Donna Frost

Chapter 5 156 Excerpts of data and quotations that were used in conference presentations, during the inquiry period, and within this thesis after the inquiry, were sometimes only translated at the time of inclusion in the written work. I discussed any translations I was not sure of, and in any case material which included creative or symbolic speech, with one or other of the inquiry participants or with one or other of my Dutch colleagues in the School of Nursing at my place of work in the Netherlands. In doing so I specifically discussed reaching a balance between literal translation of language and accurate representation of meaning. Many such decisions had to be made in the translation of even quite short passages as illustrated in the two examples below. In the quotation given earlier in this chapter, Floortje talks about her new job within the community nursing team as being a ‘whole different kettle of fish’. That is not a phrase that is used in Dutch. Her actual words were: ‘ Dat is heel andere koek ’. Translated literally Floortje had said, ‘That is a whole different cake’; a phrase which has no particular meaning in English. In this case, literal translation would not have been helpful. My own knowledge of English and Dutch idiom is sufficient for me to know that the phrase ‘a different kettle of fish’ is a close fit for Floortje’s meaning. This was confirmed by a colleague and, in this case, by internet sources which give examples of how other people have translated the same or similar phrases 10 . Other options would have been, for example, ‘that’s a whole different ball game’, ‘that’s something else entirely’, or ‘that’s a different story’. My choice for ‘different kettle of fish’ is both correct in terms of idiom and remains a choice which reflects my interpretation of the ‘feel’ of Floortje’s expression andmeaning at the time. In another example, taken from the same quotation, Floortje talks about people ‘yanking on her jacket’ when they want to have a word with her. The original phrase, ‘ aan mijn jasje trekken ’, is often used in Dutch to indicate someone requesting your attention or help with answering a question, for example. Although that particular expression is not used in English, a direct translation of the Dutch into English conveys the same meaning, and by placing it between quotation marks I could emphasize that it was a figure of speech. So in this example I kept to Floortje’s original words. These kinds of decisions were made in each case of translation. 10 For this example see https://context.reverso.net/vertaling/nederlands-engels/ andere+koek.