Finnish Christmas carols are often seen as extraordinarily depressing. That isn’t quite fair. In fact, we have a Finn (Jaakko Suomalainen, Jacobus Finno) to thank for some of the best loved carols worldwide. He was a priest and head of the…
Blog Archives
‘Jack Finn’s Carols
Tagged with: Christmas Carols, Finnish, Jacobus Finno, Latin, Piae Cantiones, Swedish, Translation
Posted in Christmas, history, translation
Posted in Christmas, history, translation
Do Geese See God?
Do geese see God? (English) Knit again and you’ll get a beer (Neulo taas niin saat oluen, Finnish) It was raining bread in the garden (Aias sadas saia, Estonian) Maybe tomorrow that lady will give a cake to the hedgehogs…
Tagged with: English, Esperanto, Estonian, European Day of Languages, Finnish, Free Word Centre, German, Latin, Palindromes, Polish
Posted in language, translation, words
Posted in language, translation, words
Rejoice! or Exult?
Catholics should be used to the new English translation of the Latin liturgy after four years. But at times like Easter, which particularly cut through and beyond time, it’s familiar words we want. The premise for the new translation was…
Tagged with: Easter, Exsultet, ICEL, Latin, Rita Ferrone, St Jerome, Translation, Virgil
Posted in faith, translation
Posted in faith, translation
holy languages for holy week
The holy books of Christians and Jews are a complex mixture of languages and manuscripts that gloriously overlap and contradict. There are more and more chances to see this huge diversity coming together. Two exhibitions, similar content, different title: verbum…
Tagged with: Agnes Lewis, Aramaic, Bible, codex sinaiticus, English, German, Greek, Hebrew, Latin, Old English, Russian, Syriac, syriac sinaiticus, Translation, Verbum Domini exhibition
Posted in faith, international, language, translation
Posted in faith, international, language, translation
more gender pronouns: they
Facebook has finally broadened its pronoun options from 2 to 50. This should theoretically stop those odd posts with the “wrong” gender assignment, and make a lot of transgendered and queer people very happy. The only problem is that you have to…
O!
‘Would it be of any use, now,’ thought Alice, `to speak to this mouse? Everything is so out-of-the-way down here that I should think very likely it can talk: at any rate, there’s no harm in trying.’ So she began:…
Tagged with: advent, Alice in Wonderland, Arvo Pärt, Bible, English, German, Language, Latin, Marc-Antoine Charpentier, o antiphons, vocative
Posted in language, translation
Posted in language, translation
twist your tongue around the world
Sometimes your tongue gets in a knot and the words just don’t come out. But if you can untangle it, you will sound fluent as never before. I tell first time visitors to Finland that they can find the lift…
Tagged with: English, Finnish, Hebrew, Language, Latin, Maori, Polish, pronunciation, Tongue-twister, Welsh
Posted in international, language, translation, words
Posted in international, language, translation, words
Terms and conditions
Have you ever noticed that lawyers like to say the same thing twice? A marriage is to have and to hold; the partners who make and enter into it may covenant and agree that their goods and chattels are shared…
mihi placet
mihi placet. That’s how to “like” something in Latin. Facebook will ask you “quid in animo tuo est?” instead of “what’s on your mind?” Hopefully not everyone will respond with MC (short for magno cachinno = LOL). For describing those…
found in translation 