RYI STUDENT BLOG

I learned the Tibetan alphabet years ago but I had never learned the language itself until I came to RYI. What did actually inspire me to follow my dream to be a translator? Seeing many translators translating Rinpoche’s teaching directly from Tibetan to English and other languages. Won’t it be incredible to be able to understand Rinpoche’s precious words without even waiting for translations? Surely it will. Won’t it be even more beneficial if you were able to be a medium through which Rinpoche connects to his upcoming and current students? Definitely it will be! Wow, I dream of this every day. Dream to be a translator so that words of Dharma can be listened to in native language and understood exactly the way Rinpoche wants us to. When I first heard about RYI - co-incidentally via Kyabje Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche- I was so glad to get a chance to study in-depth about Buddhism. On top of that, learning Himalayan language especially Tibetan and Sanskrit grabbed my attention....

There is the generalized belief that a translated text will never be able to capture the greatness of its original—in other words, it will always imply per se a loss of sumptuosity.  The semiotician and novelist Umberto Eco [1] (1932) epitomizes this pessimistic understanding when he states that “translation is the art of failure” [2] . Taking into the account this gloomy premise, I wanted to explore some of the features associated with the process of translation which might have captivated people since the very invention of written literature [3] .  To start with, we should examine the assumption of the implicit loss of richness in translation in order to ascertain either it is appropriate or not. Linguists have articulated different paradigms of translation. Nevertheless, one of the most fascinating is the theory that Walter Benjamin [4] (1892-1940) formulates in his The Task of the Translator [5] . Simplistically speaking, Benjamin undermines the previous ...