Skönlitteratur vs Fiction

There's a proposal to combine the above two tags. I don't think it is a good idea, as the English "Fiction" corresponds to two slightly different Swedish words: "Skönlitteratur", which is "narrative literature" (novels, plays, etc.), and "Fiktion", which is more towards "not fact".

I steer clear of voting either way on translations where I don't speak the language for exactly this reason. Non-fluent speakers who just dictionary-translate are not equipped to understand the possible nuance of a term and shouldn't vote either way.

I agree - I can't even bring myself to vote undecided with those options in which I have no knowledge.
I think they should be decided by those who 'know'.

Well, to be honest, "fiction" has both those meanings also in English.

However, the older definition of "skönlitteratur" is the same as that of the French term that it is a direct translation of (belles lettres) -- see http://www.thefreedictionary.com/belles-lettres -- and I'd oppose the combination for that reason. It's not a perfect match.

Hmm, that's what I was trying to say.

Was it? That skönlitteratur can also mean "good literature" as opposed to "trivial literature"? For example, children's literature and cheap thrillers are not skönlitteratur in that sense (but they are fiction).

Not absolutely sure about "skönlitteratur", but if the analogy with the French "belles lettres" is accurate than it would translate into something like "high literature" (not sure if English has a word for that) - excluding "trivial" literature.

>7 Nicole_VanK:

Rather like the literature vs. fiction argument. Frankly, to me it's like porn: I can't define it, but I know it when I read it!

>7 Nicole_VanK: Yes, that's my point. However, today it usually means just novels/short stories. But not necessarily for everyone. Besides, rereading >1 andejons:, do you mean that fiktion can mean literature in Swedish? If so, I disagree. That's an anglicism. Fiktion means "not real". But maybe you didn''t mean that.

Anyhow, we agree: These tags should not be combined. That's the important thing here.

Edited after having missed some messages:
What I meant was that you can translated "fiction" into either "fiktion" or "Skönlitteratur". Most of the time they are effectively the same, but sometimes not, and thus the suggestion is bad since it could combine words with different meaning.

As an example, I checked Nationalencyklopedin, which names essays as an example of "Skönlitteratur", and I don't think they are usually considered "fiction".

Hehe, we must have posted at exactly the same second! ;)

ETA: And the citation from the encyclopedia proves the point.

Now someone suggested combining "kaunokirjallisuus" with fiction as well. I don't know any Finnish, but it usually have similar terminology as Swedish, and the Finnish Wikipedia article seems to confirm my suspicions.

>10 andejons:

you can translated "fiction" into either "fiktion" or "Skönlitteratur". Most of the time they are effectively the same

No, not in Swedish. That's an anglicism. Fiktion can only be used as in "There's no justice. That's pure fiction." In Swedish you cannot say that you read fiktion.

I wonder whether to vote in the Finnish vote. I think not; I don't speak the language either.

Of course you can not say that. But as you just demonstrated, there are other contexts where "fiktion" is the correct translation of "fiction".

I think we agree, we just misunderstand each other all the time. ;)