5) How to translate 'I don't need' in 'I don't need happiness as a woman'? [Golden Kamuy Russian]

This time, we'll look at Sofia in chapters 179 and 191.
I'll delve into her intentions, which were never directly depicted.

[5 minutes to read]

This is a series where we enjoy the Russian dialogue in Golden Kamuy.
It is written with the assumption that you have finished reading the manga.
We will explore the story through the differences between the Japanese and Russian dialogue provided by the author and the supervisor.
It is written so that even those who have no connection to the Russian language can enjoy it.

Russian explanation: Goodbye

First, let's look at the farewell greeting from chapter 179.

"прощай [proshchay]" literally means "forgive me." It is a "goodbye" for eternity... or when there is no prospect of meeting again. A parting.

Since you likely won't meet again, it is a greeting where you forgive and are forgiven for everything up to that point so that there are no regrets.It does not mean 'be healthy' or 'take care.'

Just before this line, Wilk says "Let's meet again" in Japanese, Sofia smiles silently, and then she says the above line to Kiroranke, who seems reluctant to leave.
As long as you only read the Japanese dialogue, it can be taken as "Take care until the day we meet again." Furthermore, since Kiroranke later says, "Sofia!! She is still waiting for us in Russia!" (Chapter 267), it is even more deeply ingrained that there was a prospect of meeting again.

🟦 Russian dialogue
⇒ Words actually spoken in the world of Golden Kamuy (objective fact)
🟥 Japanese dialogue
⇒ How the person being spoken to perceived the above (subjective fact)

Actually, the literal translation of "Сау бул [Sau bul]"—which appears when you translate "прощай [proshchay]" into Tatar using Google Translate—is "be healthy (сау = healthy/health, бул = be/to be)."
And if you re-translate this "Сау бул" back into Russian, it becomes "До свидания [Do svidaniya]" (goodbye until the next opportunity to meet) instead of "прощай [proshchay]."

For the three of them, Russian is only a second language. Their native/first languages are likely French for Sofia, Tatar for Kiroranke, and Polish or Sakhalin Ainu for Wilk.
Therefore, Kiroranke may not have grasped the nuance of the Russian "goodbye" and perceived it as being told "take care"... perhaps that is the setting. It is the same structure as the discrepancy in farewell greetings between Japanese and Russian that we covered in the first installment of this series.

On the other hand, since French distinguishes between daily farewell greetings and the parting "adieu," it is thought that no discrepancy with Russian would arise.

(Note: Since the author can only speak English and Russian, I cannot delve further into other languages. Regarding Tatar, I not only used Google Translate but also read several Tatar language explanations written in Russian to confirm that the literal translation of "Сау бул" is a greeting that refers to health. I could not be certain about the nuance with which it is used locally. As for French, I only know it as general knowledge.)

The smile she returned when told "Let's meet again" was just politeness.
Sofia bid them a firm farewell, and was not waiting for their return with bated breath.

Next is the farewell greeting in chapter 191. Words of funeral for a deceased friend. This, too, is a final farewell.

Yeah... I know it's a strange translation, but I dared to use "take care" here.
In other words, as a farewell greeting, chapters 179 and 191 are exactly reversed. For the person being told, that is. If I were to paraphrase it appropriately for the situation, it would be "Rest in peace."

The literal translation of "бывай [byvay]" is "may you continue to be yourself." "May you continue to be well." So, if paraphrased, it means "take care." There is no equivalent greeting in Japanese, making it difficult to translate.
Originally, it is a light, daily farewell greeting between close acquaintances.

Russian explanation: The specific content of 'I don't need'

Now, let's look at the title of this post, taken from Chapter 179.
What exactly does the 'iranai' (don't need) in 'I don't need happiness as a woman' mean?
Even if you feel like you have a vague understanding of it in Japanese, it becomes difficult when you try to translate it into another language.

Does 'iranai' mean 'I don't want it'?
Does 'iranai' mean 'I don't need it'?
Does 'iranai' mean 'I am giving it up'?

The phrasing changes depending on the answer. Now, let's look at the actual dialogue and a re-translation.

The word used was 'to forget (забыть [zabyt'])'.
…If that's the case, the tense of 'happiness as a woman' changes. If it were 'don't want,' 'don't need,' or 'giving up,' it would refer to happiness that could be obtained in the future. She doesn't have it now.
But if it is 'to forget,' it means that happiness is already in her hands right now. In other words, she did not give up on 'the family she would likely build with Wilk if she went to Hokkaido as planned.'

She was 'happy in the present' being with the person she loved, so she learned Japanese while being dragged along. She wasn't interested in Japan, so she didn't pick it up as easily as the other two.

By getting 'Fina and Olga' caught up in the crossfire, she decided to forget her carefree feelings and made the resolve to say 'прощай [proshchay] (goodbye).'

What she took heavily was not whether it was her own bullet that caused it, but the fact that she lost her justification as a revolutionary by involving the civilians she was supposed to protect. The cause leading to that was that she was too caught up in the happiness of being with the person she loved, forgot her duty, and spent her time in vain.

It is Kiroranke's bias that leads the reader to interpret her decision through the Japanese dialogue as 'based on romantic feelings' or 'giving up on a future of having children because she caused a child to die.' Such a bias exists because Kiroranke was projecting his own 'unrequited love' onto her. The re-translation of Sofia's entire dialogue in this scene is as follows.

In the second line, she doesn't say 'because.' She just says 'I love you.'
In context, it's not 'I love you because,' but 'I love you, but.' It means, 'I have decided to part ways with you. It's not that I've come to hate you, but.'

That is why, even when Sofia was later informed that Wilk had married and had a daughter, her heart was no longer troubled. This is in contrast to Inkarmat, who had complex feelings about Asirpa being both a memento of her first love and the daughter of her romantic rival.
Sofia had properly forgotten.

1. Russian dialogue is based on the collected volumes.

2. Obvious typos have been corrected.

3. This is not a Russian language course.

   • Explanations of grammar and usage are kept simple and limited to what is necessary to explain the dialogue.

   • I have provided kana readings for key terms, but they do not fully represent the actual pronunciation. Also, I will not provide them for everything to avoid redundancy.

4. For real-world reference materials, I am consulting sources written in Russian. Therefore, there may be discrepancies with the Japanese perspective.