Talk:Mahouka Koukou no Rettousei:Volume 1 Chapter 3

There is 4 'sempai' and 6 'senpai' here. Could someone testify which one is the better writing? Arczyx 03:34, 12 July 2012 (CDT)

'Sempai' is traditional Hepburn romanization. According to some, it's because ん is pronounced like 'm' when it comes before 'b', 'p' and 'm'. But as far as I know, that is not true. As far as Japanese are concerned, there is only one way, and no two ways, to pronounce ん. If one speaks and articulates properly at natural speed, ん + 'b'/'p'/'m' WILL SOUND LIKE 'm' to a listener (by closing your mouth quickly after vocalizing 'n'), and not because the speaker articulates or pronounces ん as 'm' sound. So I prefer using 'Senpai'. --larethian 04:00, 12 July 2012 (CDT)

In regards to the translation "I understand. Miyuki and I will call on you then." (分かりました. 深雪と二人でお邪魔させていただきます) I feel like "I understand. Miyuki and I will be imposing on you for the meal" but then that bugs me a bit. Depending on how liberal you want to be, I think "Very well. Miyuki and I will gratefully accept your offer" would still retain the core meaning and formality. Also for the line "Maybe it was to interest Miyuki?" (!), it would be better to use "Maybe it was to recruit Miyuki?" for 勧誘に --Lighthalzen (talk) 00:10, 21 November 2012 (CST)

Why does "Rin-chan" fit her better than Suzune?, I don't understand :c

I assume this is because she DOES look cute (and -chan is usually considered a "cute" honorific, though given only to females you are quite intimate with, if i remember correctly), and that is also the reason she does NOT want to be called that way (it makes her seem less serious, while she's supposed to be a composed member of the commettee)--Liryan (talk) 17:49, 12 September 2013 (CDT)

I think this passage is a bit off: ["Is that so? If we weren't siblings, then we would be lovers, is that what you think?"

Tatsuya calmly countered and quickly defused the explosion. Or more likely accidentally detonated it.
"...Of course, that was a joke."]

I can't confirm on the original, but the situation doesn't really make sense because as written he seems to just imply the other speaker was thinking something, and if that were the case, what's the point in saying you're joking? and why was everyone startled at him logically stating what the other speaker is clearly implying? On the other hand, it would make sense if he actually went and stated the fact himself rather than attributing it to the other, and then after the reaction, came out and reassured everyone it was just a joke. --Liryan (talk) 16:20, 12 September 2013 (CDT)

Also, tenses (among many other things) need to be heavily edited: if the narration is told in simple past tense, there's no reason for some random sentences in present tense unless they're direct thought of th charachters; also, any reference to the past should logically be in past perfect. I will take it on myself to fix this as i read it, unless i receive any objection. Negative clauses should also be looked upon: for now, i'm not editing heavily even though many double negatives (like all those "he didn't look to be misunderstanding things") might possibly be better turned into simple affirmative sentences, as it may be intentional on the author's part, but "nested" negative clauses should definitely be avoided in my opinion ("It looked like he did not misunderstand the situation" --->"It did not look like he misunderstood the situation")--Liryan (talk) 17:11, 12 September 2013 (CDT)

As for the passage Lighthalzen was concerned with, i'm sure you got the meaning of it correct, it's quite obvious actually, japanese people talk overly polite like that all the time (at least in fiction). As for the translation, i'd go with your first literal one, if anything, just to keep the japanese feel to it, as i think pretty much anyone understand it's just courtesy and that they're not really planning on being bothersome.

Another thing i heavily worked on were punctuation marks, often missing while the sentence was phrased as a question, other times retained in japanese usage which is quite different from english (and most non-asiatic languages)

I've finished editing the chapter, would appreciate feedback before moving on to the next --Liryan (talk) 20:21, 14 September 2013 (CDT)