Indywidualna stylistyka autora w przekładzie literackim na pzrykładzie powieści Joanny Bator "Piaskowa góra" i jej tłumaczenia na język niemiecki

Abstract

To merely mention such skills or qualifications of a literary translator as perfect knowledge of a target language or literary skills would be a cliche. Much more interesting aspects of the art of literary translation emerge when it comes to taking strategic decisions concerning how far the translator can trust the reader in deliberate violation of conventions in the target language and culture or how close the translator can near the limit of acceptability. This Polish-German contrastive analysis of extracts of Joanna Bator’s novel, in which the author in an unconventional way works with her language, was conducted on the basis of German philosopher Friedrich Schleiermacher’s well known idea of dichotomy in the theory of literary translation, which employs domestication and foreignisation strategies, with the concepts of style, personal aesthetics and formal-aesthetic equivalence, as well as on the basis of Esther Kinsky’s theorethical essay „Fremdsprechen. Gedanken zum Ubersetzen”. Kinsky, the translator of Joanna Bator’s novel, suggests that a certain level of foreignisation in translation should be preserved . This theoretical assumption is virtually applied by Kinsky, foreignization being her main translation strategy. In the process of translation Kinsky also takes more radical steps of omitting or neutralising certain passages, thus diminishing their semantic strength. By analysing a literary text we can determine to what extent the strategies that the translator uses are justified or when the decision to implement a domestication strategy erases certain value of the text and creates only an illusion of authenticity, or vice versa – when foreignisation which goes too far makes the text unclear to the reader. Translation techniques employed by Kinsky are, as we may presume, the effect of the translator’s attempt to reach the balance between adequacy and acceptability, which are so crucial in the art of translation.