I wrote a while back about how a Japanese translator handled the adaptation of the term "old sport" in the seminal novel The Great Gatsby. This time around I have not just one, but three more translations of the term from their respective translations and the choices are interesting.
Kureha chose 尊公 (sonkou, lit. "revered duke"), an archaic honorific for another person's father as well as a polite pronoun in its own right. Gatsby, emulating his older forbearer and thus speaking in the way of an elderly gentleman, covering up his actual rougher self.
Cutting to the chase, here are three new translations from across:
Satou Ryouichi (佐藤亮一, 1924-) uses 旧友 (kyuuyuu, "old friend, old pal"; lit. "old friend"). This does communicate the sense of them having been acquaintances for a long while, but is not as archaic as 尊公.
Ootuski Sabuoru (大貫三郎, 1916-2003) uses the informal 2nd person pronominal 君 (kimi), whose tone is that of "friend, pal", and gives it the nonstandard reading of オールド・スポート (ôrudo supôto, "old sport"), adding in a note:
オールド・スポート 男は酒・賭事などの道楽を持っているのでこう呼ぶ。従って女には用いない。非常な親しみをしめす。
Old Sport - Men who gamble and drink as pastimes call each other this. It cannot be used for women. It displays an extreme degree of familiarity.
Nozaki Takashi (野崎孝, 1917-1995) uses 親友 (shin'yuu, "close friend, buddy, bosom friend, crony, chum", lit. "intimate friend"), which certainly reflexes the wide range of connotations that old sport has, and it does imply a closer level of intimacy than that of 旧友.