Big business of plagiarism under the guise of

(re)translation
The case of Turkey*

Mehmet Şahin1, Derya Duman1 and Sabri Gürses2

1Izmir University of Economics / 2Erciyes University

Taking Turkey’s case as a basis, the current study focuses on the retranslation
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practice with an aim to discuss plagiaristic forms of retranslation which may

create serious repercussions in the field of translation such as violating translators’
copyrights, complicating the issue of translator’s voice, producing defective
cultural artifacts and affecting culture in general negatively. The study tries to
outline and exemplify commonly-accepted impetuses for retranslation and
inquire the validity of the rationale for the retranslations with a particular focus
on Turkey. For our analysis, we used a total of 40 classical books distributed by
a national newspaper as a promotional campaign. Following a brief discussion
on voice in translation, an overview of publishing and retranslation practices
in Turkey; this study presents guidelines for a more comprehensive analysis
of the phenomenon of plagiarism in retranslation and translation in general.
The analyses of both qualitative and quantitative data derived from the sample
of classical books showed that the books were just reproduction rather than
retranslation or translation at all. The article concludes with a discussion on
the possible impact of fake retranslations on translation practice and culture in
general and calls for further empirical studies to prevent plagiarism in translation.

Keywords: plagiarism in translation, retranslation, translation theory, voice in

translation, literary translation

* This study was conducted within the framework of a scientific project titled “Plagiarism
in Translation” (112K388) funded by The Scientific and Technological Research Council of
Turkey (TÜBİTAK) to serve as a pilot for a larger corpus. Initial results of the current study
were presented at the Third International Translation Conference “Translation: New Destina-
tions” organized by Yıldız Technical University.

Babel 61: 2 (2015), 193–218. © Fédération des Traducteurs (fit) Revue Babel
doi 10.1075/babel.61.2.03sah issn 0521–9744 e-issn 1569–9668
  Mehmet Şahin, Derya Duman & Sabri Gürses

Introduction

Literary translation most arguably reflects the most artistic and prestigious side
of the act of translation. Literary translators take on a quite challenging task of
recreating “the refined sensibilities of foreign countries and their people through
the linguistic, musical, rhythmic, and visual possibilities of the new language.”
(Schulte, 2010) which usually results in giving their individual voice to the trans-
lated work.
Despite the fact that the volume of literary texts to be translated is constantly
growing, some literary works, which have already been translated, get the atten-
tion of translators and/or publishers and are subject to retranslation. Retranslation
has been defined as several translations of a work that have already been translated
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into the same target language (Tahir Gürçağlar 2009: 233). However, the term is
also used for translations from the translated versions of the original. For the latter
concept, “relay translation, or indirect translation” is also in use (Jianzhong 2003).
Here, the term retranslation is used in the sense to include any repeated work of
translation to the same target language, whether from the original or from the
translated version. Not all text types are liable to retranslation though. It is usually
canonical literary works, sacred and dramatic texts that are translated more than
once into the same target language; in other words, retranslations of classical texts
are usually welcome (Jianzhong 2003; Tahir Gürçağlar 2009: 233).
In theory, retranslations are expected to contribute to a better reception and
transmission of an original (Berman 1990); they are usually thought as improved
translations, details of which are discussed below. Yet the practice does not always
follow the theory, at least not in Turkey. Although there are excellent examples of
retranslations in Turkish produced by reputable translators; especially in the last
two decades, not all cases of retranslation take place in an ideal fashion. The book
market in Turkey has witnessed the rapid emergence of inflation in retranslated
versions of classical works most of which are not genuine translations but pla-
giarized versions of previous translations. There already appeared a literature on
this subject details of which will be discussed below. This study aims to contribute
to the literature by raising issues like the differences between fake and genuine
retranslations, identifying plagiarism in translation and the effects of plagiarism
on culture.

Why retranslate?

The rationale for retranslations has also been formulated by various scholars while
some other arguments have been found irrelevant. Bellos (2011: 295) argues that
 Big business of plagiarism under the guise of (re)translation 

except for “special moments such as 1945 (or the immediate aftermath of the
Russian Revolution, when Maxim Gorky launched his ‘World Literature’ publish-
ing house), retranslation is nearly always a strictly commercial affair”. However,
there are many cases, in which retranslation is far from a “commercial affair”.
Monti (2011) gives several factors motivating retranslations, which we will list
with examples:

1. to restore the textual integrity of the source text since the previous transla-
tion is unsatisfactory because of omissions or modifications [(a motivation
introduced by Berman (1990) with the term “defaillance originelle” (original
limitation)]. For example, censure may be a cause for omission. In 2005, after it
was revealed that some translations of Dostoyevsky’s Karamazov Brothers were
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censured, a translator of Russian, Ergin Altay admitted that he had omitted

some paragraphs from the translation; then he added the omission and reno-
vated his translation.
2. to recover a direct link to the source text, a link that could be missing in the
previous translation (relay translation). The status of any language as a lin-
gua franca may be the cause of many cases of relay translations. In Turkey,
translators of Russian were few during the 20th century and this resulted in a
great number of relay translations. For example Mikhail Bulgakov’s Мастер и
Маргарита (Master and Margarita) was translated from French in 1968, the
year that it was published with its first French translation and it had to wait
until 2012 for its first direct translation from Russian (Bulgakov 2012). In China
also, many literary classics of the world languages like Russian, Arabic, French
and Sanskrit were translated from their English or Japanese versions since
these two languages had many speakers in China (Jianzhong 2003: 196–197).
3. to revitalize the previous translation(s) that age(s). One of the books analyzed
in this paper, Charles Dickens’s The Old Curiosity Shop, can be given as an
example for this kind of motivation. The first Turkish translation was done in
1955. But after 30 years, the language of the book became slightly archaic due
to ongoing process of linguistic purification. By 1980s, the book needed a new
translation into modern Turkish. Thus, came a genuine retranslation by Azize
Bergin.
4. to improve the previous translation(s) with the help of new lexicographical
and research tools, that offer contemporary translators resources that are
incomparable in relation to the means of work of the “ancient” translators,
not counting better linguistic competence that followed generally the profes-
sionalization of their profession. This is editorial work in general and there are
many cases that editors decide for a new translation after they struggle with
the old translation.
  Mehmet Şahin, Derya Duman & Sabri Gürses

5. to give a new perspective to the text. Certainly, the dissatisfaction is often

latent, hidden behind the conviction that some perspectives of dimensions
of the source text were not sufficiently taken into consideration in previous
translations. An example could be the retranslation of Jane Austin’s Emma
into Chinese. The first translation was in 1984 by Zhang Jinghao, who after 14
years, retranslated his own translation. The latter version was found more flu-
ent, vivid and closer to the original (Jianzhong 2003: 194). Another example
can be Adam Thorpe’s retranslation of Madame Bovary (as the 19th transla-
tion of this classical work into English language) with an aim to come closer
to the “period language” (Thorpe 2011).
6. to create a retranslation just because the operation proves to be more profit-
able than a new edition of the existing translation.
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In any discussion of retranslation it would be inevitable to exclude the concept

of voice. In most of the motivations outlined above, the translators are naturally
urged to give their own voice to their new work which would make them vis-
ible and distinguishable. The terms “translator’s visibility” (Venuti 1995), transla-
tor’s discursive presence (Schiavi 1996), “translator’s style” (Baker 2000) all come
in front when a retranslation is in question. Different approaches, definitions or
understandings toward the concept should not obscure the one clear sense of the
term especially when taken into consideration in the context of plagiarism in
translation. No matter how one takes the term, in an original attempt to translate
a canonical work, a translator puts in his/her own effort in constructing his/her
style, translational approach or illocutionary intention. In the case of retransla-
tions, each retranslation is (or meant to be) a new attempt to present a different
translator’s voice, at least theoretically.

Consulting Previous Translations

In his/her attempt to give a new voice to the target texts, the retranslator faces a
big challenge before putting pen to the paper: consulting previous translations.
Bellos (2011: 296) believes that the task of retranslating modern classics is not
enviable at all as those retranslators “have to steer a clifftop path between inad-
vertent plagiarism and gratuitous change”. The retranslator tries to fill the gap
in the previous translation/s in his/her new version. This requires, as one may
expect, a close examination of the previous translation/s. The situation addresses
a vital issue about plagiarism in translation: if the new translator has to examine
the previous translation/s, it seems inevitable to be influenced by them (Leighton
1994: 69). Identifying the extent of the influence in retranslations, especially in
 Big business of plagiarism under the guise of (re)translation 

prose, has been a neglected issue partly due to the complexity of the problem and
partly because of the vulnerability of the situation. The important thing here is,
in Leighton’s (1994: 71) own words, identifying “the line between permissible and
impermissible use of existing translations to create improved new versions”.
The problem is not to be solved easily, but some possible solutions have been
proposed by theorists. One such elucidation comes from Pyman (1965; cited in
Leighton 1994: 81), a theorist and literary translator, who laid down the principles
for an ethical, proper and authentic retranslation. She argued that previous trans-
lations should not be examined cautiously during the actual process of retrans-
lation. A close scrutiny will probably result in the interference of the previous
translation in the ongoing one. Such interference is unwanted not only because
of ethical considerations but also stylistic ones. A translation combining differ-
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ent stylistic and methodological approaches of different translators will inherently

lack the essence which makes a translation coherent in itself, in Pyman’s words “a
stylistic freak” (1965; cited in Leighton 1994: 81) may come up. Pyman adds as a
second principle: the translator’s good sense as the moral justification in the use of
previous translation/s for the betterment of the new one. The problem of consult-
ing previous translations during the process of retranslation can be formulated
from the viewpoint of “voice” concept: Unless a retranslator is able to justify the
motivation behind the attempt to retranslate a work or to give his or her individual
“voice” to the newly formulated text in the same language, he or she is prone to
face the risk of getting involved in a plagiaristic activity.

Plagiarism in Retranslation

Turell (2004: 7) identifies two different forms of plagiarism in translation. In the

first case, a translated text is published as an original work in another language.
The second form of plagiarism, which is the subject matter of this paper, involves
the publication of an already translated text as a retranslation by another translator.
Turell (2004) takes plagiarism in translation in the realm of violation of intellectual
property rights and argues that norms, boundaries and understanding of plagiarism
are culture bound, which suggests that each culture has its own norms in deciding
whether a literary creation (let it be a retranslated or an original work) is original
or plagiarized since some cultures tolerate matching, borrowing or copying ideas
while some do not. However, from the legal aspect, plagiarism is a crime and there
already appeared a legal literature on the exploitation of intellectual property rights.
From the legal point of view, plagiarism in translation is defined around
some principles. Turell (2004: 14) quoted one such case drawn from a prosecu-
tion expert report (Turell 2004: 14) which identifies the following issues for a
  Mehmet Şahin, Derya Duman & Sabri Gürses

genuine retranslation: A retranslation is the translator’s commitment for making

a contribution to literature with a new translation together with the retranslator’s
own interpretation and personal approach to the literary work. A retranslator’s
starting point is by no means the previous translations, but the original work; in
addition the dictionaries and his/her expertise in translation. If the retranslator
adopts some of the lexical, syntactic or stylistic units from previous translations,
this effort is evidently a case of plagiarism.
When needs to be justified, Turell (ibid.) argues, plagiarism calls for some
analytic tools for justification and prosecution of the plagiarizing translator.
The evidence may have qualitative or quantitative nature and it may come on
lexical level with respect to overlapping vocabulary, shared once-only words/
phrases, unique vocabulary and approach to word plays; or on syntactic level
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with respect to “calque syntactic structures”; or on stylistic level with respect to

recreation in the target language or translational approach particularly chosen
by the translator.
In addition to its legal consequence as a crime, there are other arguments
against plagiarism in translation (Gürses 2011). For one thing, plagiarized transla-
tions distort the history of translation, making it impossible to trace the individual
histories of each work. Secondly, plagiarized translations may come to the fore
as prominent works of art since libraries, private or public, are full of them. In
this respect, plagiarized translations, obscuring the quality of different translations
of a literary work, prevent the public from appreciating the value of a transla-
tion. Thirdly, plagiarism in translation is responsible for negatively affecting the
labor price of translation. The more drastic effect, however, for Gürses (2011) is
the way it becomes a cultural norm in a society, where original and real works are
less appreciated and rewarded.

Translation, Manipulation and Plagiarism: The Case of Turkey

A brief survey on the Internet proves the fact that plagiarism in translated works
is emerging as a serious problem in Turkey. Gürses (2011) argues that the appear-
ance of plagiarized translations in the Turkish market dates back to the begin-
ning of the twenty first century. Although it is a recent problem to be seen for the
last few decades, there already appeared a literature on plagiarism in translation
(Gürses 2006, 2007a, 2007b, 2008, 2011; Parlak 2007; Evirgen 2007; Çelik 2007;
Akyavaş 2011). In 2006, the problem was discussed in an academic conference
held at İstanbul University (Translation Ethics, 7–8 December 2006); and in 2008
it has found more publicity through the joint work of associations of publishers
and translators.
 Big business of plagiarism under the guise of (re)translation 

Translation of classics has been an important topic of modernization in

Turkey/The Ottoman Empire; the concept first came out on the Turkish liter-
ary scene at the end of the 19th century with the westernization of literature.
Before that, not only western literature was poorly translated, but also “classic”
as a concept was absent and literary critics had a hard time making a definition
which could include both Turkish, eastern and western literature. With the start
of the twentieth century, publishing companies had created their series of clas-
sics, but these publications were poor in number. Because the publishing sector
had been relatively weak during the twentieth century, state interventions or
subsidies to culture before and after the Turkish Republic was founded in 1923
were common.
The last but not least of these interventions occurred at the beginning of
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twenty-first century. In 2005, the Ministry of Education organized a commission

from literary critics, academics and authors and asked them to prepare two lists of
“100 Classical Books” (100 Temel Eser)1 which would be necessary reading within
the national curriculum.2 After the commission selected the books (73 national,
and 27 international classics), publishing sector hurried to publish these books
and within a short period many sets of classical books were prepared by different
publishers. Because most of the books were out of copyright, for the publishers
this was a profitable business.
But then it was seen that this new market of classics could easily get out
of control. Two years before this list was prepared, a big scandal occurred as it
was found out that some publishers were changing and manipulating the texts
of the books ideologically. In fact, ideological and religious manipulation of the
translations of classics had been a subject studied by some translation schol-
ars (Karadağ 2003). But a year after the list was declared, it was seen that this
had become a general attitude and besides the texts, some publishers were also
manipulating the translators’ identities by using plagiarized translations. Again
in 2006, newspapers had also entered into this market of classical books: they
had started distributing books which they co-published with a publisher for very
cheap prices (it was possible to buy a book with a newspaper paying the price of

. The government and the commission used the word “temel” which means “fundamental,
basic” or “necessary” to cover the concept of “classic”. This was probably because the word
“classic” does not have the desired “must-read” effect in Turkish.
. http://www.meb.gov.tr/duyurular/duyurular/100TemelEser/100TemelEser.htm [consulted
17.07.2013].
The list for the primary education is currently not available on the web site of the Ministry
of Education but can be seen at http://tr.wikipedia.org/wiki/MEB_100_temel_eser_listesi_%2
8ilk%C3%B6%C4%9Fretim%29 [consulted 17.07.2013].
  Mehmet Şahin, Derya Duman & Sabri Gürses

two newspapers). Translation scholars soon discovered that these books were, in
general, plagiarisms of old translations. They had fictional and unknown trans-
lator names which were listed as the translator of improbable number of books
from a couple of languages.
Starting from 2006, scholars and organizations started working against pla-
giarism in translation: First, articles about cases of plagiarism were published on
a translation studies magazine’s website (ceviribilim.com); then several papers
were presented at different translation studies symposia and articles about this
kind of plagiarism were published in literary magazines (Parlak 2007; Gürses
2007; Evirgen 2007; Çelik 2007; Oral 2011); and also Turkish Publishers Asso-
ciation and Turkish Association of Literary Translators launched a joint project
of inspecting several translations of classical books published by different pub-
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lishers for plagiarism and the result of this report, which corroborated the exis-
tence of plagiarism, was shared with the public (Çevbir 2008); and in 2009, at
the 5th National Congress of Publishing the Commission of Politics of Transla-
tion proposed a “national commission for inspection of plagiarism” (Ulusal Yayın
Kongresi 2009).
Between 2005 and 2013, three newspapers launched more than six campaigns
of a series of translated books. Each series consisted of at least ten classical works.
On the other hand, with the trademark of a variety of publishing houses, there are
tens of classics available in the market and each of them has more than ten editions.
For example, by April 2013, there are over 10 different copies of Dostoyevsky’s
Crime and Punishment on sale and the number is growing.
Thus, it is observed that there are very different results two different kinds of
interventions made from outside respectively in 1940 and in 2002 to the culture,
in short to the field of translation and more precisely to the field of “translation
of classical works”. With the 1940 intervention, the first translations of many clas-
sics appeared and their retranslations were done very seldom and in wider time
intervals. On the other hand, the 2004 intervention did not generate any first-time
translation of any classical work, caused an increase in the number of texts under
the guise of retranslation in a very short period of time. The use of these texts
in education, publishing them individually or as a series by numerous publish-
ing houses and with the signature of different translators, and their distribution
through the newspaper campaigns made it necessary and imperative to examine
all of these texts on a critical and translatological level and to assess their textual
features. In the investigation of plagiarism in translation, the conclusions need
to go beyond sporadic findings based on locally implemented methods; a more
empirical method is needed in the field of translation studies that can be replicated
across contexts and time periods. This study aims at contributing to the effort of
creating such a method.
 Big business of plagiarism under the guise of (re)translation 

How to identify genuine and plagiarized retranslations?

There are number of ways to identify whether a retranslation contains plagiaris-

tic elements. The first and the most obvious form of plagiarism is the wholesale
duplication of a previous translation and this form of plagiarism can be identified
with a simple comparison of two texts manually or electronically. On the other
hand, plagiarism does not always reveal itself as openly as the blatant duplica-
tions. Plagiarizers can be capable of finding subtle ways to produce a retranslation
without giving much hint of malicious practice. These subtle ways can be listed as:

a. certain lexicological and syntactic modifications to the previous translation(s);

b. combining random or non-random pieces of two or more previous transla-
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tions to create a “new” product;

c. rewriting an existing translation by adding “style” to it;
d. producing a condensed version of a relatively longer text by excluding some
random or non-random sections or deleting certain paratextual elements
such as footnotes, translator’s preface, etc.;
e. combining a partial retranslation with sections from previous translation(s),
usually using the latter more intensely in the middle sections;
f. and lastly and maybe as one of the most heinous ways of creating plagiarized
works, combining different sections of a literary work “translated” by several
translators, probably not knowing each other, as part of a scheme of exploiting
young “translators” by asking them to translate certain portions of a book as a
trial process.

Certainly, such various ways of plagiaristic actions pose significant problems

for those who try to identify and provide evidence for such actions. As seen in
Figure 1, any attempt to identify plagiaristic elements in translated works may
involve the examination of multiple texts which are bound to affect each other
in different ways. In her groundbreaking study, Turell (2004) used an analytical
tool, called CopyCatch, to detect non-originality in literary translation. By creat-
ing a corpus of two previous translation of a literary work, its plagiarized transla-
tion and a disputed translation; Turell (2004: 3) aimed to answer two questions:
“What makes plagiarism between translations different from other types of plagia-
rism and thus more difficult to detect?” and “How similar two or more texts have
to be before we decide that one has been plagiarized from the other or others?”.
Turell also presents an unprecedented application of a document comparison tool
to identify plagiarism which includes “elements of reliability and of internal and
external validity to the linguistic analysis of plagiarized translations” (ibid: 4). In
this empirical approach the first and foremost criterion for the identification of
  Mehmet Şahin, Derya Duman & Sabri Gürses

SOURCE
TEXT

RETRANSLATION
IN TURKISH ORIGINAL
TRANSLATIONS
ORIGINAL
IN A LANGUAGE
TRANSLATIONS
OTHER THAN
IN
TURKISH
TURKISH

RETRANSLATION
IN TURKISH
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RELAY
TRANSLATIONS
IN TURKISH

possible significant influence possible direct influence

possible moderate influence direct influence

Figure 1. How to identify plagiaristic elements in translation

plagiarism is “overlapping vocabulary”, up to 35 per cent of which is considered

normal and up to 50 per cent is not unusual. Further above 50 per cent of overlap-
ping, she argues, is likely to indicate a borrowing relationship between the texts.
Turell (2004) makes a distinction between lexical (content) and closed (function)
words in her analysis and includes only lexical words in the comparison of trans-
lations. Since her comparison analysis between four translations showed that all
four translations had more than 50 per cent overlapping of vocabulary (although
the disputed translation had much more) and thus failed to provide decisive evi-
dence, Turell (2004) integrated other components in the analysis: shared once-only
words, unique vocabulary, and shared once only phrases. The same literary works
were evaluated by an expert using a qualitative approach: analysis of single verses
in the four translated texts under comparison. The expert report proposed “several
taxonomies (one-word calques, multi-word calques, whole-verse calques, calques
of a series of verses, addition, omission, translation changes, and recreation), but
there was no reference to the frequency of occurrence of these syntactic structures
and lexical items.” (Turell 2004: 20).
In the event that subtle manipulations of the previous texts make it rela-
tively difficult to pinpoint the plagiaristic elements using the above mentioned
techniques; another approach can be adopted: “stylistic forensics” approach as
 Big business of plagiarism under the guise of (re)translation 

proposed by Baker (2000). Through stylistic analysis of texts included in a cor-

pus, Baker (2000: 248) aimed at exploring “the possibility that a literary transla-
tor might consistently show a preference for using specific lexical items, syntactic
patterns, cohesive devices, or even style of punctuation, where other options may
be equally available in the language.” The main questions investigated in Baker’s
(2000: 248) study were:
“(a) Is translator’s preference for specific linguistic options independent of the style of
the original author?;
(b) Is it independent of general preferences of the source language, and possibly the
norms or poetics of a given sociolect?;
(c) If the answer is yes in both cases, is it possible to explain those preferences in terms
of the social, cultural or ideological positioning of the individual translator?”
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In the study, where translations of different source texts by two different trans-
lators were analyzed using quantitative methods, Baker (2000) concludes that
through such data it would be possible to differentiate translators’ style. On
another concluding note, Baker (2000: 261) poses the relevant question for the
purposes of the current study: “Instead of analyzing several translations by
the same translator, should we perhaps be comparing different translations of
the same source text into the same target language, by different translators, thus
keeping the variables of author and source language constant?”. The approach,
details of which are not included in this paper, can be employed if the methodol-
ogy proposed by Turell (2004) falls short to spot and provide evidence for the sly
acts of infringement.
The current study aims at providing further empirical evidence for the exis-
tence of plagiarism in translation in Turkey taking two sets of classical books
distributed by a national newspaper as a sample. Along with the discussions on
motivations for retranslation, the study also tries to identify country-specific moti-
vations for the practice of retranslation and examine how and why such retransla-
tions are produced.

Analysis

In this paper, the progressively conspicuous existence of the phenomenon of

plagiarism in translation in Turkey is substantiated through two sets of books,
distributed in January 2013 by a national paper (Star) in return of a monthly sub-
scription (see Figure 2). Each set consists of 20 books, one “Bestsellers” and the
other “World classics” as presented in Appendix A. All of the books were pub-
lished by Kenta Publishing House (Kenta Yayınevi) with International Standard
Book Numbers. As can be seen in the table presented in Appendix A; multiple
  Mehmet Şahin, Derya Duman & Sabri Gürses

publishing houses and translators seem to have taken interest in republishing or

retranslating the works listed.
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Figure 2. Advertisement of the books (Original and Translated Versions)

For the preliminary analysis of the two sets of books, i.e. in order to determine
whether a probable cause can be established for the plagiarism claim, the following
steps were taken:

1. an inventory of the retranslations for each artifact (each book in the set) was
prepared using documentary research.
2. a cost analysis (price list for the genuine or original translations and the cost
of the current sets) was conducted.
3. research on the translator’s background (if available) was made through the
Internet resources such as online bookstores, search engines and LinkedIn.
4. Paratexts such as footnotes and translator’s preface were examined.

For a detailed and comparative analysis, three books were chosen out of 40, for
identifying the possible traces of plagiarism:
Honoré de Balzac – Le Père Goriot (Goriot Baba)
Charles Dickens – The Old Curiosity Shop (Antikacı Dükkânı)
Fyodor Dostoyevsky – Записки из подполья (Yer Altından Notlar)

For the detailed analysis of those books, all original and presumably genuine
translations were acquired. Three parts – the beginning, the middle, and the last
 Big business of plagiarism under the guise of (re)translation 

parts – of the books, each part consisting of five pages, were examined and com-
pared with the books in question.

Results and Discussion

The preliminary analysis of the two sets of books (world classics and bestsellers)
distributed by a national paper in return of a month-long subscription showed
that about half of the books do not contain any information about translators,
that is they are published anonymously. Another common observation is that the
books in the sets are also commercially available in major online book markets,
which suggests that they are produced on a profit-based publishing policy. None
nyu/2 IP: 128.122.230.132 On: Tue, 23 May 2017 19:00:25

of the books contain information about the translators’ background or footnotes

within the text, which is usually observed in most of the genuine translations.
It was also observed that the covers of almost all of the books were designed by
the same person. One of the most striking fact was that 11 books in the “best-
sellers set” were translated by a single person, on whom no information is avail-
able neither on the Internet nor on the databases of translators registered in
certain translators’ associations within the country. The documentary research
on translators’ background again showed that none of the translators – İlker
Tekiner (2 books), Aslı Yılmaz, Tuğba Yeşil, Mustafa Karataş, Ayşegül Sezgin,
Hatice Karademirci, Leyla Demircioğlu, Kadir Türkoğlu, Elif Zincirkıran, and
Sima Baktaş (11 books) – have any trace on the Internet, translators associations
or elsewhere.
The cost analysis was conducted through a web search in online bookstores.
The daily newspaper costs 50 kuruş.3 For each set, the readers had to buy the paper
for 30 consecutive days, which would make two sets worth 30 TL. However, if the
readers were to buy genuine translations of the books in the online bookstores,
they would cost almost 600 TL. Another interesting finding is that some of the
books in the sets are also commercially available in the book market, again pub-
lished by the same publishing house, Kenta. Each book costs at least 5 TL (for
example Goriot Baba [Le Père Goriot (Old Goriot)] costs 6.80 TL); which means
that the total of books would cost 200 TL if the reader were to buy the very same
books in the online bookstores.

. 1 Turkish Lira [TL] = 100 kuruş and 1 TL = 0.51 US Dollars as of July 2013.
  Mehmet Şahin, Derya Duman & Sabri Gürses

First-page analyses

One striking fact observed in the course of researching the availability of the
textual content of the given world classics book set revealed that potential read-
ers have actually access to these literary works in the electronic environment.
Therefore, in order to get further insight into the matter, another methodology
of making a research about these books was developed, which involved scanning
the first page of every book in the set and tracing their “twins” on the Internet.
The subsequent findings justified the departure point of this method since the
twins created no trouble in coming to the fore in several popular book sites and
blogs.
The first thing that drew our attention was an absolute overlapping between
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the sentences in the first pages of the books Kamelyalı Kadın [La Dame aux camé-
lias (The Lady of the Camellias)], Siyah Lale [La Tulipe Noire (The Black Tulip)],
Acımak [Ungeduld des Herzens (Beware of Pity)], Diriliş [Воскресение (Resurrec-
tion)], Kırmızı ve Siyah [Le Rouge et le Noir (The Red and the Black)] and Budala
[Идиот (Idiot)] published by Kenta and Akvaryum publishing houses. Any part of
the first page written on the Internet search tool provided us with the exact written
material available in the content of these books published by Akvaryum. Another
important fact was that the translator of these books was the same person – Sevil
İnan Sönmez. Still another considerable fact was that except for the book Siyah
Lale which was published by Akvaryum in 2011, all the books were published in
2012, the same year of the publication year of the books from Kenta publishing
house.
Akvaryum was not the only publishing house the content of whose books
was the same with that of Kenta. Three other books created the same contro-
versial situation in this respect. Any part of the sample sentences taken from
the books Parma Manastırı [La Chartreuse de Parme (The Charterhouse of
Parma)], Düşünür and St. Barbaralı Balıkçıların İsyanı [Aufstand der Fischer von
St. Barbara (Revolt of the Fishermen of Santa Barbara)] overlapped with the con-
tent of the books published by Kumsaati, B–T and Eflatun publishing houses,
respectively.
Such important facts bring forward some crucial questions for a thorough
consideration: Are the books published by Akvaryum Publishing House also
the products of plagiaristic activity? Given the fact that the books by both Kenta
and Akvaryum were published in the same years, can we assume that there is an
important connection between the two publishing houses? Can we reach the same
reasoning in terms of Kumsaati, B–T and Eflatun publishing houses as well? Are
the set of books published by Kenta Publishing House actually the plagiarism of
plagiarized books?
 Big business of plagiarism under the guise of (re)translation 

The analysis of the books, investigation on the so-called4 translators’ back-

ground, and the overall situation in the country show that none of the books exam-
ined in the current study can be classified as a “retranslation”, nor a “translation”
due to the fact that they do not fit in any of the descriptions outlined above. Simi-
larly, the publication of these books does not seem to be driven by any of the
motivations listed by Monti (2011). This dreadful, metamorphosed version of pla-
giarism urges us to name these “artifacts” as plain theft, and an attempt to under-
mine the respect for intellectual work and literary heritage of the country.

Comparative Analysis
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The detailed and comparative analysis focused mainly on translators’ background,

cover design of the books, additions and omissions, overlapping with other trans-
lations, changes on lexical and syntactical levels (i.e. synonyms, word order, etc.).
For the first book, Goriot Baba [Le Père Goriot (Old Goriot)] by Honoré de
Balzac, analysis of the earlier translations of the book and the comparison with
more recent “translations” showed that the “artifact” presented as the translation
of Le Père Goriot in Turkish, is the partial reproduction of a “translation” by Sevim
Özgür, published by Amfora Publications, the latter being, too, a partial reproduc-
tion of the very first translation of the book, translated by Nahid Sırrı Örik, repub-
lished by the Ministry of Education in 1992. The main observations were that the
so-called translator Sevim Özgür chose to make changes in the original translation
on a lexical level, that is to use more contemporary equivalents of some words, with-
out changing the syntactic structure of the sentences. Sevim Özgür, about whom
there is no information available on the Internet or elsewhere, also presented her
“translation” without any preface, omitted all footnotes and divided some para-
graphs. The publication year of this product is 2006. This is likely to suggest that
the plagiaristic actions in the translation market had started long before this date as
the timetable (see Appendix B) also signifies the accumulation of “retranslations”
after the year 2000. The artifact that is the subject of the current study is almost
the same as the one created by Amfora Publishing except that the former has some
omissions in some parts. It is important here to note that the overlapping between

. The term “pseudo-translator” was avoided here as it can be associated with the term
“pseduotranslation” by Toury (1998), which refers to “a more or less deliberate attempt
to introduce new options into a culture while neutralizing many of the objections that
might have arisen, had the same novelties been offered in a straightforward, non-disguised
fashion.”
  Mehmet Şahin, Derya Duman & Sabri Gürses

these three works based on three 5-page-long random samples can be observed
more vividly in the middle and the end sections rather than the beginning section.
This is likely to suggest that this is not a coincidence, rather a sly method of creating
an impression that the work presented is an original translation.
In the plagiarized version of the second book, Charles Dickens’s The Old Curi-
osity Shop [Antikacı Dükkânı], the name of the (so-called) translator was given as
Elif Zincirkıran, about whom nothing could be found on the Internet. The transla-
tion is obviously a shortened and plagiarized form of the original book, translated
by Azize Bergin and published in 1970 by Hayat Neşriyat (original edition in 1955
by Maarif Yayınları). The traces of plagiarism are so obvious that the so-called
translator has either changed some words, or word order, without altering the
syntactic structure. However, omissions abound: approximately two third of the
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book is omitted in the translation. At the very first page of the book, similarities,
although still very prominent, seem to be confined to the minimum. Towards the
end, the use of synonyms or changes in word order is almost never seen. Figure 3
shows the first pages of the original and plagiarizing book where the changes are
at the minimum. The highlighted sections reflect the overlapping between the two
texts; whereas the sections without highlighting are the sections that are either
omitted or altered in the plagiarizing text. Still, the overlapping indisputably shows
that similarities are by no means due to coincidence.

Figure 3. Comparison of two translations of Antikacı Dükkânı (The Old Curiosity Shop)
 Big business of plagiarism under the guise of (re)translation 

The following are some of the strategies used in changing the original
translation:
Synonymous pairs are used:
(1) Original translation:
…bütün gün kırlarda, sokaklarda dolaşırım…
all day in fields in lanes I roam
Plagiarized translation:
…bütün gün kırlarda, sokaklarda gezerim…
all day in fields in lanes I roam
Original sentence:
“(I) roam about fields and lanes all day.”
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Word order is changed without changing the syntactic structure:

(2) Original translation:
…günlerce, haftalarca ortalıkta gözükmem.
for days for weeks around I do not appear
Plagiarized translation:
…haftalarca, günlerce ortalıkta gözükmem.
for weeks for days around I do not appear
Original sentence:
“… even escape for days or weeks together.”
A further point about the above sentence is that the original translator Azize
Bergen has avoided translating the sentence literally; rather she used another verb
(to disappear) for “escape”. In the Kenta Publications’s version, the original transla-
tor’s choice is kept, which is a strong evidence for plagiarism.
Types of sentences are altered. In this example coordinated sentence is con-
verted into a subordinated one:
(3) Original translation:
Bu sırada bir soruyla karşı karşıya kaldım ki bunun anlamını
At this moment a question I faced with that its meaning
birdenbire kavrayamamıştım.
suddenly I had not comprehended
Plagiarized translation:
Bu sırada anlamını birden kavrayamadığım
At this moment its meaning suddenly that I couldn’t comprehended
bir soruyla karşılaşmıştım.
with a question I had faced with
  Mehmet Şahin, Derya Duman & Sabri Gürses

Original sentence:
“…I was arrested by an inquiry, the purport of which did not reach me.”
Just for the sake of changing the sentences, superficial additions can be done. In
the following example, the pronoun (size) is added. It is also worth noting that the
original translator did not translate the adverb “firmly”, the plagiarized version too
omitted that part:
(4) Original sentence:
Çocuk “İşte bunu söyleyemem” dedi.
The child “that this I cannot tell” (he/she) said
Plagiarized sentence:
Çocuk “İşte bunu size söyleyemem” dedi.
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The child that this to you I cannot tell said

Original sentence:
“‘That, I must not tell,’ said the child firmly.”
The third example is Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s Yeraltından Notlar (Записки из
подполья – Notes from the Underground). This book has three original transla-
tions from Russian made by well-known translators of Russian: (1955), (1982)
and (2011). But today in the book market we can identify 20 books with different
translator names, three of which can be said to be relay translations. The other
translations are suspected of containing plagiarism.
First of all, the book included in the set has no translator name. This was a
general problem for 11 books in the set, so this can be commented as a symptom
of plagiarism. In the book, translator’s name is absent, but the cover designer’s
name is mentioned and the same name is the same for almost all the books of the
set. It is a strange fact that this cover designer’s name is found in many other clas-
sical books published by other, little known publishing houses; this brings to mind
a possible link between these companies.
Comparison of the text with original translations reveals a different type of
text producing: Kenta Publishing version is a freestyle rewriting of an original
translation; it is highly different from the Russian original and it has improbable
additions. The first, well known sentence of the novel can be a good example. The
original Russian text starts with two famous sentences:

(5) Original sentence:

Я человек больной… Я злой человек.
I (am) man sick I (am) evil man
which is well known in English by Constance Garnett’s translation:
I am a sick man. I am a spiteful man.
 Big business of plagiarism under the guise of (re)translation 

In Turkish, it is translated by Mehmet Özgül as:

Hasta biriyim ben. Huysuz adamın tekiyim.
Sick man I am. Capricious men one of those
But in this Kenta Publishing version, these two sentences have been
rendered as follows:
Ben mızmız, asabi, hastalık hastası,
I crybaby, irritable, hypocondriac
keçi gibi inatçı biriyim.
obstinate like a goat person (am)
The analysis of the text reveals that this method is used throughout the whole text
and because the Kenta version is very different from the source text and genuine
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translations in Turkish (which belong to real, living translators of Russian) and

also from the standard English translation, it can be called as a freestyle rewrit-
ing of a translation. This can be considered as a tact that plagiarists use in order
to escape from being caught by similarities. This kind of “retranslation” practice
reflects the complicated nature of plagiarism as outlined in Figure 1 because of the
multiple texts involved.
In short, the findings from the detailed analysis of three books out of the book
sets supported and consolidated the findings of first-page analyses and provided
empirical evidence in support of the claim that all of the 40 books included in
the sets are mere reproductions of other translations or retranslations of the same
books; some of which are also prone to include plagiaristic elements.

Conclusion

The current study aimed at providing evidence of plagiarism in retranslation in

Turkey through a set of books distributed by a national newspaper in return of
a monthly subscription. A chronology of translations for 40 books was created;
translators’ (if indicated at all) background was investigated through documentary
research; first pages of all of the books were scanned and compared with available
(re)translations of the same; and finally a detailed analysis of three books out of the
set was conducted by random sampling of pages from three sections – five pages
from the beginning and five from the middle and the last part of the books.
The major conclusion of the study is that the whole may be classified as “repro-
duction” rather than retranslations produced upon commonly accepted motiva-
tions (Monti 2011). Another important fact is that, although it was not in the scope
of the current study, in addition to the serious links between the books distributed
through the newspaper campaign and some translated books published by other
  Mehmet Şahin, Derya Duman & Sabri Gürses

publishing houses, there are further connections between initial translations of the
books with the ones published under different translators’ names by other pub-
lishing houses. In short, plagiarism detected in the current study seems to reflect
only the tip of the iceberg in the translation industry in Turkey. It is a fact that
plagiarism in translation exists in other countries as well but in the case of Turkey,
we witness a new and organized form of plagiarism: plagiarism from plagiarism;
meta-plagiarism or supra-plagiarism. This study is likely to serve as a step forward
in the effort to identify plagiarism, a move towards methodological crystalliza-
tion and a research model which involves using both qualitative and quantitative
data (a mixed-method research (Creswell, 2003). In a more detailed analysis of
plagiarism in translation, quantitative data out of the document comparisons as
exemplified in Turell (2004) and qualitative data out the stylistic analyses as exem-
nyu/2 IP: 128.122.230.132 On: Tue, 23 May 2017 19:00:25

plified in Baker (2000) can go hand in hand to further prove empirical evidence
for the existence of plagiarism in retranslated or reproduced works.
The cost analysis also showed that there is a huge price difference between
the cost of the translated books investigated in the study and genuine translations
of the same. This finding is particularly important since it urges researchers to
investigate the means that a national newspaper may use to afford to offer the same
books with such a lower price, any possible deals between the publishing house
and the newspaper, the outcome of such a newspaper campaign for both parties,
and the motivation for such a campaign for both parties. Due to space limitations,
all these, of course, deserve to be a subject of another study. It is also of high impor-
tance to analyze social, cultural, legal, political aspects behind this phenomenon,
which also can be a topic of another study that would involve data and information
from all major actors in the field such as authors, translators, publishing houses,
literary critics, readers, translators’ associations, bookstores, distributors, etc.
In order to be able to prevent such artifacts, it is essential to identify the chain
of events and the factors that make it possible for publishing companies and news-
papers to launch them without any risk of being legally or financially responsible.
There are already several proposals for the prevention of plagiarism in translation
such as requiring translators to introduce preface and biography into their works
(Parlak 2007: 8), creating patents for unique translational elements (Gürses 2009),
and establishing a commission on plagiarism in translation (ibid). With the help
of empirical evidence of plagiarism, new proposals may involve the introduction
of new legal sanctions, lack of which poses a great challenge to thwart plagiarizers.
Another handicap in this effort is the readers’ indifference to the phenomenon of
plagiarism in translation. Although there are several institutional, academic, and
personal reactions to this wrongdoing; a simple web search on readers’ comments
about the books shows that the readers themselves do not seem to differentiate
 Big business of plagiarism under the guise of (re)translation 

“genuine” (re)translations and plagiarized works. This, undoubtedly, points to the

importance of raising readers’ awareness about this issue.
Such newspaper campaigns are known to increase the circulation of the paper,
thus the main motivation of such a campaign should be clearly stated. If all these
newspaper campaigns have included fake translations such as these, then the effect
on culture is in question. Similar works are on sale both in bookstores and online
book markets and most people tend to buy cheaper publications if they are not
aware of the existence of plagiarism, if they know about it at all. Most bookstores
around primary and secondary schools are full of such plagiarized works and their
linguistic quality is definitely in question, how much of ideological, manipulative
or arbitrary intervention has been made to the translations is mostly unknown.
New ways of promoting and protecting genuine retranslations should be intro-
nyu/2 IP: 128.122.230.132 On: Tue, 23 May 2017 19:00:25

duced so that such newspaper campaigns and certain publishing houses could
not further undermine translators’ efforts to make themselves heard in the mar-
ket by promoting books that kidnap translators’ voice by stealing their purpose,
approach and style in translation.

Acknowledgements

We would like to express our gratitude to Merve Avşaroğlu for her valuable contribution to the
background work of the study.

Dedication

We would like to dedicate this article to the memory of M. Teresa Turell i Julià, Ph.D., who
passed away April 24, 2013.

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Appendices

Appendix A. Details about the books distributed by the newspaper

WORLD CLASSICS SET

Number of
Book title Original book title (Book Title Publishing Number of
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(in Turkish) in English) Author Houses Translators

Don Донские рассказы (Tales of the Mihail Şolohov 5 1

Hikayeleri Don)
Denemeler Les Essais (The Essays) Montaigne 39 30 + 3**
Macbeth Macbeth William 15 12
Shakespeare
Ana Мать (The Mother) Maksim Gorki 39 34 +2**
Martin Eden Martin Eden Jack London 25 21
Kamelyalı La Dame aux camélias (The Alexandre 22 13
Kadın Lady of the Camellias) Dumas
Siyah Lâle La Tulipe Noire (The Black Alexandre 14 9
Tulip) Dumas
Parma La Chartreuse de Parme Stendhal 19 10
Manastırı (The Charterhouse of Parma)
Nana Nana Emile Zola 17 12
Goriot Baba Le Pére Goriot (Old Goriot) Honore de 46 30 +1**
Balzac
Acımak Ungeduld des Herzens (Beware Stefan Zweig 8 5
of Pity)
Anna Анна Каренина (Anna Tolstoy 39 25
Karanina Karenina)
Düşünür Unknown* Anton Çehov 4 3
Diriliş Воскресение (Resurrection) Tolstoy 42 30
Kırmızı ve Le Rouge et le Noir (The Red Stendhal 35 27
Siyah and the Black)
Ölü Evinden Записки из Мёртвого дома Dostoyevski 19 13
Anılar (The House of the Dead)
(Continued)
  Mehmet Şahin, Derya Duman & Sabri Gürses

Appendix A. (Continued) Details about the books distributed by the newspaper

WORLD CLASSICS SET

Number of
Book title Original book title (Book Title Publishing Number of
(in Turkish) in English) Author Houses Translators

Budala Идиот (Idiot) Dostoyevski 38 27 +1**

St. Barbaralı Aufstand der Fischer von St. Anna Seghers 4 3
Balıkçıların Barbara
İsyanı (Revolt of the Fishermen of
Santa Barbara)
Bulantı La Nausee (Nausea) Jean Paul Sartre 9 5
Antikacı The Old Curiosity Shop Charles Dickens 13 9
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Dükkanı

BESTSELLERS SET

Number of
Publishing Number of
Book title Original book title Author Houses Translators

Soytarı Клоун (A Clown) Maksim Gorki 8 2

Küçük Kadınlar Little Women Louisa May 26 18
Alcott
Martı Чайка (The Seagull) Anton Çehov 16 8 +1**
Arkadaş Мой Cпутник (My Fellow Maksim Gorki 7 5
Traveller)
İnsancıklar Бедные люди (Poor Folk) Dostoyevski 22 15 +1**
Germinal Germinal (Germinal) Emile Zola 21 15
Yeraltından Записки из подполья (Notes Dostoyevski 28 18
Notlar from Underground)
Siyah Lale La Tulipe Noire (The Black Alexandre 14 9
Tulip) Dumas
Ezilenler Униженные и оскорблённые Dostoyevski 20 14
(Humiliated and Insulted)
Kumarbaz Игрок (The Gambler) Dostoyevski 34 26
Hayat Üzerine О Жизни (On Life) Tolstoy 3 1
Düşünceler
Büyük Umutlar Great Expectations Charles Dickens 25 19
Fırtınanın Unknown*** Maksim Gorki 4 3
Habercisi
(Continued)
 Big business of plagiarism under the guise of (re)translation 

BESTSELLERS SET

Number of
Publishing Number of
Book title Original book title Author Houses Translators
Otuzunda La Femme de trente ans (A Honore de 11 8
Kadın Woman of Thirty) Balzac
Meyhane L’Assommoir Emile Zola 23 11
Alacakaranlıkta Tristan Thomas Mann 7 4 +1**
Therese Raquin Thérése Raquin (Therese Emile Zola 18 11
Raquin)
Yüzbaşının Kızı Капитанская дочка (The Alexander 38 24 +3**
Captain’s Daughter) Pushkin
nyu/2 IP: 128.122.230.132 On: Tue, 23 May 2017 19:00:25

Son Yaprak The Last Leaf O. Henry 5 3

Kırmızı Le Lys Rouge (The Red Lily) Anatole France 17 12
Zambak
*There is no single original work that can be linked to the target text in Turkish.
**Multiple translators.
***Compilation of stories from different sources.

Appendix B. Timeline of the translations of Goriot Baba [Le Père Goriot

(Old Goriot)] in Turkish.

Nahid Sirri Cemal Tahsin

Örik Süreya Yücel
Nahid Sirri Tahsin Cemal Tahsin Cemal Cemal Ismail Nahid Sirri
Örik Yücel Süreya Yücel Süreya Süreya Yerguz Örik
Nahid Sirri Nahid Sirri Nasuhi Nasuhi Nesrin Nesrin Nesrin Şerif Nesrin Cemal Sabahat Cemal Nurten M. Emre
Şerif Hulusi
Orik Örik Baydar Baydar Altinova Altinova Altinova Hulusi Altinova Süreya Ataç Süreya Tunç Karaörs

1943 1954 1961 1967 1972 1974 1982 1983 1984 1986 1987 1988 1989 1991 1992

Faruk Çil

Elanur
Bahar
Mete
Aydoğan
Ulker Nurten Tahsin Şerif
Baykal Tunç Yücel Hulusi
Tolga Elmas Tolga Nazh Seza Nurten
NO NAME
sağlam Şahin Sağlam Çankaya Tunç
M. Emre Nesrin Nuriye Mustafa Mete Sevim Ahmet
Faruk Çil NO NAME
Karaörs Altinova Yiğitler Bahar Aydoğan Ozgür Gezgin
Şerif Hulusi
Nesrin Nahid Sirri Oktay İsmail M. Emre Gülşah Cem Tolga Barbaros Funda
- Tayfun Sonat Kaya NO NAME Filiz Göktaş NO NAME
Altinova Örik Incesu Yerguz Karaörs Nazhgül Taşkiran sağlam Küpçük Hülagü
Genç

1993 1995 1996 1997 2000 2001 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011

The editions with bold charactes and gray background color are the translations by the same
translator and/or published by a different publishing house.
  Mehmet Şahin, Derya Duman & Sabri Gürses

Résumé

En se basant sur le cas de la Turquie, la présente étude se concentre sur la pratique de la retra-
duction dans le but de discuter des formes de plagiat dans les retraductions, qui peuvent avoir
de graves répercussions dans le domaine de la traduction, comme violer les droits d’auteur du
traducteur, compliquer la question de la voix du traducteur, produire des artefacts culturels
défectueux et porter atteinte à la culture en général. L’étude tente de décrire et d’illustrer des
dynamiques de retraduction généralement acceptées et examine la validité de la raison d’être
des retraductions, en se concentrant en particulier sur la Turquie. Pour notre analyse, nous
avons utilisé au total quarante livres classiques, distribués par un journal national dans le cadre
d’une campagne promotionnelle. Une vue générale des pratiques d’édition et de retraduction en
Turquie succède à une brève discussion sur la voix dans la traduction. Cette étude présente les
lignes directrices d’une analyse plus complète du phénomène du plagiat dans une retraduction
et dans la traduction en général. L’analyse des données tant qualitatives que quantitatives, tirées
nyu/2 IP: 128.122.230.132 On: Tue, 23 May 2017 19:00:25

de l’échantillon de livres classiques, a montré que les livres étaient une simple reproduction,
plutôt qu’une retraduction ou une traduction. L’article s’achève par une discussion sur l’impact
éventuel des fausses retraductions sur la pratique de la traduction et la culture en général et
préconise d’autres études empiriques afin d’éviter le plagiat en traduction.

Mots-clés: plagiat dans la traduction, retraduction, théorie de la traduction, voix dans la

traduction, traduction littéraire

About the Authors

Mehmet Şahin is an assistant professor of translation and interpreting at İzmir University of
Economics and his research interests include translation studies, translation and interpreting
technologies, machine translation and translator and interpreter training.
Address: İzmir University of Economics, Department of Translation and Interpreting, Sakarya
Caddesi No: 156, Balçova İzmir, Türkiye
E-mail: mehmet.sahin@ieu.edu.tr / rbsmsahin@gmail.com

Sabri Gürses is the author of poems and novels titled Gereksinimler, Elde Edemeyişler ve
İlerlemeler (1990), Unutulmuş Ay Altında (1992), Duraksamadan Eline Alıyorsun Bu Kitabı
(1993), Boşvermişler: Bir Bilimkurgu Üçlemesi (1995), Sevişme (1996), Maceraperest Turan Sözlüğü
(2012). In 1999 Gürses graduated from Russian Language and Literature Department at İstanbul
University and completed his master’s degree studies in Translation Studies at the same univer-
sity. Sabri Gürses is currently pursuing doctoral studies in Russian Language and Literature at
Erciyes University and working as a literary translator from Russian and English languages. Sabri
Gürses is also the editor of the Çeviribilim, an online translation journal (www.ceviribilim.com).
Address: Ethem Efendi Cad, Fırın Sok 12/7 Erenköy-İstanbul, Türkiye
E-mail: sgurses@ceviribilim.com

Derya Duman is an assistant professor of translation and interpreting at İzmir University of Eco-
nomics. Her research interests include translation studies, sociolinguistics and discourse analysis.
Address: İzmir University of Economics, Department of Translation and Interpreting, Sakarya
Caddesi No: 156, Balçova İzmir, Türkiye
E-mail: derya.duman@ieu.edu.tr