Issues in Translation

Presented
By
Huzzan Naeem
16031517-002
To
Mam Kanwal Zahra
Introduction
• Style in translation
• Fiction and footnotes
• Some notes on translating poetry
Style in translation
• Style is a multi topic on which countless treatises continue to be
written.
• There are elements of style that transcend the specific words used by
the author, for example the ratio of long sentences to shorter ones,
figures of speech , loose or periodic sentences.
• The translator strives to have no style at all and attempts to disappear
into and become indistinghuisbale from the style of SL author.
• Style can be defined as a characteristics mode of expression and
consciously or unconsciously the translator display one.
There are some several ways of approaching
the problem
• Break the passage into discrete sentences.
• Use semicolon instead of commas.
• Introduce a dash here and there or even recast the passage.
• Leave the passage as is hoping for an exotic flavor.
Fiction and footnotes
• Literature in the form of prose, especially novels, that describes
imaginary events and people.
• Any wide gap between the source language and target language
cultures will introduce the problem of whether to attempt to provide
sufficient background to approximate the source language reader’s
response to that word or phrase.
• There are three basic ways to cope with gap in the target language
reader’s knowledge of source language culture: footnotes,
interpolations and omission.
Footnotes
• Some translator adopts this approach routinely, especially
academicians who tend to dominate literary translations.
• They desire to convey the maximum possible amount of information.
• In the absence of footnotes in the original the translation that includes
them is a warped reflection because they destroy the mimetic effect,
the attempt by most fiction writers to create the illusion that the reader
is actually witnessing, if not experiencing.
• Footnotes break the flow, disturbing the continuity by drawing the eye.
Interpolation
• Another way to impart essential information already known to SL reader is
interpolation.
• Its nothing more than adding a parenthetical word or phrase.
• Interpolation should always be short, never more than a few words.
• The big advantage of interpolation is that after the term is explained the
first time it frees you to use the term SL term which is likely to be more
concise and certainly more denotative than its translation.
• For example: He interpolated a very critical comment in the discussion.
Omission
• The term omission here does not mean to cut out a portion of the work
that present difficulties or deleting any part of the original text, rather
here it refers to ‘what is omitted is the explanation leaving the readers
to his own devices.
• Within a single culture the passage of time tends to render prices all
but meaningless.
• When a translator deals with money it leads to two approaches: first is
always the author’s consent, second is self-leveling: leaves the sums in
the original and let the context demonstrate the approximate value of
the currency.
Some notes on translating poetry
• Translating poetry is difficult and so it is called impossible by most experts.
• John Ciardi referred to translation as ‘the art of failure’.
• If literary translation is a leap of faith, poetic translation puts that faith to the
severest of all tests.
• The soul of poetry lies in the use of language in the use of language in a
figurative, metaphorical mode of expression that transcends traditional semantics
limitation of language.
• The embracing of ambiguity is the hallmarks of literature and more than any
problems of scansion or rhyme.
• An issue that must be considered before beginning to translate poetry is what
does the target audience regard as a poem?
To rhyme or not to rhyme?
• English is a notoriously rhyme poor language. In Romance languages its
almost a challenge not to rhyme.
• The poets problem is not one of finding rhyme but rather avoiding hackneyed
rhymes.
• For all its versatility English boasts few rhymes for some of the most crucial
words around which of human experience and therefore poetry revolves love-
four rhymes one of which is ‘shove’ is non-starter.
• Translator must posses a poetic sensitivity even if he or she has never written a
line of original poetry.
• Anyone who can’t read an English language poem with feeling and more than
surface comprehension is an unlikely candidate for poetic translation.
Translating humorous verse
• Opportunities to translate comic verse are rare but constitute an
unusually provocative challenge. There are certain principles;
1) Humorous verse must rhyme
2) Brevity is the soul of writer
3) Save the humorous rhyme for last
4) Sound trumps meaning