translation

John Cayley, with Giles Perring

translation investigates iterative, procedural 'movement' from one language to another.

The series of pieces I now call translation developed from the earlier but still quite recent overboard. All these pieces are, in one sense, examples of literal art in digital media that demonstrate an 'ambient' time-based poetics. The earlier brief description of overboard on this site gives some explanation of this ambience, and there is also a more detailed, related exposition of overboard's inner workings in dichtung-digital.

While running the same algorithms as 'overboard', passages within translation may be in one of three states - surfacing, floating or sinking. But they may also be in one of three language states, German, French or English. If a passage drowns in one language it may surface in another.

The main source text for translation is extracted from Walter Benjamin's early essay, 'On Language as Such and on the Language of Man.' (Trans. Edmund Jephcott and Kingsley Shorter. One-Way Street and Other Writings. 1979. London: Verso, 1997. 107-23.) Other texts from Proust may also, less frequently, surface in the original French, and one or other of the standard German and English translations of 'In Search of Lost Time.'

The generative music for the translation pieces was developed in collaboration with Giles Perring who did the composition, sound design, performance and recording of the sung alphabets.

requirements

translation requires the most recent version of QuickTime to be installed on your system (7.0.3). It may work with earlier versions of QuickTime, but given the possible permutations, this is impossible (for me) to confirm.

IMPORTANT. To hear the generative musical soundscape designed for the pieces by Giles Perring, you must first download and install a total of four 'sound font' files, following these instructions. If you have already installed the sound fonts for 'overboard' you only need the two new 'translation' sound fonts, 'dfe1.sf2' and 'grins.sf2'.

- download the archive(s) containing the files from the Shadoof .mac download site: http://homepage.mac.com/shadoof/FileSharing9.html.

- if your browser doesn't do this for you, unpack the archive.

- depending on your system, move the files 'overboard bell.sf2', 'overboard rolls.sf2', 'dfe1.sf2', and 'grins.sf2' into the following folders:
   Mac OS 9: System/Extensions/QuickTime Extensions
   Max OS X: Library/Audio/Sounds/Banks
   Windows XP: Program Files/QuickTime/QTComponents

NB: 'BordoFixed' truetype font retired. I've abandoned this font and reverted to Monaco (likely to be preinstalled on most Mac systems) for Mac playback, because access to this font seems to be intermittently broken by OS 10.6 Snow Leopard, which also threatens to make certain other features of QuickTime projects difficult of access (Midi, in particular). See this Apple Support article.

reading translation

There are, currently, four published versions of translation, the most developed version of which is translation5. The links below will open the work in QuickTime Player which is installed with QuickTime. You may also select 'Open Movie in New Player...' from the QTPlayer File menu and type in the relevant URL.

t r a n s l a t i o n 5 - In this version the audio correlative is performed in three voices from a set of three sung alphabets (German, French and English) using a similar harmonic scheme to that composed for translation3. Click the icon to launch, otherwise point QuickTime Player to: http://homepage.mac.com/shadoof/translation/translation5.mov.

t r a n s l a t i o n 3 - This was the first published version of translation in which the audio correlative of the ambient text-generation is rendered by two bell instruments scanning the morphing texts. Click the icon to launch, otherwise point QuickTime Player to: http://homepage.mac.com/shadoof/translation/translation3.mov.

t r a n s l a t i o n 6 - This version was produced in relation to a presentation at the conference 'Writing Europe,' Kyiv, Ukraine, June 28-July 2, 2005. In a workshop after the conference I introduced some of my working methods and principles to a small group of Ukrainian students and asked them to help me translate the Benjamin passages and incorporate a romanized Ukrainian text into translation. This is the result. As in the case of translation 5, German and English texts are provided with an audio correlative in two sung alphabets. Because I do not have recordings for the Ukrainian alphabet, the audio correlative for Ukrainian reverts to the bell-like sounds of translation 3. Click the icon to launch, otherwise point QuickTime Player to: http://homepage.mac.com/shadoof/translation/translation6.mov.
Please note that there are technical problems with incorporating and displaying the Ukrainian version of the cyrillic alphabet because there are anomalies in the way that programmed QuickTime handles Unicode. Interested parties are encouraged to lobby Apple so that Unicode is handled better in the future. translations are not all equal in the worlds of networked and programmable media.
Thanks to the British Council, Kyiv, for their support in attending the conference and arranging the workshops. Thanks to the students for their translation and their enthusiastic participation and response to the workshop.

t a x i l a t i o n 3 - An 'occasional piece,' this version was done for Mark Jeffrey of the Goat Island performance group and his collaborator, Judd Morrissey, a colleague and fellow writer in programmable media. While it retains the fragments of Proust in three languages, this version substitutes English texts by Jeffrey and Morrissey selected from the materials accompanying Goat Island's most recent performance work, 'When will the September roses bloom? Last night was only a comedy'. Benjamin's German is retained with a bell sound audio correlative. Audio for the English is based on a 'grinning dog' sound inspired by the Goat Island work. Click the icon to launch, otherwise point QuickTime Player to: http://homepage.mac.com/shadoof/translation/taxilation3.mov. The title of the piece refers to its being made for and first performed on the occasion of the closing celebration for Jeffrey and Morrissey's installation, '38 Stanesfield Road: The Mooring of Richard Anynumber,' for the Taxi Gallery in Cambridge, 12 March, 2005.

The translation pieces are intended, primarily, simply to run in ever-shifting patterns of language. However, you can hold down key combinations to produce a limited range of effects, as follows (you will need to hold the keys down for 3-5 seconds before the effect begins):

shift-s: restart the quasi-randomization of verse states (resume normal ambience of the piece)

shift-d: surface in German

shift-f: surface in French, or, in translation6 shift-u: surface in romanized Ukrainian

shift-e: surface in English

shift-q: fade to black

	t r a n s l a t i o n 5 - In this version the audio correlative is performed in three voices from a set of three sung alphabets (German, French and English) using a similar harmonic scheme to that composed for translation3. Click the icon to launch, otherwise point QuickTime Player to: http://homepage.mac.com/shadoof/translation/translation5.mov.
	t r a n s l a t i o n 3 - This was the first published version of translation in which the audio correlative of the ambient text-generation is rendered by two bell instruments scanning the morphing texts. Click the icon to launch, otherwise point QuickTime Player to: http://homepage.mac.com/shadoof/translation/translation3.mov.
	t r a n s l a t i o n 6 - This version was produced in relation to a presentation at the conference 'Writing Europe,' Kyiv, Ukraine, June 28-July 2, 2005. In a workshop after the conference I introduced some of my working methods and principles to a small group of Ukrainian students and asked them to help me translate the Benjamin passages and incorporate a romanized Ukrainian text into translation. This is the result. As in the case of translation 5, German and English texts are provided with an audio correlative in two sung alphabets. Because I do not have recordings for the Ukrainian alphabet, the audio correlative for Ukrainian reverts to the bell-like sounds of translation 3. Click the icon to launch, otherwise point QuickTime Player to: http://homepage.mac.com/shadoof/translation/translation6.mov. Please note that there are technical problems with incorporating and displaying the Ukrainian version of the cyrillic alphabet because there are anomalies in the way that programmed QuickTime handles Unicode. Interested parties are encouraged to lobby Apple so that Unicode is handled better in the future. translations are not all equal in the worlds of networked and programmable media. Thanks to the British Council, Kyiv, for their support in attending the conference and arranging the workshops. Thanks to the students for their translation and their enthusiastic participation and response to the workshop.
	t a x i l a t i o n 3 - An 'occasional piece,' this version was done for Mark Jeffrey of the Goat Island performance group and his collaborator, Judd Morrissey, a colleague and fellow writer in programmable media. While it retains the fragments of Proust in three languages, this version substitutes English texts by Jeffrey and Morrissey selected from the materials accompanying Goat Island's most recent performance work, 'When will the September roses bloom? Last night was only a comedy'. Benjamin's German is retained with a bell sound audio correlative. Audio for the English is based on a 'grinning dog' sound inspired by the Goat Island work. Click the icon to launch, otherwise point QuickTime Player to: http://homepage.mac.com/shadoof/translation/taxilation3.mov. The title of the piece refers to its being made for and first performed on the occasion of the closing celebration for Jeffrey and Morrissey's installation, '38 Stanesfield Road: The Mooring of Richard Anynumber,' for the Taxi Gallery in Cambridge, 12 March, 2005.