The Catcher in the Rye · The Map of Untranslatability

Where the line breaks

ENParts

CatcherThe role Holden invents

in the ryeThe song’s place

the citationBurns, misremembered

ENSourceThe Catcher in the Rye

CatcherSource

in the ryeSource

the citationSource

JA Japanese Published translation ライ麦畑でつかまえて

つかまえて Thins Mechanism mismatch

ライ麦畑 Arrives

— Breaks Cultural reference

Published translation. 野崎孝, Hakusuisha, 1964. The title that became the book’s Japanese name.

JA Japanese Published translation キャッチャー・イン・ザ・ライ

キャッチャー Thins Lexical gap

ライ Thins Lexical gap

— Breaks Cultural reference

Published translation. 村上春樹, Hakusuisha, 2003. A transliteration of the English title.

DE German Usual rendering Der Fänger im Roggen

Fänger Arrives

Roggen Arrives

— Breaks Cultural reference

Usual rendering. The standard German title.

FR French Usual rendering L’Attrape-cœurs

Attrape Thins Connotation

cœurs Breaks Lexical gap

— Breaks Cultural reference

Usual rendering. The established French title. Hearts replace the rye.

Text alternative

Japanese “ライ麦畑でつかまえて” (published translation): breaks: cultural reference. Japanese “キャッチャー・イン・ザ・ライ” (published translation): breaks: cultural reference. German “Der Fänger im Roggen” (usual rendering): breaks: cultural reference. French “L’Attrape-cœurs” (usual rendering): breaks: cultural reference.

Catcher The role Holden invents

An agent noun. Holden’s fantasy is a job: the person who catches children before they go over the cliff. It is also his misreading of the song.

What happens to “Catcher” in each lane
Lane	Form	Status	Break	What happens
Japanese	つかまえて	Thins	Mechanism mismatch	A verb, “catch (them),” not the agent noun. The job-title fantasy thins into an act of catching.
Japanese	キャッチャー	Thins	Lexical gap	The English word, in katakana. Sound kept, sense withheld unless the reader knows English or the note.
German	Fänger	Arrives	—	An agent noun. The role arrives.
French	Attrape	Thins	Connotation	A catcher of something. The something is no longer children at a cliff so much as hearts.

in the rye The song’s place

The field in Burns’s “Comin’ Thro’ the Rye.” Without the song, it is only a field of grain.

What happens to “in the rye” in each lane
Lane	Form	Status	Break	What happens
Japanese	ライ麦畑	Arrives	—	A rye field. The place arrives.
Japanese	ライ	Thins	Lexical gap	“Rye” as sound, not as ライ麦, unless the reader parses the English.
German	Roggen	Arrives	—	Rye arrives.
French	cœurs	Breaks	Lexical gap	The rye is gone. Hearts are a new image.

the citation Burns, misremembered

Cultural reference. The title cites a song Holden has heard wrong. The wrongness is the character. A translation that cannot count on Burns has to teach the song, or abandon it.

What happens to “the citation” in each lane
Lane	Form	Status	Break	What happens
Japanese	—	Breaks	Cultural reference	Burns does not fire for a reader who has not been told. The title does not sound like a song.
Japanese	—	Breaks	Cultural reference	The song is still outside the title.
German	—	Breaks	Cultural reference	The image is translated. The song is not thereby quoted. A German reader still needs Burns supplied.
French	—	Breaks	Cultural reference	The song cannot be heard in a title that has left the field.

The joint

Holden hears a song in the street and builds a vocation out of a word the song does not use. Burns wrote “if a body meet a body, coming through the rye.” Holden wants “catch.” His little sister corrects him. The title is the mishearing, and the mishearing only matters if the reader can feel the original.

German Der Fänger im Roggen is the straight road: catcher, rye, the role intact. The citation still breaks, because Burns is not a German proverb. The translator’s note, or the scene with Phoebe, has to do the work the title did for an Anglophone reader in 1951.

野崎孝’s ライ麦畑でつかまえて describes the act in a rye field and turns the catcher into a verb. 村上春樹’s later title transliterates the English and leaves the meaning in the foreign words. French L’Attrape-cœurs does a third thing, and it is the bold one: it throws the song away and offers hearts. A reader of that title is not failing to remember Burns. Burns was never invited.

Why this break matters to a reader

The cliff, the children, the catcher: those arrive in the chapter where Holden explains himself, in any decent translation of that chapter. The title is the early, quiet version of the explanation. Where the title keeps the field, the reader walks in already standing in the rye. Where the title says “hearts,” the reader walks in under a different metaphor and only later finds the field. Where the title is katakana, the reader walks in under a sound. All three are readings of the book. They are not the same entrance.