Apr 6

Gist isn't translation.

I've been working on Italian and fluency, and wanted to do more reading. Google led me to fabulang and in concept, its exceptional, but in practice I'm deterred.The fourth line; per ogni evenienza has been paraphrased as "just in case" when the translation is "for each/every eventuality/contingency". While I understand that "just in case" in english means something similar to, its not the same as. I'm curious why not just use the actual translation, or change the context of the story to simplify the translation. Like instead of "just in case" you could have said "Sto essere preparato" which has the same end result while also being more exact.

Closed

changed status toClosed·Apr 7, 2026

Apr 7, 2026

Dear Spencer. Languages are complex and messy and there is very rarely exactly one perfect translation. It requires a lot of human judgement to consider what is both a good translation and also a natural thing to say, and which actually captures the intended meaning. I believe that "per ogni evenienza" / "just in case" do work as equivalents in the context of that moment in the story.

Apr 7, 2026

I am aware. The complexity of language is why I am endlessly fascinated, and why I submitted in the first place. I also agree that human judgment is required for a good translation and what captured the intended meaning. I believe that reducing per ogni evenienza to just in case has not succeeded and they are not equivalent. But I'm also not complaining about a free service, so thank you for your effort. You've shown that YOUR language is not up for debate despite the complexity of language as a whole, so best eishes and buona fortuna.