Instantiation and individuation in Buddhist scripture translation

2021 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 227-246
Author(s):  
Pin Wang

Abstract This paper analyses and compares the systemic functional features of the Sanskrit original text and the Chinese and English translations of the Buddhist scripture Heart Sutra, focusing on the ideational components that are manifest on the strata of discourse semantics and lexicogrammar. Results show that there are both expected equivalence and significant differences among the Sanskrit original text and the two translated texts. The accounts for the equivalence and differences are twofold (on two hierarchies): in terms of instantiation, the translators go along different re-instantiation routes in finding corresponding potentials between the source text and their respective target texts; in terms of individuation, the English and Chinese translators’ personal and social identity has an immediate influence on their respective reproductions of the text.

2021 ◽  
Vol 32 ◽  
pp. 167-189
Author(s):  
Amina Arnautović

Translating a work of literary art, especially poetry, also means translating its style. At the lexico-stylistic level, style manifests itself in both denotative and connotative meanings of the lexical units of a text. By analyzing the connotations of the lexical layer of shame motif in English translations of Bosniak ballad “Hasanaginica”, we can identify and problematize the interpretation of this motif in the target texts in relation to the source text. Applying the method of lexico-stylistic analysis to the key verses of the shame motif, both in the source text and in the target texts in English, we examine the ways in which different translators build the mystical motif as the only abstract concept that never develops into a poetic image, leaving space for multi-layered connotations that are imposed on the reader. The results of the analysis point to the translations that are closest to the source text in terms of containing minimal differences in the degree of their interpretive limitation or intrusiveness. The most vividly evoked key verse of the shame motif is found in Francis Jones’ translation. However, the final vocabulary choice made by a discerning translator possessing a high degree of stylistic awareness should also be influenced by other aspects of the original text, such as its established rhythmic pattern or meter that requires preservation and other formal characteristics of this ballad, which are not to be found in Jones’ translation. Therefore, our conclusion is that the results of lexico-stylistic analysis of the original should be weighed against the results of analysis on other linguo-stylistic levels of expression (phonostylistic and syntaxostylistic) in order to synthesize them as successfully as possible, which could help recreate a new, more effective and reliable translation of this masterpiece of our oral literature.


2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 65-86 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ewa Kujawska-Lis

Heart of Darkness, due to its semantic complexity, interpretative openness and universal thematic interests, has been frequently intersemiotically adapted in a variety of media, encompassing radio broadcast, films, opera, graphic narratives and video games, as well as rewritten in the form of interlingual translations and refracted, with refractions including reviews and critical assessments, but also textual versions radically different from the source text. This article considers selected reinterpretations of Conrad’s text and comments briefly on how in each case the adaptation illustrates a fusion of Conrad’s vision with that of the adapter, hence (trans)fusion, and how this may give a new life to the source text via interpretative shifts. The article presents case studies: the film adaptation – Francis Ford Coppola’s Apocalypse Now (1979), Tarik O’Regan’s one-act chamber opera (both the United Kingdom in 2011 and the US staging in 2015), the graphic narrative by Catherine Anyango and David Zane Mairowitz (2010) and Jacek Dukaj’s Polish language version Serce ciemności (2017). This selection is governed by the variety of media and by the dissimilar approaches of the adapters to their source text. What is evident based on these variants is the role of the adapter as a creative participant in the process of transmitting the ideas of the original text, often updating them to make them relevant to new recipients of various cultural backgrounds. Additionally, reinterpretations and recontextualizations of the novella result directly from adaptive strategies specific to a given medium.


2016 ◽  
pp. 91
Author(s):  
Reginaldo Francisco

http://dx.doi.org/10.5007/1980-4237.2014n16p91O teórico e crítico de tradução francês Antoine Berman afirma que as traduções literárias em suas formas tradicionais e dominantes representam um ato culturalmente etnocêntrico, isto é, que traz tudo à sua própria cultura, às suas normas e valores, buscando fazer com que se esqueça que se trata de uma tradução. Para se opor a essa prática dominante, o autor propõe uma tradução que não esconda o elemento estrangeiro na obra traduzida, e que para isso seja fiel à “letra” (lettre) do original. Essa oposição é muito conhecida também nos termos utilizados pelo teórico norte-americano Lawrence Venuti, que fala em “domesticação” (domestication) e “estrangeirização” (foreignization) para se referir respectivamente às práticas tradutórias que ocultam as diferenças culturais, adaptando tudo à cultura de chegada, e àquelas que mantêm a estranheza do texto original e da cultura de partida. Interpretações mais radicais das ideias desses autores podem levar a pensar a tradução como dividida nessas duas possibilidades, e muitas vezes à escolha de uma delas como ideal e a outra como condenável. Entretanto, assim como com dicotomias mais antigas (literal x livre, equivalência formal x equivalência dinâmica, etc.), também estas não são duas categorias estanques, podendo haver diferentes combinações de ambas na tradução de um mesmo texto, além de estratégias híbridas ou soluções que não representam nem uma nem outra posição. Neste trabalho discuto a problematização dessa dicotomia, incluindo exemplos de minha tradução do italiano para o português do livro infantojuvenil O diário de Gian Burrasca, de Luigi Bertelli (Vamba).ABSTRACTFrench translation theorist and critic Antoine Berman states that in their traditional and dominant forms literary translations represent a culturally ethnocentric act, which adapts everything to its own culture, standards and values, seeking to make readers forget that they are reading a translation. To oppose this dominant practice, the author suggests a kind of translation that would not hide the foreign element in the translated work, one that is faithful to the “letter” (lettre) of the original text. A similar opposition to that / to Berman’s is also well-known through the terms “domestication” and “foreignization” as defined by American theorist Lawrence Venuti, who uses them to refer to translation practices that on one hand conceal cultural differences, adapting everything to the target culture, and on the other keep the strangeness of both source text and culture in the translation. Radical interpretations of these authors’ ideas may lead to the misconception that translation is divided into those two possibilities, and often to the judgement that one of them is ideal and the other condemnable. Nevertheless, as with other older dichotomies (literal vs. free translation, formal vs. dynamic equivalence, etc.), these are not clearly distinguishable and opposed categories. There may be different combinations of them in the translation of a text, as well as hybrid strategies or solutions that do not represent either one of them. In this paper I discuss the problems of such dichotomy, drawing examples from my translation of Luigi Bertelli’s book Il giornalino di Gian Burrasca from Italian to Portuguese.Keywords: foreignization; domestication; dichotomy.


2021 ◽  
Vol 44 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Vahid Medhat ◽  
Hossein Pirnajmuddin ◽  
Pyeaam Abbasi

This article applies the theory of possible worlds to the field of translation studies by examining the narrative worlds of original and translated texts. Specifically, Marie-Laure Ryan’s characterization of possible worlds provides an account of the internal structure of the textual universe and the progression of the plot. Based on this account, one of the stories from Rumi’s Masnavi is compared to Coleman Barks’s English translation. The possible worlds of the characters and the unfolding of the plots in both texts are examined to assess the degree of compatibility between the textual universes of the original and the translated texts and how significant this might be. It also examines how readers reconstruct the narrative worlds projected by the two texts. The analysis reveals some inconsistencies in the way the textual universes of the original and translated texts are furnished and in the way readers reconstruct the narrative worlds of the two texts. The inability of translation to fully render the main character results in some loss in terms of the pungency and pithiness of the original text. It is also shown that the source text presents a richer domain of the virtual in comparison, suggesting a higher degree of tellability in the textual universe of the Masnavi’s narrative.


The Shining ◽  
2017 ◽  
pp. 35-56
Author(s):  
Laura Mee

This chapter examines the process of adapting Stephen King's book The Shining. Looking at how and why parts of the book were adapted (rather than just focusing on what changed) allows for a coherent appreciation of Stanley Kubrick's film as a significant horror movie. Moreover, The Shining provides an ideal case study for more nuanced theories of adaptation which consider films ‘in relation to the history of generic conventions within which both the film and its source text are situated. In other words, a film participates in—and should therefore be conceptualized as part of—a sequence of adaptations of which the “original” text, in turn, constitutes a segment’. Changing the story's horrific nature does not result in it being less suited to the horror genre, it just offers a different take on its conventions. Comparing the film directly to its equally iconic source text results in inevitable competition in which the original will often ‘win’, even when then the two serve different functions. In addition to analysing adaptation, considering the film within the context of its production and its creators' filmmaking style, and looking at its position within the genre and its themes, offers a fuller picture of The Shining's effective approach to horror.


2019 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 131-152
Author(s):  
Sally Elizabeth Cowan

Abstract Tourist promotional texts function like advertising texts in that they aim to “persuade, lure, woo, and seduce” (Dann 1996). In the context of global marketing, tourists can be considered consumers who seek to escape from ordinary life carrying their culturally embedded mindsets with them. Although cultural differences have been widely discussed in the literature on tourism translation, few studies have focused on the deeper level ‘out-of-awareness’ culture through which tourists travelling abroad interpret what they see. This paper investigates cultural localisation as a strategy to adapt the source text of a French wine tourism website to the hidden cultural values of British tourists in order to preserve the persuasive function of the target text. Using Hall’s anthropological iceberg model and Hofstede’s cultural dimensions as the framework, a small sample of French source texts and their English translations are compared to demonstrate the link between the stylistic features of tourism language and the psychological motivations of tourists, highlighting the interplay between all levels of the cultural iceberg. The findings suggest that culturally localised tourism websites are more likely to succeed as instruments of persuasion, with ego-targeting discussed as an effective strategy when adapting the text to appeal to the British market.


2019 ◽  
Vol 32 (3) ◽  
pp. 195-207
Author(s):  
Patricia González Bermúdez

Abstract This article is a comparative study of four different translations into English of Federico García Lorca's play Bodas de sangre (1933) carried out in the United Kingdom and Ireland throughout the 1990s. Since the publication of Antoine Berman's seminal article on 'retranslation', this theoretical concept has provided a fecund framework for descriptive translation studies, illuminating the variety of solutions translators provide when confronted with the same original text. This article furthers that body of scholarship while simultaneously providing new angles on Lorca's dramatic work. The comparative approach to several English translations of this classic work concentrates on two key scenes of the play and discusses the linguistic, pragmatic and theatrical adequacy of each translation.


2010 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 102-123 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bengt Altenberg

Conclusive English then and Swedish då are compared on the basis of a bi-directional translation corpus. The examples are classified into five different uses according to certain formal and contextual criteria. The two words are shown to have obvious functional similarities: in each of the categories distinguished then and då are the preferred translation equivalents of each other. But there are also striking differences. Swedish då is generally much more common than English then and the latter is often left out in the English translations. In other words, the use of an explicit conclusion marker is more often felt to be redundant in English than in Swedish. The two words also display positional differences. For example, unlike then, Swedish då cannot occur initially in non-declarative clauses and its use as an unstressed pragmatic particle is confined to clause-final position. Another notable feature is that an unstressed particle in the original text (in both languages) is sometimes rendered by a stressed adverb in the translation, a tendency which suggests that the distinction between stressed anaphoric adverb and unstressed pragmatic particle is blurred and a matter of degree rather than a clear-cut dichotomy.


Target ◽  
2002 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-41 ◽  
Author(s):  
Graham. D. Low

Evaluating translations of poetry will always be difficult. The paper focuses on the problems posed by French surrealist poetry, where the reader was held to be as important as the writer in creating interpretations, and argues that evaluations involving these poems inevitably require reader-response data. The paper explores empirically, in the context of André Breton’s “L’Union libre”, whether a modification of Think-Aloud procedure, called Note-Down, applied both to the original text and to three English translations, can contribute useful information to a traditional close reading approach. The results suggest that comparative Note-Down protocols permit simple cost-benefit analyses and allow one to track phenomena, like the persistence of an effect through the text, which might be hard to obtain by other methods.


PMLA ◽  
1906 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 435-461
Author(s):  
John W. Cunliffe

This tragedy was presented before Queen Elizabeth by the Gentlemen of the Inner Temple in 1567–8. In its original shape it remained in ms. until published a few years ago in Brandl's Quellen des weltlichen Dramas in England; but a recast by Robert Wilmot was printed in 1591 under the title Tancred and Gismunda and included in Dodsley's Collection of Old English Plays. From the initials appended to each act in this later version it has been concluded that Henry Noel wrote Act II, Christopher Hatton Act IV, and Robert Wilmot Act V; the authors of Act I (Rod. Staf.) and Act III (G. Al.) are as yet unidentified. Before examining the play it will be well to glance at the literary and dramatic influences under which it was produced. A notable beginning in English classical tragedy had been made at the Grand Christmas of the Inner Temple in 1561–2 by the performance of Gorboduc, which was repeated before the Queen at Whitehall a few weeks later: an unauthorized edition of the play was printed in 1565. In 1564 the Queen saw at King's College, Cambridge, “a Tragedie named Dido, in hexametre verse, without anie chorus,” and “an English play called Ezechias, made by Mr. Udall.” At Christmas, 1564, a tragedy by Richard Edwards (probably Damon and Pythias) was acted at Whitehall, and in 1566 his Palamon and Arcyte was presented before the Queen in the hall of Christ Church, Oxford, as well as a Latin play, called Marcus Geminus. At Gray's Inn the same year Gascoigne's Supposes (translated from Ariosto) and the Jocasta were performed: the last purported to be taken from Euripides, but was really a translation of Lodovico Dolce's adaptation, itself made probably not from the Greek but from the Latin. Dolce adhered in the main to the model of Seneca, whose tragedies he had translated: English translations of eight out of the ten had also been published during the ten years before 1566, so that Elizabethan tragedy came under Senecan influence at first, second, and third hand. The learned dramatists of the Inner Temple no doubt had recourse to the original text, but like their fellows of Gray's Inn of a year or two before, they turned to Dolce as their immediate model, and they made an important step in advance by taking their plot from Boccaccio. It is true that Arthur Brooke in the preface to The Tragicall Historye of Romeus and Juliet (1562) said that he had seen the same argument “lately set foorth on stage,” but the play referred to is now to be found only at second-hand in a Dutch version, Romeo en Juliette, written about 1630. Gismond of Salerne is the earliest extant English tragedy founded upon an Italian novel.


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