welcome to camp telophase

The Christopher Pike thing I mentioned a few days back? It gets better. Take a look at the last thing in the writeup there, added recently.

Going strong. It was sparked when someone posted to fanficrants complaining about the whole Light/Raito romanization issue. (For thsoe of you who are unaware of this, the scanlators started calling the character "Raito" and then it came out that the mangaka's official romanization was "Light." It has further been established that the mangaka has a serious tin ear for English, as "Near," "Mello," and "Quillsh Wammy" should hint.)

But I'm not posting for that, I'm posting for this, from puipui:

I'd just like to take a moment to point out that the official romanization given by Togashi Yoshihiro for a name in Hunter x Hunter that is pronounced "Pakunoda" is, as given in the official handbook for the series, "Phalcnothdk". Kurapika's official spelling is "Curarpikt", Shizuku's official spelling is "Chzzok", Ubogin's official spelling is "Wbererguin" and Kuroro Lucifer's official spelling is "Quwrof Wrlccywrlir".

I have learned several lessons from this:

1) Although it takes a whole hell of a lot of effort to get to one, there really is such a thing as an incorrect romanization.

2) Although the wishes of the original Japanese author should be respected when it comes to romanization, that does not necessarily make their opinion the only valid opinion.

3) Death Note fans have absolutely no idea how good they have it.

and, of course, 4) Togashi Yoshihiro is on crack.

Although, to be fair, I already knew that about #4, really.

It made me laugh and yes, I did scare the cat.

ETA: And in that selfsame thread, we learn that a 13-year-old American girl in the Death Note novel is named Backyard Bottomslash. Man I hope Viz translates it, sooooon.