OK, I don't suppose anyone except me watches this, but I can't resist Laurence Fox. In fact, who am I kidding? Apart from the dreadful, clunky plots (who cares?) everything about the series is a delight, from the Oxford landscapes and gorgeous music to the brilliant, sparky chemistry between our two heroes, both of whom are so lovely you just want to bring them home for tea.

However, my reason for posting is, did anyone watch last night's episode - the ludicrous story about the 'quizaholics', with the hammy Alan Davies playing a hammy Alan Davies-type figure as the conman quizmaster?

My question is this. They paid that expensive translator to translate the Russian for them, right? The one who kept smiling knowingly? And she managed to identify some of the mystery texts found on the deceased's laptop as being his own inimitable translations of Checkov and Tolstoy? Well, if they were his translations, then why did Lewis and Hathaway need her to read and identify them? That is to say, if they were translations, why were they still in Russian???

It makes me think the dead bloke had somewhat missed the point of a translation...

Rosy x

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Or maybe that's why the translator was doing all the knowing smiling? She was being paid to translate something that was already in English?

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Or even Chekhov. 'Checkov' was my own translation from the Russian...

I love the series, but I Hate ITV because they never tell anyone when the next series is on, so I miss half of it.
Thank god for iPlayer.

I watch it, too, Rosy. In fact, I will come out and say I really like it - as you say, it looks lovely and they often have really good actors and the central double-act is a joy.

I hadn't picked up on the translation howler, although I kept making my husband pause the TV so I could complain about something that was a bit daft or didn't ring true (adds to the pleasure for me, although I'm not sure how my husband feels about it). In fact, he was very disappointed that I found so many holes to pick at as last night's episode was written by Alan Plater who comes from Hull and wrote the Biederbecke Affair (my husband still goes all misty-eyed when he thinks about Barbara Flynn in that). Anyway, I shall now email him your comments on translation - tee hee.

I also love to pick holes, Saturday - mainly when they get all the college stuff wrong. (Don't even get me started on the Professor who claimed also to be a Research Fellow...) But is is delightful - the televisual equivalent of warm slippers.

R x

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Ruth Gemmil is always fab in everything - I thought she was great in it.

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I mean, of course, 'Gemmell'. That was another piece of free translation.

I also LF but I wanted to watch the drama about Boy George and I'm glad I did.

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I also "love" LF I should have written. But maybe I also "would" LF would be a good substitute.

I love Lewis, mostly because of Lawrence Fox I'll admit

I think the Translator was smiling knowingly because she was getting paid £100 to read the stuff in the first place - that's why I'm encouraging my daughter to do languages!

Edel

I think I Player is good too, is ITV catchup similar?

And Jem, I would too

Whether the 'translations' were in Russian or English, they must have been pretty wordy because the hefty volume that one of the characters held up to camera as being 'The Cherry Orchard' would have been at least 50 times as long as the original (about the size of a school exercise book). Maybe the deceased was paid by the word...

Chris