Question: is it hard to translate other languages

Maja Popovic answered on 15 Jan 2020:

In a matter of fact, it is.

It is not very hard to understand other languages.
It is much harder to speak other languages, but once you’re used to it it is not so difficult anymore — you can start to think directly in that language.

To translate from one language into another is much harder. Because first, you have to understand precisely what the text in the original language means. Then, you have to find the words and phrases in another language which correspond to that meaning. sometimes it is quite simple, you only have to know all the words. However, often it is not enough, because sometimes the translation has to be very different in order to sound natural in another language.

For example, if I say for something “you can hang it on a cat’s tail”, I’m pretty sure you wouldn’t have a clue what I am talking about. However, precisely these words are used in Serbian, my native language, to say that something is useless. (I think in English is “useful as a chocolate teapot”, or “like a fish needs a bicycle”, which would both sound very strange if translated word by word in Serbian).

Or, in English you say “I thought you knew it”, but in Serbian it would be “I thought you know it”.