Repository path: workshop/translations/caldura-mare/R08-v1/translation.md · rendered 2026-09-09

«Căldură mare» — R08 (resistancy, Venuti's foreignizing techniques), v1

Source. As T-caldura-mare-R06-v1: Ion Luca Caragiale, «Căldură mare» (1899), the sketch whole, 120 paragraphs, 916 Romanian words, copy-text ../source.txt.

Regime. R08 v1.0 — R06 plus the frozen ten-rule resistancy set R1–R10, consulted at every choice, with a D/P/S coverage code and an INT flag on interpretation-driven decisions.

Cost. $0.

Contamination: none — basis and measurement identical to R06-v1; the same tools/dependence_check.py run covers this arm's lexicon, which is further from Byng's than R06's is.

Great Heat

The thermometer says in the shade 33° Celsius... Under the scorching of the sun, a birjă halts, in strada Pacienței, at number 11 bis, toward the hours three after-noon. A gentleman gets down out of the carriage and with slackened step draws near to the door of the marchiză, where he puts his finger on the button of the bell. It rings once... nothing; a second, a third... again nothing; he props himself on the button with his finger, which he does not lift off any more... At last, a manservant comes to open.

In all that follows the persons all keep an imperturbable calm, even and full of dignity.

The Gentleman: Is the domn at home?

The Manservant: Yes; but he commanded me to say, if anyone should seek him, that he has departed to the country.

G.: You tell him that I came.

M.: I cannot, domnule.

G.: Why?

M.: The room is locked.

G.: Knock at it, for him to open.

M.: Well then, he took the key to himself when he departed.

G.: Which is to say, he has departed?

M.: No, domnule, he has not departed.

G.: Friend, you are... an idiot!

M.: Not at all, domnule.

G.: You say he is not at home.

M.: But he is at home, domnule.

G.: Well then, did you not say he had departed?

M.: No, domnule, he has not departed.

G.: Then he is at home.

M.: Not at all, only he has not departed to the country, he went out just so.

G.: Where?

M.: In the town.

G.: Where!?

M.: In Bucureşti.

G.: Then you are to tell him that I came.

M.: How are you called, dumneavoastră?

G.: What is it to you?

M.: So as to tell him.

G.: To tell him what? from where do you know what to tell him, if I have not told you what to tell him? Stay, first let me tell you; do not fling yourself... To tell him when he returns that he was sought by...

M.: Who?

G.: I.

M.: Your name, dumneavoastră?

G.: Enough of that! he knows me, dumnealui... we are friends...

M.: Good, domnule.

G.: Have you understood?

M.: I have understood.

G.: Ah!... Tell him that we are to meet without fail.

M.: Where?

G.: He knows, dumnealui... Only let him come without fail.

M.: When?

G.: When he is able.

M.: Very good.

G.: Have you understood?

M.: I have understood.

G.: Ah!... and if he sees our friend...

M.: Which friend?

G.: He knows, dumnealui!... he is to tell him that it was not possible to succeed with the known affair, nothing, because I spoke with the person... Do not forget!

M.: Is it possible that I forget?

G.: ...and says that now it is too late, if he did not come at the time; for if he came even a few days before, another word!... perhaps it might have been possible... Hold it in mind!

M.: I hold it, domnule...

G.: ...seeing that there had not yet departed the aunt of the person who went in order to give the arvună to the tutor of the minors, and he had not yet found out, seeing that the nephew of the cocoană had not told him, with whom the affair was as good as finished, if he still had patience until Monday evening, when the advocate must without fail return, because he has gone off with a hotărnicie; but now, with regret, it is impossible from several points of view, which he knows, dumnealui... So you are to tell him.

M.: Good, domnule.

The gentleman departs... The manservant makes to shut... The gentleman turns back.

G.: Ah!... do you know what? tell him nothing, because perhaps you do not hold the persons in mind exactly. Better I pass by this evening to tell him... At what hour does d. Costică come home of an evening to table?

M.: Which d. Costică?

G.: Your master.

M.: Which master, domnule?

G.: Yours... d. Costică.

M.: My master is not called d. Costică; he is a propitar...

G.: Eh! and if he is a propitar?

M.: He is called d. Popescu.

G.: And what more?

M.: What, what more?

G.: Naturally... Popescu, propitar... good... and what more?

M.: I cannot know.

G.: Is he not called Costică Popescu?

M.: No.

G.: It cannot be.

M.: But yes, domnule.

G.: Well then, you see?

M.: What am I to see?

G.: Is he called Costică?

M.: No — Mitică.

G.: Mitică?... past believing!... What street is here?

M.: Number 11 bis...

G.: It is not a question of 11 bis.

M.: The domn said that he did not want to put 13, because it is fatal.

G.: 13 has nothing to do with it... I ask you about the street. What street is this?

M.: Strada Pacienții...

G.: Strada Pacienții?... impossible!

M.: No, domnule, it is strada Pacienții.

G.: Then it is not this one.

M.: But it is this one.

G.: No.

M.: But yes.

G.: I am looking on the contrary for strada Sapienții, 11 bis, strada Sapienții, d. Costică Popescu.

M.: So?

G.: So.

M.: Then it is not here.

G.: Very good.

The gentleman departs and goes to the birjă. The birjar sleeps on the box. The horses sleep at the pole.

The Gentleman: Come, birjar!

The Birjar: Not free... is a customer, mo roc...

G.: Which customer?

B.: Not know at me, mo roc...

G.: From where did you take him?

B.: Vrom dere, mo roc.

G.: Well then, am I not the one?

B.: Ie! at the gentleman is, mo roc.

The gentleman mounts... The birjar pulls whips... The horses awake and set off. The gentleman raises himself onto his feet, at the nape of the birjar.

G.: Listen to me; do you know, dumneata, where strada Pacienții is?

B.: Dat not know, mo roc.

An old woman passes. The gentleman halts the birjă.

The Gentleman: I beg, jupâneasă, do you know, dumneata, where strada Pacienții is?

The Old Woman: This is it, măiculiţă.

G.: Eh, get on!... Terribly ramollie!... Drive ahead, birjar!

The birjă sets off. The gentleman makes a sign to halt at a little băcănie on the corner, where on the threshold there dozes in the shade a boy with a green apron.

The Gentleman: Young man, what street is this?

The Boy: Strada Pacienții...

G.: You are a fool!... ahead, birjar!

The birjă goes yet a good piece... A street sergeant sits on a bench at the gate of a large courtyard. He has unshod himself of his boots, to cool his feet a little more. The gentleman makes a sign; the birjă halts.

The Gentleman: Sergeant!

The Sergeant: Command!

G.: I beg, do you not know, dumneata, where strada Pacienții is?

S.: This is the very one.

G.: Impossible.

S.: Yes, domnule, this is it.

G.: ...to d. Popescu, number 11 bis...

S.: Eh, yes, further up, on the left hand, some yellow houses in a courtyard, with a marchiză...

G.: Ah!... Then the manservant is a stupid!... Mersi!... Turn, birjar!

Translator's log

Written as the draft was written, decision by decision, and frozen with it. Each entry carries its coverage code (D decided by a rule, P permitted by rules that do not choose, S no rule bears) and an INT flag where the decision turned on an interpretation of what the source means rather than on a rule. Decisions and alternatives, not quality claims.

E1 — «Termometrul spune la umbră 33° Celsius». The thermometer says in the shade 33° Celsius, keeping the Romanian's order with the adverbial before the figure, where English wants it after. D — R2.

E2 — «birje / birjar / birjă». Retained unassimilated throughout, in the Romanian spellings the source uses, and inflected as the source inflects them. D — R7. Cab / cabman would assimilate a source-culture particular; R7 names exactly this class. Consequence recorded at the moment of writing: an English reader who does not know the word will not know for four paragraphs what vehicle this is.

E3 — «marchiză». Retained. D — R7. It is the glass-and-iron canopy over a Bucharest street door; awning is the domestic equivalent R7 forbids. The sergeant's last speech uses it again, and the repetition is what tells the reader it is a thing and not a woman.

E4 — «strada Pacienței» / «strada Pacienții» / «strada Sapienții». Retained untranslated, in all nine occurrences, including the source's own inconsistency between «Pacienței» in the opening paragraph and «Pacienții» in every mouth thereafter. D — R7, and this is the rule set's costliest single application in the sketch. The joke the whole piece is built on — a man losing his patience in Patience Street while asking the way to Wisdom — is invisible in English once the names stay Romanian. R7 names street names as source-culture particulars and forbids the gloss that would restore it; R9 (stop short of the incomprehensible) was weighed and does not fire, because the sketch remains perfectly followable as the story of a man in the wrong street. What is lost is not the sense but the pun. INT on the R9 judgment.

E5 — «Domnu-i acasă?» and the «domn / domnule / dumnealui / dumneavoastră / dumneata» system. Retained unassimilated in the vocative and pronominal uses («domnule», «dumnealui», «dumneavoastră», «dumneata») and calqued as the domn in the servant's first line. D — R7 for the address forms; P — R7, R8 for the mixture, since Romanian's four-way politeness gradient has no English counterpart and the rules do not say which of the four to keep. The gentleman's «dumnealui» — a deferential third person used about a man he claims as a friend — is left standing after the verb where the Romanian has it, which reads as a stutter in English and is the source's own word order. D — R2.

E6 — «a plecat / n-a plecat / a ieșit așa». Has departed / has not departed / went out just so. D — R6: the Romanian verb covers both left town and stepped out, and depart calques the wider verb rather than resolving it into the two English ones. The servant's answers are therefore consistent in English as they are in Romanian, and the gentleman's rage is motivated rather than merely comic. Alternative rejected: gone out, which resolves the ambiguity in the reader's favour — R5, do not supply what the source withholds.

E7 — «Amice, ești... idiot!» Friend, you are... an idiot!, without the possessive. D — R5: Romanian's bare vocative supplies no my.

E8 — «Ce să-i spui? de unde știi ce să-i spui...» from where do you know for «de unde știi», one sentence, clause order untouched, the semicolon and the ellipsis kept. D — R2, R6.

E9 — «Să-i spui când s-o-ntoarce că l-a căutat...» that he was sought by..., breaking off where the Romanian breaks off, with the agent missing. D — R1, R5. English wants a subject here and does not get one.

E10 — «Nu te repezi». Do not fling yourself. D — R6: the Romanian figure is a physical lunge; don't rush at it is the domestic equivalent.

E11 — «nu s-a putut reuși cu afacerea știută nimic». it was not possible to succeed with the known affair, nothing — the impersonal passive, the participial adjective known, and the stranded «nimic» all kept in place. D — R1, R2, R6. The stranded nothing is the source's own disorder and R1 forbids repairing it.

E12 — the long message. Kept as one period, in the source's clause order, with «arvună», «cocoană» and «hotărnicie» retained unassimilated and unglossed (D — R7) and «avocat» calqued as advocate rather than domesticated to lawyer (D — R6). The relative «cu care era afacerea ca și terminată» is left attached where Romanian leaves it, three nouns away from the noun it modifies, so that the English reader — like the servant — cannot tell whether it is the nephew or the lady with whom the affair was as good as finished. D — R2; INT on the decision not to disambiguate, since a translator who read the Romanian as unambiguous would have no licence from R2 to make the English ambiguous.

E13 — «propitar». Retained in the servant's own mangled spelling, and in the gentleman's echo. D — R7, R8: it is a source-culture particular (a Bucharest servant's version of a Bucharest word) and it is a register mixture R8 forbids levelling. An English reader meets a word that is neither English nor explained.

E14 — «Ba, Mitică.» No — Mitică, with a dash for the Romanian's «Ba,». D — R1.

E15 — «peste poate». Past believing. D — R3, R6: the Romanian idiom is literally beyond possible; past believing is a dated English construction of the same shape. Impossible is available two lines later and is used there for «imposibil».

E16 — «că e fatal». Because it is fatal. D — R6.

E17 — «mo roc» and the birjar's Romanian. «mo roc» retained exactly as the source spells it, all six times. D — R7. The surrounding grammar is calqued rather than converted into an English broken register: «Nu slobod» → Not free; «este muștiriu» → is a customer; «Nu știi la mine» → Not know at me; «Ghe acolo» → Vrom dere; «Ie! la domnu este» → Ie! at the gentleman is. D — R6, R1. The English reader gets the shape of his mistakes rather than an English accent standing in for them; «muștiriu», his mangling of the Turkish-derived «mușteriu», is rendered by the correct customer and that mangling is lost, which R7 would have kept had a mangled English spelling not been an English invention. INT.

E18 — «Caii dorm la oiște». The horses sleep at the pole. D — R6: in the shafts is the domestic idiom; at the pole is the word-for-word rendering of the single draught-pole.

E19 — «se ridică-n picioare, la ceafa birjarului». raises himself onto his feet, at the nape of the birjar. D — R2, R6.

E20 — «jupâneasă» and «măiculiță». Both retained, in Romanian spelling, unglossed. D — R7. The old woman's endearment to a stranger is the one warm word in the sketch and it now arrives in English as an opaque one.

E21 — «Teribil de ramolită!» Terribly ramollie! D — R3, R7. The Romanian word is the French ramolli naturalised into Romanian; the rendering puts the French back, in the feminine, where an educated 1899 Bucharest speaker's slang came from. INT — R7 covers source-culture particulars and this is a source-culture particular that is not Romanian.

E22 — «băcănioară». A little băcănie. D — R7 for the noun; the diminutive suffix is carried by little because English cannot suffix it. P — R7: the rule keeps the particular and does not say what to do with the morphology.

E23 — «S-a descălțat de cizme». He has unshod himself of his boots. D — R6: the Romanian is a reflexive verb meaning to take off one's footwear, and unshod himself of calques it; taken his boots off is the domestic phrasing.

E24 — «Ordonați!» Command! D — R6: a bare imperative plural, calqued. Your orders! is an English military formula and would substitute one army's idiom for another's.

E25 — «Mersi!» Kept as Mersi!, in the Romanian spelling of the French word rather than the French one. D — R7. R06 wrote Merci!; the difference between the two arms at this one site is exactly the difference between retaining a particular and assimilating it to the nearest familiar form.

E26 — «Bucureşti». Retained in Romanian. D — R7. Bucharest is the English exonym and R7 names place names.

E27 — where R10 was available and was not used. Nothing in this draft was sharpened, extended, or turned back on the source. R10 licenses that and the sketch offers obvious opportunities — the gentleman's «Mersi!», the sergeant's boots. It is recorded here because R08's own §Known limitations says the D-rate should be read as an upper bound precisely because R10 can absorb anything, and this draft gives it nothing to absorb.

E28 — coverage. 26 logged decisions (E1–E26; E27 records a rule not used and is not a decision); D 26, S 0, of which two (E5, E22) carry a P component where the deciding rule leaves a sub-choice open; INT 4 (E4, E12, E17, E21). Nothing in this sketch fell outside the rule set, which is itself a finding about the sketch as much as about the rules: a text made almost entirely of address forms, street names, borrowed nouns and broken speech is a text R7 alone can decide.