Traducción Literaria grupo 2

Inmaculada Puntas Serrano

ASSIGNMENT 1: EVELINE
She was about to explore another life with Frank. Frank was very kind, manly, open-
hearted. She was to go away with him by the night-boat to be his wife and to live with him
in Buenos Ayres where he had a home waiting for her. How well she remembered the first
time she had seen him; he was lodging in a house on the main road where she used to visit.
It seemed a few weeks ago. He was standing at the gate, his peaked cap pushed back on his
head and his hair tumbled forward over a face of bronze. Then they had come to know
each other. He used to meet her outside the Stores every evening and see her home. He
took her to see The Bohemian Girl and she felt elated as she sat in an unaccustomed part
of the theatre with him. He was awfully fond of music and sang a little. People knew that
they were courting and, when he sang about the lass that loves a sailor, she always felt
pleasantly confused. He used to call her Poppens out of fun.

Estaba a punto de iniciar una nueva vida con Frank. Él era una persona muy amable, varonil y
de buen corazón. Tenía que largarse con él en el barco nocturno hacia Buenos Aires donde se
casarían y vivirían juntos. Frank había preparado una casa para vivir allí con ella 1. Eva2
recordaba la primera vez que lo vio a la perfección. Frank se hospedaba en una casa en la calle
principal por la que ella solía pasar. Al parecer fue hace unas semanas. Estaba de pie al lado de
la puerta, llevaba una gorra de visera hacia atrás y su pelo caía hacia adelante sobre su tez de
bronce. Desde ese momento empezaron a conocerse 3. Todas las noches acostumbraba a reunirse
con ella fuera de la tienda4 y después la acompañaba a su casa. La llevó a ver la película The
Bohemian Girl de Harley Knoles5. Estaba entusiasmada porque se sentaron en una parte del
teatro donde no solían sentarse6. Él era amante de la música y cantaba un poquito.7 La gente
sabía que estaban saliendo y, cuando él cantaba la canción sobre esa muchacha que ama a un
marinero, ella siempre se sentía gratamente confusa. Solía llamarla Poppens porque le
divertía.8

1
In the translation of this sentence, an alteration of the syntactic order has been carried out and the sentence has been
divided from the source language to the target language.
2
The proper name Eveline derives from Eve, that is the first woman from the Bible. Therefore, the Spanish
equivalent Eva will be used.
3
I understood it was from that point on that they started to know each other.
4
The Stores is the name of her familiar store, so I decided to transfer this connotation to the Spanish culture and
decided to take the name “la tienda” in general terms as we would say in our culture.
5
Amplification of information about the title of a film from 1922.
6
“Unaccustomed part” as a place where they did not use to sit.
7
I used the suffix -ito in “poquito” in order to approach the Spanish lexicon.
8
Use of the connector “porque” in order to express the reason to his amusement. I kept Poppens because it could
refer both to an English song or a pet name.

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 Traducción Literaria grupo 2
Inmaculada Puntas Serrano

First of all it had been an excitement for her to have a fellow and then she had begun to
like him. He had tales of distant countries. He had started as a deck boy at a pound a
month on a ship of the Allan Line going out to Canada. He told her the names of the ships
he had been on and the names of the different services. He had sailed through the Straits
of Magellan and he told her stories of the terrible Patagonians. He had fallen on his feet in
Buenos Ayres, he said, and had come over to the old country just for a holiday. Of course,
her father had found out the affair and had forbidden her to have anything to say to him.

Ante todo, le conmovía9 el hecho de tener un compañero y acto seguido empezó a interesarse
por él10. Contaba historietas de países lejanos. Había empezado como mozo de cubierta por una
libra al mes a bordo de un barco perteneciente a la línea marítima Allan11 que zarpaba hacia
Canadá. Le hablaba sobre los nombres de los barcos en los que había estado y de los diferentes
servicios que tenían.12 Había navegado por el Estrecho de Magallanes y le contaba anécdotas
sobre los espantosos patagónicos. Dijo que salió bien parado13 en Buenos Aires y que había
vuelto a la madre patria14 por vacaciones. Sin lugar a dudas, el padre de Eva15 se había
enterado del asunto y le había prohibido dirigirle la palabra al muchacho.

CONSIDERATIONS
9
The whole expression “It had been an excitement for her…” would be reduced to the Spanish verb “conmover”.
10
The verb “like” would be translated into the Spanish expression “interesarse por algo”.
11
Spanish equivalent “línea marítima” in order to specify the name of the boat.
12
Modulation changing the syntactic order in order to naturalize the quality of the text in Spanish.
13
Spanish expression “salir bien parado” in order to point to his positive experience.
14
Spanish equivalent “madre patria” as “old country”.
15
Amplification of information “el padre” in order to clarify who we are talking about.

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 Traducción Literaria grupo 2
Inmaculada Puntas Serrano

To carry out the translation of this fragment, I decided to make several clarifications
through amplifications in order to facilitate the reading comprehension of the novel
itself. I added several footnotes to clarify the nature of the name of some cultural
elements such as the maritime line or the film and decided to keep the original name
of each cultureme to maintain the essence of English culture. In addition, I tried to
change some sentences at the syntactic level through modulations and adaptations to
Spanish so that in this way the reading of the terminal text flows naturally. Otherwise,
personal names have been translated into their Spanish equivalent as a personal
choice since I considered it would be positive to give consideration to the name of
Eveline and its implicit meaning. The reader would understand the hidden connotation
that the author gives to the name and its connection with Eve.

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