Spontaneity

Tonight I went to my aunt's house to tell her about the memorial we had for my brother. Most of this I did in Icelandic, but here or there I slipped into English (I am still really jetlagged). One thing I said in English was that in several of the speeches, people mentioned how spontaneous my brother was. My aunt asked her husband what that word meant, and he could not come up with an Icelandic translation for it. Then his sister and niece came over, and they also could not come up with the right Icelandic translation for the English word 'spontaneous'. Which makes me think spontaneity is a bit lacking here. 

Comments

Ko-Leen said…
not down town late at night :)
March 9, 2009 at 10:30 PM
Anonymous said…
Ég myndi jafnvel segja hvatvísi, en ég held samt að það sé frekar neikvætt á íslensku en jákvætt á ensku. Annars bara snöggur eða duglegur.
March 10, 2009 at 5:29 PM
Thordis said…
Nei, ég held að þó þau hafi ekki fundið orðið þá þýði það varla að íslendingar séu ekki uppátektarsamir (sem er ein þýðingin :) :)

Hér eru til uppátektarsamir íslendingar og ekki, alveg eins og til eru uppátektarsamir ameríkanar og ekki. Hvatvísi er meira impulsive. Annars er íslenska ekki sama lýsingarorða tungumálið og enska... íslenska er nafnorðamál.

Eins og mér finnst erfitt að þýða mindful en íslendingar eru jafn ef ekki meira mindful en ameríkanar.
March 10, 2009 at 8:10 PM
Thordis said…
Annað orð er "fyrirhafnarlaust" (a noun I know :) Erfitt að segja að einhver sé fyrirhafnarlaus en hægt að segja að einhver geri eitthvað án fyrirvara.
March 10, 2009 at 9:41 PM
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