DarOv wrote:
I disagree with that. I like the idea that a person can have multiple fates. And only he chooses which one to follow. I think it creates some opportunity to avoid a fatalistic view of life.
I too like the notion that a person can influence their future by their present actions/choices, but I think that very notion is incompatible with the meaning of "fate". Perhaps what we're actually discussing here requires another term, like "destiny", "path", or "chance", which allows for the possibility of present actions altering later outcomes, unlike "fate". As I mentioned, though, I'm not sure whether this is what OP intended, so I'd need more context before I could provide an appropriate translation.
As for fate and fatalism, they are necessarily related concepts. To "avoid a fatalistic view of life" one needs to reject the notion of a single fated outcome, i.e. fate, because accepting the concept of fate is, by definition, fatalism. You seem to be conflating a rejection of this concept with redefining the term "fate" itself, however, if you were to accept a different meaning for the term "fate", one which allows more than one possible outcome, you would then end up with a lexical gap and would require another word to describe the viewpoint which necessarily results in adopting a fatalistic viewpoint.
DarOv wrote:
After all, this is a lyric, not a science. Let there be multiple fates, why not?

I'm not the word police. People can use language however they will. I'm just unsure how to translate such abstract notions without OP being more specific as to what was meant.
tiomluasocein wrote:
Well put. As for "other than that", the poems of Pablo Neruda (just giving one poet out of thousands of examples) have been directly translated into multiple languages, one poem parts of which I will give examples below, translated directly into English:
YO NO TENGO SOLEDAD I am not alone
Es la noche desamparo The night is helplessness
. . .
Pero yo, la que te estrecha But I, the one who rocks you
. . .
Es el cielo desamparo The sky is helplessness
. . .
Es el mundo desamparo The world is helplessness
The night, the sky, the world are helplessness. What nonsense!
And the Beatles, specifically John Lennon, were well known for the odd phrase.
How dare you! "I am the walrus, coo coo cajoob" is one of the most poignant and meaningful lines ever written! High literature!
I take your point, but I don't think the examples you've given are very comparable to what we're discussing here (not least because I think "helplessness" is a poor translation of
desamparo). A phrase like "the night is abandonment" can be easily understood as a metaphor. The author is drawing attention to the inherent loneliness of night. This is apparent without me even needing to know the rest of the poem (and despite its title).
What we're discussing here, however, seems different. It is not merely an "odd phrase", but an oxymoron. Plurality in a term, the very concept of which explicitly excludes the possibility of plurality. A closer comparison, to my mind at least, might be found in the use of the term "literally" when a person actually means "figuratively"; "I literally died of embarrassment!" Because of the actual meaning of the term "literally", this abstract usage can sound very jarring.
In any case, I meant nothing I wrote as any form of literary criticism. I simply don't know how to translate "fate" in a way that will express the meaning OP intends, because, unlike the Spanish examples, it is not immediately clear to me what is intended. Perhaps, as I suggested above, it's actually another term or concept which is in question here, and not fate.