হিমাদ্রি চ্যাটার্জী Himadri Chatterjee

Retired operational research analyst. Fan of Shakespeare, Verdi, Sherlock Holmes stories. Champions Jamesian prose in a world of soundbites.

[হিমাদ্রি চ্যাটার্জী Himadri Chatterjee @HimChatt]

This book is on a subject very close to my heart, and I can only hope my love of these plays come through. As well as my thoughts on them, of course.
You may order it from https://t.co/kUyM7ii0v2 , or from https://t.co/BuJhzZRY1E .

[হিমাদ্রি চ্যাটার্জী Himadri Chatterjee @HimChatt]

@MartyRossWriter Fisher hit the nail on the gead when he said he didn’t makr horror films as such - he made fairy tales for grown ups.

[হিমাদ্রি চ্যাটার্জী Himadri Chatterjee @HimChatt]

Late night Friday. Time for a whisky, and a classic Hammer horror.
This one isn't perhaps quite top drawer Hammer, but it dates from the vintage years, is directed by the great Terence Fisher, and it's been years since I last saw it.

[হিমাদ্রি চ্যাটার্জী Himadri Chatterjee @HimChatt]

@raphaeldcey I enjoyed it thoroughly last night.

[হিমাদ্রি চ্যাটার্জী Himadri Chatterjee @HimChatt]

@ncolloff Is this the exhibition in Zurich?

[হিমাদ্রি চ্যাটার্জী Himadri Chatterjee @HimChatt]

@Surfphilosopher My doctor wouldn't approve...😀

[হিমাদ্রি চ্যাটার্জী Himadri Chatterjee @HimChatt]

Spain vs Belgium now, and, foolishly, I haven't stocked up either on Rioja nor on Belgian beer.

[হিমাদ্রি চ্যাটার্জী Himadri Chatterjee @HimChatt]

@grailcountry @nguyenhdi @kalezelden Sometimes "I'm sorry, I didn't express myself well" is a better, more dignified response than "You missed my point".
But I'm frankly bored with this exchange now: it's becoming extremely silly. If you really think Shakespeare's language wasn't refined, fair enough.

[হিমাদ্রি চ্যাটার্জী Himadri Chatterjee @HimChatt]

@grailcountry @nguyenhdi @kalezelden To say Shakespeare’s language is “not refined” seems to me a very odd thing to say in any context, but I do take your point now that you have clarified what you had intended.

[হিমাদ্রি চ্যাটার্জী Himadri Chatterjee @HimChatt]

@grailcountry @nguyenhdi @kalezelden Thank you for clarifying that: that had not been clear in your earlier tweets.
Shakespeare does, I think we agree, write in many different registers; and so much of it is indeed, by my understanding, “refined”, it seem pointless and frankly perverse to deny him that quality.

[হিমাদ্রি চ্যাটার্জী Himadri Chatterjee @HimChatt]

@grailcountry @nguyenhdi @kalezelden You had said, quite clearly, that “his language is not refined” (see quoted tweet). Not “it’s not always refined” - no-one would have any quarrel with that - but it’s “not refined”.

If you’re now modifying what you’d said, I think we can all accept that.

[Sir Parsifal @grailcountry]

@nguyenhdi @kalezelden It's structurally verse, but his language was not refined, it was original and innovative, but not refined, you are simply wrong about the facts here.

[হিমাদ্রি চ্যাটার্জী Himadri Chatterjee @HimChatt]

@grailcountry @nguyenhdi @kalezelden Shakespeare’s language is varied - he was, after all, a dramatist, speaking in different voices - but it’s often very refined indeed, given, at least, my understanding of refinement. So I can make sense of your argument, could I ask you what you mean by “refined” in this context?

[হিমাদ্রি চ্যাটার্জী Himadri Chatterjee @HimChatt]

@dailowe Whereas I refused to party because I was a miserable old sod.

[হিমাদ্রি চ্যাটার্জী Himadri Chatterjee @HimChatt]

One has to admire this degree of pedantry!

[Dexerto @Dexerto]

A Norway fan has gone viral for not taking part in their Row celebration after matches and won't do it if they win the World Cup

"It’s factually wrong; they didn’t row, they sailed over the Atlantic”

[হিমাদ্রি চ্যাটার্জী Himadri Chatterjee @HimChatt]

@PuzzlerSharpe @nguyenhdi I can understand his choice, but if I were translator of a past text that depicts a world far removed from the modern, I think I’d try to avoid terms that suggest modernity, as too close a proximity to the modern world can be jarring.
2/2

[হিমাদ্রি চ্যাটার্জী Himadri Chatterjee @HimChatt]

@PuzzlerSharpe @nguyenhdi Of course, translators are faced with valid choices. In Rutherford’s translation of Don Quixote, say, he has Quixote dying of “depression”, which, though accurate in meaning, is modern.
1/2

[হিমাদ্রি চ্যাটার্জী Himadri Chatterjee @HimChatt]

I’m seeing various tweets claiming this (in quoted tweet) is not a penalty.
Neither is this a pipe.

[𝐕𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐨 @Varticoo]

Mbappe might just unlocked a new diving technique.

[হিমাদ্রি চ্যাটার্জী Himadri Chatterjee @HimChatt]

@PuzzlerSharpe @nguyenhdi That the past world had values so alien to our own presents huge challenges for both translator & reader, but no-one said grappling with classics is easy. Of course it’s difficult. If a translation that doesn’t confront me with these difficulties, I’d feel I’ve been fobbed off.

[হিমাদ্রি চ্যাটার্জী Himadri Chatterjee @HimChatt]

@PuzzlerSharpe @nguyenhdi A good translation of a work from the past should invite readers into that past world, and help them understand the values that were then prevalent. It should not pretend that that past world was more or less like our own.
I make this merely as a general observation.

[হিমাদ্রি চ্যাটার্জী Himadri Chatterjee @HimChatt]

@d4doome I can’t stand films with messages myself, but the kind of film I’m thinking of (The Last Detail, Cabaret, Chinatown, The Godfather, The Outlaw Josey Wales, Cross of Iron, etc) while addressing serious themes, don’t strike me as message movies. I like the seriousness, I must admit

[হিমাদ্রি চ্যাটার্জী Himadri Chatterjee @HimChatt]

@d4doome Yes, Dracula has often been seen as such - especially in John Badham’s 1979 film with Frank Langella. I prefer Dracula as the epitome of sheer evil, myself!