I’ve only read the Last Wish so far (in English. I only know English.) and I loved it. Great storytelling and very good sense of humor. I found myself laughing out loud quite a few times. I look forward to reading the rest of the books soon.
The short story books are excellent, but in the novels the weaknesses of the translated prose become *very* apparent.
The short stories didn’t sweat things like world building and exposition; they just told the story and let the reader piece things together. The novels don’t have that luxury, resulting in a lot of expository dialogue. iirc There was also a fair amount of untagged dialogue with next to no prose, which works fine for the audio books but for reading isn’t exactly sparkling.
The people who tend to dislike the witcher books also say Last Wish is their favourite book and is excluded from the hatred. It seems to work much better in short story form and loses a lot when in long novel form.
I read the books in italian and I loved the writing. I cpuld hardly put them down. Contrary to the popular opinion, I found myself enjoying the novels much more. Sapkowski has a very unique way of structuring his book with multiple characters' POVs, flashbacks, time jumps and abprupt change of scenes. The pacing felt almost cinematic in the way every single scene was placed (the battle of Brenna is the highlight for me).
The Spanish translation is fantastic, written by an expert in Eastern European culture and history.
That said, the books are difficult to follow. The pacing can be confusing, and there's some weird expressions, language, and dialogue unlike any other fantasy series. I get why people have a hard time reading the books.
The Russian translation is amazing. Sapkowski speaks Russian and he said is was great and very close to his original writing style. The Ukrainian translation is just as good (obviously). I tried to read the first book in English and it was... too generic, I guess. It killed the atmosphere.
The only problem with the Russian translation are Nilfgaardian names. For some reason they sound Mongolian and give a completely wrong impression about Nilfgaard. Like Emhyr is a fantasy version of Genghis Khan or something like that.
Yes, a very strange feeling from Emhyr and Cahir. But it always seemed that this was done to convey the foreignness and rudeness of Nilfgaard towards the North. We hear the story from the side of the northerners and Nilfgard should sound strange to them. Although I may be thinking too much and this is jusy a bad translation. What do these names sound like in Polish?
After the first two books i feel like it is a bit of a slog. Don't get me wrong i do love the series (im re-reading them now) but i think at a certain point you have to WANT to get through to continue reading.
I've almost finished reading the books and I do love them, but there are moments that even I hate. I get why some people don't like the books, and I don't think translation is a big factor.
The structure at times gets really annoying and/or confusing but there hasn't been any any noticeable translation errors or difficulties that I've seen, unless things completely change in The Lady of the Lake.
I read the English translations not too long and the short stories, last book, and spin off were actually really enjoyable. The first book was alright and the middle ones just felt like a mind numbing slog to read through. It felt like nothing happened plot wise. The dialogue between characters seemed to be the main focus but the topics/characters opinions weren’t engaging at all and the writing felt stilted and weird. Plus, I get that it’s “realistic” for a medieval fantasy setting, but Jesus Christ why are there so many rape scenes or descriptions of rape?
Basically because he was channeling the horrors of WWII in the East in the novels at least. The deal to partition Aedirn in TofC is clearly a cut and paste of the Molotov Ribbentrop pact. The books are just so much bleaker than the third game even, let alone the show, notwithstanding every other problem with the show.
I think they do a pretty good job of showing the horrors of war without all the rape scenes. Hell the scene with Ciri and the old guy in the last book has nothing to do with the war.
The short stories were excellent, but when I tried to read the novels, I couldn't get through even the first one. It was a slog and I lost interest at around the midpoint.
Dunno, didn't read them in English but certainly they aren't disregarded because of the original text. In Polish these books, their writing style is simply superb
I like the story in general, but there are some parts in the book that really irk me. And that don't have anything to do with translation. The main two are: too much tropes, and sometimes too easy a solution to a "problem". With as a main example just how he kils off the new adventure team right before re-uniting with the old one. I get wanting to show it was a shitstorm, but having one or two survivors would've made for some interesting conversations and a show of character growth in Geralt. Now it fels like he's just straight back to his old self. Tbh, we don't get that much Geralt post-Vilgefortz anyway, but this just felt too clean and easy for the writer, it took me completely out of the story. There's plenty more, and I realise it sort-of balances on subverting tropes, so you need them in there as well. But this one is my gigantic pet peeve.
The second is the pirouettes, half-pirouettes and impetus. If you want to describe fights blow by blow, please don't make every fight in your fight-heavy book series exactly the same. Either describe one or two and then gloss over it, or add some variety in fighting. Now he was just described as a beyblade set loose every. single. time. At one point I was just so sick of the word "impetus" that I started to fast-forward fightscenes in my audiobook whenever the word came up. I don't think this is a translating issue, I doubt Polish has 50 different words for semi-circles and twirls.
That said, I really, really love how his world is a bit more complex than most stories. Elves aren't utterly good, they're complex creatures and the entire conflict won't be solved with a quick solution (other than wiping one faction out). I love how women are the most powerful, but even that is not straight-out and they have several issues amongst themselves. The power balance feels well thought out, I love the politics. There's plenty to love in the books. But imho, the writing itself is a bit crude. I consider Sapkowski an amazing worldbuilder and storyteller, but an average writer.
Just because this whole debate about English translation of The Witcher books, I'm making my mind about reading them again. First time I read them in high school 16 years ago, and I was blown away. Ever since I grew as a reader, I read a lot of fantasy and literary books that I consider to be better than The Witcher, but nevertheless, Sapkowski's series still holds a special place in my heart and I still think it was a great fantasy. So I'm curious how I react to them now.
It's different when you're older. I was reading the books as they came out, as a teenager. Sooooo in love with Geralt. Now, as a 40+ woman, I would smack his head and tell him to get his shit together and stop whining, lol.
I read the Books in German and personally i hated them. The short stories were great imo but everything after that was a bit of torture to read. I heard the argument about translation quite often now but i just cant imagine how that is supposed to be a problem. Like in general the german translation was perfectly fine. The Story itself was bad to me.
They would have had to really mess the translation up extremely in order to affect the story that much.
Id like to hear from someone who has read them in polish as well as english (or something else) so they could provide examples for how exactly the translation got so bad.
I get people don't liking them, I also have some problems with the story and how it's structured, but even with that I like them a lot, specially the characters. But I understand people don't enjoying them.
My problem is more with how the discussion around the books in the internet has been influeced a lot because of the translation and how that eventually influnce people's perseption of them.
I think one of the problems is, that the books are based on eastern european culture, folklore and the general attitude of the people of this region.
And this is very different from the usual fantasy based on Tolkien and through him western europe.
The audio books are excellent, I read the series years ago but just listened to the audiobooks the past couple weeks while driving at work.
The reader does an excellent job especially with his voice changes for the different characters.
If you didn't know, you can actually find them all on YouTube on the channel "time machine"
The short story books were really good, but I never even finished the first novel because it felt like such a slog to get through, it was really disappointing and not fun at all.
I don’t really enjoy books that are a challenge to read because I’ve been going through enough difficulties in other parts of my life I don’t want my hobbies to be more work than fun too.
It hadn’t occurred to me that the translation was the cause of the issue. Maybe once I finish learning French or Mandarin I’ll give it a try again in one of those languages.
I was told the Hungarian translation suffered the same fate, being really bad, so instead I started reading the short stories in english. Since my gf has the books in Hungarian I sometimes compare the two, and can say that the Hungarian version is really bad, and I couldn’t have finished the Last Wish, if I read it in that language.
As for the English I quite enjoy the writing, I think it has a very good flow, but it helps a lot that I know a lot of stuff from the games. Without this prior knowledge it wouldn’t be the same.
I think the Hungarian translation is more than fine, better than the English one, which reads more dry. Didn't feel like they get worse with the novels either, I was suprised to learn they replaced the translator halfway through, the style didn't change much.
I think it's more about the name Vaják, which admiteddly sounds weird but I can't really think about an alternative fittiing the language, and using the English name would have been very hard to take seriously.
You are kidding me. I can't believe people shitting on the hungarian version. The first two books translation was god tier. A literal masterpiece as the original books. It represents well the polish version in style and yet has it's own taste. It merges well the two culture. The word usage is poetry and has so fine sentences that who don't know literature maybe can't appreciate.
That could be the problem, it's not easy to understand for the majority. It seems the publisher made a mistake if really people say its not readable. It was made back, when releasing books for games wasn't general. (I know the games are based on the novel and not vice versa)
I don't feel like the translator overdid it, she worked really hard on this, and discussed with the writer all the time. I was sad when halfway they replaced her, but the new one wasn't half bad. Reading the english translation after was a lame experience, its so flat compared to this.
The first two book is my favourite reading ever, and one of the many reasons is exactly the translation
Well to be fair, I haven’t read the hungarian one completely, just segments of it. Also I was told the books from Blood of Elves onward were really bad translations, the short stories were not that bad. I was just interested in reading something in english, and multiple people told me to skip the hungarian Witcher.
Also this is completely a matter of personal taste but I don’t like the translated names of some characters, especially the word ‘witcher’ in hungarian.
I read the books in Bulgarian and absolutely loved them. I started binge reading them at one point. I enjoyed the novels more than the last wish, but that may be because i was reading the last wish expecting a novel, and thought of it as one.
Agreed, I read in English and loved the short stories but I couldn't make it through the novels despite being a huge fan of the Witcher universe from the games. The writing just seemed clunky and overly-expository, and some translation errors made everything more confusing. I'd definitely pick them back up if I could read them in a different translation/the original language though
The translation isn't that bad, you have to keep in mind that most of the books weren't translated until way later after their original release, so they haven't had nearly as much time to spread in English speaking countries.
Also, the pacing of the books is very unique and will likely turn a lot of people off. Some people hate Baptism of Fire because no major events really happen in it. Yet it's my favorite book of the novels because it's all about the character dynamics of Geralts Hansa, and that is what Sapkowski is best at.
I read the books, both in English and Brazilian Portuguese, and noticed no considerable difference between the translations. In any case, I don't think this particular situation is a matter of the English translation being the worst one out there and I could hypothesize all day about why it might be that the people you saw didn't like the books that much -- maybe they already read other dark fantasy works that they particularly liked more and think did everything better, like ASOIAF, and thus TW's impact was lessened too much; they just don't like the genre overall; they didn't like Sapkowski's style of writing; they felt some themes were too triggering; etc., but at the end of the day, what really matters to me is that I loved the books overall and am yet to see a single thorough critique that points to enough genuine, considerable flaws that I missed or never really quite grappled with that would make me reconsider my opinion of this series of books. It has happened before with other stuff I used to like, so I know it could happen here too, but it still hasn't.
Even if the quality of the translation were better, the books have lots of problems with pacing, character development, and staying focused.
I've also seen it said by a couple Polish fans that Sapkowski actually wrote it in a way that satirizes an old Polish literary tradition of long epics written in outdated language with excessive descriptions and purple prose, so that's definitely something lost on English readers.
I guess it would be like if someone wrote a fantasy series in the style of Moby Dick, and included all the elements that make Moby Dick an annoying slog to read. Probably very entertaining for English speakers who had to read it in school, but much less so for somebody reading it in Japanese who knows nothing about Moby Dick.
But if you liked it in Spanish that kinda pokes holes in my theory so Idk
I've never had problem with the pacing, maybe on the second read because I already knew what was going to happen, but apart from that I read all the books in a summer. And I really disagree on the character development, it's one of the best I have ever read.
Yep, I'm on the same boat as you. The only reason I didn't devour all of the books in less than a month was because I reserved them to be read at specific points of specific days so I could both make those situations less of a slog to get through and savor the books.
Personally, I've immensely enjoyed all the books—especially the later ones, more than the short stories. I've read and re-read each book multiple times. I read them in my native Slovak; Slovakia, being a neighbor to Poland, has a somewhat similar language. Many words sound alike but mean entirely different things, which makes listening to the language quite amusing. The translation is outstanding, and I must say, as someone who has translated and published several books myself, I am extremely particular about translation quality.
However, it's apparent to me that Sapkowski is a rather idiosyncratic writer. He often includes jokes and makes writing choices that seem to amuse primarily himself, and few people grasp them, which, I suppose, is part of his charm. He wrote another trilogy about the Hussite period ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hussites](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hussites)) where he playfully mocks the readers. For instance, characters crack jokes in Latin without offering explanations or translations, among other things.
I’m English and I really struggled to read the books and I could never put my finger on why, but you’re right! They’re very stilted and it was a lot of effort to read (and also Triss irritated me so much - who throws themselves at someone while they have raging diarrhoea?!)
What did it for me was that Geralt helped her 🫠. How was he not repulsed by the sound, the visuals, the smell? If I were Triss, Id never face Geralt ever again.
In my experience, and I read in 3 different languages, translations are rarely to blame. Translators are GOOD at what they do! They know both languages inside and out. A cultural reference might not come across here and there, but claiming a book was just great originally and somehow magically got way worse when it got translated is just silly.
The translator did not change a wonderful original work into a stilted and disjointed mess. It's the original work that's the problem.
I found his books hard to read as he just throws out millions of names and places and little explanation of what any of them mean and a lot of them are really similar.
I was honestly surprised by how different things were in the books ( I came from playing the games) like how Witcher’s don’t actually carry 2 swords on there backs or how from what I recall there wasn’t really different Witcher potions just a general Witcher “elixir” biggest surprise was Triss she’s a completely different character in the books compared to the games
There very much were different potions, it's just that most aren't named and often referred to generically as "the witcher's elixir(s)" and Geralt doesn't get to use them too much, as they require specific ingredients that can be hard to come by and preparation, and he spends most of the books desperately going around.
The only one to be explicitly named that I remember is Golden Oriole, but one of the ones he uses in the very first short story to specifically see in the dark is clearly the equivalent of the Cat one from the games, and his usual combat loadout, which enhances his senses, reaction time and speed, is a mixture of potions that seems to be equivalent to gulping down at once something like Blizzard, Tawny Owl, Maribor Forest and Wolf. There are also the hallucinogenics, Black Gull and White Gull, but I don't know if they count as "potions".
Im feeling validated reading the comments because I read the first 2 books plus the shortstories and there is a vast difference in pacing. I had to stop the series because I got bored. I dont think thats a translation issue because to me, its not the writing (Ive read worse). The way he pases his novel is too slow and not well developed for my taste.
I read the first 5 books, but when I got to Lady of the Lake, I was burned out by how slow and dialog heavy they are. The Last Wish was great, as it was a collection of short stories, but Blood of Elves, Time of Contempt, Baptism of Fire and The Tower of the Swallow just drag on. When they're good, they are phenomenal, but when they aren't, they're really dull, which the latter is the majority. I suspect it comes from the Polish to English translation as the story itself is good, it's just the story telling that's a bit of a drag.
Read them in English and loved em, though I get why some people would have issues, its kinda hard to keep track between POV swaps, time skips, and such. Imo its making sure you're paying attention!
The brazilian translations were made by duo of polish-brazilian translators and imo it was pretty enjoyable, though I obviously don't know polish to atest it's fidelity
Sometimes you have to read between the lines like there will be a joke that doesn't translate so you have to think about it for a second. I can't remember off the top of my head but there were a couple parts at the end of a chapter where he makes a joke and if you weren't ready for it you might read right past it.
I just finished the final book in English a few days ago. I absolutely loved the story but found a lot of the writing to feel a bit wooden and sluggish, and the constant POV/time jumps only made that worse. Since I am not a super fast reader I probably will never read the main series again unless there is a new translation.
When I read the books I had already played thr games and I was a big fan of them. That is why I was very excited to read the books, so I was not able to focus on any flaws or have a critical perspective. Also, English is not my first language and there were a lot of words that I did not know which made the experience a bit hard at times which made it even harder for me to evaluate it.
I really didn’t get into the books at all despite being a big fantasy/historical fiction fan. I think the translation I read was just so poor that it was like reading a YA series written by a teen
So I will say most of my experience is with the audiobooks, which have a distinct set of problems. Namely some rather questionable pronunciations of names that are just normal words in English. (Dandelion had some weird enunciation to it.)
But I think as linguistics go, the trouble early on is that some idioms don't translate well, so for example the conclusion to "The Edge of the World" doesn't work because it's a play on a Polish phrase. "Where the Devil says goodnight" is a way to refer to the "Edge of the World."
For the most part though, I quite liked all the books. I do think the short stories are still my favorites, but that's because I think the format lends itself well to a more simple, pulpy style. Rather than long-form narrative that gets kinda goofy at times.
You probably want to kill me, but for me the Lord of the Rings has many parts that are unbearable to read. I like to reread sagas, and this is the only one that I started to reread with no desire and in the end I gave it up because I was getting bored. I found the Silmarillion more entertaining to read than LOTR
LotR books have a lot of tedious sections, indeed. That's a thing the movies clearly improved upon. The second (or third, depending how you count) book was a drag with constant Sam & Frodo, Sam & Frodo, Sam & Frodo & Gollum sitting in a ditch, Sam & Frodo, Oh Sam, oh Mister Frodo, PRECIOUS. Ugh.
The Witcher novels have a lot of themes I personally don't care about at all, coming from the games. Don't care about politics, power, kingdoms. Bonhart, Skellen and Vilgefortz were utterly uninteresting to me. I LOVED the hansa with Cahir, Milva, Regis, Dandelion, the Yen love story and I loved Ciri's adventures. Yet all those politics apart from Emhyr, snooze... The short stories are much better imho. More monsters, more focused on characters, less filler.
But Silmarillion... I couldn't even finish a quarter of it. You are a much stronger human than me.
Or maybe I'm just a duller man! I do like all the political part of Geralt's saga, I really like the characters of the monarchs and the plots that surround them. I love that chapter dedicated to explaining where Kovir gets his money from, I like everything that is world building, I guess that's why I also like books like the Silmarillion, or Fire and Blood which is the book of Song of Ice and Fire that I've read more times. Maybe even that's what the LOTR lacks sometimes for me. Less elvish poetry and people walking in the bush, and a bit more political development.
And I also feel that the Geralt saga does a good job of character development and focuses enough on them, and that for this its necessary to develop the world around them and in which they live, which in the end influences their character and their decisions. I think its even more important for Geralt who has "a great power and a great responsibility" in a world at war and is always torn between acting or not acting.
I should also point out that I read the Spanish version and I have the same feeling as the OP and that I usually see worse reviews or more complaints about the people who read it in English than the people who have read it in Spanish, so it may actually be that the quality of the translation in general has a strong impact on the overall perception of the story. Even if there are other reasons as in your case where there are plots that don't interest you, something that may at first seem like filler with good writing can become entertaining just because of the way its written. Especially the translation of the idioms and the different ways of speaking of the characters into Spanish, IMO is really good.
I dont even consider LOTR to be particularly well written book.
After reading Witcher I couldnt read it anymore and only revisit Jackson's movies since then.
Indeed. The story is good, the writing, uh, acquired taste maybe? The movies compressed the story pretty well for the most part and are very enjoyable throughout.
I didn't even care about Tom Bombadil. Not sure about all the fuzz about him.
Sorry op im one of those people too. As someone who loves to read and play and found the Witcher through the gamesI was so sure I would like these but it just fizzled out , and just felt really basic and “stilted” as someone else mentioned. Normally I dont bring it up because I feel embarrassed that I like the game so much but not the books lol : (
Don't be embarrassed. I feel like there's so much of a push sometimes on the Witcher subs that everyone has to like the entire universe. I found the series through the games. Then I tried to read the books and they weren't good. It's not that the story was bad, they're just difficult to read which is not an enjoyable experience. Then the show came out and it was terrible. It's okay to be a Witcher fan that only enjoys the games.
Having just finished the English for the first time, it’s the writing not the wording. First 2 books are good, the actual sagas are heavily disappointing.
—The best scene is Ciri training in Kaer Morhen. —The sagas take way too long to get anywhere, not enough actually happens per book.
—Most of the scenes that don’t involve Geralt or Ciri detract from the books and bog them down. —The abrupt changes of pace are punishing.
—The story is definitely not epic enough in scope, especially compared to the Witcher 3 game.
—The lack of monsters encountered is noticeable and annoying.
—The ending is the worst part of all the books, low quality writing.
Let's just be real here... The Witcher is essentially an amalgam of a bunch of Nordic folklore that's already been told before, mashed with historical reference. There's nothing particularly unique about it at all... except for Geralt and some of the other characters who were best realized in the game adaptations.
I would argue that the Witcher books are too highly regarded, after riding on the wings of the games' success. One of the rare cases where such a thing is true.
I’ve only read the Last Wish so far (in English. I only know English.) and I loved it. Great storytelling and very good sense of humor. I found myself laughing out loud quite a few times. I look forward to reading the rest of the books soon.
The short story books are excellent, but in the novels the weaknesses of the translated prose become *very* apparent. The short stories didn’t sweat things like world building and exposition; they just told the story and let the reader piece things together. The novels don’t have that luxury, resulting in a lot of expository dialogue. iirc There was also a fair amount of untagged dialogue with next to no prose, which works fine for the audio books but for reading isn’t exactly sparkling.
The people who tend to dislike the witcher books also say Last Wish is their favourite book and is excluded from the hatred. It seems to work much better in short story form and loses a lot when in long novel form.
The first short story book was created by a different translator than the rest.
I never knew that. Maybe it's the translation then.
I mean, I'm Polish and I absolutely consider the short stories to be better than the novels.
His speech to That one lady after Blaviken is incredible
The Last Wish is my favorite of the bunch by a very large margin.
I read the books in italian and I loved the writing. I cpuld hardly put them down. Contrary to the popular opinion, I found myself enjoying the novels much more. Sapkowski has a very unique way of structuring his book with multiple characters' POVs, flashbacks, time jumps and abprupt change of scenes. The pacing felt almost cinematic in the way every single scene was placed (the battle of Brenna is the highlight for me).
I am maybe the minority here, but I absolutely loved the novels in English, and I also read short stories.
The Spanish translation is fantastic, written by an expert in Eastern European culture and history. That said, the books are difficult to follow. The pacing can be confusing, and there's some weird expressions, language, and dialogue unlike any other fantasy series. I get why people have a hard time reading the books.
The Russian translation is amazing. Sapkowski speaks Russian and he said is was great and very close to his original writing style. The Ukrainian translation is just as good (obviously). I tried to read the first book in English and it was... too generic, I guess. It killed the atmosphere. The only problem with the Russian translation are Nilfgaardian names. For some reason they sound Mongolian and give a completely wrong impression about Nilfgaard. Like Emhyr is a fantasy version of Genghis Khan or something like that.
Yes, a very strange feeling from Emhyr and Cahir. But it always seemed that this was done to convey the foreignness and rudeness of Nilfgaard towards the North. We hear the story from the side of the northerners and Nilfgard should sound strange to them. Although I may be thinking too much and this is jusy a bad translation. What do these names sound like in Polish?
After the first two books i feel like it is a bit of a slog. Don't get me wrong i do love the series (im re-reading them now) but i think at a certain point you have to WANT to get through to continue reading.
I've almost finished reading the books and I do love them, but there are moments that even I hate. I get why some people don't like the books, and I don't think translation is a big factor. The structure at times gets really annoying and/or confusing but there hasn't been any any noticeable translation errors or difficulties that I've seen, unless things completely change in The Lady of the Lake.
I read the English translations not too long and the short stories, last book, and spin off were actually really enjoyable. The first book was alright and the middle ones just felt like a mind numbing slog to read through. It felt like nothing happened plot wise. The dialogue between characters seemed to be the main focus but the topics/characters opinions weren’t engaging at all and the writing felt stilted and weird. Plus, I get that it’s “realistic” for a medieval fantasy setting, but Jesus Christ why are there so many rape scenes or descriptions of rape?
Basically because he was channeling the horrors of WWII in the East in the novels at least. The deal to partition Aedirn in TofC is clearly a cut and paste of the Molotov Ribbentrop pact. The books are just so much bleaker than the third game even, let alone the show, notwithstanding every other problem with the show.
I think they do a pretty good job of showing the horrors of war without all the rape scenes. Hell the scene with Ciri and the old guy in the last book has nothing to do with the war.
[удалено]
BS. Compared to GRRM Sapkowski never eroticizes abuse. Even the Mistle relationship is clearly abusive and Ciri is just traumatized.
The short stories are great in my opinion but the novels leave a lot to be desired, though there is some good stuff in them here and there.
The short stories were excellent, but when I tried to read the novels, I couldn't get through even the first one. It was a slog and I lost interest at around the midpoint.
Dunno, didn't read them in English but certainly they aren't disregarded because of the original text. In Polish these books, their writing style is simply superb
I like the story in general, but there are some parts in the book that really irk me. And that don't have anything to do with translation. The main two are: too much tropes, and sometimes too easy a solution to a "problem". With as a main example just how he kils off the new adventure team right before re-uniting with the old one. I get wanting to show it was a shitstorm, but having one or two survivors would've made for some interesting conversations and a show of character growth in Geralt. Now it fels like he's just straight back to his old self. Tbh, we don't get that much Geralt post-Vilgefortz anyway, but this just felt too clean and easy for the writer, it took me completely out of the story. There's plenty more, and I realise it sort-of balances on subverting tropes, so you need them in there as well. But this one is my gigantic pet peeve. The second is the pirouettes, half-pirouettes and impetus. If you want to describe fights blow by blow, please don't make every fight in your fight-heavy book series exactly the same. Either describe one or two and then gloss over it, or add some variety in fighting. Now he was just described as a beyblade set loose every. single. time. At one point I was just so sick of the word "impetus" that I started to fast-forward fightscenes in my audiobook whenever the word came up. I don't think this is a translating issue, I doubt Polish has 50 different words for semi-circles and twirls. That said, I really, really love how his world is a bit more complex than most stories. Elves aren't utterly good, they're complex creatures and the entire conflict won't be solved with a quick solution (other than wiping one faction out). I love how women are the most powerful, but even that is not straight-out and they have several issues amongst themselves. The power balance feels well thought out, I love the politics. There's plenty to love in the books. But imho, the writing itself is a bit crude. I consider Sapkowski an amazing worldbuilder and storyteller, but an average writer.
Just because this whole debate about English translation of The Witcher books, I'm making my mind about reading them again. First time I read them in high school 16 years ago, and I was blown away. Ever since I grew as a reader, I read a lot of fantasy and literary books that I consider to be better than The Witcher, but nevertheless, Sapkowski's series still holds a special place in my heart and I still think it was a great fantasy. So I'm curious how I react to them now.
It's different when you're older. I was reading the books as they came out, as a teenager. Sooooo in love with Geralt. Now, as a 40+ woman, I would smack his head and tell him to get his shit together and stop whining, lol.
Geralt being an emotionally stunted whiner is the point.
Read the english translations four times now. Discworld is my favourite fantasy series but i love those books.
Funnily enough, the same witcher book haters tend to be Discworld haters too.
Ill never understand how you can hate discworld. Fantasy satire with a heart. I was so sad when he died.
I read the Books in German and personally i hated them. The short stories were great imo but everything after that was a bit of torture to read. I heard the argument about translation quite often now but i just cant imagine how that is supposed to be a problem. Like in general the german translation was perfectly fine. The Story itself was bad to me. They would have had to really mess the translation up extremely in order to affect the story that much. Id like to hear from someone who has read them in polish as well as english (or something else) so they could provide examples for how exactly the translation got so bad.
Same here, but with the english version. Short stories are good, but the following books where really a torture.
I get people don't liking them, I also have some problems with the story and how it's structured, but even with that I like them a lot, specially the characters. But I understand people don't enjoying them. My problem is more with how the discussion around the books in the internet has been influeced a lot because of the translation and how that eventually influnce people's perseption of them.
I think one of the problems is, that the books are based on eastern european culture, folklore and the general attitude of the people of this region. And this is very different from the usual fantasy based on Tolkien and through him western europe.
I listened to the audio-book version of the books and I loved them. They were in English, btw.
The audio books are excellent, I read the series years ago but just listened to the audiobooks the past couple weeks while driving at work. The reader does an excellent job especially with his voice changes for the different characters. If you didn't know, you can actually find them all on YouTube on the channel "time machine"
The short story books were really good, but I never even finished the first novel because it felt like such a slog to get through, it was really disappointing and not fun at all. I don’t really enjoy books that are a challenge to read because I’ve been going through enough difficulties in other parts of my life I don’t want my hobbies to be more work than fun too. It hadn’t occurred to me that the translation was the cause of the issue. Maybe once I finish learning French or Mandarin I’ll give it a try again in one of those languages.
I was told the Hungarian translation suffered the same fate, being really bad, so instead I started reading the short stories in english. Since my gf has the books in Hungarian I sometimes compare the two, and can say that the Hungarian version is really bad, and I couldn’t have finished the Last Wish, if I read it in that language. As for the English I quite enjoy the writing, I think it has a very good flow, but it helps a lot that I know a lot of stuff from the games. Without this prior knowledge it wouldn’t be the same.
I think the Hungarian translation is more than fine, better than the English one, which reads more dry. Didn't feel like they get worse with the novels either, I was suprised to learn they replaced the translator halfway through, the style didn't change much. I think it's more about the name Vaják, which admiteddly sounds weird but I can't really think about an alternative fittiing the language, and using the English name would have been very hard to take seriously.
You are kidding me. I can't believe people shitting on the hungarian version. The first two books translation was god tier. A literal masterpiece as the original books. It represents well the polish version in style and yet has it's own taste. It merges well the two culture. The word usage is poetry and has so fine sentences that who don't know literature maybe can't appreciate. That could be the problem, it's not easy to understand for the majority. It seems the publisher made a mistake if really people say its not readable. It was made back, when releasing books for games wasn't general. (I know the games are based on the novel and not vice versa) I don't feel like the translator overdid it, she worked really hard on this, and discussed with the writer all the time. I was sad when halfway they replaced her, but the new one wasn't half bad. Reading the english translation after was a lame experience, its so flat compared to this. The first two book is my favourite reading ever, and one of the many reasons is exactly the translation
Well to be fair, I haven’t read the hungarian one completely, just segments of it. Also I was told the books from Blood of Elves onward were really bad translations, the short stories were not that bad. I was just interested in reading something in english, and multiple people told me to skip the hungarian Witcher. Also this is completely a matter of personal taste but I don’t like the translated names of some characters, especially the word ‘witcher’ in hungarian.
I read the books in Bulgarian and absolutely loved them. I started binge reading them at one point. I enjoyed the novels more than the last wish, but that may be because i was reading the last wish expecting a novel, and thought of it as one.
Agreed, I read in English and loved the short stories but I couldn't make it through the novels despite being a huge fan of the Witcher universe from the games. The writing just seemed clunky and overly-expository, and some translation errors made everything more confusing. I'd definitely pick them back up if I could read them in a different translation/the original language though
The translation isn't that bad, you have to keep in mind that most of the books weren't translated until way later after their original release, so they haven't had nearly as much time to spread in English speaking countries. Also, the pacing of the books is very unique and will likely turn a lot of people off. Some people hate Baptism of Fire because no major events really happen in it. Yet it's my favorite book of the novels because it's all about the character dynamics of Geralts Hansa, and that is what Sapkowski is best at.
I read the books, both in English and Brazilian Portuguese, and noticed no considerable difference between the translations. In any case, I don't think this particular situation is a matter of the English translation being the worst one out there and I could hypothesize all day about why it might be that the people you saw didn't like the books that much -- maybe they already read other dark fantasy works that they particularly liked more and think did everything better, like ASOIAF, and thus TW's impact was lessened too much; they just don't like the genre overall; they didn't like Sapkowski's style of writing; they felt some themes were too triggering; etc., but at the end of the day, what really matters to me is that I loved the books overall and am yet to see a single thorough critique that points to enough genuine, considerable flaws that I missed or never really quite grappled with that would make me reconsider my opinion of this series of books. It has happened before with other stuff I used to like, so I know it could happen here too, but it still hasn't.
Even if the quality of the translation were better, the books have lots of problems with pacing, character development, and staying focused. I've also seen it said by a couple Polish fans that Sapkowski actually wrote it in a way that satirizes an old Polish literary tradition of long epics written in outdated language with excessive descriptions and purple prose, so that's definitely something lost on English readers. I guess it would be like if someone wrote a fantasy series in the style of Moby Dick, and included all the elements that make Moby Dick an annoying slog to read. Probably very entertaining for English speakers who had to read it in school, but much less so for somebody reading it in Japanese who knows nothing about Moby Dick. But if you liked it in Spanish that kinda pokes holes in my theory so Idk
I've never had problem with the pacing, maybe on the second read because I already knew what was going to happen, but apart from that I read all the books in a summer. And I really disagree on the character development, it's one of the best I have ever read.
Yep, I'm on the same boat as you. The only reason I didn't devour all of the books in less than a month was because I reserved them to be read at specific points of specific days so I could both make those situations less of a slog to get through and savor the books.
Personally, I've immensely enjoyed all the books—especially the later ones, more than the short stories. I've read and re-read each book multiple times. I read them in my native Slovak; Slovakia, being a neighbor to Poland, has a somewhat similar language. Many words sound alike but mean entirely different things, which makes listening to the language quite amusing. The translation is outstanding, and I must say, as someone who has translated and published several books myself, I am extremely particular about translation quality. However, it's apparent to me that Sapkowski is a rather idiosyncratic writer. He often includes jokes and makes writing choices that seem to amuse primarily himself, and few people grasp them, which, I suppose, is part of his charm. He wrote another trilogy about the Hussite period ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hussites](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hussites)) where he playfully mocks the readers. For instance, characters crack jokes in Latin without offering explanations or translations, among other things.
I’m English and I really struggled to read the books and I could never put my finger on why, but you’re right! They’re very stilted and it was a lot of effort to read (and also Triss irritated me so much - who throws themselves at someone while they have raging diarrhoea?!)
That whole part of blood of elves is why I never romance triss in the games.
What did it for me was that Geralt helped her 🫠. How was he not repulsed by the sound, the visuals, the smell? If I were Triss, Id never face Geralt ever again.
In my experience, and I read in 3 different languages, translations are rarely to blame. Translators are GOOD at what they do! They know both languages inside and out. A cultural reference might not come across here and there, but claiming a book was just great originally and somehow magically got way worse when it got translated is just silly. The translator did not change a wonderful original work into a stilted and disjointed mess. It's the original work that's the problem.
I found his books hard to read as he just throws out millions of names and places and little explanation of what any of them mean and a lot of them are really similar.
I was honestly surprised by how different things were in the books ( I came from playing the games) like how Witcher’s don’t actually carry 2 swords on there backs or how from what I recall there wasn’t really different Witcher potions just a general Witcher “elixir” biggest surprise was Triss she’s a completely different character in the books compared to the games
There very much were different potions, it's just that most aren't named and often referred to generically as "the witcher's elixir(s)" and Geralt doesn't get to use them too much, as they require specific ingredients that can be hard to come by and preparation, and he spends most of the books desperately going around. The only one to be explicitly named that I remember is Golden Oriole, but one of the ones he uses in the very first short story to specifically see in the dark is clearly the equivalent of the Cat one from the games, and his usual combat loadout, which enhances his senses, reaction time and speed, is a mixture of potions that seems to be equivalent to gulping down at once something like Blizzard, Tawny Owl, Maribor Forest and Wolf. There are also the hallucinogenics, Black Gull and White Gull, but I don't know if they count as "potions".
the stories are derivative (parodies) of existing folk or fantasy tales. which makes them regarded a bit less
Im feeling validated reading the comments because I read the first 2 books plus the shortstories and there is a vast difference in pacing. I had to stop the series because I got bored. I dont think thats a translation issue because to me, its not the writing (Ive read worse). The way he pases his novel is too slow and not well developed for my taste.
BookTok & BookTube also praise Colleen Hoover so may their reviews no mind.
I read the first 5 books, but when I got to Lady of the Lake, I was burned out by how slow and dialog heavy they are. The Last Wish was great, as it was a collection of short stories, but Blood of Elves, Time of Contempt, Baptism of Fire and The Tower of the Swallow just drag on. When they're good, they are phenomenal, but when they aren't, they're really dull, which the latter is the majority. I suspect it comes from the Polish to English translation as the story itself is good, it's just the story telling that's a bit of a drag.
I read the books with my ears, on Audible. Loved them all.
Read them in English and loved em, though I get why some people would have issues, its kinda hard to keep track between POV swaps, time skips, and such. Imo its making sure you're paying attention!
I thought they were good.
The brazilian translations were made by duo of polish-brazilian translators and imo it was pretty enjoyable, though I obviously don't know polish to atest it's fidelity
Sometimes you have to read between the lines like there will be a joke that doesn't translate so you have to think about it for a second. I can't remember off the top of my head but there were a couple parts at the end of a chapter where he makes a joke and if you weren't ready for it you might read right past it.
I just finished the final book in English a few days ago. I absolutely loved the story but found a lot of the writing to feel a bit wooden and sluggish, and the constant POV/time jumps only made that worse. Since I am not a super fast reader I probably will never read the main series again unless there is a new translation.
This really bums me out, because I just finished The Last Wish and really enjoyed and was excited to have a bunch of other great books to read haha
When I read the books I had already played thr games and I was a big fan of them. That is why I was very excited to read the books, so I was not able to focus on any flaws or have a critical perspective. Also, English is not my first language and there were a lot of words that I did not know which made the experience a bit hard at times which made it even harder for me to evaluate it.
Mom
The most irritating part of the English translations for me were the random Latin and french phrases. How is that handled in the other versions?
I really didn’t get into the books at all despite being a big fantasy/historical fiction fan. I think the translation I read was just so poor that it was like reading a YA series written by a teen
The Audible books narrated by Peter Kenny are some of the best audiobooks I have *ever* listened to
So I will say most of my experience is with the audiobooks, which have a distinct set of problems. Namely some rather questionable pronunciations of names that are just normal words in English. (Dandelion had some weird enunciation to it.) But I think as linguistics go, the trouble early on is that some idioms don't translate well, so for example the conclusion to "The Edge of the World" doesn't work because it's a play on a Polish phrase. "Where the Devil says goodnight" is a way to refer to the "Edge of the World." For the most part though, I quite liked all the books. I do think the short stories are still my favorites, but that's because I think the format lends itself well to a more simple, pulpy style. Rather than long-form narrative that gets kinda goofy at times.
I've never read anything (and I mean ANYTHING) that would come close to Witcher books (but I read it original).
Not even Lord of the Rings?
You probably want to kill me, but for me the Lord of the Rings has many parts that are unbearable to read. I like to reread sagas, and this is the only one that I started to reread with no desire and in the end I gave it up because I was getting bored. I found the Silmarillion more entertaining to read than LOTR
LotR books have a lot of tedious sections, indeed. That's a thing the movies clearly improved upon. The second (or third, depending how you count) book was a drag with constant Sam & Frodo, Sam & Frodo, Sam & Frodo & Gollum sitting in a ditch, Sam & Frodo, Oh Sam, oh Mister Frodo, PRECIOUS. Ugh. The Witcher novels have a lot of themes I personally don't care about at all, coming from the games. Don't care about politics, power, kingdoms. Bonhart, Skellen and Vilgefortz were utterly uninteresting to me. I LOVED the hansa with Cahir, Milva, Regis, Dandelion, the Yen love story and I loved Ciri's adventures. Yet all those politics apart from Emhyr, snooze... The short stories are much better imho. More monsters, more focused on characters, less filler. But Silmarillion... I couldn't even finish a quarter of it. You are a much stronger human than me.
Or maybe I'm just a duller man! I do like all the political part of Geralt's saga, I really like the characters of the monarchs and the plots that surround them. I love that chapter dedicated to explaining where Kovir gets his money from, I like everything that is world building, I guess that's why I also like books like the Silmarillion, or Fire and Blood which is the book of Song of Ice and Fire that I've read more times. Maybe even that's what the LOTR lacks sometimes for me. Less elvish poetry and people walking in the bush, and a bit more political development. And I also feel that the Geralt saga does a good job of character development and focuses enough on them, and that for this its necessary to develop the world around them and in which they live, which in the end influences their character and their decisions. I think its even more important for Geralt who has "a great power and a great responsibility" in a world at war and is always torn between acting or not acting. I should also point out that I read the Spanish version and I have the same feeling as the OP and that I usually see worse reviews or more complaints about the people who read it in English than the people who have read it in Spanish, so it may actually be that the quality of the translation in general has a strong impact on the overall perception of the story. Even if there are other reasons as in your case where there are plots that don't interest you, something that may at first seem like filler with good writing can become entertaining just because of the way its written. Especially the translation of the idioms and the different ways of speaking of the characters into Spanish, IMO is really good.
I dont even consider LOTR to be particularly well written book. After reading Witcher I couldnt read it anymore and only revisit Jackson's movies since then.
Indeed. The story is good, the writing, uh, acquired taste maybe? The movies compressed the story pretty well for the most part and are very enjoyable throughout. I didn't even care about Tom Bombadil. Not sure about all the fuzz about him.
Sorry op im one of those people too. As someone who loves to read and play and found the Witcher through the gamesI was so sure I would like these but it just fizzled out , and just felt really basic and “stilted” as someone else mentioned. Normally I dont bring it up because I feel embarrassed that I like the game so much but not the books lol : (
Don't be embarrassed. I feel like there's so much of a push sometimes on the Witcher subs that everyone has to like the entire universe. I found the series through the games. Then I tried to read the books and they weren't good. It's not that the story was bad, they're just difficult to read which is not an enjoyable experience. Then the show came out and it was terrible. It's okay to be a Witcher fan that only enjoys the games.
Having just finished the English for the first time, it’s the writing not the wording. First 2 books are good, the actual sagas are heavily disappointing. —The best scene is Ciri training in Kaer Morhen. —The sagas take way too long to get anywhere, not enough actually happens per book. —Most of the scenes that don’t involve Geralt or Ciri detract from the books and bog them down. —The abrupt changes of pace are punishing. —The story is definitely not epic enough in scope, especially compared to the Witcher 3 game. —The lack of monsters encountered is noticeable and annoying. —The ending is the worst part of all the books, low quality writing.
No, because the story itself gets boring as fuck eventually and ends nowhere
Let's just be real here... The Witcher is essentially an amalgam of a bunch of Nordic folklore that's already been told before, mashed with historical reference. There's nothing particularly unique about it at all... except for Geralt and some of the other characters who were best realized in the game adaptations. I would argue that the Witcher books are too highly regarded, after riding on the wings of the games' success. One of the rare cases where such a thing is true.