…or, rather, he gets subtitles in Tą…

On a whim, I decided to translate my favorite scene of my favorite video game, Super Paper Mario, into my new language Tą. The scene is from Chapter 6, and I think it’s one of the most awesome scenes in the game…and besides, it’s accompanied by an incredible piece of music! Well, as I started the translation, I thought it would be pretty easy. I had already translated a government notice with quite long and complex sentences, after all, and a song, too. So a random scene from a Mario game should be pretty easy, right? Not! Man, that was one tricky translation!! So many figures of speech, metaphors, colloquial expressions, complex sentences…And Count Bleck had the most difficult lines of all. Even though Tą has absolutely no problem with passive voice!

But, despite the fact that Count Bleck appeared determined to overwhelm the Tą language by the force of his…eloquence? – Well, despite that fact, I managed to translate the scene, and I really like the result. There are bits in there that have some interesting nuance the English doesn’t, and I just like how it sounds! So, for a fun project, I decided to make a nice subtitled video of the scene. I also wanted to dub it into Tą – that is, if my mouth cooperated, Tą is hard to speak – but as it turns out, I can’t find any good quality videos that go slowly enough for me to read the Tą lines aloud. So I’m off the hook for now, at least, but at some point later I might upload an audio-only reading of the scene in Tą. (And I might add the original music, because it’s seriously awesome.)

And so, here is the “Champion of Destruction” scene from Chapter 6 of Super Paper Mario, with Tą! Below the video, I have an interlinear and literal translation of the Tą version. Thanks to BlueJackG on YouTube for the original video!

Interlinear and Literal Translation

List of Abbreviations

1p – first person
2p – second person
3p – third person
acc – accusative
ant – anterior
aug – augmentative
ben – benefactive
bip – bipersonal particle
caus – causative
comp – comparative
fut – future
gen – genitive
imp – imperative
ins – instrumental
loc – locative
mpc – more than paucal
neg – negation
nom – nominative
pc – paucal
pres – present
rc – relative clause
s – singular
trg – trigger
vrb – verbal focus

The Real Thing

Tippi:

The emptiness is becoming more large…I order us, hurry!

Voice:

Hurry? For what reason to not pause, not lingeringly watch?

Count Bleck:

The sun just a moment ago became too dark, stop not…Lord Bleck!

Bowser:

What creepy freak with the cloak…Lord Bleck!

Count Bleck: BLEH HEH HEH HEH! BLEK!

The prophecy rhythmically falls in a controlled way, because of the Chaos Heart.

The flame of each world will be flattened, one, one…

Tippi:

To do that, so – so ugly – why you want?

Count Bleck:

Question you at Lord Bleck?!

Destroying this world without meaning is not tall!

It is definitely the best course of action for Lord Bleck to throw it into oblivion, leaving it behind by him not!

Tippi:

By what means can you speak that? That…is terrible, monstrous!

Count Bleck:

Lord Bleck at you laughs!

A short Pixl for the benefit of Lord Bleck of actions high and low speaks in an eyebrow way?

Tippi:

This is something that should be discussed not! You are low…are sick!

Hearts of all living things exist. All of them are the worthiest.

It is impossible to just…make white you them!

Count Bleck:

All things near you are close, yet hearts you use?

Being more worthless is impossible…

Count Bleck:

All things…are meaningless. Except for Timpani, a treasure that mattered to me existed not, not one…

Tippi: …Tim…Timpáni?

Count Bleck:

More speak not!

Count Bleck:

This world is dying at the sight under the monocle of…Lord Bleck!

But I command you, do not allow the stopping of finding the Pure Heart you will never get by that!

BLEH HEH HEH HEH! BLEK!

Tippi:

Oh, gods save us…