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Il mare si può vivere, scegliere o amare.

English translation: The Sea. Live it. Choose it. Love it.

GLOSSARY ENTRY (DERIVED FROM QUESTION BELOW)
Italian term or phrase:Il mare si può vivere, scegliere o amare.
English translation:The Sea. Live it. Choose it. Love it.
Entered by: Therese Marshall

15:29 Sep 13, 2012
Italian to English translations [PRO]
Tourism & Travel / Sea Tourism
Italian term or phrase: Il mare si può vivere, scegliere o amare.
Context:
Il mare si può vivere, scegliere o amare.
Il mare vive, si fa scegliere e ricambia l’amore con relazioni intime ed intense.
Ciascuno parla con lui come vuole. Nulla è dovuto. Nulla è forzato.
Port Village è la rivista di chi ama vivere il mare. Di chi sceglie in libertà il miglior rapporto con lui, quello che più gli corrisponde.
Therese Marshall
Italy
Local time: 23:40
The Sea. Live it. Choose it. Love it.
Explanation:
Since this is a promotional or puff piece for a magazine, you could opt for an arresting, telegraphic introduction.

Phil's freer translation is suitable for the rest of the text but leaving the first sentence in Italian is a bit risky. I'm not sure that many readers would make much sense of "Il mare si può vivere, scegliere o amare" without a little help.

The second point is that "vivere" is evidently a key notion, which the author uses transitively in the first sentence, then intransitively ("ll mare vive") and transitively again ("la rivista di chi ama vivere il mare"). This needs to be reflected in the translation.
Selected response from:

Giles Watson
Italy
Local time: 23:40
Grading comment
4 KudoZ points were awarded for this answer



Summary of answers provided
4 +9The Sea. Live it. Choose it. Love it.
Giles Watson
4 +6don't translate it
philgoddard
4the sea could be breathed, adopted, or adulated
Nesrine Echroudi
3 +1You can experience the sea, you can choose it or love it!
Vittoria Barbieri
3The sea gives us life, freedom and love.
Wolf Draeger


  

Answers


12 mins   confidence: Answerer confidence 4/5Answerer confidence 4/5 peer agreement (net): +6
don't translate it


Explanation:
Maybe someone will prove me wrong, but I think this whole thing is untranslatable. You need to more or less ignore the Italian, write something from scratch in English that conveys something of the same flavour, and tell the customer why. If you try to stay at all close to the Italian, it will sound like a translation.

You could say something like: "Everyone has a different relationship with the sea. Some earn their living from it, some use it for recreation, others prefer to gaze upon it from afar, but it occupies a pivotal role in our collective unconscious."

philgoddard
United States
Specializes in field
Native speaker of: English
PRO pts in category: 71

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
agree  P.L.F. Persio: you're 100% right.
12 mins
agree  issyb: I agree completely
30 mins
agree  Colin Rowe: Now that your point has been demonstrated, you get my agree, too!
43 mins
agree  tradu-grace: you're completely right. What a wonderful English rendering!! It just sounds great to me.
1 hr
  -> Thank you!
agree  Lara Barnett
1 hr
agree  Lirka: yes, a nice version, one could use it, but since Giles offered a good ( and more literal) translation, I think there's no need for staying away from the Italian....
4 hrs
neutral  writeaway: nice but it takes on too much of a life of it's own. imo the style/register of the original has to be kept. This is really very far away from the original. but I do agree with the principle.
7 hrs
  -> If you kept the style and register of the Italian it would sound ridiculous.
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39 mins   confidence: Answerer confidence 4/5Answerer confidence 4/5
the sea could be breathed, adopted, or adulated


Explanation:
THat doesn't sound simple translation. Or, how we can translate literary works. Just try to be a little bit poetic to convey the meaning:)

Nesrine Echroudi
Tunisia
Specializes in field
Native speaker of: Native in ArabicArabic, Native in FrenchFrench
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1 hr   confidence: Answerer confidence 4/5Answerer confidence 4/5 peer agreement (net): +9
The Sea. Live it. Choose it. Love it.


Explanation:
Since this is a promotional or puff piece for a magazine, you could opt for an arresting, telegraphic introduction.

Phil's freer translation is suitable for the rest of the text but leaving the first sentence in Italian is a bit risky. I'm not sure that many readers would make much sense of "Il mare si può vivere, scegliere o amare" without a little help.

The second point is that "vivere" is evidently a key notion, which the author uses transitively in the first sentence, then intransitively ("ll mare vive") and transitively again ("la rivista di chi ama vivere il mare"). This needs to be reflected in the translation.

Giles Watson
Italy
Local time: 23:40
Specializes in field
Native speaker of: English
PRO pts in category: 103

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
agree  Raffaella Berry: You got the meaning of "vivere" right! In this case, it means "experience", not "make a living from it". This use of the verb is very frequent in the Italian advertising industry, especially in the tourism/travel field.
31 mins
agree  Colin Rowe: Nice solution. I don't think, though, that Phil meant leaving the first line in Italian, just phrasing the text differently in English!
42 mins
  -> OK, Colin. Apologies to Phil if I got hold of the wrong end of the stick.
agree  Umberto Cassano
56 mins
agree  Rachel Fell
1 hr
agree  Shera Lyn Parpia
2 hrs
agree  Lirka: very nice :) I'd use it instantly
2 hrs
agree  texjax DDS PhD: It's time yet again to raise those rates... ;)
2 hrs
  -> Thanks, Bruna. Good advice!
agree  Katia DG: Visto che si può tradurre in modo efficace, perché non rispettare lo stile e il ritmo dell'originale?
5 hrs
  -> Domanda intelligente, Katia! L'italiano e l'inglese hanno aspettative stilistiche diverse: ricalcare l'italiano produce un inglese "floscio" mentre una retrotraduzione della mia versione sarebbe troppo slegata per l'orecchio italico.
agree  Angie Garbarino
15 hrs
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7 hrs   confidence: Answerer confidence 3/5Answerer confidence 3/5 peer agreement (net): +1
You can experience the sea, you can choose it or love it!


Explanation:
I would traslate "live" with "experience" because it give more the idea inside the extract. And I think that in this case, we can maintain a similirar sentence structure with the italian one.

Vittoria Barbieri
Local time: 23:40
Works in field
Native speaker of: Italian

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
neutral  writeaway: see Gilles' answer. he has already translated vivere with experience (which is the right translation in the context in any case). the or here sounds strange. imo the 'o' in Italian means and in this case.
6 mins
  -> In Italian "o" refers to an option to choose, and here you can choose among 3 options: experience, choose or love the sea.
agree  Angie Garbarino: I like also this one, and yes O doesn't mean AnD, it refers to an option.
9 hrs
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18 hrs   confidence: Answerer confidence 3/5Answerer confidence 3/5
The sea gives us life, freedom and love.


Explanation:
Tough one; this is why people want to learn to speak Italian :-)

The sea gives us life, freedom and love.
The sea brims with life, captures our imagination and returns our feelings with intimacy and passion.
We all have our own special relationship with her. There are no conditions. There are no obligations.
Port Village is the magazine (of choice) for those who love to live the sea. For those who freely embrace her and enjoy her in their unique way.

Wolf Draeger
South Africa
Local time: 23:40
Works in field
Native speaker of: English
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