# 말하는 태도부터 좀 틀리던데.



## wonlon

가: 아까 왔던 그 사람의 인상이 나는 그닥 좋지 않던데 나는 어땠니?
나: 나도 별로 였어. *말하는 태도**부터** 좀 틀리던데.*

How do you translate the highlighted sentence? (My book has got an awkward translation which I would rather not mention it.)
I think the meaning of *부터* is the point.


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## vientito

*starting with *his manner of speaking, he has committed some faux-pas


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## 조금만

I'd say: "Even the way he spoke [=before we even get round to considering the substance of what he actually said] was pretty questionable, wouldn't you agree?"  

Since the experience referred to, though presumably recent, is over and done with, we don't want an English perfect tense (_has _committed) here to match the "pastness" indicated in the Korean form. My "wouldn't you agree" is an attempt to catch the invariably elusive significance of the somewhat elliptical/pensive final particle so typical of Korean exchanges of opinion.


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## ddungbo

First, the exchange in the original post is slightly unnatural. Direct to the point on the table, 말하는 태도 부터 좀 *틀리던데* seems ambiguous to me. If I had to interpret it, I would think it means he was "different" in a bad way. (eg. he talks in a condescending manner.) 

What I usually expect to hear is 

말하는 태도부터 틀려먹었더군
말하는 태도부터 글렀더군
말하는 태도부터 맘에 안들었어.

말하는 태도부터(가) 틀렸어. -- this is okay. 
말하는 태도부터 틀렸던데? -- maybe this is the closest I can get to the original and sounds natural.


부터's meaning is very tricky, I must say. It somehow involves various aspects and meanings. 
This is one of the many possible translation.

I could tell by his attitude only that he is an asshole.


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## wonlon

ddungbo said:


> First, the exchange in the original post is slightly unnatural. Direct to the point on the table, 말하는 태도 부터 좀 *틀리던데* seems ambiguous to me. If I had to interpret it, I would think it means he was "different" in a bad way. (eg. he talks in a condescending manner.)
> 
> What I usually expect to hear is
> 
> 말하는 태도부터 틀려먹었더군
> 말하는 태도부터 글렀더군
> 말하는 태도부터 맘에 안들었어.
> 
> 말하는 태도부터(가) 틀렸어. -- this is okay.
> 말하는 태도부터 틀렸던데? -- maybe this is the closest I can get to the original and sounds natural.
> 
> 
> 부터's meaning is very tricky, I must say. It somehow involves various aspects and meanings.
> This is one of the many possible translation.
> 
> I could tell by his attitude only that he is an asshole.



I searched through my grammar books and from some examples I arrived at a meaning which is close to *조금만*.
"Even from the way he speak (not to consider the content / not to consider other aspects outside speaking), I see that he is a bad person / evil guy."

and 틀리다 is very likely to mean this:
http://krdic.naver.com/detail.nhn?docid=39937800*
마음이나 행동 따위가 올바르지 못하고 비뚤어지다.* 


그는 인간이 *틀렸어*.
그 사람은 외모는 출중한데 성격이 *틀렸어*.
 
Due to lack of context, I think it is the meaning I should compromise.


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## 조금만

The sense of 부터 is indeed rather elusive, but its general significance seems to be to mark a starting point or initial condition, in a sequence which may be temporal, spatial or logical. To that extent it has the opposite function to 까지 which marks the end point or final condition of a temporal, spatial or logical sequence. An immediate difficulty specifically for English speakers is that both concepts can in apppropriate contexts be rendered by "even" in English. "Even the way he spoke" [before we progress to considering anything else whatever] ... is a case for  부터 whereas "he even [as the ultimate extreme of a series of offensive remarks] called me a liar" would be a case for 까지. 

*ddungbo, * I don't think we want "only" in English for 부터 here, at least not in that position in the sentence.  I think what you actually had in mind was "I could tell by his attitude *alone *that he is an asshole".  The word "only" in that position in English gives the quite different sense akin to the force of appending a ~만 :  "From his attitude I could deduce only that...", where we might find a (differently structured) equivalent employing -만 in Korean.  Your version is correct English, of course, but it's not quite a match for the Korean meaning.*

wonlon*, I'm uneasy about translating좀 틀리던데  as "I see that he is a bad person / evil guy"  Both the expression "I see" and the phrase "evil person" strike me as much more categorical and specific that what the Korean speaker (albeit a speaker who seems to be the figment of a textbook author's imagination) was trying to say (or hint at). A and B both agree that they had distinctly bad vibes about the guy, but I don't sense that it's something they could quite pin down in the rather blunt and forceful way your English version of the phrase in question does.


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## ddungbo

Thank you very much for the correction! Yes, I meant to say 'alone' but that meaning ran out of my mouth in the form of 'only'. I don't think this is a plain mistake. I'll study the grammar about them. If you would correct my English I would be so grateful for that.     P.S. you wouldn't believe how long it took me to write this short message through mu stupid phone.


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