Asahi Weelkly の「天声人語」の英訳練習欄で、ムーミンと日本の梅雨との関係について述べられていたコラムがあり、その中でいくつか気になるワードがあったので、調べたいと思います。
In “Moominpappa at Sea” by Finnish author Tove Jansson (1914-2001), Moominpappa is troubled.
Fearing he has not earned the trust of everyone in his family, he is desperate for a change of surroundings.
This results in the family leaving their familiar Moominvalley and relocating to a small island.
But once they are on the island, it rains all the time and everybody becomes depressed.
This book depicts the struggles of each family member as they try to find themselves.
The illustrations by the author include impressionistic renditions of the cold, relentless rain in fine slanting lines, which seem to represent the characters’ melancholic state of mind.
Depicting a driving rain with such diagonal lines is said to have originated with Japanese ukiyo-e woodblock prints such as “Ohashi Atake no Yudachi” (Sudden Shower over Shin-Ohashi Bridge and Atake) by Utagawa Hiroshige (1797-1858).
I wonder if Jansson was influenced by ukiyo-e. If so, the Moomins may have been connected to Japanese culture through the rain.
In our real world, the start of the “tsuyu” rainy season is late this year. We are already past the “official” start date on the old calendar.
The situation is obviously quite different from when poet Kyoshi Takahama (1874-1959) penned this piece: “This year’s start of tsuyu is chronologically correct.”
The word tsuyu is said to have derived from “tsuyukeshi” which denotes high humidity.
The combination of rain and high humidity is definitely unpleasant. But the delayed arrival of tsuyu also makes me antsy.
Back to the Moomin book. The troubled Moomin family goes on a picnic at Moominmamma’s suggestion. And it rains again, but strangely, nobody is bothered this time.
One character says to the effect: “Everything is very natural, and I have begun to think that’s just fine.”
I wonder if Jansson wanted to say that rain is also a symbol of rebirth.
—The Asahi Shimbun, June 14
取り上げるのは、relentless /rɪˈlɛntlɪs(US), rɪˈlentlɪs(UK)/ です。
『ジーニアス英和辞典』によると、形 1 〈人・事などが〉〔‥の点で〕情け容赦のない、無慈悲な、厳しい〔in〕2 絶え間のない、間断ない と定義されています。
LDOCE では、 1 strict, cruel, or determined, without ever stopping 2 something bad that is relentless continues without ever stopping or getting less severe 類義語 endless という定義でした。
Cambridge Dictionary では、 never stopping or getting any less extreme 絶え間ない, 執ような といった他の辞書とは異なり、絶え間ない方の意味を先行して取り定義されていました。
Asahi Weekly では、 relentless rain で「冷たい雨」というように訳されていました。
意味として constant と類似していることが分かりますが、調べてみると、relentless にはネガティブなイメージが内包されていますが、 constant にはそういったマイナスイメージは含まれないようです。使用する際には誤解を招かないよう、使い分ける必要があります。（est）
https://ja.hinative.com/questions/15602754#google_vignette
https://ameblo.jp/jyoji8/entry-12618685882.html