View from the North 40: It's the different between sound and caucaphony

It’s no secret that I love the English language, despite all its frustrating faults. You can really do some magical things with it.

The versatility of English by sound alone is a real asset for the language. Compare the sounds of “The drip pooled in the sink, then trickled into the pipes” to “Water gushed from the faucet, showering the walls and flooding onto the floor.”

Yeah, yeah, it’s not magic, but listen to the words, how sound adds meaning.

In the first sentence those little, tiny I’s actually sound trivial. Drip sounds like what it names, and its synonyms include dribble, trickle, sprinkle, leak, bead, drizzle. Compare that to the round, long “ah,” “oh” and “uh” sounds of the multi-syllable words in the second sentence. And those “sh” words? You can practically hear the water spraying everywhere.

I don’t see a lot of other languages holding up to that sort of aural or musical versatility for story-telling.

Yes, full disclosure, I don’t really speak other languages — with the exception of a pretty decent understanding of Canadian, and I could likely make myself understood speaking the Canadian parent language, British, despite the confusing boots, wellies, chips and such — but I have ears to hear languages.

So if we take the more dramatic “Water gushed from the faucet ...” sentence and run it through Google Translate the results aren’t the same in other languages.

And, yes, I will interrupt the flow of this column for another full disclosure acknowledging that Google Translate is a touch suspect with its accuracy. But I live in a small town in a frontier area of a rural state on the north end of fly-over country, so I don’t have access to real live translators. You work with what I got to get the job done, that’s how you roll.

That said, the sentence translates into Spanish as: “El agua salió a borbotones del grifo, roció las paredes e inundó el suelo.”

It sounds dramatic, yes, because Spanish is a language made for drama, but it sounds more like the telenovela theatrics of explaining to the judge why I murdered my lover in the library with a candelabra.

I blame watching too much “Jane the Virgin” for making all things said in Spanish sound like a scene in a Spanish soap opera.

I know, I know, there are brilliant writers like Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Isabel Allende, who work magic with the language (I’m guessing because I can only read them translated into English). Still, to my ear even when the grandma-chef in De mi Rancho a Tu Cocina — my favorite YouTube cooking channel — is talking about searing meat and preparing chilis, I want to tell her, “Oh, grandma, why didn't you tell me before that the president is my father!”

It’s like with German. That sentence in German is: “Wasser strömte aus dem wasserhahn, übergoss die wände und flutete auf den boden.”

German just sounds like someone is reading to me from a Volkswagen repair manual, and they’re getting perturbed because I can’t remember to turn the wrench righty for tighty and lefty for loosy. Even that nice Google translate woman’s voice pronouncing the sentence sounds like she wants to roll her eyes and grunt impatiently after the period.

Then we have a language like Norwegian: “Vann rant fra kranen, dusjet veggene og flommet ned på gulvet.”

In writing, the word looks like we’re dealing with the impatient German … who can’t spell, but when you listen to it, well, I have a hard time taking anything said in Norwegian seriously. It’s all “herda gerda flird, verplunken whosen jigger,” with lots of upward inflection sounds. These people could not write county songs, and forget about the blues.

“My baby left me, left me in the lurch. My dog done died, on the way to the church” translates to “Babyen min forlot meg, forlot meg i stikken. Hunden min døde, på vei til kirken.” You know what it sounds like? “Herda gerda flird, verplunken whosen jigger.” skip the harmonica accompaniment in a dimly lit bar.

If I sound a little miffed here, it’s because I have a song stuck in my head. A song in Norwegian. Which I do not speak.

The song is “Håper du har plass” by Cezinando, which was recently sung by a contestant on The Voice of Norway. I’m not going to vouch for the exact wording filtered through that sketchy Google Translate but I think it’s safe to say that it’s a love/heartbreak song.

This is confirmed by the fact that one of the normally stoic judges is seen in the YouTube video getting watery-eyed and doing all the fidgety stuff humans do when we’re choking down an ugly cry. He’s really hearing that song in his soul.

You know what I hear? I mean, it’s a real earworm level, can’t get it out of my mind, woke up hearing it in the middle of the night so had to get up and write it down, problem.

I hear: “Herda gerda flird, herda gerda flirdah, verpluus, da glass, verplunken whosen jigger.”

That’s catchy at 3 a.m.

——

Does Ivermectin work on earworms? Asking for a friend at http://www.facebook.com/viewfromthenorth40 .