Analysis of translated tropes: metaphors, similes & analogies in a case study of the English & Dutch translations of the Russian poet Alexander Galich

Since Even-Zohar and Toury introduced a target-culture approach in translation studies, research focus turned to the effect of the target text on the reader. Consequently, it is, among other things, important to study the translation of typical elements of literary texts and their potential effect. This paper concentrates on the translation of a certain types of tropes dealing with comparison: metaphors, similes & analogies. Three categories of these tropes were selected for this paper: (i) lexicalized, (ii) conventional and (iii) private, because each of them requires a different strategy from linguistic and literary points of view in translation. This paper contains an analysis of the metaphors, similes and analogies used by a Russian poet Alexander Galich, which were translated from Russian into English and Dutch. The aim of the paper is twofold: (i) on the one hand, to look how the above-mentioned tropes were rendered in existing translations and (ii) on the other hand, to explore how they could have been rendered in a potential translation and to compare both versions. Besides, since tropes can be creative and decorative, the analyzed tropes are examined in order to establish which of them are truly relevant for translation and which are not in order to avoid possible overtranslating. Finally, conditions that favour or hamper trope translation are discussed

Intersemiotic translation and transformational creativity

In this article we approach a case of intersemiotic translation as a paradigmatic example of Boden’s ‘transformational creativity’ category. To develop our argument, we consider Boden’s fundamental notion of ‘conceptual space’ as a regular pattern of semiotic action, or ‘habit’ (sensu Peirce). We exemplify with Gertrude Stein’s intersemiotic translation of Cézanne and Picasso’s proto-cubist and cubist paintings. The results of Stein’s IT transform the conceptual space of modern literature, constraining it towards new patterns of semiosis. Our association of Boden’s framework to describe a cognitive creative phenomenon with a philosophically robust theory of meaning results in a cognitive semiotic account of IT

Psycholinguistic features of creative literary translation

The paper outlines the study of translation from the point of view of creativity. The research generalizes and empirically verifies a psycholinguistic approach to the study of creativity in the translation of fiction. A psycholinguistic model of literary translation made it possible to define some avenues of empirical research into future literary translators’ creative strategies. Individual creativity is viewed as the main indicator of future literary translators’ creative potential. The Smile by R. Bradbury and its Ukrainian versions made both by professional translators Lada Kolomiyets, Andriy Yevsa, Yaroslav Vepryniak, and 183 novice translators, were the principal sources of the analysis. As a result of studying the translating strategies applied, three groups of novice translators were defined – ‘combining strategy group’, ‘analogical strategy group’, and ‘reconstructing strategy group’. The novice translators’ versions manifested poor and sufficient levels of individual creativity, as they tended to apply only the simplest translating techniques, such as addition and deletion, rarely antonymous translation as the most creative translation solution. By contrast, mature translators used creative reconstructing and universal strategies, as they applied a variety of translating transformations including generalization, specification, addition, deletion, integration, full rearrangement, and antonymous translation. The empirical research results based on three of Cattell’s personality factors showed high correlation indices between translators’ personality traits and their literary translation creativity

Literary machine translation under the magnifying glass : assessing the quality of an NMT-translated detective novel on document level

Several studies (covering many language pairs and translation tasks) have demonstrated that translation quality has improved enormously since the emergence of neural machine translation systems. This raises the question whether such systems are able to produce high-quality translations for more creative text types such as literature and whether they are able to generate coherent translations on document level. Our study aimed to investigate these two questions by carrying out a document-level evaluation of the raw NMT output of an entire novel. We translated Agatha Christie's novel The Mysterious Affair at Styles with Google's NMT system from English into Dutch and annotated it in two steps: first all fluency errors, then all accuracy errors. We report on the overall quality, determine the remaining issues, compare the most frequent error types to those in general-domain MT, and investigate whether any accuracy and fluency errors co-occur regularly. Additionally, we assess the inter-annotator agreement on the first chapter of the novel

Psycholinguistic Features of Creative Literary Translation

Стаття висвітлює погляд на художній переклад з позиції творчості. У роботі обґрунтовано та емпірично підтверджено психолінгвістичний підхід до вивчення творчого потенціалу майбутніх перекладачів художніх текстів. Сконструйовано психолінгвістичну модель реалізації творчого потенціалу перекладачів, що дало змогу виокремити шляхи емпіричного дослідження творчого потенціалу майбутніх перекладачів художніх текстів. Особистісна креативність розглядається як головний фактор у розвитку творчого потенціалу майбутніх перекладачів художніх текстів. Для аналізу структурних одиниць операціонального блоку психолінгвістичної моделі реалізації творчого потенціалу перекладачів художнього тексту був обраний уривок художнього твору Рея Бредбері «Усмішка». Здійснювався зіставний аналіз перекладів трьох перекладачів рівня акме Л. Коломієць, А. Євси, Я. Веприняка та 183-х майбутніх фахівців з перекладу. Встановлено значущі кореляційні зв’язки між показниками особистісної креативності майбутніх перекладачів із різними складовими творчого потенціалу. Виділено групи досліджуваних із домінуючим операціональним блоком творчого потенціалу: з переважанням комбінаторних стратегій, із домінуванням стратегій аналогізування та з переважанням реконструктивних технік. Результати дослідження перекладацьких трансформацій, які використовують професійні перекладачі та майбутні фахівці з перекладу, свідчать про те, що студенти надають перевагу найпростішим перекладацьким прийомам, зокрема опущенню і додаванню. Серед найскладніших прийомів використовується лише антонімічний переклад. Професійні перекладачі використовують різноманітний репертуар перекладацьких технік: конкретизацію, диференціацію, гене-ралізацію, цілісне перетворення, антонімічний переклад, додавання і опущення. Результати емпіричного дослідження із застосуванням трьох факторів Кетела засвідчили міцні кореляційні зв’язки між особистісними рисами непрофесійних перекладачів та ступенем індивідуальної креативності

The Danger of Foreignization: Ling Shuhua’s Ancient Melodies

Lawrence Venuti’s foreignization theory, with its link of translation strategy with power struggle, is one of the most influential theories in translation studies since the 1990s. At the same time, his theory has also been subject to heated debate due to its loosely defined terms, prescriptive approach, binary thinking, elitist tendency, and other issues. One issue stands out in particular: contrary to its goal of resistance against Anglo- American hegemony, foreignization can lead to its opposite—exoticism or Orientalism—under certain circumstances. In this paper, I examine the validity and application of Venuti’s foregnization theory in Ling Shuhua’s English autobiographical work Ancient Melodies. In Ling’s creative writing that embodies several forms of translation, foreignization is the dominant writing and translating strategy. By analysis, I argue that while Ling unwittingly breaks several binaries in translation studies, she deliberately creates the foreignizing effect with her careful maneuver of domestication. Ling’s highlighting of foreignizing strategy reveals her binary thinking, which displays deep roots in the power hierarchy of the West. In this way, it can be seen that foreignization strategy functions as a double-edged sword; in its open resistance against power, it is also deeply involved with and assists the power structure