translation, meaning, language, laughter (silent)

[vidya]

Mr. Aditya Dev Sood wrote:

> The grammar may be wrong*The grammar may be wrong*The grammar may be wrong
> but that has less to do with the distinction between a 'good' (=literal?)

and 

> How to communicate that arguing about a translation is akin to arguing
> about a line in a novel? -- you may not like it, but that doesn't make it
> wrong. One's only effective response is to write another reflection of

As far as one can remember, Prof. Witzel's criticism was that O'F's
translation was idiosyncratic and unreliable, not that it was wrong. 

And I'm sure that all the comments about translation being fracture and
reconstitution are perfectly well-known to every serious academic. The
point is that the reconstitution should not be colored by preconceived
ideas of what constitutes the original text. 

Regards,

S. Vidyasankar