STYLISTIC LITERALISMS: DEFINITION AND TYPOLOGY

Abstract

The description of literal translation problematics is an age long tradition. Notwithstanding this fact, many dimensions of literalisms have been open for academic research both in theoretical and practical aspects. The article focuses on such kind of literalisms as stylistic literalisms and explores their definition and typology. The subject matter of this article is crucially topical and reflects the current demand of modern theory of translation for new and profound research in this sphere. The objective of the article is to describe stylistic literalisms through the prism of modern Translation Studies. The objective determined the tasks of the research: to clarify and describe literalisms and the factors of their creation, to define the term “stylistic literalism” and to classify their multifaceted essence. Our study relies substantially on the application of linguistic descriptive methodology and devices. The innovation of this article relies in specifying the quintessence of “stylistic literalism” notion which is relevant for understanding the translation interference mechanism and crucial for modern Translation Studies; highlighting and analyzing different types of stylistic literalisms; grounding the comprehensive definition of literalism — key term of modern Translation Studies. The article claims that stylistic literalisms are the result of interference between two languages which leads to violation of target language stylistic norms. Various factors of stylistic literalisms origins contribute to their types selection: difference in relative frequency of definite word; ignorance of the erase metaphor degree; distinction in stylistic tone of source and target texts; stylistic discrepancies among words of different languages or within the boundaries of one target text; disparities in connotations; vague and sloppy phrases in translation text.