Deixis as an interactive feature in literary translations from Romanian into English

Abstract

This study aims to investigate the use of deixis in a corpus of translations from twentieth century Romanian literature (novels and short stories) into English. Viewing deixis as an interactive feature of texts, it endeavours to find whether there are significant differences between the use of deixis in source texts and translations, and to see how systematic shifts as well as single occurrences can contribute to the shaping of a translated text which positions the reader in a different way from the source texts. It also explores ways in which the translators position themselves with respect to the text. The study finds that the main tendency is one of distancing, whereby proximal deictics tend to become distals, with the effect that readers will be presented with a translation which elicits less involvement on their part than the original text did in its context.