motto translation request

[snorri]

I'd like my go motto translated into three asian languages (Chinese (Mandarin), Korean, Japanese). I'd like these done by go players to get the right sense, but I wouldn't want it to sound idiotic to a non-go player, either.

"Play thick moves and read like the devil." (Or "play thickly and read like the devil" if that works out better.)

I'm willing to pay one or multiple people a reasonable fee. This is short, but it requires specialized vocabulary and some poetic sense and you may have to educate me on the options (for example, I know Japanese has more than one word for "thick" and it could be "devil" is problematic). So I'd be willing to compensate it as a page of text.

PM me if interested although you can volunteer something here if you are generous and it's trivial for you.

Thanks!

[gowan]

How about Japanese: 厚く打つ一所懸命読む (atsuku utsu, isshokenmei yomu) Play thickly and read for dear life. "Isshokenmei" means with utmost effort, with all your might, desperately, for dear life, etc.

[EdLee]

読む

Gowan (purely a question about Japanese): is 読む also overloaded with the Go-specific jargon meaning of "look ahead possible variations in your own mind" as in "read" in English?
(Kind of related question: in chess, in English, do they also use "read" as in Go? )

[oren]

読む

Gowan (purely a question about Japanese): is 読む also overloaded with the Go-specific jargon meaning of "look ahead possible variations in your own mind" as in "read" in English?
(Kind of related question: in chess, in English, do they also use "read" as in Go? )

I'm answering for gowan, but yes. One of my favorite phrases, since I do it so much is 勝手読み.

http://www.godictionary.net/term/katteyomi.html

When you read what you want to happen and not the better moves for your opponent.

[Koroviev]

in chess, in English, do they also use "read" as in Go?

They usually say they 'calculate.'

[Bill Spight]

in chess, in English, do they also use "read" as in Go?

They usually say they 'calculate.'

With a somewhat different meaning. Calculation is part of reading.

[EdLee]

Thanks, oren, Koroviev, Bill.
Follow-up question: etymology of this Go-specific meaning of "read" in English -- did it come from 読む or elsewhere?

[snorri]

How about Japanese: 厚く打つ一所懸命読む (atsuku utsu, isshokenmei yomu) Play thickly and read for dear life. "Isshokenmei" means with utmost effort, with all your might, desperately, for dear life, etc.

Thanks, gowan. It's interesting if it has a self-effacing sense to it, but I'm not sure that's what I'm going for. But it might grow on me.

For me, "read like the devil" really has this demon or impish sense. Not just that I try to see clever, devious things but that I expect my opponent will, too.

For others: Yes, "calculate" is okay. That's why I'm asking here.

[ez4u]

読む

Gowan (purely a question about Japanese): is 読む also overloaded with the Go-specific jargon meaning of "look ahead possible variations in your own mind" as in "read" in English?
(Kind of related question: in chess, in English, do they also use "read" as in Go? )

I'm answering for gowan, but yes. One of my favorite phrases, since I do it so much is 勝手読み.

http://www.godictionary.net/term/katteyomi.html

When you read what you want to happen and not the better moves for your opponent.

But see the discussion on SL of this term.

[jts]

etymology of this Go-specific meaning of "read" in English -- did it come from 読む or elsewhere?

I took a quick look at Lasker's 1934 "Go and Gomoku." As far as I can see he never uses the word "read" or "reading". He mentions the analysis of positions, he once mentions foreseeing a complicated variation, and describes Karigane and Honinbo Shusai as "deliberating" or "considering" at points where we might say they were reading. Then on the very last page he quickly mentions "careful calculation of the different variations" and "calculation of a combination without glaring errors" as important skills for budding players. So I'm guessing neither the word nor the concept of "reading" was current in 1934. "The Game of Go" (1956) doesn't mention reading either.

"Go for beginners" (1974) seems to introduce reading on p. 62: "Occasionally we find a beginner tracing the path of a shicho with his finger... However, such boorish behavior is unnecessary. You can easily read out a shicho by eye alone..." But I don't see any evidence of it elsewhere in the book (again, after a quick skim), and some examples of describing what we call reading as "thinking ahead" or "seeing".

In 1975 James Davies started "Tesuji" with an essay on the importance of reading, and although he unfolds the status of reading, he does not seem to feel that the word itself will be strange to the reader. Reading is already familiar to the presumed audience of the first issue of Go World in 1977: "Nothing else can bring a game to so precipitate and humiliating a conclusion as a mistake in reading a ladder." Most of us are familiar with the strong emphasis on basic reading skills in "Lessons in the Fundamentals of Go", which is translated in 1978.

So on the basis of this sketchy review of some of the relevant sources, it seems that the term "reading" might have gone from completely unknown to a well known substitute for "calculation" by 1970, and then subsequently it became an important theme for writers/translators of Go books. But it's no use for me to speculate, I'm sure we have members who can serve as primary sources.

[EdLee]

snorri,

Play thick moves and read like the devil.

These are not direct translations (perhaps not even directly related),
but recently these two came to mind:
(1) 大道無門
(2) 鬼眼通身

Here are two calligraphy versions of (1):

s1.jpg (33.38 KiB) Viewed 23958 times

s2.jpg (74.15 KiB) Viewed 23958 times

The second one on the fan was by Fujisawa Hideyuki.

[tchan001]

"Play thick moves and read like the devil." (Or "play thickly and read like the devil" if that works out better.)

How about this in Chinese?
厚行魔算 "Thick Move, Devilish Calculation"

Maybe someone else could do better

[illluck]

tchan's translation feels quite good, but perhaps "魔" could be replaced with "鬼" since 鬼算 is an actual term in Chinese.

I suspect some sort of two phrases with 4/5/7 characters might work even better, but that is considerably beyond my ability.

[gowan]

etymology of this Go-specific meaning of "read" in English -- did it come from 読む or elsewhere?

I took a quick look at Lasker's 1934 "Go and Gomoku." As far as I can see he never uses the word "read" or "reading". He mentions the analysis of positions, he once mentions foreseeing a complicated variation, and describes Karigane and Honinbo Shusai as "deliberating" or "considering" at points where we might say they were reading. Then on the very last page he quickly mentions "careful calculation of the different variations" and "calculation of a combination without glaring errors" as important skills for budding players. So I'm guessing neither the word nor the concept of "reading" was current in 1934. "The Game of Go" (1956) doesn't mention reading either.

"Go for beginners" (1974) seems to introduce reading on p. 62: "Occasionally we find a beginner tracing the path of a shicho with his finger... However, such boorish behavior is unnecessary. You can easily read out a shicho by eye alone..." But I don't see any evidence of it elsewhere in the book (again, after a quick skim), and some examples of describing what we call reading as "thinking ahead" or "seeing".

In 1975 James Davies started "Tesuji" with an essay on the importance of reading, and although he unfolds the status of reading, he does not seem to feel that the word itself will be strange to the reader. Reading is already familiar to the presumed audience of the first issue of Go World in 1977: "Nothing else can bring a game to so precipitate and humiliating a conclusion as a mistake in reading a ladder." Most of us are familiar with the strong emphasis on basic reading skills in "Lessons in the Fundamentals of Go", which is translated in 1978.

So on the basis of this sketchy review of some of the relevant sources, it seems that the term "reading" might have gone from completely unknown to a well known substitute for "calculation" by 1970, and then subsequently it became an important theme for writers/translators of Go books. But it's no use for me to speculate, I'm sure we have members who can serve as primary sources.

The term calculate is interesting in this context because the word comes from calculus which, in Latin, means stone However, it also has a meaning of working with numbers, and I'd think in a go context it would refer to counting points or the value of moves rather than exploring the results of sequences of moves.

[jts]

The term calculate is interesting in this context because the word comes from calculus which, in Latin, means stone However, it also has a meaning of working with numbers, and I'd think in a go context it would refer to counting points or the value of moves rather than exploring the results of sequences of moves.

Yes, but in chess "to calculate" is a term of art for more or less what we would call "to read" in Go. That's certainly where it comes from in "Go and Go Moku"... Lasker, at least initially, uses chess terms for just about everything (tempo for sente, combination for sequence or tactic, man for stone).