Peculiarities of Transferring Russian Colloquial Substantives into English

Abstract

The article is devoted to colloquial substantive lexis studied in L. Ulitskaya’s novel «Daniel Stein, Interpreter» compared with its English ver- sion. The purpose of the research is to identify the main ways of transferring Rus- sian colloquial substantives into English in a literary text. The colloquial substantives and their English-language equivalents are obtained by the sampling method and subject to a thorough comparative analysis, during which six main methods of translation have been identified.The conducted linguistic research allows us to draw conclusions about the predominant use of neutralization as the main method of translation. The diversity of systems as well as linguistic and cultural specifics of the Russian and English languages determine the use of transformational and approximate methods of translation. The equivalents used in relation to colloquial substances with nega- tive evaluative connotations are less common. Omission and description are only slightly represented in the analyzed texts. The research results described in the article indicate discrepancy between the original and the translated version of the novel from the stylistic and emo- tional points of view. Lexical colloquialism, expressed by the substantives, as a feature of the individual author’s style of L. Ulitskaya, is mostly not transmitted in its English version.