(The increasingly less) Daily senryu thread

Ah, has this thread died? I’ve been enjoying it, even if I don’t always participate. I was wondering if it just got lost in the chaos of the holiday season, but still no updates. :pensive:

2 Likes

Mea culpa!

I will revive it in a few hours.

2 Likes

Monday, January 9, 2023


Previous senryu

  1. キャスターの怒りは次のニュースまで
    キャスターのいかりはつぎのニュースまで
    Newscaster’s / fury lasts until / news segment

Notes:

  • Apologies for being away for a few weeks. I was distracted with other projects.

  • I’ve taken some liberties with the provided translations. I think this was the intended interpretation. As @KJules wrote: In other news, puppies!

  • This translation is a 3-5-3.

  • Note the corrected reading for (いか)

Current senryu challenge

Volume: Children

  1. 注射以後孫は行き先確かめる

Some good kanji practice here today!

My interpretation:

I think this is an example of “once bitten, twice shy”. The grandchild wants to ensure the grandparent isn’t taking them somewhere they won’t like!


Remember to please use the spoiler tag with your translation attempts! Also, please include the reading in kana with your submission.

Everyone is encouraged to participate, no matter your level! Questions and comments are as valued as translation submissions.

Please try not to be disappointed if your translation isn’t selected or if you disagree with the daily choice: the judge isn’t terribly consistent with his grading (and has awful taste!).
Online tools like dictionaries, sentence databases, and even AI translation engines are fair game and can be extremely helpful. Yomichan is particularly handy if you use the Chrome or Firefox browser. The 語源(ごげん)由来(ゆらい)辞典(じてん) is also an excellent resource for researching the etymology of various words and expressions.

Here are the links to the 356 Japanese originals (spoiler free) and to the the spreadsheet with all the upcoming senryu as well as the translations to date.

4 Likes

ちゅうしゃいごはいきさきたしかめる

post-injection,
the grandchild asks “where
are we going?”

The main trouble with this one for me was trying to eliminate the English ambiguity around the word “shot.” I had “after the shot”, but didn’t like how that came across in English. And trying to shoehorn “getting a shot” into it reduced ambiguity but was just too many syllables haha. So I went with the more clinical (but harder to misinterpret) “injection”, which is unfortunately a chunky one, syllable-wise.

6 Likes

Heh. The challenge is putting it into English for sure.

Recent events may provide a few additional alternatives, though:

  • Jab
  • Inoculation
  • Vaccine (not specified but not a bad guess)
  • Booster (also over-specific and veers too far from the original but might work)
1 Like
  1. 注射以後孫は行き先確かめる
    (ちゅうしゃいごまごはいきさきたしかめる)

Once jabbed, twice shy
My grandchild views an outing
With suspicion

4/7/4

4 Likes
  1. 注射以後孫は行き先確かめる
    (ちゅうしゃいごまごはいきさきたしかめる)

Post-vaccine jitters
My grandson wants to know
Where we are going

5/6/5

1 Like
  1. 注射以後孫は行き先確かめる
    (ちゅうしゃいごまごはいきさきたしかめる)

Since the jab
Hesitation
“Where to, Gramps?”

3/4/3

2 Likes

Wednesday, January 11, 2023


Previous senryu

  1. 注射以後孫は行き先確かめる
    ちゅうしゃいごまごはいきさきたしかめる
    Once jabbed, twice shy
    My grandchild views all outings
    With suspicion

Notes:

  • Upon review, I like @nemurineko’s first submission best after slight modification (still 4/7/4). My best effort was this 4-7-4 (15 syllables, same as @nemurineko). It’s a little more direct of a translation:

    Grandchild after
    inoculation: confirms
    destinations

  • It tickled me a little to use both a 5-syllable and a 4-syllable word

  • Note that ()(さき) can be plural (and the plural seems to work better in English)

  • One more attempt at merging several attempts (4-5-4):

    Post-jab grandchild
    now confirms every
    destination

Current senryu challenge

Volume: Various Settings

  1. パノラマの隅に意外なツーショット

I suspect we may need to use one of our “Phone-a-Native” lifelines for this one.

Katakana-go:

  • パノラマ • A panorama (I presume usually photographic)
  • ツーショット • A “two shot,” a photo of a couple (usually male and female?). This is from my dictionaries — I’ve never heard this before in my life!

My best guess: Maybe a secret affair was captured in the corner of someone’s panoramic photo?


Remember to please use the spoiler tag with your translation attempts! Also, please include the reading in kana with your submission.

Everyone is encouraged to participate, no matter your level! Questions and comments are as valued as translation submissions.

Please try not to be disappointed if your translation isn’t selected or if you disagree with the daily choice: the judge isn’t terribly consistent with his grading (and has awful taste!).
Online tools like dictionaries, sentence databases, and even AI translation engines are fair game and can be extremely helpful. Yomichan is particularly handy if you use the Chrome or Firefox browser. The 語源(ごげん)由来(ゆらい)辞典(じてん) is also an excellent resource for researching the etymology of various words and expressions.

Here are the links to the 356 Japanese originals (spoiler free) and to the the spreadsheet with all the upcoming senryu as well as the translations to date.

4 Likes

パノラマのすみにいがいなツーショット

in the corner
of the photo there’s
a shocking pair

“Panorama” is way too many syllables haha and I ended up giving up on it :sweat_smile:. The meaning seemed rather straightforward to me, but there could be something I’m missing…

5 Likes
  1. パノラマの隅に意外なツーショット
    (パノラマのすみにいがいなツーショット)

A corner of
The panorama
Captured those two.

4/5/4


An error occurred: No more than 3 consecutive replies are allowed. Please edit your previous reply, or wait for someone to reply to you.


  1. パノラマの隅に意外なツーショット
    (パノラマのすみにいがいなツーショット)

A scenic shot
I didn’t notice
Steve and Gladys.

4/5/4

  1. パノラマの隅に意外なツーショット
    (パノラマのすみにいがいなツーショット)

A close-up of
My vista photo
Revealed a tryst.

4/5/4

3 Likes
  1. パノラマの隅に意外なツーショット
    (パノラマのすみにいがいなツーショット)

My landscape
Was marred by their
Canoodling.

3/4/3

6 Likes

Hello everyone,

Summary

If you remember, I was caught lurking here back in post 1186 and I finally got through all the previous posts. The reason my reading pace dropped off until now was due to some unfortunate irl events, but regardless, there have been some very interesting contributions and discussions from you all. I’ve been picking up loads of grammar and vocab (which I should probably have written down there’s so much), cultural context, and even sentence diagramming practices in Japanese.

I really appreciate mulling over all the different interpretations you guys had though I must admit I didn’t agree with all of them and your various senses of humor, all the more since this thread was objectively long and dense.

When I saw this thread I had never heard of a senryuu, but I instantly loved the idea. I must say when I recently scrolled to the bottom to see how far you’d come I was a bit terrified that the thread seemed to be dying (not that I’ve participated at all). I don’t want to jinx it, but I really hope @Rrwrex 's vision of completing all 374 (or at least a good number of those) and publishing them in some way/mailing them back to the OG webpage creator pans out.

TLDR: Glad to be here and continue this wonderful thread.

That being said here’s my try for #164.

  1. パノラマの隅に意外なツーショット
    パノラマのすみにいがいなツーショット

Pano’s edge
An unexpected
Couple

3/5/2 --Could be 2/5/2 if you squeeze the syllables

Unsure if ‘pano’ is too vague without context, it might have to be ‘panorama’ making it a gross 5-5-2. Maybe
Panorama’s
Corner hides an unlikely
Couple
4-7-2 :person_shrugging:
I favor ‘couple’ because, like ツーショット, it has what seems to be a romantic connotation.

7 Likes

So happy to see you made it at last!

I’m still motivated to finish all of them. I emailed the owner of the original site, but never heard back.

Eventually, I hope to turn all this content into an app for the dashboard.

My interest in this project was fading, but I’m very happy you’ve all pulled me back in!

It’s a fair bit of work, and I’ve got any number of things competing for my time, but I do care about this project. My passions tend to pull me in different directions after several months. It’s quite rare that I stick with anything as long as I have with my WK reviews! I’d kinda put this thread on the back burner a bit, but will try to prioritize it higher.

I’m WAY behind on updating the spreadsheet and the link in the top post. I need to tackle that at some point.

The good news is that I’m very, very close to the end of my WK lessons. I’ll still be here and doing my reviews daily for a long time to come, but my working set for reviews should finally start shrinking for real. Hopefully that will give me a bit more time to focus.

I’ll post the next one tomorrow morning.

Cheers!

4 Likes

Sunday, January 15, 2023

Welcome, @WovenSapling. I can’t believe you went back and read this whole thread!


Previous senryu

  1. パノラマの隅に意外なツーショット
    パノラマのすみにいがいなツーショット
    Panorama’s / Corner hides an unlikely / Couple

Notes:

  • I like this one as it captures the essence of each Japanese word.

  • My best effort was a 3-6-3:

    Corner of / panorama, by chance: / a couple

    This cheats with extra punctuation. It also leaves the interpretation up to the reader, which I like.

Current senryu challenge

Volume: whatever

  1. 「お父さん」やさしく呼んでゴミわたす

Oh, good grief. THIS has been the meaning of life all along?

Regardless, I think the only tricky bit is parsing who is doing what in this one. I think that as usual, eliminating the subject is handy for poetry. I think this is an “A did X, then B did Y” usage of で.


Remember to please use the spoiler tag with your translation attempts! Also, please include the reading in kana with your submission.

Everyone is encouraged to participate, no matter your level! Questions and comments are as valued as translation submissions.

Please try not to be disappointed if your translation isn’t selected or if you disagree with the daily choice: the judge isn’t terribly consistent with his grading (and has awful taste!).
Online tools like dictionaries, sentence databases, and even AI translation engines are fair game and can be extremely helpful. Yomichan is particularly handy if you use the Chrome or Firefox browser. The 語源(ごげん)由来(ゆらい)辞典(じてん) is also an excellent resource for researching the etymology of various words and expressions.

Here are the links to the 356 Japanese originals (spoiler free) and to the the spreadsheet with all the upcoming senryu as well as the translations to date.

2 Likes

Here’s a 4-5-4:

Hey honey! Call
him softly and hand
him the trash bag

6 Likes

Interesting.

I read this from the husband’s point of view: “Honey?” she calls me sweetly … I take out the trash.

You interpreted it from a third person’s point of view: someone giving advice to the wife.

Both seem to work.

Since I’m a husband often reminded of forgotten chores, I may be biased!

2 Likes

Yeah, both work and so does it being from the wife’s pov (“I call him and hand him the bag.”) I went with what I did partly because I feel like the husband pov in these husband-and-wife interaction senryu often shades into stereotypical gender-role stuff, partly because the advice phrasing is fewer syllables because it doesn’t need the ‘I’ or ‘she’ for the subject, and partly influence from Roosevelt’s “speak softly and carry a big stick” dictum

5 Likes

I disagree – I think both the person doing the calling and the person handing over the trash bag to be put out are the same person, both logically and because switching subjects midstream like that is unlikely/odd in very short sentences like this one.

4 Likes