Meanderings: February 19, 2000

Saturday,
February 19, 2000

Well, THAT's somewhat annoying.

I was cleaning my office and I found the German edition of CROSSING THE BORDER on my writing desk. Remembering that I hadn't checked how one of my favorite insults in the book had been translated (quite literally, as it turns out -- "Pig. Whale snot. Bureaucrat!" became "Schweinn. Walrotz. Bürokrat!"), I sat down with both the English and German versions and began flicking back and forth.

At some point, my gaze idly wandered up to the top of the page, where the title of the story was printed. It read, "Hermaphrodite."

I check the German version. Yep, it's "Hermaphrodite" there, too.

Unfortunately, the title of the story is "HerAmaphrodite," as it's a play on Hera's genderflexing activities in the story. I went back and checked my files -- yup, it was misspelled there, too, all the way from the initial request to the contract.

Well, shit. No, it's not a big deal -- the title that was actually printed still makes sense, thank Allah -- but it's not MY name for the story. I was really rather impressed with my play on words there, and it wound up being completely lost in the one country where it might have been appreciated.

Of course, it's too late now to do anything about the English and German editions, but in case there is another foreign edition (which is a possibility, the editor said), I'll have to make sure the story title is changed back to the original, correct one. It also teaches me to read my contracts a little more thoroughly from now on.

Still, arrgh. Annoying stuff.

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