Literal translation. The ideal is to take two languages and stick an equals sign between the two relating to a piece of writing. A supposedly impossible task, considering that as much as one word seems to equate to another, the entire history of the word gives it a slightly different contextual meaning. As we saw last week, in the OED, even the word "translate" originally has a different primary meaning than is used today. "To bear, convey, or remove from one person, place or condition to another; to transfer, transport" (from dictionary.oed.com). Where as in another language there may not be the same semiotic history. En français, la définition est "transposer un discours, un texte, l'exprimer dans une langue différente" (from larousse.com). Perhaps a better comparison to make would be between these words: Canis, Cane, Chien, Hund, Собака, Perro, 犬 (Inu), הונט, Dog, and even Dawg. These words all come from different idioms and have different histories, some of the words in the list are similar to each other, leading to up to "dawg" which has completely evolved into a different meaning as I am sure Ella will talk about in her final project. Even though it is impossible to make deux égal dos, we can come close enough to make simple sentences nearly equal. As semantics in idioms get more complex the ideas become harder to communicate. This is where the term "literal translation" enters the equation. Literalists would say, when the ideas become complex and thus incommunicable via an one to one translation, continue translation as if it were still possible to translate one to one, and then just create footnotes to explain the strange phrasings of passages; the object being to bring the reader to the foreign-ness of a piece and attempt to emulate the feeling of the foreign language. The benefits of this method are a near perfect faithfulness to the original, making the translator as invisible as possible. The deficit, however, is the piece becomes confusing and inaccessible to its target audience, as the "skyscrapers of footnotes" overwhelm, and the odd phrasings alienate said audience.
On the other hand, we have "free translation." This method attempts to preserve the meaning, but potentially sacrifices the foreign-ness and the inherent uniqueness of that idiom in the process. This is not always the case. In some cases (none jump to mind, but I am sure they exist), the foreign feeling of the original is transmitted through a free translation, but often as not, free translations take away from, or betray the original. The question now, is whether a free translation can still be called a translation at all. If I were to ask the OED, one of its definitions of translate is: To interpret, explain; to expound the significance of (conduct, gestures, etc.); also, to express (one thing) in terms of another. This seems to fit well with the idea of free translation. When the free translation comes under attack, some authors or critics defend the work being prosecuted by asking the criticizers to consider the work in question as something separate from the original, to evaluate the piece on it's own without comparing it to its predecessor. Although this may artificially increase the quality or value of the free translation, it no longer fits the definition of any translation. I would call this a "free" or a "not worth the time to read, because it's plagiarism." The point being that free translations seem to run away a bit with the first part of the term, and can even forget about the second part.
Ideally, a translation would fall somewhere between these two extremes, being faithful to the original, word for word, as much as possible, and at the same time, changing words in order to keep the meaning, and context accurate. Does this succeed as a translation? No. But like many have said before, we must keep trying.
I agree with you when you say that an ideal translation falls somewhere between the two extremes, though for me personally it would definitely lean toward "free" translation. I don't think that free translation HAS to sacrifice the foreign-ness of a text. The example that comes to mind is a Spanish poem that I read as part of my project. The original talks about the "habilidades," which I would literally translate as "abilities" of the indigenous peoples, but the translation uses the word "nahuatl," the name of that indigenous group. It's a translation that never would have occurred to me but that I love, because by using such a foreign word the translator gets to the core of what he's trying to express, mainly the mystical, uncomprehendable "abilities" that the soldiers think these indigenous people possess.
ReplyDeleteTranslation as a Blending of Cultures by Ahmad Abu-Mahfouz says it better than I have here, and then has a much more interesting conclusion.
ReplyDeleteNice post! Whenever I think of literal translation now I think of the super computer in the "Global Market" essay. The translating machine is never a real threat because it simply cannot make up for the creative aspect of translation. You're right to bring up semantics; we're dealing with systems of signs. The key difference is that great works (both philosophy and literature) break down the system and rebuild it in a new and interesting way. Because writers are essentially doing something new with language a creative sensibility is needed to truly translate it. This is why I'm with Carisa on the importance of free translation. The only problem with leaning toward a more free translation is that it allows the translator to insert themselves in a text (I'm looking at you, Constance Garnette).
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