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evident in his highly colloquial style, which is still unusual in the discourse of recipe writing. He often addresses the reader directly (using the pronoun 'you' far more frequently than Delia) and offers personal explanations, comments and even apologies in his recipes. He is famously imprecise in his quantities, too, frequently asking for 'a splash', 'drizzle' or 'handful' of an ingredient. And his language has a powerful physicality: the oven is heated 'to full whack', wine is 'sloshed' into sauces and further ingredients are 'tipped', 'thrown' or sometimes 'chucked in' before the resulting meal is 'whacked' onto the table. This is the language not of a domestic science teacher but of someone talking his mate through his favourite pasta dish. His discourse invites the reader to place trust in his combination of practical experience and straightforward 'normal-ness' rather than in any natural authority – hence expert friend rather than teacher. This 'expert friend' role, and its associated style, is unusual in English cookbooks and may contribute significantly to Jamie Oliver's success in this country. Analysis of an admittedly limited section of the German cookery book market suggests that it is at least as rare in that language. Much German recipe writing is strongly didactic, with sparse, often itemised instructions and very few attempts to address the reader personally. Use of first-person pronouns seems virtually non-existent and any discussion, clarification or explanation (as opposed to instruction) is relegated to the status of post-scripted 'tips'. © 'JAMIE OLIVER', REALLY SHORT, 9/11/08 VIA WIKIPEDIA (CC BY 2.0) From friend to teacher At first sight, it appears that Jamie's German translations retain much of the informal style. They show a greater tendency to address the reader directly than homegrown German cookery texts. First-person expressions are often retained, as well as the imprecise and physical measurements of quantity (handfuls, glugs, etc), as in this example from Jamie's Great Britain (2011): Toss [the pasta] with your sauce and a little splash of the cooking water to make it silky then add a nice handful of cheese. Taste and check the seasoning then serve immediately with another good sprinkling of cheese, a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil and some fresh thyme tips. Vol/52 No/3 2013 Back translation of target text: Turn the pasta in the sauce, mix in 1 dash of cooking water so that it becomes nice and creamy, and mix in 1 handful of cheese. Season to taste, round off with more cheese, some olive oil and fresh thyme and serve immediately. The use of the digit '1' in place of the indefinite article lends terms like 'dash' and 'handful' an oxymoronic precision – '1 dash of cooking water' looks more precise than 'a little splash'. The phrase 'a nice handful' probably means a large one, but the idea of measurements as physical or visual quantities, rather than weights, has been retained. Where the style moves from informal to strongly colloquial, however, the German translation tends to be bowdlerised. In one recipe, Jamie describes John Dory as 'a really wicked fish'; in translation, the entire sentence is omitted. In an example from The Naked Chef (1999), strongly colloquial language is rendered quite unexceptionable in German: I'm afraid that this is a clichéd and obvious combination but it is quick and bloody good, so try it. The phrase 'bloody good' might have been translated as saugut or verdammt gut but perhaps this was deemed unacceptable. The back translation reads: At the risk that this combination looks too banal: it is quickly prepared and tastes really good. There is also a tendency to eliminate any uncertainty in the English discourse. Take this example, again from The Naked Chef: I don't always stuff the chicken but when I do I generally go with lemon, bay and rosemary, which I push into the cavity at this point […] To me the perfect roast chicken has tender moist breast meat, crisp skin and, dare I say it, over-cooked thigh meat. Back translation of target text: I fill the belly with lemon slices, bay leaves and rosemary. […] The perfect roast chicken has a soft, juicy breast and a crispy skin. The flesh on the thighs must properly fall apart. Elements of the source text that appear advisory or apologetic ('I don't always… but when I do', 'To me' and 'dare I say it') are absent from the German version, which includes the directive modal verb muss BOOK SHELF Cook books by Jamie Oliver and 'national treasure' Delia Smith ('must') and re-words the final sentence so as to avoid any suggestion that Jamie approves of 'over-cooking'. The effect of this is to move his character away from the 'expert friend' role towards the more conventional 'authoritative teacher'. Given that style and discourse themselves convey meaning, this in turn implies an important shift in communication between the two languages. This exemplifies a conflict that frequently bedevils translation: to what extent should it faithfully reflect the source culture, and to what extent should it adapt to the expectations of the target culture? The adaptation of Jamie's work to the German recipe genre changes his relationship with his readers. In doing so, it also changes what he is saying to them. It may be true that the outcome – the meal ultimately served – will differ very little. But won't the cook feel differently about it? Or about Jamie? And isn't that at least partly the point of recipe books? The reader's confidence in the recipe surely rests, to a degree, on their relationship with the writer. Most interesting of all, perhaps, is one further question: if it is not in the novel nature of his relationship with his readers, where does Jamie Oliver's appeal to his German audience lie? Notes 1 Andrews, M, 2003, 'Nigella Bites the Naked Chef: The sexual and sensual in television cookery programmes' in Floyd, J & Foster, L (eds), The Recipe Reader, Aldershot, England, Ashgate, pp.187-204