Lost in Translation

The Importance of Earnest word plays like there's no tomorrow. "Can you take the time from me?" "I'm not little" (dealing with the fact that little can mean being physically little or being young). These sort of witty remarks then could be lost in translation as we had started to discuss last time in class.
It would be a great loss to us if we had to understand the languages certain works were originally written in. Even if we may lose certain cultural and specific language things within the texts, it's better to have it at all than be kept from their overall greatness.
Even in conversation we lose much of what the other really means at times. Last spring semester at HWS I took a Japanese language class. I learned a lot about this language, but also about my own native language. As an English speaker, especially in America, we rely heavily on the way we pronounce and stress our words to convey how we really feel. In the Japanese language we cannot rely on this, in fact it usually will confuse the meaning if you take this sort of license. Their words are meant to be emphasized at certain points, otherwise it may mean something else entirely or not even translate. The experience of learning a new language is always frustrating and liberating. Straight translation usually does not work well, so you learn to understand in the specific language; not trying to pick each word apart and change it into your native language.