Posted by languagehat
https://languagehat.com/entelechy-in-the-desert/
https://languagehat.com/?p=18967
I just watched Buñuel’s Simon of the Desert again; every time I see it I find new things in it, and this time I scooped up plenty of Hattic material. As it happens, the movie itself is available on YouTube (for the moment) and the published screenplay is at Internet Archive; in what follows I will provide [minute:second] timings and follow each line in Spanish with the translations in the subtitles and then the screenplay.
The first bit that made me think “I’ll have to post this” comes shortly after Simon heals the man whose hands had been severed (and who immediately uses them to slap his daughter for asking questions):
Con estas entelequias nos hemos entretenido demasiado. [8:17]
We’ve spent long enough on these spiritual shenanigans.
We have spent too much time on these revelations.
The Spanish usage made me quiver with delight, because entelequia is one of those words whose literal definition — in this case, entelechy — is so recherché it’s known to almost nobody, but which in Spanish has developed the colloquial sense (per my trusty Harper Collins dictionary) ‘pipe dream, pie in the sky’; both the movie translations are inadequate, but at least “spiritual shenanigans” shows some awareness of the meaning, while “revelations” sounds like sheer guesswork.
Much later, Simon is delivering a sermon from his pillar, and he says:
No cedamos en la ascesis, tendámosla como un arco. [20:35]
Let us not yield in our asceticism. Let us spread it like an arc.
We shall not rest from our sacrifice. We shall span it like a bridge
Both translations have completely misunderstood the word arco; “tendámosla como un arco” means ‘let us draw it like a bow.’
Immediately after that, Brother Trifón, a monk possessed by the devil, starts spewing blasphemies; at one point he curses Christ “y su madre putativa.” [24:21] I don’t think I’d realized before that this is a pun on “y su puta madre” ‘and his whore of a mother’; the subtitler renders it literally as “and his so-called mother,” while the screenplay ignores the pun and has “and his whore of a mother.” Trifón then goes into a hilarious rant in which his blasphemies get more and more recondite, and the monks have increasing trouble figuring out how to respond:
[Trifón] ¡Abajo el sagrado hipóstasis!
Down with the sacred hypostasis!
Down with the holy hypostasis!
[Monks] ¡Viva el sagrado hipóstasis!
Long live the sacred hypostasis!
Up with the holy hypostasis!
¡Muera anástasis!
Death to the anastasis!
Down with the anastasis!
¡Viva!
Long may it live!
Up with…?
¡Viva el apocatástasis!
Long live the apocatastasis!
Up with the apocatastasis!
¡Muera!
Down with it!
Down with …!
(I should point out that anástasis is not a Spanish word — at least it’s in no dictionary I have access too, even the Real Academia’s [“La palabra «anástasis» no está en el Diccionario”] — and hypostasis is one of those recherché words that’s developed a colloquial sense, this time in Russian, which I wrote about here.) At this point, one monk turns to the other and mutters “¿Qué es eso del apocatástasis?” [24:32-44]. The subtitle has the straightforward “What on earth is the apocatastasis?” but the screenplay throws up its hands and renders it “This devil knows more theology than we do!” As for the very obscure word apocatastasis, I had occasion to mention it in this post (though for some reason I spelled it apokatastasis).
After Simon has expelled the devil from Trifón, the elder monk says (I am transcribing the Spanish as I hear it):
Luego, en la mándara, terminaré yo de exorcisarla a mi manera. [25:16]
I’ll finish exorcising him at the monastery in my own way.
Then, when we return to the monastery, I will complete the exorcism… in my own way.
I presume “monastery” is correct, since both versions use it, but what on earth is the Spanish word? My “mándara” isn’t a word, but that’s what it sounds like to me after repeated listenings. Any help will be deeply appreciated.
https://languagehat.com/entelechy-in-the-desert/
https://languagehat.com/?p=18967
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