Translator’s arsenal
Another thing I have learnt recently is that “to translate” does not always mean to replace one word with another in a different language. The clue of translation is to give the sense of a text in the most faithful way. The process of translation leaves us a number of methods to manipulate the text to make it more clear for the reader. Among these methods from “the translator’s arsenal” there are:
1. Linking – combining many short sentences into one longer;
2. Dividing – parting long sentences (sometimes made of complex grammatical structures) into shorter with the use of a comma or a semicolon;
3. Generalizing – an ambiguity of a phrase may be generalized by choosing one particular meaning of it, however, one should be careful to choose the adequate meaning that would follow the point stated by the author. The best way to avoid the ambiguities is to form the sentence in a way that leaves the interpretation to the reader;
4. Word shifting – due to the fact that usually there are different grammatical rules in different languages and the word order as well as the syntax may differ, it is common rule that the process of translation goes together with shifting the words within the sentence;
5. Replacing – the translated sentence sometimes may not fit the whole text stylistically due to i.e. word repetition. A good translator will in such case re-edit the text and express the same idea in different words. What is noticeable, English words good, small, short, etc. are usually translated into Polish with a lot of caution: niezły, nieduży, niedługi. ex. There’s good restaurant – Tam jest niezła restauracja;
6. Erasing and simplifying – unless one wants the translation to look ridiculous one should erase some things that are obvious for the target reader, i.e. if a text explains that Polish parliament is called “Sejm” or an American states that 1 meter equals 100 centimetres, which is evident for the Polish reader, putting such sentence into the text is aimless;
7. Adding and complementing – to achieve more precision it is consider worthy to add some words either for clearness, stylistic matters or grammatical rules. It is sometimes good to add something for better narration or while translating troublesome plural forms;
8. Changing grammatical forms – due to different grammars of languages, the translator needs to replace some collocations or syntax with more understandable and acceptable in the target language. Such a change may include: a change of tense, number (singular or plural), (double) negatives, voice (active or passive);
9. Replacing repetitions – sometimes repetitions are acceptable in one language and cannot be accepted in another. The easiest way to avoid it is to use synonyms, a pronoun or simply changing the sentence in a way to avoid repetitions.
Based on ‘Poradnik tłumacza’, Arkadiusz Belczyk, wydawnictwo IDEA, Kraków 2004r.
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