San, sama and other honorifics in translated literature


I have always been told that centuries of Japanese literature had been
successfully translated without keeping "san" or "chan" suffixes. Is it an
unbreakable rule or are there famous examples of such things in respectable
translations?

I remember seeing "chan" in an old French translation of a Tanizaki novel and
I was wondering if this practice was outdated.

If this rule is unbreakable, how to translate things like, for example,
「田中さんをまだ田中様と呼んでいた時代」?




If you prefer natural translation and such name suffixes are not particularly
important in the context, I think you may just rephrase them so that there is
a natural contrast in English (e.g., "Mr. Tanaka", "Master" or "President"
instead of "Tanaka-sama", "Taro" instead of "Tanaka-san"). You may even
rephrase the entire sentence, like "days when I was talking to you more
politely".

If you believe your audience understand those Japanese suffixes (for example
if you're doing an anime fansub), you may choose to directly use them. In rare
cases where the topic is the Japanese-specific name suffixes themselves, you
may have to familiarize readers with those suffixes anyway in some way or
another.

I doubt there is such a thing as "an unbreakable rule" in translation. It's up
to your decision.




If you prefer natural translation and such name suffixes are not particularly
important in the context, I think you may just rephrase them so that there is
a natural contrast in English (e.g., "Mr. Tanaka", "Master" or "President"
instead of "Tanaka-sama", "Taro" instead of "Tanaka-san"). You may even
rephrase the entire sentence, like "days when I was talking to you more
politely".

If you believe your audience understand those Japanese suffixes (for example
if you're doing an anime fansub), you may choose to directly use them. In rare
cases where the topic is the Japanese-specific name suffixes themselves, you
may have to familiarize readers with those suffixes anyway in some way or
another.

I doubt there is such a thing as "an unbreakable rule" in translation. It's up
to your decision.

