Awkward Overuse of "By the way"
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This has been happening in various series, and I've been doing my best to ignore it so I don't have an ongoing list of series it occurs in. But while reading Isekai Tensei Vol. 3, it's bothered me to the point that I just had to pause reading to say something about it. I don't know if it's just a weird translation thing or not, but the phrase "By the way" is so overly saturated in the narrative, that it's really jarring. Mostly because it's used incorrectly (or rather just awkwardly) and it's completely unnecessary. Every single time it's used, the sentence works without it. It's supposed to be more of an aside or an afterthought. But, it's really just being used as a transition to the next thought, as opposed to an addon.
I acknowledge that it's probably just the closest translation that can be found. If that's the case, and nothing else works, just cut it out completely. "By the way" isn't a phrase that's used super often in English, but I'm seeing four sentences start with it on a single page (on multiple pages, by the way) <--- that is how it's used.
So please, either find a better translation, or just cut that phrase from the beginning of sentences.
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I don't speak Japanese, but I'm guessing a lot of what you see is a translation of common Japanese terms such as そういえば (sou ieba) and ところで (tokoro de) that are used to indicate a topic switch, especially into a question.
So while the term could be translated in different ways or not at all the reason it is presumably seen so often is because JNC is translating from Japanese into English and "by the way" is a close translation as you speculate. I have just checked and JNC do use alternative translations for such terms as well.
This isn't something that has ever bothered me, but it might do now my attention has been drawn to it. I don't recall JNC using the phrase four times on one page (and haven't read Isekai Tensei Vol. 3) but if so that sounds excessive. In those cases they might want to consider switching it up a bit and potentially dropping some of the topic change markers. In other cases alternative wording could end just up sticking out more because it is longer or more fancy.
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@Shiny Yeah, I figured it's a translation thing. I just personally feel like whatever the original term in Japanese is has a slightly different contextual feel to it in their language than "by the way" does in English, because it just doesn't flow as well as I assume it does in Japanese. According to cambridge dictionary, it is "used for introducing a statement or subject that may not be directly related to the subject being discussed". So you aptly put into words what I was trying to say with "topic change marker". I'm still reading Isekai Tensei, but I'm on volume 5 now and I'm actually looking at the perfect example of what I'm talking about. Here's an excerpt:
I was making candy. I'd found someone selling sugar syrup yesterday, so I bought a bunch and improved it to create a type of portable food that could easily replenish energy. Candy in this world was just made from sugar syrup, but I'd never seen it in the form of hardened balls, like I was currently making. Gramps and the others said they'd never heard of such a thing either. I'd tried to envision the kind of candies I'd eaten back in my previous world. Luckily, the ingredients were simple, so I remembered how to make them, but I wasn't sure if I'd be successful or not.
I removed "by the way", but did you at any point while reading that think to yourself "hmm, this sentence right here needs a topic change marker"? Now, since it's the topic of this discussion, you can probably guess where it was (start of third sentence). But if I had no idea it was even initially in there, I would have read through that passage without even the smallest hiccup. That's how redundant it is, and since that redundancy is used as often as it is, it draws my attention and pulls me out of the immersion of the story, which is the main thing that bugs me about it. Not that it's enough to make me quit reading or anything, but just compelling enough for me to provide feedback on it.
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@SpaceShorts While you may be correct. I don't agree completely. I speak two languages and I find dictionaries to mean jack shit by themselves. Dictionary is tool to help you understand words but it is not the true. I check several Dictionaries and I always seen to find additional meaning more than I like to. For example if I look for word in my language. Dictionaries would use more words to explain to explain the complexity of the word. But if you ask someone from my language to explain it. More than likely they would use one word to explain it complexity.
Additionally sometimes the author is very particular about certain words. So to us it may seen like the translantion spamming one word for convenience. But in reality the author really is the one spamming it.
I not saying you are wrong but that it is not clear cut.
