Seven Seas in Trouble for Heavy alterations and censorship of light novels.
-
@Paul-Nebeling That was my policy until someone at SS's decided that some things were too naughty for our delicate eyes.
-
I've gone back to both the manga and novel translations of Mushoku Tensei, both done by Seven Seas. The manga translation predates the LN translation by about 4 years, and they were done by different translators, with different editors.
The "rape" scene is handled pretty similarly in both. The word "rape" is not used in either translation. The idea that it was a forced action is given in both. In the manga, Lilia says the first time was forced, in the LN she saw it as "her opportunity".
I don't have the original Japanese to fall back on, but both translations are consistent with Paul committing adultery and giving Rudeus two siblings.
So, I'm not seeing where this is a significant change to the story, "to protect our tender sensibilities", or to "make it more marketable".
-
@SomeOldGuy Those weren't the only changes. It seems entire paragraphs are missing. In twitter you can find exactly what was changed. Anyway those changes go beyond what a translation should be, because they change the perception on some characters and parts of the story. As for the "sensibilities" part I think they mean less people would get offended and the "marketable" part is because with the changes they appeal to a wider audience (Lower age rating perhaps...), so more sales.
-
It's interesting for things such as classroom of the elite. Many people think trival changes are fine, but if someone wanted to insert a narrative into media without being blunt there is a technique used in modern journalism that's now being used in all forms of literature called "framing". Framing is a psychological form manipulation in many non fictional literature works. By taking a statement and re-arranging the structure of the sentence or by changing from a statement to a question (that may include added context) does the meaning and result change.
Here is an example in journalism.
"Original: Mr. Hertz interrogated the man in the room with his colleagues and they found no results of spying. ""Modified: Mr Hertz interrogated the man in the room room with his colleagues and found no results in spying."
In this example the original implies a group consensus of no spying. But in the modified section by removing 'they' from the sentence changes the framing that Mr. Hertz was the only one to come to the conclusion of no spying and implies to the reader the rest in the room may not think the same way.
Another example is declaration to question.
"Newsflash! Bob Ross found to be painting forgeries in the park!""Newsflash! Was Bob Ross found to be painting forgeries on the streets of the park?"
This trick changes the qualifier. By changing it to a question and putting "on streets of the park" it asks to qualify the statement did Bob Ross paint forgeries in the park to did Bob Ross paint forgeries on the physical street in the park. This rephrase makes the truth false because the the qualifier now points elsewhere. People will see that no fakes were on the streets but the fact that it happened in park is now obscured.
It's like in literature where characters originally say
Koyabashi: You aren't dressed lightly today.
Luccoa: I was told it was it was drawing unneeded attention. Everything was getting bothersome.Being modified to.
Koyabashi: You aren't dressed lightly today.
Luccoa: I stopped because of the perverted stares were unwanted. It was bothersome.So here it's a tweak but meaning is changed rather easily. Rather than being scolded for dressing lewdly and changing because the whole situation was bothersome it's been rephrase to "I have an issue with being stared and I found those stares bothersome." No longer is it about finding being scolded the issue but the stares.
Now with classroom of the elite it does multiple things on a psychological level to the reader. The omitting of sentences will cause. Changing cold in my heart to the ice in my heart along with the omitted sentences now frames the girl from being gripped with fear and self blame, to anger and no self introspect. This is a cultural difference in mentality between western and Asian for bullying.
Also a heart filled with ice in literature has long implied cooling of emotions, a calm anger. A chilled and cold hear usually references fear.
The following sentences omitting again of removing the idea that accepting reality makes it easier. The sentence leaves up for interpretation but on a surface level by omitting those sentence and only leaving in acceptance of reality it portrays the character as silent resistance with strength. But the omitted lines show the character as weak. So basically the editor couldn't stand the thought of a bullied girl being mentally weak to the point of self depreciating.
As for the last part it was a lot harder without reading the whole chapter but I think the omitting of text causes a framing of shift of blame, removal of doubt and a need to cause readers to view characters a certain way.
-
@SomeOldGuy You don't need the word "rape" to be spelled out to make it clear what happened. But Seven Seas muddles this event to the point where it looks closer to consensual casual fling than forced encounter, which is further muddled by changing straightforward "cheater and rapist" description of a character to "cheater and womaniser". Think how it would change impressions about Paul's techings about consent from the previous chapter and readers impressions on him going forward.
Not to mention that it is only one of half a dozen changes that were spotted because of the anime (there probably are more), which include not only "questionable" stuff like that barn scene, but also random lines and paragraphs like Rudy wanting to use Sylph as chick magnet or, the most recent example, "Let girls fall from the sky" prayer. Which is not only a reference to a very popular anime/manga trope, but is also a damn foreshadowing.
If all of that aren't significant changes, what is? A complete rewrite?
-
@BookManiaReader said in Seven Seas in Trouble for Heavy alterations and censorship of light novels.:
It's like in literature where characters originally say
Koyabashi: You aren't dressed lightly today.
Luccoa: I was told it was it was drawing unneeded attention. Everything was getting bothersome.
Being modified to.
Koyabashi: You aren't dressed lightly today.
Luccoa: I stopped because of the perverted stares were unwanted. It was bothersome.If I encounter something like this, I would probably ask what the line was originally, since Japanese is a language notorious for not having subjects in sentences. As an example, not too long ago, I had a discussion with the translator of The Apothecary Diaries in its correction thread on whether a certain beautiful eunuch himself thinks or is told by people that his beauty could even attract the Emperor--two situations with different implications considering the context.
-
Did we hear any news of Seven Seas correcting the "errors"? Or will they simply try to put this under the rug?
-
@saskir I know they rereleased volume 7 of Classroom of the Elite earlier this month. I didn't really look much into why specifically though, so maybe it's unrelated.
-
@saskir They fixed CotE vol.7 (you can find extensive comparison on r/lightnovels, I won't link it here since it has an amount of text far larger than can be justified by any fair use) and announced fixes of MT volumes 1 and 2. No news about fixing the rest of th volumes yet.
P.S.: here's a small part of that comparison: -
@saskir
This is what they have said recentlyWe’ll be releasing new edits of those books very soon. See these pages for details:
https://sevenseasentertainment.com/books/mushoku-tensei-jobless-reincarnation-light-novel-vol-1/
and
https://sevenseasentertainment.com/books/mushoku-tensei-jobless-reincarnation-light-novel-vol-2/ --LWI've also found that they have also left out an illustration from volume 7 as well. :(
-
I'm glad to have found this thread, I was planning to buy new volumes sometime soon, including some Seven Seas titles. Now though... Yeah, looks like Seven Seas is going to my boycott list.
This is depressing though. I thought at least light novels would be safe from western censorship, but I suppose it was a vain hope...
Edit: I guess I'll wait and see whether I'll continue buying Seven Seas works or not. From what @Timmaaah said, I can see they're releasing edits of MT volume 1 and 2. If it has been truly uncensored and they'll do the same to all other volumes as well, I'll continue buying from them still.
-
Does anybody else own Classroom of the Elite Volume 7 for Kindle? According to the Seven Seas website, the updated editions should be freely available, but my Kindle library is not indicating any updates available, nor does the copy on my device reflect a March 2021 date.
I'm just curious if anybody else has yet been successful to download the update version from Amazon.
-
They did it for skeleton knight as well. "localized" certain scenes that resulted in drastically altering it.
-
@NoirMorter That's the first I heard of that one, what did they change?
-
@NoirMorter Can you please provide some examples so we can check it with japanese edition of LN?
-
@Rawon You have missed your calling. Perhaps a newspaper sub-editor?
-
@gineraay said in Seven Seas in Trouble for Heavy alterations and censorship of light novels.:
@Rawon You have missed your calling. Perhaps a newspaper sub-editor?
Nah, then it'd have to be "Seven Seas SLAMMED by FURIOUS fans over CENSORSHIP: HANDS OFF our stories!"
-
@Rawon Nah, only if the newspaper is a tabloid.
-
@NoirMorter said in Seven Seas in Trouble for Heavy alterations and censorship of light novels.:
They did it for skeleton knight as well. "localized" certain scenes that resulted in drastically altering it.
What was altered? It's one of the series I follow, if this is true, uuh... I assume these are alterations compared to the Japanese light novel releases, and not a matter of differences between the webnovel and light novel(the latter shuffled around quite a lot of the events in the webnovel).
-
[This post has been heavily edited to remove some editorializations and incorporate some insights from later in the thread. I was going to leave this post as-is, but I've learned that it's linked off r/lightnovels and it's possible that a lot of people are not going to read past this post.]
I noticed something odd when a piece I remembered from a translation of the WN for 私の推しは悪役令嬢 didn't show up in the Seven Seas translation of the LN (I'm In Love With the Villainess). It stuck in my head because it was a particularly powerful scene and I felt like the LN's characterization of Rei made her sound like she was unrepentant in her harassment, when in the WN, she felt guilty about it but was unable to stop herself.
Things change between WN -> LN all the time, so I didn't think anything of it at the time, but now that I know that Seven Seas had removed things from other novels, I went bought the GL Bunko version to compare. I found that that scene appears in full in the LN exactly as it did in the WN, and that the Seven Seas translation is the first publication not to include it.
Original:
「私たちにもっとこうして欲しい、とかそういうことはある？」
「んー、別にないかな。私はクレア様を毎日愛でられるだけで幸せだし」
「あなた、そういうことばっかり言っているから、私も身の危険を感じるんですのよ？」うん、その点は全面的に私が悪い。
言ってみれば、前世において同性愛者の偏見をまき散らしていた、同性愛を売りにする芸能人のような振る舞いを私自身がしているようなものである。でも――。
「茶化さないとやっていけないんですよねー」
ははは、と私は笑った。でも、その笑いには誰も呼応してくれなかった。Seven Seas:
“Is there any objectionable behavior I ought to change?” Lene asked.
“No, not really. I’m just happy to dote on Claire every day,” I said.
“It’s because you’re always saying those sorts of things that I worry!” Claire whined.
Perhaps that was true, and if I was overstepping boundaries,then that was my bad.But then again… “I just can’t live without poking fun at you,” I said, laughing. But I was laughing alone.
And then later in that same chapter, even more egregious, but cut for what I can only assume is the same reason:
Original:
「あはは」
「……」もう完全にいつも通りだ。さっきまでのシリアスな感じは霧散している。私がクレア様をいじり、クレア様がムキになり、レーネが宥めて、ミシャがそれを見守っている。本当にいつも通りだ。
そう、いつも通り。いつも通りに、私はちょっとだけ……本当にちょっとだけ辛い。
前世において、よく、同性愛者への偏見を無くそうとする識者が、テレビに出てくる同性愛を売りにした芸能人を批判することがあった。その主張はきっと正しくはあるのだろう。でも、私はこうも思う。真偽のほどは定かじゃ無いけど、茶化してでもいないとやってられないんじゃない人もいるんじゃないか、と。もちろん、そういう芸能人が偏見を拡大しているのは事実だ。出来れば偏見もなくなった方がいい。でも、現実にいる同性愛者の人でも、わざとそういった偏見が求めるような振る舞いを自らする人は一定数存在する。理由は人それぞれだろうが、中にはいると思うのだ。茶化さないと生きていくのが辛いっていう人たちが。人を好きになっても、応えて貰えることはほとんどなくて、何も言わなければ異性よりも近くにいられるけど、好きになった瞬間から誰よりも遠い。そんなことを何度も繰り返している内に、知らないうちに笑い飛ばすしかなくなってしまったような人たちがいるのではないだろうか。同性愛者の全員がそうだとは決して言わない。でも、少なくとも私はそうだった。「クレア様」
Seven Seas:
"Ha ha ha."
The serious talk had finally ended. I teased Claire, Claire got angry, Lene soothed her, and Misha watched it all happen with a resigned look. Things were back to normal.
Normal. And like always, I felt a bit…sad.
“Miss Claire?”Linking WN translations for licensed works is taboo, so I'll do my best to translate the passage in question myself. (For readers coming here from reddit and don't know me - I barely speak any Japanese. I may be proud of what I do know and eager to share, but this translation was the work of me muddling through with a dictionary and some basic knowledge of grammar. It's not authoritative, and is 100% guaranteed to contain mistranslations. Please don't quote me.)
“Is there any objectionable behavior I ought to change?” Lene asked.
“No, not really. I’m just happy to dote on Claire every day,” I said.
“It’s because you’re always saying those sorts of things that I worry!” Claire whined.
Yeah. This was absolutely my bad. In a manner of speaking, I was spreading homophobia myself. Just like those entertainers in my past life who exaggerated their homosexuality to sell a character.But then again…
“I guess I couldn't go on if I didn't joke like that, you know?” I said, laughing. But I was laughing alone.(@Gamon corrected me later in this thread - the line doesn't necessarily imply exaggerations and says nothing about characters. A better translation might be
Yeah. This was absolutely my bad. In a manner of speaking, I was spreading homophobia myself. What I was doing was the same as some entertainers from my past life who would make homosexuality their gimmick)Out of context, "I just can’t live without poking fun
at you" is a perfectly legitimate translation, because the object of 茶化す (to make fun of) is never specified - but the other segment provides the context."Ha ha ha."
"..."
The serious talk had finally ended. I teased Claire, Claire got angry, Lene soothed her, and Misha watched it all happen with a resigned look. Things were back to normal.
Normal. And like always, I felt a bit…sad.
In my past life, there were progressives who wanted to eliminate homophobia would criticize TV-entertainers who made their homosexuality into a gimmick.Those people were undoubtedly right.
But I think there was more to it.
Regardless of it was right or wrong, there were people who couldn't go on if they didn't make fun of it.Of course, it's a fact that those entertainers amplified prejudice.
And if possible, it'd be good if prejudice died out.
But the sad truth is that there were gay people who'd act in a way to invite prejudice on themselves like that.
I think each of them had their own reasons.
For some people, mockery was probably the only way they could deal with the pain.People we came to like would almost never reciprocate. If we didn't say anything to them, we could get closer to them than someone of the opposite sex, but the moment we started to like them, we'd be more distant than anyone
After repeating that over and over again, before we knew it, we'd become someone who could only laugh at it. People like that surely existed.
Not all gay people are like that.
But, at the very least, I was.“Miss Claire?”
This makes it absolutely clear that the person Rae is saying she can't go on without making fun of in the first excerpt is
herselfand her own life, though she never says that out loud. In the Seven Seas translation, Rae is just completely unrepentant in her sexual harassment and makes it sound like she's just doing it to get a rise out of Claire. And yeah, It's also a bit of an author tract, and the references to "entertainers who make homosexuality their gimmick" could plausibly be argued to not work for some western readers (I'm not aware of any western equivalent of ハードげイ), but I don't think that would be a good enough reason to remove it.(Edit: Removed some editorializations.)
