Just got my contrib. copies of the October ’10 issue of Pevnost with “Sinner, Baker, Fabulist, Priest” reprinted in Czech:
This marks my first Czech language publication, and I learned something interesting. Female and male surnames take different forms, and they modify foreign female surnames by appending them with “ová.” So my byline in Pevnost is “Eugie Fosterová.”
When I first saw it, I thought they’d misspelled my name. But then I noticed that Stephanie Meyer was listed as “Stephanie Meyerová,” and a bit of Googling showed that they refer to the U.S. Secretary of State as Hilary Clintonová and the First Lady as Michelle Obamaová.
I’m not sure how I feel about having my name modified. On the one hand, it’s an integral part of the Czech language. But on the other, it’s my name, my byline, my trademark, y’know?
Pingback: Tweets that mention EugieFoster.com “Sinner, Baker, Fabulist, Priest” now in Czech in the Oct. 2010 issue of Pevnost -- Topsy.com
Just think of the name addition as a title like Mrs/Miss/Ms only it’s appended instead of preceding. Congrats on yet another translation.