{"id":503,"date":"2010-11-18T15:01:09","date_gmt":"2010-11-18T15:01:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/?p=503"},"modified":"2018-05-21T19:22:48","modified_gmt":"2018-05-21T19:22:48","slug":"into-the-concept-of-west-siar-thiar-agus-aniar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/into-the-concept-of-west-siar-thiar-agus-aniar\/","title":{"rendered":"Into the (Concept of) “West”: Siar, Thiar, agus Aniar"},"content":{"rendered":"

(le R\u00f3isl\u00edn) <\/strong><\/p>\n

Let\u2019s temporarily move away from the \u201cafter\u201d and \u201cex-\u201c meanings of \u201ciar\u201d <\/strong>and look at the basic adverbs pertaining to the direction \u201cwest.\u201d\u00a0 Eventually we can expand this to the other three points of the compass and the directions up and down, since they all work in basically the same way.<\/p>\n

The differences hinge on whether motion is present and whether \u201cwest\u201d is the point of origin or the destination.\u00a0 So we have three different (but related) words for \u201cwest\u201d (stationary), \u201cwest(wards)\u201d (motion to the west), and \u201cfrom the west\u201d (motion from the west).\u00a0 \u00a0English, of course, has these concepts as well, with motion indicated with words like \u201cwestward,\u201d \u201cwestering,\u201d and \u201cwesterly.\u201d \u00a0But there\u2019s key difference for learners of Irish, I think.\u00a0 In Irish, the form of the word \u201cwest\u201d itself appears to change more obviously and, if nothing else, one can say that the core of the word \u201cwest\u201d ends up with three different initial letters (an-, s-, and th-), making the three words seem less related.\u00a0 Till you get used to the system.\u00a0 Here are some examples:<\/p>\n

thiar <\/strong>(west, stationary), as in the line from the song \u201cCasadh an tS\u00fag\u00e1in\u201d:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Thiar i nGaillimh d\u2019\u00f3l m\u00e9 leo mo sh\u00e1ith <\/strong>(West in Galway I drank my fill with them).<\/p>\n

Stationary is probably a good position to be in while drinking!<\/p>\n

siar <\/strong>(westwards), as in the line from another song, \u201cTrasna na dTonnta<\/strong>\u201d:<\/p>\n

Trasna na dtonnta, \u2018dul siar, \u2018dul siar<\/strong> (across the waves, going west, going west).<\/p>\n

Note that the word \u201cag<\/strong>,\u201d which would normally come before \u201cdul<\/strong>\u201d is not used here because of the rhythm of the song.<\/p>\n

aniar<\/strong> (from the west, eastwards), often used together with the preposition \u201cas<\/strong>\u201d (out of, remember the \u201chard\u201d s, unlike English; say \u201cahss\u201d):<\/p>\n

T\u00e1 s\u00e9 ag teacht aniar as Connachta <\/strong>(He\u2019s coming from Connacht in the west \/ eastwards from Connacht).<\/p>\n

Now we can ponder the less straightforward, including a possible translation for the title of an Irish movie that rattles around in my mind whenever this topic comes up.\u00a0 You may have just guessed it.\u00a0 Into the West<\/em>, with Gabriel Byrne (1992).\u00a0 The movie juxtaposes traditional Irish traveller life with late 20th<\/sup>-century Dublin and the west of Ireland with the American West, and is well worth seeing on all accounts, not just as a crucible for translating \u201cwest.\u201d \u00a0And, yes, I did sort of borrow that idea for the title of this blog.<\/p>\n

Mulling over a translation of the movie title, Into the West<\/em>, though, it appears a bit tricky.\u00a0 One could do an adequate job with the phrase \u201cIsteach san Iarthar<\/em>\u201d <\/strong>but to me, at least, and apparently to a few online chatters on the topic, it doesn\u2019t have quite the same feel.\u00a0 Grammatically the phrase works and it has even been used in reference to a Taxi Trax trip in Belfast as part of F\u00e9ile an Phobail \u201909<\/strong>.\u00a0 Presumably this is some sort of nod to the movie title, although the actual subject of the tour was B\u00e9al Feirste Thiar<\/strong> (West Belfast).\u00a0 But one could debate, perhaps endlessly, the relative merits of phrases like \u201cAg Dul Siar<\/strong>\u201d (going west) or simply \u201cSiar<\/strong>\u201d (westward) or \u201cSiar Linn<\/strong>\u201d (west with us).\u00a0 The latter might not be very flowing in English translation but the pattern in Irish is quite typical in Irish, as noted in the previous blog.\u00a0 There are also lots of other phrases using \u201clinn<\/strong>\u201d (with us) like this: ar aghaidh linn<\/strong> (on we go, very literally \u201cahead with us\u201d) and the multiple-punning Gael-Linn<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

One could ponder the use of a 1st<\/sup>-person plural imperative, with the \u201c-imis<\/strong>\u201d ending, along the lines of \u201ct\u00e9imis<\/strong>\u201d (let us go) or \u201cgu\u00edmis<\/strong>\u201d (let us pray).\u00a0 First hitch is, though, that \u201csiar<\/strong>\u201d isn\u2019t really a briathar<\/strong> (verb) \u2013 it\u2019s a dobhriathar<\/strong> (adverb).\u00a0 As an adverb, \u201csiar<\/strong>\u201d and a few other adverbs of direction can take the 2nd<\/sup>-person plural imperative ending (-ig\u00ed<\/strong>) as in \u201camachaig\u00ed<\/strong>\u201d and \u201cisteachaig\u00ed<\/strong>.\u201d\u00a0 But to the best of my knowledge, these adverbs can only<\/em> take the 2nd<\/sup>-person plural ending, not 1st<\/sup>-person plural.\u00a0 Second hitch is that if such a word (siar<\/strong> + –(a)imis<\/strong>) existed, it might be interpreted as \u201clet\u2019s go back\u201d instead of \u201clet\u2019s go west.\u201d\u00a0 Perhaps a perpetual dilemma, given the multiple meanings of \u201csiar<\/strong>,\u201d but in the realm of movie titles, one probably wants the title to evoke as specific an image as possible.<\/p>\n

So far, I haven\u2019t seen any availability of the movie completely translated into Irish, with a title decided upon by the film crew.\u00a0 I\u2019d love to see what the original writers and producers would come up with.\u00a0 Ever since I saw that Synge\u2019s play, \u201cRiders to the Sea\u201d has been evocatively translated as \u201cChun na Farraige S\u00edos<\/strong>\u201d (Down to the Sea), I never expect that translations of titles will remain close to the originals.\u00a0 Actually, I guess I realized that a couple of decades ago, but the Synge example really crystallized the idea for me.\u00a0 To literally put the word \u201criders\u201d in the Irish title seems clunky, to me and apparently to the official translator, no matter what variation might be used (marcaigh, eachaithe<\/strong>, etc.).<\/p>\n

So, as far as I can tell, the translation for the movie title, \u201cInto the West,\u201d is still up for grabs.\u00a0 But it\u2019s a good example of how hard it can be to translate even seemingly simple phrases.\u00a0 Sl\u00e1n go f\u00f3ill – R\u00f3isl\u00edn<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(le R\u00f3isl\u00edn) Let\u2019s temporarily move away from the \u201cafter\u201d and \u201cex-\u201c meanings of \u201ciar\u201d and look at the basic adverbs pertaining to the direction \u201cwest.\u201d\u00a0 Eventually we can expand this to the other three points of the compass and the directions up and down, since they all work in basically the same way. The differences…<\/p>\n

Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":36,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[3898],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-503","post","type-post","status-publish","hentry","category-irish-language"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/503","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/36"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=503"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/503\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10488,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/503\/revisions\/10488"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=503"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=503"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=503"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}