From linguaphiles

[apollotiger.livejournal.com]

I was reading a post in linguaphiles about things that people say in response to "Say something in [x language]", and someone suggested, "My hovercraft is full of eels" from the Monty Python skit. With the help of Lingvo, I tried to translate it: «транспортное мое средство на воздушой подушке -- это полное угрей!»

Is this right?

Comments

[oryx_and_crake]

The first part is more or less OK (should be "мое транспортное средство на воздушной подушке").
But the rest is not. The complete phrase should be "Мое транспортное средство на воздушной подушке полнО угрей."

[apollotiger.livejournal.com]

Okay. I wasn't sure if it would be clear that полно was applying to транспортное средство на воздушной подушке ...

[oryx_and_crake]

you cannot say "транспортное средство это полное угрей" anyway. It is ungrammatical.

[apollotiger.livejournal.com]

Also ... why is it полно instead of полное? I thought that, since the other two adjectives matching средство (мое and транспортное) took the -ое ending, so ould полный.

[oryx_and_crake]

You need a predicate in this sentence. In this case, полно acts as a predicate. I guess you could say "мое транспортное средство - полное угрей" but a) it sounds awkward, to me, and b) you should not use "это" here. I am not even sure how it came up. If you tried to translate "is" with "это" - don't. "Is" is almost never translated into Russian anyway, and definitely never with "это".

[apollotiger.livejournal.com]

No, no. I was separating it into two sentences (sort of) and translating as "My hovercraft — it is full of eels!"

[oryx_and_crake]

Then you should do it like
"мое транспортное средство - оно полно угрей!"

[apollotiger.livejournal.com]

Ahhh, thank you. :)

[dair-spb.livejournal.com]

lmao

if you translate hovercraft as транспортное средство на воздушной подушке" then oryx_and_crake is right at the first reply.

But in SciFi translations I met just "хувер" (hover). Shorter and more.. eh.. correct, huh? I can't translate "hovercraft Nabucconazzer" (not sure in spelling) from "The Matrix" as "транспортное средство на воздушной подушке Навуходоносор". Sounds ridiculous ;-)

In fact, we don't have correct word. Though we do have hovercrafts ;-)

[apollotiger.livejournal.com]

(I think it's "Nebuchadnezzar" or something like that.)

[wolk-off.livejournal.com]

Anyway, it's Навуходоносор in Russian :)

[ashalynd.livejournal.com]

In the real life, I guess, something like "Мой катер - он полон угрей!" would be said in most cases.

(hovercraft could be translated also as катер на подводных крыльях, but if you are speaking about the things that are your own you usually do not describe them much; in this situation I'd only say катер на подводных крыльях if I'd have another vessel that was not a hovercraft).

[freedomcry.livejournal.com]

Very well put about the level of detail.

As for the wording, I'd say «У меня полный катер угрей». The way you put it, it still has a touch of that distinct style in which characters talk in overdubbed foreign movies. :)

[apollotiger.livejournal.com]

I see. So it's more like "My craft is full of eels" in that case?

[wolk-off.livejournal.com]

Катер is a cutter; Russians tend to apply the name of a similar craft to anything which serves for about the same purpose and is of about the same size, if they don't have a specific name for this exact craft :)

[ashalynd.livejournal.com]

I think that in English it happens as well or even more, but in different areas; take the word "pet" as an example. There is no one-word analog in Russian for it. It just happened that in contemporary English it happened to be more important to distinguish a cutter from a hovercraft, therefore two widely used words, than to distinguish, say, a dog from a cat: you can say "I have two pets" in English but in Russian you'll mostly say "У меня две кошки/ две собаки/ кошка с собакой". You would not say "У меня двое домашних животных" unless you are making an official statement :)

[wolk-off.livejournal.com]

I have heard dialogues like:
- У вас дома есть животные?
- Есть животные, а как же. Кот и попугай.
(Do you have pets at home? Of course we have - a tomcat and a parrot.)
As you can see, this животные is used here in the "pet" meaning - because a parrot is not even a proper животное (animal,) it's a bird :)

[http://users.livejournal.com/bc_/]

Zoologically, птицы (birds) and not only насекомые (insects) but even простейшие (protozoans) are животные (animals). The colloquial usage tends to be different, though.

[http://users.livejournal.com/bc_/]

If you still want to be specific, it seems that Судно на воздушной подушке is a bit more common.

At any rate, Yandex finds more references for it.

[onodera.livejournal.com]

Wouldn't катер на подводных крыльях be a hydrofoil?