Lost in translation (Part 5)

Thank you all for your patience, and this time I am going to wrap up the third letter in Candy Candy Final Story (CCFS) epilogue. 🙂 As I said in Part 3, Candy kept using the titles “Prince on the Hill” or simply “prince” throughout her letter to him, and so far I’ve been showing you the evidence (the two titles will be emphasized). 😉 Think about it, a decent girl in her right mind would not treat her friend, brother or father this way, unless she’s suffering from some sort of mental disorder?! 😂

Anyway, let me continue from the end of the previous post (I will not show every single line, however), where Candy described Albert’s confession in detail, even recalling that her prince’s voice was a bit hoarse. Anyway, since she mentioned his voice, she went on to elaborate further…

王子さまの声―― そう、確かに王子さまの口調！
すぐそばにいて、いつも聞いていながら、気がつかなかった……。

The voice of (my) prince — that’s right, it is certainly (my) prince’s tone of voice!
I have not noticed anything, despite being close by your side and hearing your voice all the time….

In Japanese, pronouns are often omitted, and rather, names or titles are directly used. This is one of the examples, which Candy recognized her prince’s tone. The second sentence was literally “right there beside, though always listening, didn’t notice / realize…”. In English this sounds odd and extremely choppy, don’t you think? 😛

The word 口調 can also mean manner of speaking (like choice of words, etc.), but her first encounter with her prince was very brief, not to mention she was so young then, so she could not possibly remember his manner of speech. Nevertheless, this is just my two cents, and you don’t have to agree with me. 😉

でも、いつもなんて心地のいい声なのかしら、ってそう思っていたわけがわかりました。
そして、大おじさまがいつもと違って見えた理由も―― 。
突然、ポニーの家に現れたのは、”大おじさま”ではなく、 ”丘の上の王子さま”、だったんだって。

But it made sense to me (now) why I used to wonder how always soothing your voice had been.
Not only that, the reason why Granduncle William had looked different from usual to me—
The one who suddenly appeared at Pony’s Home was not “Granduncle” but was “Prince on the Hill”.

This link tells you the opposite of わけがわかりました. If you like, you can look up the adjective Candy used to describe Albert’s voice (心地のいい声), and you will see that his voice made her feel comfortable, so I simply picked “soothing”. The Italian / Spanish translation even said his voice soothed her heart, which was actually a great choice (not far from the original meaning at all). 👍

わたしの涙はなかなか止まらなかったけど、あれは幸せの涙でした。
それにしても、王子さまはひどいわ！
わたし、マグノリア荘でも宝物のバッジを見せて何度も”丘の上の王子さま”の話もしましたよね！

Though I seemed unable to stop my tears from flowing, those were tears of joy.
Nevertheless, my prince you’re terrible!
How many times did I show you the precious badge in the House of Magnolia and tell you the story of “Prince on the Hill”, you know!

I’d like to point out that it is not easy to translate なかなか to English. For your interest, you can click on this link to read the variety of possible translations, and here it hints Candy had meant to stop her tears, but after some time, what she had expected still had not taken place. That is, you can sense that despite herself, she seemed unable to control her emotions or you can even say she had a hard time to hold back her tears.

Also, Candy really did say that the badge was a treasure. Why? Because as a little girl she had been convinced it would lead her to the mysterious boy as long as she held onto it. In short, she still cherished this childhood memory, which hadn’t faded even with hindsight (now that the mystery had been revealed). She wasn’t embarrassed at all to say it out loud to Albert that his badge had remained a treasure to her. 💕

Do you see my point? Can’t you tell that not only she felt no shame before him about being utterly honest concerning her childish dream but she was more than happy her crush turned out to be none other than Albert himself? 🌹

The only blame from her was that he had been listening to all her girlish chattering about a certain teenage boy in silence. No wonder she asked him later whether his memory had returned back then, because if he had recovered, he would have understood that she had liked his young self so much that she called him a prince. Not only that, she had been dreaming of running into him one day (likely on Pony’s Hill, where he had first appeared). Is that why he took the trouble of coming all the way from Chicago? 😍 Maybe back in Magnolia he decided to keep this secret to himself (for who knows how long), and I bet Candy was dying to know what made him change his mind. 😉

Note that Candy said Albert was terrible, and I’ve emphasized the adjective merely because of the particle わ right after that. When this particle is tagged at the end of a sentence, it affects the tone and softens what the speaker is saying; the speaker, usually a lady, uses this particle to express surprise, admiration, disgust, or that she’s emotionally moved. Since there’s no equivalent in English, you can’t really translate it. However, I’m sure you can at least imagine Candy’s voice or feelings in her tone if she had spoken this out loud. This is similar to another passage in CCFS, where she said he was driving her crazy… 💘

Also, as mentioned before, the last two particles (よね) of her question to him about the countless times she had talked about him in the House of Magnolia essentially indicate that he knew this very well, and she was seeking his agreement. 🙂

そう――王子さまはわたしが泣きやむまで黙ってやさしく見つめてくれていました。
涙で濡れた頬に丘を吹き過ぎていく風が気持ちよかった。
青空の下……わたしの横には丘の上の王子さまがいる――。
うっとりとしていたら、丘のふもとでとどろいたジョルジュのクラクションに現実に引き戻されたのです。ふん！
わたし、丘の上の王子さまに会ったら、聞きたいことがたくさんあったのです！
なんで、あのときポニ―の丘にいたのか、なんで、急に消えてしまったのか、なんで、なんで？？？
でも、それは、今度、王子さまに会ったときに！
楽しみがたくさんふえました！

So yes — my prince kept his silence, tenderly gazing at me while I cry myself out.
It felt great as the breeze that swept over the hill brushed my tear stained cheeks.
Under the blue sky… here right beside me is Prince on the Hill—
While still being fascinated by this, I was snapped back to reality by the roaring honks of Georges’ horn from down the hill. Humph!
If I would meet Prince on the Hill one day, I had a lot of questions to ask him!
Why did he come to Pony’s Hill back then, and why he suddenly disappeared. Why, why???
But, next time I meet my prince I will ask!
(Now) I have so much more to look forward to!

First, I want you to know that you can translate 見つめて to “watching”, “staring at”, “gazing at”, etc. Since Candy said he was quietly doing this, in my imagination he was gazing at her with tenderness. Besides, more likely than not her tears were still streaming down her face then. First, remember this ‘meeting’ didn’t last very long, probably no more than fifteen minutes, because Candy mentioned in her first letter that Georges immediately came to pick up his young boss after his confession. Secondly, Candy herself said just few lines earlier that she could not stop crying. Therefore, I have reasons to believe that when Georges blasted his horn, Candy had not entirely dried her tears, which means that before Georges’ interruption, Albert had been patiently waiting for Candy to cry herself out. Actions speak louder than words, right? He wasn’t tired or afraid of her tears, and he gave her as much time as she needed to let all this sink in (we know in his letter that he had originally intended to stay much longer). In fact, this special moment between these two in CCFS, when they were silently looking at each other with bubbling emotions, reminds me of the following manga scene — this is when Candy discovered Albert’s real identity, and you can easily imagine what it’s like by replacing the name “Albert-san” with “Prince on the Hill”: 💕

The last two lines in the above excerpt are not as straightforward. Literally Candy said the following:

But, those (questions), this time/next time, the moment I (have) met my prince!
My anticipation has increased a lot!

It’s confusing because the term for “this time”, 今度, can also be translated to “next time” or “another day/time”, depending on the context. My friend pointed out that the past tense form of “meet” (会った) + the time (とき) can mean the future moment when Candy would meet with her prince.

Of course it’s understandable she had even more questions for her prince next time. Other than why he had come but vanished right afterwards, the readers who know Candy well can easily come up with a long list of questions for Prince on the Hill. What’s more, she knew how to reach him, and that explains why she expressed her anticipation being much higher than before. 😛 In other words, she had concrete reasons to look forward with much eagerness and hope to seeing him again.

Therefore, it’s only natural that Candy wanted Albert to come again, and to make sure he would grant her wish, she provided a supposedly irrefutable reason behind her request — her upcoming birthday!

そう、誰かの誕生日です！（大声で！）
さあ、これからわたしは丘の上の王子さまに魔法をかけます！

So, whose birthday is it! (In a loud voice!)
Well, I’m going to cast a spell on Prince on the Hill!

As though her birthday was not strong enough an excuse, she even went so far to cast a spell on him. Don’t you find that cute? 😁 Yes, she was desperate but adorable… 😄 Many of you knew that her birthday wish was his holiday (she was fully aware of his frantic schedule) so that he could spend time with her, talking to her. My friend has a good point, that Candy must have anticipated to talk with Albert real soon, and that he could answer all her questions face to face.

この魔法、きっと、かかったと思うんだけどーーー。

I think you’re surely under the spell——

Yes, that’s how Candy ended her letter. In most cases, the highlighted word means “however”, “but”, etc. Yet, this can also be a colloquial way to express the speaker’s emotions or feelings. If you like, you can read this long post by Maggie Sensei, in which she explained with lots of real life examples that when one can’t see the contrast coming or it doesn’t lead to anything contradicting, the word is added to either emphasize the feelings or soften the speech, which is exactly the case here. Candy ended her letter with feelings, that she indeed wanted her spell to work — her Prince on the Hill would take a holiday to come to Pony’s Home on her birthday to spend time with her. 💖 For next post, please click here.