Friday, March 25, 2011

Keeping Up with Olde English... Jonny




Dear Brayshaw,

I didn't understand a word of Jonny's last post. Can you help me?

- Confused in Cornwall (Cornwall, Pennsylvania, that is)

Dear Confused,

Your confusion is perfectly understandable. Jonny speaks what is known as Olde English; indeed, he is the last known living speaker of the language (and, because it's the only language he speaks, in actual fact he can communicate with nobody). The problem, of course, is that the Culvert is an American website, and often the software we use is simply unable to translate properly. But I've done it for you.

First, I select Jonny's story. I then run this through our "Web to Olde English" translator, thus producing (for example):



Now, I have to run this through another back-translator (please excuse all the webmaster/computer jargon), in this case "Olde English to American", thus producing:

"Me 'n ol' Z wents t' fishin', and twern't bad. We had t' drive a fer piece, but got us a few, 'n had a burger 'n fries on th'way home."

(That's actually the entire story, once translated.)

Always happy t' help!

T.J. Brayshaw

2 comments: