It’s another newsletter from “A Way with Words.” Woot! In last weekend’s episode: Is it wrong to type two spaces after a period? We arm-wrestle over that, and talk about the odd language in “True Grit.” Also...
Martha reads a love sonnet by the Chilean poet Pablo Neruda. Here’s the text of the original Spanish, with an English translation by Mark Eisner. And here’s a lovely audio rendering of the poem in Spanish. This is part of a complete...
In a previous episode, we wondered how U-turn might translate in different languages. One listener explains that in Hebrew, drivers make a horseshoe or a hoof-turn. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Hoof-Turns” Quite a...
The Bangladeshi idiom translated as oiling your mustache in anticipation of the jackfruit tree bearing fruit roughly matches English don’t count your chickens before they hatch. The image depends on cultural context: jackfruit is juicy, a mustache...
“You really love peeled potatoes.” That’s a translation of a Venezuelan idiom describing someone who’s lazy. Grant and Martha share other idioms from South America. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of...
A sign-language interpreter found herself translating the word doldrums. She wonders if it has to do the area of the ocean known by that name. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Doldrums” Hello, you have A Way with Words...