Translation Of Fiction Research Articles

Out of this World: Speculative Fiction in Translation from the Cold War to the New Millennium by Rachel S. Cordasco (review)

Out of this World: Speculative Fiction in Translation from the Cold War to the New Millennium by Rachel S. Cordasco (review)

Rendering of genre-stylistic specificity when translating fantastic realities in science fiction (using the example of the translation of J. R. R. Tolkien’s trilogy “The Lord of the Rings” ).

This article is devoted to the study of the problem of the transfer of genre-stylistic specificity in the translation of fantastic realities in science fiction. Using the example of the translation of J.R.R. Tolkien's trilogy "The Lord of the Rings", the author analyzes the methods and techniques of translation used to preserve the authenticity and magic of the original text. The article is based on a comprehensive analysis of translations of the work into different languages, taking into account the cultural and linguistic characteristics of each language. The author highlights key aspects, such as the translation of fantastic terms, names and concepts, as well as the transfer of the atmosphere and style of the book of J.R.R. Tolkien. The results of the study allow us to conclude about the importance of professionalism and cultural competence of the translator in the transmission of fantastic worlds, names of heroes, events, places where the events of a literary work develop, adaptation of the literary image for the Russian-speaking reader and provide practical recommendations for specialists or future specialists in the field of translation of literature and science fiction. The features of the transfer of genre-stylistic specificity in the translation of sci-fi in books are revealed, using the example of the translation of J.R.R. Tolkien's trilogy "The Lord of the Rings".

Vernacular Visions in North and South Korea: Interlingual Translations of Unyŏng chŏn (The Tale of Unyŏng) and Ideologies of National Literature

This article focuses on two translations of The Tale of Unyŏng (Unyŏng chŏn 雲英傳, early seventeenth century) into vernacular Korean in South Korea (1960) and North Korea (1966). Looking beyond the classical paradigm of interlingual and intralingual translation as “translation proper” and “rewording,” respectively, the article argues that translations of classical Korean fiction from Literary Sinitic into vernacular Korean represented a form of transitional intralingual translation as each nation navigated away from active membership in the Sinographic Cosmopolis and attempted to establish a new national literature and literary medium. Whereas the South Korean translation is tethered closely to the Literary Sinitic original in terms of lexicon, orthography, and representation of classical allusions and perpetuates three tiers of literacy, the North Korean translation hews much more closely to spoken vernacular and traditional kungmun manuscript versions of classical fiction and embodies the overriding North Korean policy of sinograph abolition and han'gŭl promotion.

A Study on the English Translation of Chinese Science Fiction from the Perspective of Eco-Translatology Theory—A Case Study of the English Translation of Death's End

A Study on the English Translation of Chinese Science Fiction from the Perspective of Eco-Translatology Theory—A Case Study of the English Translation of Death's End

Diachroninis vertimo normų tyrimas literatūros diskurso pavyzdžiu

The article addresses the issue of the translation of fiction in different periods of time under the influence of various linguistic, social and cultural norms, and it aims to establish differences in the use of translation strategies employed by the translator. The paper reviews the descriptive approach in Translation Studies which argues that translation is a communicative as well as social act where the translator alone is not responsible for his/her translational behaviour; other people and institutions also contribute to the formation of common notions of translational behaviour, and these are termed norms, conventions or rules. Moreover, the research emphasizes that norms are not a stable phenomenon and may vary across different periods of time and across different cultures or communities. The research is based on the contrastive analysis of two translations of Jack London’s Martin Eden with the aim to establish differences in the use of translation strategies under the influence of translation norms.

(Post)Soviet Russia vs the West: The Ideological Enemy’s Image in English Translations of Fiction

Abstract. The Russo-Ukrainian war, especially the full-scale invasion of 2022, made the issue of manipulation particularly topical, including skewed representation in translation. On the basis of a detailed analysis of linguistic choices of translators, considered within the broad historical-political and ideological context, the paper demonstrates the discrepancies between the images of the (post)Soviet Russian and Western societies created in the novels by the contemporary Russian authors Oleg Pavlov, Viktor Pelevin, Vladimir Sorokin and Lyudmila Ulitskaya and those reproduced in the English translations. The ramifications of such modification acquire special significance under the circumstances, especially due to the increased attention to translation as an “ideological weapon” on the part of the Russian scholars and critics.

Lexico-thematic groups of non-equivalent vocabulary in Russian translations (against the background of Chinese prototypes)

This article is centered on the study and description of the ways of identification and designation of the surrounding reality phenomena in two cultures - Russian and Chinese. Special attention is paid to the significance of the national-cultural specificity of the word. The article considers both general issues of ethno-cultural phenomena nomination and its specific cases, namely, the functioning of non-equivalent vocabulary and ways of its translation from Chinese into Russian. It also gives a brief overview of the distribution dynamics in modern Chinese prose and the problems of studying Yu Hua’s work in Russia. The aim of the article is to reveal the importance of translations of modern Chinese fiction as sources of studying non-equivalent vocabulary and translation strategies when working on characteristic word-markers of Chinese culture used in the novel “To Live” by the outstanding modern Chinese writer Yu Hua. The study is based on the translation of the novel in question, made by the Russian scholar R. G. Shapiro. The article determines thematic groups of non-equivalent vocabulary in the novel “To Live” (word-designations of new Chinese life, ethnographisms, historicisms, background and connotative words) and the main translation methods of their transfer (borrowing, description, hyperonyms, etc.). Special attention is paid to approximate or inappropriate translations in the text, due to the translator’s ignorance of the semantics of non-equivalent words, which ultimately leads to an imperfect understanding of Chinese culture.

Invariant and Variability Boundaries as Indicators of the Translation Adequacy (Exemplified by Contemporary American Prose)

The object of the study is the novel "The Collector" by the American writer Nora Roberts. Interrelation of the contents’ meaning invariant and its variability inevitably springing up in the fiction translation process due to linguistic as well as extra-linguistic factors is analytically considered. Special heed is paid to the transcendence of the admissible or «tolerated» variability which is bound not only to infringe the translation invariant, but also to distort the original contents’ meaning as well as its distinctive stylistic features. Examples in the form of textual excerpts borrowed from the original and its published translation are compared and juxtaposed on the basis of the detailed linguistic examination of the voluntary deviations from the original made up by the translator both involuntarily, i.e. erroneously, and deliberately. They consist mostly either of the source text’s contents omission or introduction of his/her personal dysfunctional, redundant, and completely unjustified additional information to the target text. The examples are mainly classified according to the factors causing either the variability of the source text or its meaning’s distortion as well as to the effectiveness of various means aimed to protect the translation invariant. In most cases, the authors suggest their own equivalent versions of either omitted or distorted original’s excerpts as appropriate contextual correspondences. The authors conclude that such excessive variability in the translation of the novel into Russian distorted the general meaning of the original, changed its semantics and stylistics.

INTERLINGUAL PLAY OF WORDS AND ITS REPRODUCTION IN TRANSLATION

Objective. The objective of the article is to study the influence of interlingual word play on fiction translation, to provide practical recommendations and strategies for this stylistic device rendering in he process of translation; to expand the understanding of the complexities and peculiarities of language game elements transfer, which will help preserve the original meaning and emotional impact of the text. Methods. The main scientific results are obtained with the help of such methods as the analysis and generalization of scientific and educational and methodological literature on the problems of functioning and translation of stylistic means of an literary work, interlingual play of words in particular; system analysis; combination of cultural and linguistic methods in research; separation of subsystems of complex objects and their systematic analysis, an integral approach to the study of linguistic phenomena. Results. Interlingual wordplay plays an important role in fiction translation, adding elements of humour, suspense, and cultural depth to the text. It can cause different emotional reactions and influence readers’ perception and interpretation of the work of art. However, the translation of wordplay creates certain difficulties related to lexical, semantic, cultural and stylistic limitations. The translator needs to balance skillfully between preserving the original effect and adapting the wordplay to the target language and culture. Analysis of recent studies demonstrates the importance of understanding and accounting for cultural features, context, stylistic features, and semantic fields during the translation of interlingual wordplay. Various methods and strategies, such as adaptation, substitution, use of equivalent word games, are applied to convey cultural information and emotional effect in translation. The authors consider the meaning and effect of puns in literary texts, analyze their semantic and contextual complexity, translation problems, and consider different methods and strategies used to convey puns. The study emphasizes the importance of cultural and linguistic competence of the translator, as well as a deep understanding and consideration of the context, semantic field, stylistics and emotional component of the original text when translating interlingual wordplay. Only by taking into account all these factors one can achieve an accurate and adequate translation that preserves the author's style.

Specific Character of the Folklore Translation: After the Material of Hungarian and Slavic Languages

The translation of fiction and folklore works has its own specific character. It covers poetry and prose, lyrics and drama. Modern translators use the advice and creative heritage of their predecessors, in particular Maksym Rylskyi, who has combined scientific and folkloristic activities with translation from Slavic and non-Slavic languages, made a number of valuable comments on the issues of translation, its adequacy, transmission of the national identity of works, etc. Attention of the other translators and researchers has been also drawn to the issue of the translation of folklore works into Hungarian and Ukrainian. É. Grigássy, Zs. Rab, I. Petrovtsii and others are among them. They testify that besides the language competence, this work requires certain extralinguistic knowledge of ethnology, history, local studies, etc. They talk about two main dangers in such translations: on the one hand, it is the leveling of the national flavor of the work, its transformation into one’s own work; on the other hand, the text should not sound foreign, but should be natural and easy to read. The translation of various genres and types of folklore has its own specificity. Thus, significant difficulties arise when translating the Slavic heroic epos into Hungarian, the volumetric form of dumy and byliny, their epicness, dynamism, etc. Reproduction of the flavor of folk songs is demonstrated in the article exemplified by the translations of Hungarian calendar and love songs into Ukrainian. Then the authoress presents a number of samples of her own translations from the bilingual collection Hungarian Folk Fairy Tales of Uncommon Beauty, commenting the transmission of realia, proper names, phraseological units, language formulas – initial, medial and final. Despite certain doubts about the ability to translate folklore works into very different (not close) languages successfully, it can be said with certainty that it is possible, but this process requires, in addition to deep linguistic and discourse knowledge, extralinguistic, as well as poetic skill and talent of the translator.

Shadow and Substance: Restoring the Literary Output of Robert Pearse Gillies (1789–1858)

Late in life in in his Memoirs of a Literary Veteran (1851) R. P. Gillies reflected on a career fraught with difficulties owing to debt and other obstacles, though in it earlier stages it might be said to have paralleled in some respects the path of Walter Scott, while reaching a highpoint in the 1820s through Gillies’s significant input as a Germanist into Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine. One deep regret as expressed in the Memoirs was his eventual incapacity to piece together his own literary record owing to the loss of materials at significant points in his life. The present article attempts to ameliorate this situation by providing a fuller record than was then available to Gillies himself, through means such as the recovery of rare editions, identification of periodical contributions, and information provided by the archives of the Royal Literary Fund. More particularly it offers an improved account of Gillies’s output as a novelist and translator of fiction, with some newly identified titles being added to the list, while others are removed.

Narratives of Mistranslation: Fictional Translators in Latin American Literature

Narratives of Mistranslation: Fictional Translators in Latin American Literature

"The Impact of Ideology on Literary Translation: A Case Study of «The Nomads» by Ilyas Yesenberlin"

"The study looks at the phenomenon of ideological manipulation in translated literary works. The author highlights the tactics utilized in the translated texts to manipulate readers, using existing translations of historical fiction «The Nomads» by Ilyas Yesenberlin, published in the Soviet era. Influenced by the existing political system of that period, ideological influence and censorship in the Soviet Union that was pervasive and strictly enforced, literary text translations into Russian contain numerous evidence of ideological manipulation that was common for any literary work published in the Soviet period. Based on a review analysis of theoretical materials on the research topic, this article aims to define the leading role of idealogy on fiction translation by exemplifying cases of ideological shifts in the Russian translation of the historical trilogy «The Nomads» by I. Yesenberlin as well as reception of the translation among translation scholars. During the research, the following methods were applied: classification method, comparative analysis, review analysis of scientific articles and studies on the research topic. Based on the results of the study, hypotheses were formulated that have theoretical and practical significance for further work on the research topic. Keywords: ideological shifts, literary translation, historical fiction, rewriting, manipulative strategies. "

LITERARY TRANSLATION AS A BASIS FOR DIALOGUE BETWEEN CULTURES

The new possibilities of global communication and the latest information technology bring the history of literary translation as a scientific discipline within the science of translation to a new level since it infinitely expands the possibilities of searching and comparing historically significant information necessary to build a coherent concept of the evolution of translation activity in the history of human civilization.
 The problem of translation of fiction is one of the most important in both linguistics and literary criticism. Disputes about the methods, techniques and principles of translation, about the requirements for translations and the degree of their correspondence to a target text, about the originality of a translated text, as well as the problem of interlingual communication in general do not lose relevance in modern science.
 It has been by time that for a correct and profound interpretation of a literary text, a translator must know well the information about the era described in the work and the time in which the author lived; philosophical and socio-historical prerequisites for the creation of the work to involve “out-of-text structures” [Lotman: 1970, p. 65].
 In the paper the authors explore the peculiarities of translation of literary texts, consider different points of view on this issue and draw appropriate conclusions. Also, to reveal the specifics of fiction translation, in addition to the theory of proposition, the article deals with the theory of primary and secondary genres by M. M. Bakhtin [Bakhtin: 1986].
 The authors hold the opinion that there are no good or bad translations of literary texts in general, no perfect, no canonical ones. No translation fully renders the text of the source material: each translator selects only the essentials in the original and subordinates the secondary and the tertiary to them. What they consider primary or minor is a matter of individual taste.

On Changes of Narrative Focalization and Narrative Voice in Fiction Translation: A Case Study of Tales of Hulan River and Goldblatt’s Translation

Based on the Chinese corpus of Tales of Hulan River and its English translation, this paper analyzes the narrative discourse from the perspective of “Point of View” and “voice” at the sentence level, and explores the implications of discourse translation for the artistic reproduction of the novel’s narrative. The study attempts to generalize the differences in focalization and discourse between the source text and the target text, and discusses the results of these variations in two ways: firstly, the naturalization and oneness of focalization, and discourse style, the destruction of the child’s perspective; and secondly, the loss of narrative hierarchy and colloquial feature in the translation.

ARTISTIC TRANSLATION AS A FOREIGN SIMILARITY OF THE ORIGINAL TEXT

The article highlights the main problems of translating a literary text as the most complex type of translation activity. Different approaches to the analysis of artistic translation from the standpoint of determining its results in terms of adequacy, equivalence, completeness as ways to measure the relationship between the original and target text. The peculiarities of translation activity, which is based on the reproduction of linguistic, cognitive and culturological aspects of the original text in the target text, are characterized. The perception of the translation by the public and the influence of the target text on the addressee are analyzed. It is stressed that the translation of fiction is explained by linguists from the standpoint of determining its results, i.e., in terms of adequacy, equivalence, completeness and other ways of measuring the relationship between the original and ready-made translated texts. Here we must mention the definition of A. Fedorov, who believed that the fullness of translation should be understood as the transfer of specific to the original relationship of content and form by reproducing its features (if the specifics of the translated language allow it) or «creating functional correspondences of these features». The very term «completeness» more precisely defines the relationship between the original and the translation, as it is impossible to put an equal sign between them, there is only an indication of the degree of completeness of their correspondence.

Science Fiction in Translation: Perspectives on the Global Theory and Practice of Translation ed. by Ian Campbell

Reviewed by: Science Fiction in Translation: Perspectives on the Global Theory and Practice of Translation ed. by Ian Campbell Lorenzo Andolfatto Triangulating SF in Translation. Ian Campbell, ed. Science Fiction in Translation: Perspectives on the Global Theory and Practice of Translation. Palgrave Macmillan, studies in global science fiction, 2021. xvii+359 pp. £109.99 hc, £87.50 ebk. Tackling science fiction in translation from a global perspective is a daunting endeavor. On the one and obvious hand, any single volume will always fall short in tracking the many translation flows connecting literary lineages worldwide; on the other and more pernicious one, English-language scholarship on this topic will tend to veer toward English as its main frame of reference, reinforcing from the standpoint of theory what sf scholar Istvan Csicsery-Ronay, Jr. describes as English’s “Grand Central Bottleneck” stifling non-Anglophone authors from reaching global audiences. These concerns inform and, more importantly, are challenged by the essays collected in Science Fiction in Translation, a much welcome intervention at the generative intersection between sf and translation. An organic consensus emerges from the sixteen chapters presented in this book: that the relation between sf and translation extends well beyond the contingency of the translational exchange—the rendition of sf stories from one language to another. As Rachel Cordasco states in the opening chapter, these are fields connected “in the terms of transformation that they share” (19), one unfolding between the poles of estrangement and cognition, the other between foreignization and domestication. The terms are indeed transferable: informed by the linguistic invention of the novum, sf fabulation can be considered as a narrative process of translation through which what is estranging is rendered back into cognizable terms; similarly, the foreign text presents itself to the translator as an estranging novum, persisting as such, albeit domesticated to varying degrees, in the target reader’s experience. As editor Ian Campbell further remarks, both sf and translation generate “remainders”: in one case, the foreignness of the translated text, whose “sharp edges” poke through the translator’s efforts (Campbell, 5–6); in the other, the reader’s familiar assumptions, to which the estranging effect of the sf text remains anchored. Finally, whereas sf has been historically used by European writers to “either glorify or critique colonialism,” as Erin Twohig notes in her chapter on “Speculative Orientalism” (139), translation has been similarly mobilized in support of the “operative viewpoint” of the colonizer (as argued in Alexis Brooks de Vita’s “The Clockwork Chrysalis” [292]) as well as “a form of resistance against ethnocentrism and racism, cultural narcissism and imperialism, in the interests of democratic geopolitical relations” (Lawrence Venuti qtd. in Sara Martín’s “Militant Translation” 41). The essays collected here develop around these junctures, presenting a variety of approaches to translation that include close reading, applied linguistics, formalist analysis, gender deconstruction, and postcolonial critique, as well as case studies spanning from French, Catalan, Spanish, Swedish, Russian, and Hungarian to Arabic, Bengali, and Chinese. The breadth of this spectrum foregrounds translation, not only in its “linguistic transformative sense,” but also as a process of “cultural transaction” (Suparno Banerjee, “Ghosts, Aliens, and Machines” 265), [End Page 121] whose instantiations—as Virginia L. Conn brilliantly shows in her analysis of Wang Jinkang’s “The Reincarnated Giant” [Zhuansheng de juren, 2005/tr. 2018]—are often symptoms of shifting national identities, global postcolonial repositionings, and embodied “hierarch[ies] of worth” (230). In both senses, the genre of sf, intertwined as it is with the project of imperial modernity, presents a most productive frame of reference for examining the multiple tensions underlying transcultural literary exchange. As many of this book’s contributions show, beneath the unspoken claims or aspirations of universality upon which these processes rely, they resist ethnocentric assumptions that manifest themselves in translation as domesticating strategies of “invisibility” and “hypertextuality” (Amélie Lespillette, “Philip K. Dick in French” 146), obfuscation (R.B. Lemberg’s “Ungendering the English Translation of the Strugatskys’ The Snail on the Slope), and “cross-cultural erasure” (Brooks de Vita 295); at the level of sf representation we find discourses of othering (Twohig), technoorientalism (Yen Ooi, “Translating the Chinese Monster in Waste Tide”), and pathological nationalism (Conn...

Spaceships, an Erotic Amusement Park, and a Time Machine: New Short Fiction in Translation

Spaceships, an Erotic Amusement Park, and a Time MachineNew Short Fiction in Translation The Editors of WLT No Edges: Swahili Stories Trans. Various Two Lines Press ASJA BAKIĆ Sweetlust Trans. Jennifer Zoble Feminist Press SERGEI LEBEDEV A Present Past: Titan and Other Chronicles Trans. Antonina W. Bouis New Vessel Press YURI HERRERA Ten Planets Trans. Lisa Dillman Graywolf Press We're intrigued by these short, often speculative fictions arriving early this year. No Edges: Swahili Stories Trans. Various Two Lines Press In April, Two Lines Press will add another collection to its Calico series, breaking important new ground with the first collection of Swahili fiction in English. The book brings together eight East African voices telling stories of sorcerers and spaceships that blast prisoners into eternity. Seven translators render these Afrofuturistic tales into English. ASJA BAKIĆ Sweetlust Trans. Jennifer Zoble Feminist Press Jennifer Zoble translated these dystopian stories from Bosnian poet and writer Asja Bakić. Like the writers in No Edges, Bakić uses the speculative, with women being "rehabilitated" at an erotic amusement park and a programmer building a time machine. You can also read Bakić's short story "The Talus of Madame Liken," translated by Zobel, in WLT's Winter 2019 issue. SERGEI LEBEDEV A Present Past: Titan and Other Chronicles Trans. Antonina W. Bouis New Vessel Press In these eleven stories translated by Antonina W. Bouis, Moscow-born Sergei Lebedev probes a collective guilty conscience. The voices of things, places, animals, and people seek justice in these stories from the Soviet and post-Soviet world, available in April. YURI HERRERA Ten Planets Trans. Lisa Dillman Graywolf Press Monsters and aliens populate these stories by Mexican author Yuri Herrera, translated by Lisa Dillman, who has translated previous work by Herrera, including "The Objects," a story from WLT's March 2017 issue. An intestinal bacterium gains consciousness and objects can be sentient in this latest collection, available in March. [End Page 28] Copyright © 2023 World Literature Today and the Board of Regents of the University of Oklahoma

Jiang Guangci as a Translator of Russian Literature into Chinese

The translation activity of the founder of revolutionary Chinese literature, Jiang Guangci, is considered. The novelty of the study is due to the fact that the translations of Russian and Soviet literature by Jiang Guangci are almost not studied in scientific circles. The relevance of the study is due to the importance of building and strengthening Chinese-Russian cultural ties, including in the field of translation of fiction, in which Jiang Guangci was successful in the 20s of the XX century. It has been established that Jiang Guangci’s translations corresponded to his revolutionary ideals, which he embodied in his original works. It is noted that Jiang Guangci's worldview determined his choice of Russian and Soviet works embodying revolutionary ideals for translation. It is shown that his translations received wide support from young people due not only to the content, but also to the simple, understandable language of presentation. The participation of Jiang Guangci in the literary discussion about the translation strategy is presented. Due to his good knowledge of the Russian, he made translations from the original, and not from Japanese translations of Russian works. The authors come to the conclusion that the translation activity of Jiang Guangci has not been sufficiently studied and has prospects for study.

“If I was given some kind of flight resource, then I exhausted it to the maximum extent, working at the Institute of Slavic Studies”. The memoirs of Yu. P. Gusev

At the request of the editors of the Slavic World in the Third Millennium, Yury Pavlovich Gusev (born in 1939), Doctor of Philology, a well-known researcher and translator of Hungarian literature, speaks about his life and path in science. Yu.P. Gusev was born and raised in the Urals. After graduating from the Faculty of Philology of Moscow State University, he worked for two years as a teacher of Russian language and literature in a Hungarian village in the Transcarpathian region of Ukraine, having perfectly mastered the Hungarian language. After post-graduate studies in the Institute of World Literature of the Academy of Sciences of USSR, he became a member of that Institute and worked there until the early 1990s, rising from junior to leading researcher. A quarter of a century of his activity is associated with the Institute of Slavic Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, where he worked in 1994–2019 as a leading researcher. Since the early 1970s, Yuri Pavlovich has been actively combining his research work with his work as a translator of Hungarian fiction, both classical and contemporary. For his merits in the field of translation and study of Hungarian literature Yu. P. Gusev was awarded prestigious state awards and prizes in Hungary. Yu. P. Gusev talks about his childhood during the war and in the first post-war years, his youth, studies at the Moscow University and his impressions of those times, his work at the Institute of World Literature and the Institute of Slavic Studies, his many trips to Hungary and communication with Hungarian colleagues. He also shares his opinion on the development of the Hungarian studies in Russia, the possibilities for further dialogue between the two cultures. The article was prepared with the support of the Russian Foundation for Basic Research, project No. 21-59-23002 "Soviet-Hungarian scientific relations in the field of the humanities: communication channels, intellectual presence, transfer of ideas (1945–1991)". Interviewed and prepared the text for publication by A.S. Stykalin.