@JohanLarsson I think you would just say "in silence." The suit is sewn in silence. The metaphor of a tailor concludes with this thought.
I think the metaphor is a little confused, perhaps by translating it into English.
You might want to suggest that the measurement takes place while a man is alive. All during his life he is being fitted for that final measurement, which is what others will remember of him.
Wait! I see that the metaphor does do that. First two words. No wonder I missed them. Who reads the first two words of a sentence?
But in English it might be worded better: "During a man's life, death is constantly taking his measurements. The suit is sewn in silence and worn only after he is gone." I don't know, something like that.
The Greek poet Simonides used to write epitaphs for people. Two of his that I remember (somewhat) are: "My name is Brotachos of Euboeia, and I did not come here for death but weighty business." And: "Sir, you are not looking at the grave of some great Lydian king, for being poor my gravestone is small — yet still too much for me."
@JohanLarsson Hey, you're the one who brought it up.
@JohanLarsson That's easy: if you can only hack your way through in English, prefer Swedish. On the other hand, if you're more concerned with learning the language than reading a particular book, prefer English.
@JohanLarsson If you're in between you can still choose a direction. What'll it be then? Laziness or industry? Ignorance or knowledge? Plainness or fanciness?
@tchrist: I keep wanting to read sentences like He descubierto el placer de la lectura as "He discovered . . ." instead of "I have discovered . . ." If the pronoun weren't dropped, it would not be problem in that particular instance. Not a problem for ha descubierto, but the he is so familiar as a pronoun subject my brain wants to follow that track.
@Robusto Yesterday I discovered the joys of ASN.1 BER TLV data formatting, something I have somehow managed to avoid my entire life. I want my innocence back again.
From my perspective, if we say Spanish is a 1.0 degree of difficulty (for learning) I would say German is probably a 2.5 and Japanese is a 5.0. Japanese grammar is deceptively simple but there are other issues.
@tchrist I am still innocent of that. Please do not spoil the pristine beauty of my ignorance.
The only octets I like are written for woodwinds or strings.
@Cerberus Native speakers of Latin are dead. My point exactly.
@Robusto ES has its share of tricky issues that learners either don't know about, get wrong: hearing syllable-timed execution; pronunciation w/ALL consonants different from EN and no vowel reduction; 100s of irregular verbs; clitics; word order; gender concordance, esp. w/missing or misleading -o/a cues; ser vs. estar; por vs para; how to use se correctly; preterite vs. imperfect; subjunctive vs indicative; sequence of tenses; verb+prepositions matching; 5+ forms of "you"; ...
Michel Houellebecq (French: [mi'ʃɛl wɛl'bɛk]; born Michel Thomas; 26 February 1958 or 1956) is an award-winning French author, filmmaker, and poet. Having written poetry and a biographical essay on the horror writer H. P. Lovecraft, he published his first novel, Whatever, in 1994. Atomised followed in 1998, and Platform in 2001. He published a book of poems Le Sens de Combat (translated into English as The Art of Struggle) in 1996. After a publicity tour for Platform led to his being taken to court for inciting racial hatred, he moved to Ireland to write for several years. He currently resides...
Heard good things about his books, ordering a couple.
@tchrist I had to copy-paste it nowai to spell that