Take someone on line two

[comricky]

Buongiorno a tutti, Good morning to all,

I'd like someone's help in translating in Italian this sentence (the underlined one) from a "Foreign Policy" article

“I think China views instability [as] bad for business,” British Secretary of State for Defense Ben Wallace said. “I think probably China is rather embarrassed by the behavior of Putin. He’s a rather inconvenient friend, and … you don’t see a full-throated support.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s increasing international isolation—and the threat of courting opprobrium from the West—are making it more difficult for countries to do business with Russia during the Ukraine war. “How many world leaders are going to be taking Putin on line two?” Wallace added.

Thank your for helping.

 

[Tegs]

Buongiorno, please give your own attempted translation first.

 

[comricky]

Buongiorno, please give your own attempted translation first.

My guess is something like "avere una telefonata con lui". I think about someone's secretary telling him/her "here's mister X on line two, shall I pass Mister X to you"?

 

[Tegs]

Yes, it is to do with phone calls. I imagine line one is for very important calls and line two is for calls of lesser importance, although I'm not sure about that. So, how many world leaders will accept a call from Putin on line 2?

 

[Starless74]

My guess is something like "avere una telefonata con lui". I think about someone's secretary telling him/her "here's mister X on line two, shall I pass Mister X to you"?

Esatto: credo quindi che la frase sia da tradurre letteralmente:
«Quanti leader mondiali sono ancora disposti a prendere [una chiamata di] Putin sulla 2?» *

* Credo si capisca anche senza: "una chiamata di".

 

[Haltona]

Yes, it is to do with phone calls. I imagine line one is for very important calls and line two is for calls of lesser importance, although I'm not sure about that. So, how many world leaders will accept a call from Putin on line 2?

I sort of imagined a situation in which a world leader is in a conversation on line one when Putin calls, and that given the actual situation they would not drop everything they're doing to talk to him (as it might have been the case before).

 

[MintSyrop]

I agree with Haltona: taking the call on line 2 means that it has a higher priority for the receiver, not a lower one (because they'd be interrupting the call they're already engaged in which presumably would be on line 1 in order to take it).

 

[idialegre]

I agree with Haltona also, even though I'm on the other side of town from him...😁
I think Line 2 is neither more nor less important than Line 1. It just means the person on Line 1 called first.

 

[MR1492]

I agree with Haltona also, even though I'm on the other side of town from him...😁
I think Line 2 is neither more nor less important than Line 1. It just means the person on Line 1 called first.

You are grammatically and telephonically correct! However, metaphorically line #2 is less important than line #1. So, the OP is using the latter definition of line #2.

Phil