On becoming an annotator
On becoming an annotator …
First of all thank you for giving me some of your precious time. The intention of this interview is to acquaint students with the meaning of annotation and its uses.
First what is the meaning of annotation?
Literally speaking annotation means providing the explanation, the definition , the meaning of the words for the difficult terms or difficult parts of the book in order for the reader to be able to understand the contents of the book in a simpler language.
By annotation, annotating in a second language like what we are in we try to simplify the difficult language of the English text , and make it understandable and more comprehensible for the students specially at lower level of learning English to be able to understand the text especially the masterpieces.
Do you mean that you paraphrase the original texts?
No it is a little bit different from paraphrasing the text. I leave paraphrase to student themselves. As I have remarked it at the beginning of the book I have tried to shed light and mean the individual words or the individual cluster of words- is called phrase or phrasal verb- so that the students would have enough information to paraphrase the whole sentence or the whole paragraph themselves and it's a little bit different from paraphrasing the sentences.
How much times does it takes to annotate a book?
It takes a lot frankly speaking. It is depending on how much information you would like to give to the students and of course it varies from one book to another. The one i.e. for example "waiting for Godot" as you certainly know is a modern text so the language spoken in the text in the play is a modern language the terms are up to date ones so I didn't have lots of thing to explain compare to for example "saint joan"
Thanks God for that and good for the freshmen, doesn't it?
Yah
But still for two reason I had to spend a lot of time. Firstly because I wanted to make sure that all the interested students no matter whether they have just entered the university or they are studying in term five or six will be able to understand the text and the second reason was that , I wanted to give information let me say in this way some referential information not about the meaning of the words or the meaning of the statements made by the speakers in the play but rather things that writer had in mind in other words the philosophical or deeply call references in the play have been explained and annotated for the student.
We have being thought that your first reason for annotating a book is money and the rest are not as important as the first one!
Yes of course.
We made a lot of money. That is the least things you can have in your mind when you are thinking of publishing book generally speaking in Iran.
You know that you can not find publisher finding a publisher is very difficult and then you have to undertake all the financial ,you know, you have to pay the money yourself and you can not be so hopeful how many of the books especially literally books is going to be sold. So very very honestly speaking not just in my case I think in the case of other colleague's work especially working on the literally works money is the last and the least thing that you can have in your mind when you start. There are lots of other good jobs for you to make money.
Sure, you are right.
At last can I ask you about your next book coming in Persian?
Well that one is a story a story which is very short - in fifty pages only- and that is completely personal story which will project my personal life I have been working on this second book for more than seven years. It took me actually six years to get finish with the notions and the manipulation of those notions. You see what is express there is not unique ideas maybe lots of other people have express those already but the presentation of those ideas the way they have been manipulated as you will read and I hope the readers will enjoy I think is new.
Thank you sir
Good luck with your new book and I wish you success in your life.
You're most welcome and I already thank you for a task you have also done.
First what is the meaning of annotation?
Literally speaking annotation means providing the explanation, the definition , the meaning of the words for the difficult terms or difficult parts of the book in order for the reader to be able to understand the contents of the book in a simpler language.
By annotation, annotating in a second language like what we are in we try to simplify the difficult language of the English text , and make it understandable and more comprehensible for the students specially at lower level of learning English to be able to understand the text especially the masterpieces.
Do you mean that you paraphrase the original texts?
No it is a little bit different from paraphrasing the text. I leave paraphrase to student themselves. As I have remarked it at the beginning of the book I have tried to shed light and mean the individual words or the individual cluster of words- is called phrase or phrasal verb- so that the students would have enough information to paraphrase the whole sentence or the whole paragraph themselves and it's a little bit different from paraphrasing the sentences.
How much times does it takes to annotate a book?
It takes a lot frankly speaking. It is depending on how much information you would like to give to the students and of course it varies from one book to another. The one i.e. for example "waiting for Godot" as you certainly know is a modern text so the language spoken in the text in the play is a modern language the terms are up to date ones so I didn't have lots of thing to explain compare to for example "saint joan"
Thanks God for that and good for the freshmen, doesn't it?
Yah
But still for two reason I had to spend a lot of time. Firstly because I wanted to make sure that all the interested students no matter whether they have just entered the university or they are studying in term five or six will be able to understand the text and the second reason was that , I wanted to give information let me say in this way some referential information not about the meaning of the words or the meaning of the statements made by the speakers in the play but rather things that writer had in mind in other words the philosophical or deeply call references in the play have been explained and annotated for the student.
We have being thought that your first reason for annotating a book is money and the rest are not as important as the first one!
Yes of course.
We made a lot of money. That is the least things you can have in your mind when you are thinking of publishing book generally speaking in Iran.
You know that you can not find publisher finding a publisher is very difficult and then you have to undertake all the financial ,you know, you have to pay the money yourself and you can not be so hopeful how many of the books especially literally books is going to be sold. So very very honestly speaking not just in my case I think in the case of other colleague's work especially working on the literally works money is the last and the least thing that you can have in your mind when you start. There are lots of other good jobs for you to make money.
Sure, you are right.
At last can I ask you about your next book coming in Persian?
Well that one is a story a story which is very short - in fifty pages only- and that is completely personal story which will project my personal life I have been working on this second book for more than seven years. It took me actually six years to get finish with the notions and the manipulation of those notions. You see what is express there is not unique ideas maybe lots of other people have express those already but the presentation of those ideas the way they have been manipulated as you will read and I hope the readers will enjoy I think is new.
Thank you sir
Good luck with your new book and I wish you success in your life.
You're most welcome and I already thank you for a task you have also done.
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