Challenges of literary translation and its editing

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Petro Mohyla Black Sea National University

Challenges of literary translation and its editing

Ababilova N. M.

Абабілова Н. М. ВИКЛИКИ ХУДОЖНЬОГО ПЕРЕКЛАДУ ТА ЙОГО РЕДАГУВАННЯ

Статтю присвячено проблемі перекладу художнього тексту, що є складним і багатогранним видом людської діяльності. Під час перекладу стикаються різні культури, особистості, способи мислення, епохи, рівні розвитку, традиції та погляди. У статті проаналізовано виклики, з якими може зіткнутися перекладач у процесі перекладу художніх текстів та їх редагування.

З'ясовано, що художній переклад зумовлений об'єктивними та суб'єктивними чинниками, має низку особливостей, на які перекладач повинен звертати увагу, відображаючи всі літературні особливості оригіналу, а саме: експресивність, конотацію та символіку; орієнтацію як на форму, так і на зміст; можливість кількох інтерпретацій; використання спеціальних стилістичних прийомів та виражальних засобів для посилення комунікативного ефекту; індивідуальний стиль авторів. Для виконання якісного художнього перекладу необхідний широкий кругозір, витончений художній смак, досконале володіння як іноземною, так і рідною мовами. Встановлено, що художній переклад є це мистецтвом, яке не може керуватися стандартними рішеннями перекладацьких проблем. Перевірка відкритих джерел на наявність поширених перекладів подій, імен, назв, а також вивчення контексту та історичних фактів, щоб зрозуміти і правильно перекласти текст, може допомогти уникнути помилок.

У статті зазначено, що якісно відредагований текст не повинен містити фактичних, логічних, структурних, стилістичних, словесних, лексичних, граматичних, пунктуаційних та інших помилок; бути адекватним ситуації, зрозумілим адресату і давати автору можливість досягти мети і виконати естетичну функцію, заради якої він був створений. Повний порівняльний аналіз тексту оригіналу та перекладу на лексичному рівні є невід'ємною частиною процесу редагування перекладу. Процес редагування не має чітких меж і може відбуватися на будь-якому етапі перекладацького процесу та має на маті покращити переклад.

Ключові слова: художній переклад, художні тексти, редагування, помилки, перекладачі.

The article touches upon literary text translation that is viewed as complex and multifaceted type of human activity. Different cultures, personalities, ways of thinking, eras, levels of development, traditions and attitudes come into contact in translation. The article analyzes challenges translators may face in the process of translating literary texts and editing them.

Literary translation is stated to be conditioned by objective and subjective factors; to have a number ofpeculiarities that a translator should pay attention to, reflecting all the literary features of the original, namely: expressiveness, connotation and symbolism; focus on both form and content; subjectivity; the possibility of several interpretations; the use of special stylistic techniques and expressive means to enhance the communicative effect; genre, and authors ' individual styles. To perform quality literary translation a broad outlook, sophisticated artistic taste, a perfect command of both foreign and native languages are required. The author infers that literary translation is an art that cannot be guided by standard solutions to translation problems. Checking open sources for common translations of events, names, names, and examines the context and historical facts in order to understand and translate the text correctly may help avoid inaccuraces. literary translation editing

The article mentions that a quality edited text is to contain no factual, logical, structural, stylistic, verbal, lexical, grammatical, punctuation and other errors; be adequate to the situation and understandable to the addressee and give the author an opportunity to achieve the goal and perform the asthetic function it was created for. A full comparative analysis of the source text and the translated text at the lexical level is an integral part of the process of translation editing. The process of editing has no clear boundaries and can occur at any stage of the translation process and is aimed at improving translation.

Key words: literary translation, literary texts, editing, challenges, translators.

Introduction

There seems to be no need to talk about the importance of translated literature in modern life as worthwhile translations of world literature are always popular and in great demand. Being a subject of study both literary studies and linguistics literary translation is one of the oldest and most complex types of translation involving an exchange between two cultures, societies, ideas, as well as emotions and associations. In order to make a literary work translated from another language as similar to the original as possible, such a type of literary activity as editing is needed. Thus, both good translation and quality editing may ensure translated literary works equivalence and adequacy both in terms of semantic and structural similarity and potential aesthetic effect. The paper is a reflection on the literary translation, challenges of its editing and the features inherent to these processes.

Related research. In the scientific literature much attention is paid to the creative aspect of literary translation and editing. Thus, M. Lanovik's monograph [4] is devoted to literary translation and translation as a type of interpretation. In O. Rebrii's monograph [8] three modern concepts of creativity in translation are distinguished and analyzed: monocentric, text-centered, and activity-centered. The scientist emphasizes that creativity is the leading ontological property of translation and analyzes the problems, in particular, of broad and narrow understanding of translation creativity, language translation difficulties as a source of realization of the creative potential of translations, as well as the nature and typology of translation difficulties. Without such knowledge, an editor cannot speak of high-quality editing of a translated text. D. Mironova [5] outlines functional and structural analysis in the process of editing a literary translation, explores the principles of an editor's work on works of fiction, and pays special attention to the editing of poetic translation. V. Hubarets [2; 3] reveals the essence and analyzes the methodology of editorial work with different text types, the principles of editing translated poetry, fiction, drama, scientific and popular science literature, and journalism are presented. The author is convinced that the editing process should take place in two directions: author's editing, i.e., editing of the translation by the translator, and the actual editorial work.

The aim of the paper is to point out problems a translator may face performing literary translation as well as challenges of editing translated fiction.

Presentation of the main research material. Due to the multidimensionality of the translation process, there are fundamental differences in the various authors' definitions of the literary translation essence. Thus, it is treated as a special method of intercultural communication, which is based on a well-determined system of verbal forms that carry sense and meaning, expressed by means of one language (the source language) and transcoded in another (the target language) through various transformations that cover all levels of contacting language systems (N. Shcherbakova, D. Romero Intriago and O. Danilova); the process of translation, which preserves the original work cultural pattern and emotional connotation and is aimed at achieving equivalence for an equal impact on the reader of the source text and the target one (A. Smirnova).

In literary translation, a translator's context is very close to that of the author. The criterion of coincidence, or, on the contrary, the difference of both contexts is a correlation between the data of reality and data taken from the literature. A writer moves from reality and his perception to the image fixed in words. In other words, if the data of reality prevails, then we are talking about the author's creativity. A translator moves from the existing text and the reality reproduced in the imagination through its “secondary”, “inferred” perception to a new imagery fixed in the translated text. That is, the prevalence of literary data marks the context of the translator. Thus, literary translation is conditioned not only by objective factors (specific-historical literary canon, standards), but also by subjective ones (a translator's artistic preferences). No translation can be absolutely accurate, since the language system of the target literature itself objectively cannot perfectly convey the content of the original, that inevitably leads to the loss of a certain amount of information. Each language element, using the invisible associative links, affects the visual thinking of a native speaker and creates a specific sensory image. It is natural that when translating fiction into another language, due to language differences, these associative links are heavily destroyed. In order for the fiction to continue to live as a work of art in a new linguistic environment, a translator must take over the author's functions and to a certain extent repeat the creation process and imbue the work with new associative links that would evoke new images characteristic of a certain language.

A literary text is created according to the laws of visual thinking, life material is transformed into a kind of “little universe” and presented as the author of the text sees it, therefore, in the literary text, behind the depicted pictures of life, there is always a subtextual, interpretive functional context, “secondary reality”. Such texts are written with the use of visual and associative characteristics of speech. The imagery here is the ultimate goal of creativity, while in a non-literary text, imagery is fundamentally unnecessary and, if present, is only a means of conveying information.

According to O. Honcharenko, a translator of a work of art is an artist himself, since literary translation has a creative nature, which means that a translator needs to have a natural and relaxed flair for it, sensitivity to the word, to its internal structure and melody. At the same time, the scientist notes that literary translation is hard, scrupulous, and persistent work [1].

Thus, literary texts have several characteristics that a translator must pay attention to, reflecting all the literary features of the original, namely: expressiveness, connotative features and symbolism; focus on both form and content; subjectivity; the possibility of several interpretations; use of special stylistic devices and expressive means to enhance the communicative effect; and a tendency to deviate from language norms. Their translation requires not only translators' active speech practice, broad worldview, and sophisticated artistic taste, but also a perfect command of both foreign and native languages. Moreover, translators need a special skill - the ability to interpret wordplay, a sense of linguistic form, the ability to convey the artistic image.

Therefore, a good literary translator is exceptionally sensitive to words, has an intuitive sixth sense that awakens creative potential from the subconscious, and the ability to perform a translation that is not too accurate or too loose as rendering of the source text, because too accurate translation negatively affects its readability and aesthetic appeal, but if it is too loose, it ceases to be a translation and turns into an adaptation.

A literary sensitivity has not once been mentioned as obligatory as not only for translating texts but also for their editing as it is this ability that allows to see that a translation against the rules of grammar, spelling or punctuation cannot be different because it is the only way to represent the source text features [12].

Reproducing the national specificity of the source text is one more challenge of literary translation as its preservation, which includes the functionally correct perception and reproduction of the whole combination of elements, is an extremely difficult task in terms of both its practical solution and theoretical analysis. In this case, cultural issues arise as two cultures may lack a common spiritual ground, so translators' task is somewhat complicated by the fact that they have not only to translate a specific work of art, but also to properly present a new culture unknown to readers; or representatives of different ethnic groups may have different social relations. A translator must be aware of etiquette differences and traditions that may be incomprehensible to the readers without explanation. Each nation is known to have its own nationally biased units (names of dishes, clothes, currency, holidays, etc.), so it is up to a translator to choose the best way of their rendering in the target language. Available background knowledge is to help a translator solve the problem of preserving the national specificity of the text. All these and many other discrepancies existing between different cultural areas make translators' work very complicated and sometimes require real mastery from them.

Another feature of literary texts in comparison with other types of texts is that each work of art has a unique use of linguistic means aimed at making the desirable impression on the reader. In literary translation accuracy is often achieved not by word for word translation, but by deviation from the source text and making appropriate substitutions. A translator must detach himself from the source text, from dictionary and phraseological equivalents, and look for a solution on the text level. Each language is special and has its own means of expression. In order to accurately convey an idea, image or phrase, literary translation sometimes requires changing them completely. Literary translation is an art that cannot be guided by standard solutions to translation problems. When translating a work of art, a translator has to think in images and be able to describe them, using all the variety of linguistic means and techniques that exist in the target language.

Correct understanding of the specifics and essence of the authors' stream of consciousness is key in the analysis of their works. Thus, before proceeding with the translation of a literary text, a translator needs to analyze it: determine the text composition, features of its genre, research the proper linguistic and extralin- guistic levels of the text. Literary translation involves reproducing the style of the original text by arranging and selecting the means of the target language at the phonological, lexical and semantic, syntactical, and text levels. Only such a detailed analysis of the source text is the key to its objective interpretation of the original work and, as a result, a successful literary translation [6].

The translation of works of fiction poses specific challenges and difficulties to translators, as on the one hand, they are to let readers understand the time distance, preserve the atmosphere of the time when the work was written, recreate the most accurate picture of the world, typical for the author's contemporaries, and on the other hand, not to archaize the work excessively. Genre, authors' individual styles, socio-cultural factors, and subtexts of a foreign language may also pose challenges. The translator of fiction has no right to treat any element of it as a trifle unworthy of attention. Great respect for the author's intent in its entirety should be one of the main principles of translators of literary texts.

So it is obvious if there is something that causes doubt while translating fiction works, it is better to clarify the meaning of a word in several sources, and if it is possible, consult specialists. A professional translator asks, not guesses. Even an experienced translator can be unaware of something or have difficulty with it. We would like to emphasize the necessity to check facts as often there are references to historical events or public figures in fiction texts. Checking open sources for common translations of events, names, names, and examines the context and historical facts in order to understand and translate the text correctly may help avoid inaccuraces. One more thing to note is preserving foreign-language syntax. If a text is uncomfortable to read, language stumbles over clumsy structures and meaning is hard to grasp, then the translator has retained the original syntax. The construction of the text must obey the laws of the target language. Thus, in a result of a quality artistic translation the text is as readable as if it were the original itself; it follows the same style and contains the meaning and mood intended by the author; and it does not contain grammatical, syntactical, punctuation errors and has undergone editing.

Different terms are used to refer to the process of editing translations: linguistic revision/editing, copyediting and translation revision [13]. In this paper we use the term “editing” which is defined as: careful analysis of a text in order to bring it into generally accepted linguistic and functional criteria [10]; “function of professional translators in which they find features of the draft translation that fall short of what is acceptable, as determined by some concept of quality, and make any needed corrections and improvements” [14, p. 12]; all-embracing exercise, including features of proofreading (layout, font, typos, punctuation), editing (rearranging and scrapping text, adherence to house rules), reviewing (terminology, correcting conceptual errors) and post-editing (machine translation) [9]; “checking linguistic correctness as well as the suitability of a text's style for its future readers and for the use they will make of it” [15, p. 1].

The subject of editing is bringing the object of editing into conformity with the norms in force at a particular time and in a particular society, as well as its creative optimization, the purpose of which is to obtain a given social effect [7].

A quality translated text is not to contain factual, logical, structural, stylistic, verbal, lexical, grammatical, spelling, punctuation and other errors; be adequate to the situation and understandable to the addressee and give the author an opportunity to achieve the goal for which it was created. All the above mentioned requirements explain the importance of editing. Both translators and editors must have if not thorough, then at least sufficient knowledge of philosophy, aesthetics, ethnography (since some of the everyday life of the characters), geography, botany, navigation, astronomy, and the history of art. The ideological and imaginative structure of the original can become a dead scheme in translation if a translator does not imagine the social environment in which the work arose, the causes that brought it to life, and the circumstances by which it continues to live in other environments and in other times.

Translators themselves can edit the translated literary text or editing of the finished text may be performed by another person, that is, an editor [2, 3]. While editing literary translation three its aspects need to be checked: the degree of the original text formal consistency; the degree of formal consistency in the target language; and the degree of meaningfulness and acceptability for the target audience.

Editing can be considered a broader term as it also comprises a bilingual component, although different revision procedures exist and the process can be predominantly monolingual (the editor focuses on the target text and only refers back to the source text if a passage is problematic) or bilingual (the editor systematically compares the source and target text) [11].

Although the process of editing has no clear boundaries and can occur at any stage of translation, it is worth paying as much attention to as the translation of the text itself. To errer is human, so such factors as inattention or fatigue can directly affect the quality of translation.

An integral part of the process of editing a translation is a full comparative analysis of the source text and the translated text at the lexical level. Such analysis must be based on the classification of correspondences and transformations as separate linguistic phenomena in the theory of translation. While editing literary texts finely-crafted stylistic aspects of the source text should be considered. Accordingly, during the editing process choices are to be made in favor of one or another stylistic devices or expressive means thus, forming certain stylistic systems characteristic for a particular situation. So, to render epithets the described word and its usage and semantic features are to be taken into account. The stylistic diversity of the text determines the way comparisons are to be translated. The characters' interaction may be of importance when transferring metaphors. Furthermore, editing literary translation helps eliminate such possible errors as the wrong lexical choice, sentence structure, inappropriate verb tenses, preposition selection, choice of stylistic devices and expressive means, etc. that can be considered really critical as they may cause confusion, make the text more difficult to understand, and even change the meaning.

To K. Fordonski's point of view, when editing literal translation, one should avoid three major dangers that may appear. Firstly, translating word for word. By preserving exactly as it is in the original one is likely to lose the spirit of the work, violate the syntactic norms of the language. A word-for-word translation cannot reflect the depth and meaning of a literary work. Secondly, it is translators' and editors' ignorance of the meaning and language of the original. Finally, it is an abuse of power when translators cannot influence corrections made to the text after his submitting it [12].

Conclusions

Being the most creative type of translation, in which freedom of expression is allowed, literary translation does not require literalness, but preservance of the form, structure, content, and mood of the original text. A translator has to deal with phraseological units, set expressions, collocations, wordplay, which in a literal translation would fail authors' intentions, or would not be translated at all. Thus, a translator has to look for equivalents in another language, selecting similar expressions in order to preserve the emotional and semantic message. The quality of literary translations depends directly on the translators'creative abilities. In other words, whether translators' writing skills are sufficient to make the new text as powerful as the original. After all, readers should experience the emotions, mood and impression of the original after reading the translation, and not every translator can do it. Another feature of translating literary texts is the need for mandatory compliance with the style and cultural characteristics of the era the work refers to. Translators need to realize the culture, the intricacies of everyday life and the way of life of those times, imbued with the text. Only in this way can they convey the atmosphere and meaning of the work as accurately as possible. Editing literary translation is the last step in the process of obtaining an adequate, complete work of fiction. Editing requires great skills, experience, and tact. While editing two tasks are to be solved, i.e. checking the text for errors and, at the same time, revealing an exceptional sensitivity and increasing readability. Editing a text of fiction we should state whether a translator has reached the balance between accuracy (following the authors' intention) and artistry (acceptable deviation from what is written in order to make the translation understandable and enjoyable for the reader).

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