"Take no heed of her...She reads a lot of books."
~Jasper Fforde


Sunday, August 15, 2010

Fun With Google Translate

I was bored...so I decided to play around a bit with the dreaded Google Translate *lightning and thunder* I actually got the idea from a video put out by Smosh where they took one of their old videos, ran the entire script through Google Translate into Japanese, and then back into English. Next, the rerecorded their voices with the "new" script that Google Translate gave them. I decided to do something similar, but instead of going from English to Japanese to English, I changed my entries into several different languages before returning them to English. Here are the results. First, Poe's The Raven:

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As if some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
"'Tis some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at my chamber door--
Only this, and nothing more."

~English, French, German, Greek, Polish, Korean, Romanian, Swahili, Welsh, Italian, Irish, Spanish, and BACK to English...

Dark to midnight, and my opinion is weak and tired
Original and very important number of scientific studies, liver
He liked the group below, nearly napping, suddenly and registration
As the light falls, banging on the door of my room.
"It's nice to come with me," says I, who was at the door--
But no more than

And here is another one...This time, Shakespeare's Hamlet:

To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing, end them? To die; to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd.

And same languages as before...

A man, that is the question:
What, where, heart honor
Pockets, and outrageous, but the fate of arrow
O army major problem,
Finally, the difference? Looking for death;
There is more to this end the dream
Thousands of unrest and natural motion
Successor body, responsible for
Get a room.

Wow! How does it change so drastically? This is ridiculous! I mean, these two passages barely sound anything like the originals! And, they both sound slightly suggestive, don't they? I mean, with phrases like "successor body, responsible for/Get a room". But, mostly, its gibberish.

I think I might use this sometime on a complete poem, but I'm not sure.

4 comments:

  1. Hahaha, "get a room". Goodness, that's hilarious! I liked the passages you picked. (You'll have to do a little Jane Austen next.) You nerdy English major, you. ;-)

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  2. the bottom one i could imagine as shakespeare, walking home whilest gibbering on, after spending all day in the pub.

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  3. Google Translate isn't just something to be feared. It is a heresy that leaves a stigma upon thine soul...

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  4. Haha; oh, Gaby! You are so funny! :P

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