Damn-Dutch

Over the summer I ordered in some books and CDs. This on its own isn’t out of the ordinary, but one of the objects was a bit quirky as far as I’m concerned and it deserves a little mention.

Through some friends I once ended up listening to the first three series of the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy radio plays. I loved them. In the end I ended up buying pretty much every Douglas Adams book out there. From HHG to Dirk Gently to Last chance to see. Even those silly Meaning and Deeper meaning of Liff books. They were all enjoyable in their own right.

Now that’s all well and good, but I always pooh pooh translations a bit. I find that often jokes and nuances don’t translate well. And then one of those formentioned friends told me there was a Dutch radioplay, of the first series that is. A German one too by the way, which I’m sure I might get one day too. So after some digging around I order in a copy of the Dutch HHG radioplay. Turns out it was done back in 1980, well before this Damn Dutch even existed as two gametes. I ended up listening to the whole thing in two days. I won’t say it’s as good as the original, but it’s a damn good alternative if you don’t get along with the English language much. Some names have been changed, and some places too. So now the story has a Dutch rather than a British background. A lot of jokes work out really well in Dutch and its equivalent to Slartibartfast even adds a bit to his fashionable fjord dialogue, specifically about the Netherlands.

I suppose I should also add that no I have not read the Dutch translations of the book, so I can’t compare it to that, but as far as the English and the Dutch audio- or radioplays go, yeah, I really liked it and it wasn’t at all what I expected.

A damn shame indeed, George Carlin is no more.
The world is short one grade A first class stand-up comedian and dirty bastard.
A tiny salute to the man that brought us the seven dirty words, icebox man and someone I refer to in casual conversation too often.