Translation of "kilissanti" in MN86

[sujato]

@greenTara

Thus by picking any one English word, something is lost.

A translator's job is to kill Schrödinger’s cat, again and again and again

It just occurred to me that this is what I’ve been doing as a translator. Every word in Pali, every phrase, everything present and absent, is a fuzzy and indeterminate ball of probability. It’s a cat resting or playing or stretching unseen in a box. A translator opens the lid, quietly and delicately, so as to not disturb the sensitive beast. But alas, with excruciating inevitability, the poor cat drops dead, stiff and lifeless as soon it’s seen. A thousand possible renderings die, and only one …