you lack the skills, you are in no position to make the 'faithfulness' allegations. Rather defer the discussion to someone who has them.--Harald Forkbeard (talk) 02:33, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

So you think I am completely wrong abut everything? Then do you want to defend keeping that New Yorker article mention?

And, what, you think the good process I gave example of is simply irrelevant? You want to demand publication of translation before it can be included in Misplaced Pages, and I demonstrate that there are vast areas of Misplaced Pages where that is not done, and then you dismiss me completely?

Also, I explicitly said I had not yet investigated, that I did not yet understand what the disagreement is about. I clearly said I was commenting on issues that seemed apparent to me, first, and which seem important to address. There is no call for you to be rude. And, you are edit warring.

Anyhow, continuing to try to address the problems here, I looked at wp:NOR which Altenmann has cited a couple times, and see that it doesn't say anything along the lines of his/her complaints. Okay, after looking further for possible standard tags and checking a lot of versions of this article, I finally figure out what the "who translated?" tag is. I don't know who added it first, but I see a couple instances of it restored by Altenmann in this edit using Twinkle. But in fact it is not a tag, it is merely a statement repeated in hidden comments following {{cn}} citation needed tags! Wow, that starts to seem bogus. You want to enforce a new type of demand (and using a secret way of communicating), where other editors Harald Forkbeard and I cannot even understand what you mean? And you act as if it is a standard kind of complaint, while it simply is not. Please do show me where there is a standard tag for anything like this. Please do consult wp:TRANSLATE and quote/cite exactly where your kind of complaint is supported. I don't think that you can. --do ncr am 06:11, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Please don't play verbal games with wikipedia rules I clearly cited. I claim the translation is false. I requested proof of the contrary. The burden of proof is on the challenged editor. None was provided and in fact confessed there is none. Please don't restore challenged dubious information. -M.Altenmann >t 06:24, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Okay, you're losing me further with accusations I don't understand. What wikipedia rules did you clearly cite, where, which are relevant? Do you mean your citations of wp:NOR, which don't seem relevant. What are you talking about? Have you read wp:TRANSLATE? And now you cite wp:BURDEN which is about requiring sources on content assertions, and is clearly not about requiring translations to be proven. You seem to be making up a new rule, which you are personally assuming a right to enforce, about you personally being able to determine when translations (explicitly allowed) are not good enough for you. Your rule would mean that most or perhaps all articles in Misplaced Pages about historic monuments in France must be deleted, because the translation was not elsewhere published before being put into Misplaced Pages. Your rule is not making sense. Whatever. I see no verbal games. I see no relevant wikipedia rules which you have cited. This communication is not working well. Enough for now, I will return later/tomorrow perhaps. --do ncr am 06:45, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Please nod speak about "accusations" and shorten your text. I understand that you "don't understand", and this worries me, because it seems we are talking about different things. Let's start from the very beginning, step by step. Do you know the rules that all content in wikipedia must be verifiable, and when challenged (or may be challenged) it must be properly referenced? (I deliberately did not wikilink the wikipedia rules implicit in this question.) -M.Altenmann >t 07:21, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

This whole discussion is getting way out of control, this much is clear. First of all, the original Russian verses are attributed to their respective authors, viz. the famous Russian poet Mikhail Lermontov, "A Holiday in Peterhof", and the second verse is due to Ivan Barkov. Both poets are covered in Misplaced Pages articles already.--Harald Forkbeard (talk) 16:13, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Thus, the original Russian language verses have been fully sourced and attributed to their authors from the start. The verses have been provided by another editor. I merely provided a translation that, in my expert view of a bilingual speaker, captures the spirit of the Russian original. Needless to say, there is always a degree of poetic license when rendering such works from one language to another. --Harald Forkbeard (talk) 16:13, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

This dogged insistence on rules smacks of obsession. All I did was provide a translation of the verse that reflects the wry humor and cadence of the original. For this I can vouch. If you are not a bilingual person, you cannot appreciate it. Poetry is not a subject of machine translation, it is not a technical manual. Poetic license is intrinsically a part of it if one is to convey both the meaning and the spirit properly. Read Boris Pasternak's translation of Romeo and Juliet, if you can, and then compare it to the original English version. No machine can do this.--Harald Forkbeard (talk) 16:13, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

I think the way to put it here is that dogged insistence on NEW rules proposed by the "dogger", not tried-and-true rules accepted by wide consensus, is a problem. I agree sometimes inflexible insistence on adherence to established rules can be problematic, but we don't need to go there. --do ncr am 16:45, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

It is getting out of control because you write too long texts while not giving a direct reply. It appears you completely misunderstand my objections. Therefore I am trying to start with establishing common grounds. Now, that said, once more: Do you know the rules that all content in wikipedia must be verifiable, and when challenged (or may be challenged) it must be properly referenced? At this moment please don't answer the questions I don't ask, or we never come anywhere. -M.Altenmann >t 05:14, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

You appear to be immune to reason. All explanations in the article, done by editors other than myself, are not verified. It is clear that other bilingual editors have provided translations of Russian swear words and interpretations of their meaning, based on their own experience.--Harald Forkbeard (talk) 03:40, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

It would be useful if you were to refrain from blind adherence to obscure rules and carefully re-read the article. See for yourself, the content is nothing more than interpretation by experts versed in the nuances of Russian and English colloquial terms. --Harald Forkbeard (talk) 03:40, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

I find these interpretations highly useful as a Misplaced Pages user. Without this level of contribution, Misplaced Pages would quickly turn into a useless assemblage of rote quotes from questionable resources. --Harald Forkbeard (talk) 03:40, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

Please stop dodging the question. Answer it. -M.Altenmann >t 04:15, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

P.S. Personal insinuations ("blind adherence to obscure rules", hints that I and somehow linguistically inferior to you, etc. is not a valid way to carry out discussion in wikipedia - a yet another major rule which seems to be an "obscure rule" for you). -M.Altenmann >t 04:23, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

No question has been dodged as none have been posed in any coherent manner. This dogged insistence on rules again borders on obsession. Misplaced Pages is about contributions that make sense, not blind obedience to self-imposed rules. Besides, your interpretation of these rules is just that, a misguided interpretation. I fail to see what you are trying to accomplish aside from antagonizing other editors who make sensible, and in my view, highly valuable contributions. --Harald Forkbeard (talk) 06:01, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

This discussion section is superseded by the RFC discussion opened below. Thank you to Altenmann for opening that and seeking others' comments; that seems to be constructive. Further discussion should probably go there. --do ncr am 16:45, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

RfC: How much "poetic license" does a translator of primary sources have in wikipedia?

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How much "poetic freedom" do our policies give to wikipedians in their translation of poetry, song lyrics, highly idiomatic prose, etc., when there are no good references with the translation of the text in question? (For a seasoned wikipedian the second part of the question is redundant, but I want to cut off some trivial answers.) -M.Altenmann >t 04:45, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

Specifically, two issues: allowable slack in retelling (suggested shortcut: "RETELL" ) and available means of verification ("PROOF"):

RETELL: Whether large deviation of the poetic translation from the literal text is allowed? And by "large" I mean cases which do not boil down to "PotAYto vs. PotAHto" or "dick vs. prick" nitpicking.-M.Altenmann >t 05:24, 31 July 2015 (UTC)
PROOF: If the translation is challenged, whether our basic policies about providing proof of correctness basing on references from reliable sources are applicable? -M.Altenmann >t 05:24, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

This is my first RfC to start and I have no idea whether I am allowed to present my arguments right now. Please advice -M.Altenmann >t 05:30, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

This is amazing. Do you have any idea how inappropriate this sounds? This translation has been provided for the benefit of Misplaced Pages readers, and most certainly not to appease your inexplicable adherence to 'rules'. To date, you have provided absolutely no contribution to this article, only obstructive comments. --Harald Forkbeard (talk) 06:00, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

There is plenty of 'poetic license' used by a number of editors of this article, most notably in the section Key words and expressions. The translations provided are matches against plausible English equivalents, however, the translations are of highly idiomatic nature and can be easily challenged by a native Russian / English speaker. Needless to say, there is no reliable published third party verification as is typical of colloquial expressions. --Harald Forkbeard (talk) 06:12, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

You are not helpful. You are not answering the question posted. I was not asking about your translation. Please read WP:RFC, the link prominently highlighted in the starting marker of this section. Also, regretfully I have to remind you another rule I've cited for you already, but you obviously ignored to read: if you continue with your personal attacks, you will be blocked from editing for disruption. -M.Altenmann >t 06:21, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

Comment - Short answer: as much as required by the topic, and allowed by WP:Consensus and WP:Ignore All Rules, which are pillars of the project.

Long answer (which you might not like, given a quick glance at your stated position in the linked discussion): any translation is by its very nature an exercise in creation; there is no such thing as "faithful translation" (haven't you heard the Italian saying traduttore, traditore?), only different degrees of deviation from the original, either in word choice or proximity to the author's intent. Current WP:NOENG policy is clear that the original text works as a reference so that WP:Verifiability is satisfied, and it does allow for Wikipedians crafting one if no translation in RSs is available (in fact, providing a translation in such case is mandated by that policy).

I have not read the whole affair, but if your concern is with the translation being innacurate or interpretive, a good solution (which we used back at All Your Base Are Belong To Us, which faced a similar controversy -an was an equally tricky translation, if you ask me) was to add an explicit note that the translation was provided by editors.

So, your concern with respect to the translation should by solved by quoting the original, and letting readers judge their accuracy (i.e. WP:Verify) by themselves - which they should know to be aware of, thanks to a similar note. Diego (talk) 13:31, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

<sigh> You are not addressing the concern: The concern was: is the translation allowed to have a grave deviation from the text. And in wikipedia, the correctness of information is not judged by readers, but by writers. The note "wikipedian translated it" is not a license to distort the original. We have a similar concern with self-drawn maps. And the general concern is that the map drawer must provide reasonable proof of the correctness of the map. And if it was proven that the map distorts the data, it is removed. -M.Altenmann >t 15:22, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

Policy says yes, if consensus is that the translation is valid. The point is that your original complaint about verifiability is not a solid one, since verifiability (reasonable proof which any reader may be able to check - verifiability is all about readers, not editors) is achieved with the text in the original language. The policy recognizes that an external source providing the translation is best, but does not mandate it; consensus is the arbiter. Diego (talk) 15:55, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

Sorry, I was wrong; your point that verifiability is in terms of any reasonable person is valid. And you are right that the original text is a valid attempt to provide a reference for the sake of verifiablity. Now, let's make a step in this analogy further. It is not uncommon that wikipedians misinterpret the source and (acting in a good faith!) provide an invalid reference. What's next? -M.Altenmann >t 03:49, 1 August 2015 (UTC)

Comment I would say that a translation is necessary, otherwise the phrase is not useful for English Misplaced Pages. It is important that the original phrase can be found. This is clearly the case here as both a Cyrillic and a transliteration of the original source are given. So in my view no problem so far.

Second question is what translation should be provided. In my view, especially for literature, in the ideal world we would have a professional translation from a published source (with reference). However if nobody can provide such a translation a Wiki editor translation should suffice. As Diego already reports above, the listing of the original text satisfies WP:verifiability; so 'unsourced' type of tags seem unwarranted. Instead if there is disagreement about the quality of the translation the editors on this page should aim to achieve consensus on the talk page on what a better translation might be. This should ideally be done through providing and discussing alternatives to the currently given translation - before changing the article. Arnoutf (talk) 14:48, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

You are wide off the mark: the question is whether the translation whould be proved when challenged, not "provided". And the original is not the proof of the translation. -M.Altenmann >t 15:22, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

Respectfully, you're wrong in your interpretation of policy, as WP:Verifiability explicitly says that external references are not indispensable for the translation itself (nice to have, yes; necessary, no)- i.e. this point you try to make was already agreed upon by the community, and they -we- decided to take the opposite position of what you're defending. Diego (talk) 16:01, 31 July 2015 (UTC)
Respectfully, you are wrong about what I want and what my interpretation is. FYI by our policies ext refs are not indispensable at all, and I darn well know this for 10 years now. (Do you know when ext refs are indispensable?) Please don't read my mind. Just give direct answers to the questions posted. -M.Altenmann >t 03:38, 1 August 2015 (UTC)

@>t. You asked for comments, which means you simply have to wait and listen to those comments. Aggressive responses on comments that do not support your point go against the whole idea of request for comments. To respond on your content remark. Proving a correct translation is impossible. If it were that simple there would be only a single "correct" translation of e.g. the bible, Homer's Iliad and Odyssey. The only way forward is to argue in detail what is exactly wrong with the given translation and provide a better alternative. Arnoutf (talk) 16:08, 31 July 2015 (UTC)
With due respect, I understand your point, but I am not going aggressively against non-my point, which I didn't make. If you bothered to see the beginning of the RfC I even asked whether I am permitted to make my point. What I am going after is not answering my question of the RfC, answering not mine question, and reading my mind. These three are the road to derailing the RfC. Here again you are missing my point. Yes, proving a "correct" translation is impossible. Just as impossible to write Truth in wikipedia. Just as science does not know everything. But this is not the focus of this RfC. Please re-read the two questions asked and give direct answers. -M.Altenmann >t 03:38, 1 August 2015 (UTC)

Q & A. Q: How much license is allowed? A: Some. There is no good way to measure the extent of poetic license. Perhaps zero-level poetic license in translation could be defined as a word-for-word translation (which all would agree is often quite awful). Or perhaps zero-level poetic license could be defined as usage of Google translate (whatever is the current quality of its algorithm, which is itself hard/impossible to describe) or as usage of some other "machine" translation. But again, "machine"-type translation is recognized to be awful often, to#o. So some intelligent exercise of discretion has to be allowed. So "Some" is the only possible answer to the literal question posed. --do ncr am 14:58, 31 July 2015 (UTC)
Yes, "some" is the common sense answer. and "no good way" is also true. That's why there is a second part of my question. How to handle the objection that the translation is in fact a grave distortion of the origin? -M.Altenmann >t 15:22, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

You try to build a consensus with your fellow editors on how to translate the text best. Which is that Arnoutf suggested above, and does not call for battling about missing references. ;-) Diego (talk) 16:03, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

That's what I am doing right now, or not? To build a consensus one must set ground rules, find the middle ground, smoke the peace pipe, etc etc, and hopefully I see there is a chance to see the light from both ends of the tunnel. -M.Altenmann >t 03:38, 1 August 2015 (UTC)
P.S. Why are you stuck up with "missing references"? What's wrong with asking for a reliable source? If there is a published translation, then clearly it will be superior. Please take a look how it was done, e.g., in The_Internationale#English lyrics. -M.Altenmann >t 04:00, 1 August 2015 (UTC)

You are not building a consensus. You are acting in a disruptive, belligerent manner showing no respect to the opinions of other editors. You have so far failed to add anything other than rote quotes from so-called rules that you interpret to suit your hostile attitude. Please desist from removing the article translations, as you are acting against the opinion of several editors. --Harald Forkbeard (talk) 04:38, 1 August 2015 (UTC)

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