Tłumacz jako istota historyczna: o (auto)cenzurze w pierwszym polskim przekładzie "Anne of Green Gables" oraz "Anne of Avonlea" Lucy Maud Montgomery w świetle koncepcji dziejów efektywnych Hansa-Georga Gadamera

Abstract

The main objective of this paper is to uncover potential historical sources and traces of self-censorship, which in the first Polish rendition of both Anne of Green Gables and Anne of Avonlea by Lucy Maud Montgomery have manifested themselves on the following levels: stylistic and lexical means, the translation of culture-specific elements and characteristics of the main protagonist. The analysis of the many culture-specific items which were naturalized by Rozalia Bernsteinowa, author of the first Polish renditions of the two volumes of Montgomery’s famous series under investigation, allow the author of the paper to put forward a tentative translatological hypothesis which posits that by resorting to self-censorship the literary translator attempts to maintain both a sense of cultural stability and the strong feeling of national identity among the target audience, which is always determined by the impact exerted on the translator’s decisions by so-called effective history, a concept delineated by Hans-Georg Gadamer. This hermeneutically-oriented paper also wishes to deploy one of the most important hermeneutic tenets into an analysis of the said translations. By doing so, the author of the article intends to contribute to the now developing field referred to as translational hermeneutics.