I have been meaning for quite some time to post further articles to this blog on the recently-commenced discussion topic of the translations from English, into French, of the Harry Potter series of seven novels (1997-2007) by J.K Rowling. The French children's writer Jean-François Ménard was the author of these superb Rowling renderings into his native language.
Before I began to research the translations into English of the works of the French writer, Jules Verne (the subject of my first, forthcoming book Retranslation Through the Centuries: The Example of Jules Verne, due to be published later this year by Peter Lang), my initial interest was in children's literature, and what that concept really means, and to what extent works such as those of Rowling can be blandly labelled - perhaps unfairly - as 'children's literature'. Don't lots of adults - myself included - enjoy her works and even find them dark, challenging andmulti-layered? I was then interested, pre-Verne, in how certain so-called children's authors had been translated over the years into French - novelists as diverse as the aforementioned J.K. Rowling, Lemony Snicket, Frances Hodgson Burnett (she of Little Lord Fauntleroy, A Little Princess and The Secret Garden classic children's {and adults'?} literary fame), Anna Sewell, Mark Twain, Carolyn Swift and Louisa May Alcott, to name but some. This interest in translation of classic and popular fiction in both directions of the language pair English/French has been a long-standing one. It dates back essentially to 2005, when, on the completion of the taught elements of my MA in Translation Studies (French and English) at Dublin City University (DCU), I was seeking to develop a research topic for my MA dissertation. I read an article by Dr Eithne O'Connell, of DCU, on the meanings ascribed to the concept known as 'children's literature', an article published as part of a collection of articles produced in homage to the foremost translation theorist Peter Newmark some seven years ago. Around the same time, I read an article by translation theorist Jeremy Munday on Descriptive-Translation Studies(DTS _ Gideon TOury) methodolgies, on examining existing translations to describe the translation strategies evident, and to explain, probabilistically, their multiple underlying causal influences, especially the Toury-championed cause of norms of translation.
Now, Munday gave, in his article on DTS, what proved to be, for me, a very interesting example of Toury's Descriptive-Explanatory Translation Studies empirical research methodologies and findings, in action: he discussed the translation, into Spanish and Italian respectively, of the Harry Potter novels, and compared and contrasted the translation approaches and the varying norms of translation influencing the translators. He discussed, among many other issues, how the names of characters such as Dumbledore and Snape, and many others, were rendered into these Romance languages; whether the language use was idiomatic or otherwise; and whether the translation is overtly presented as such, as deriving from a preceding literary work. He then drew inferences as to the likely norms and other causes influencing the translation forms witnessed by him, e.g. such causes include a multiplicity of influences such as publishers' and ST author's input to translation, the translator's own style, agency and intervention into the text which may be a form of 'derived creativity'; norms of accuracy, idiomaticity, source-language-oriented translation strategies versus target-oriented renderings, or hybrids of both orientations, and so on.
These articles - Munday and O'Connell - together with reading authors like Toury (his 1995 monograph entitled Descriptive Translation Studies - and Beyond is a seminal, still highly influential scholarly tome), whetted my appetite to discover how Harry Potter had been rendered into the French language.
So began months - later, years - of fun reading the Potter books in English and then in French, and then comparing certain passages and features between the English source text and French target text. I ended up discussing - as previous postings have illustrated in this blog - Ménard's (the French translator) use of style, choice of creative names for characters, places, wizarding artefacts, and so on.
In this posting, then, I would like to go back to 'basics' - here, I summarise what the introduction to my dissertation on the Gallicization of Harry was concerned with.
1.1 Research Questions
The ‘Harry Potter’ novels by J.K. Rowling have enjoyed huge success since the publication of the first book in the series, in 1997. Because I enjoyed these novels so much, I began to reflect on how Rowling’s work has won over the children of the ‘computer game’ generation to the joys of reading. Not alone do these novels challenge young readers, but they have proved equally fascinating to adults. I began to ponder the reasons for this appeal to all age groups. I also became curious about how exactly Rowling’s novels had been translated into French, and what type of impact these translations might have had on a Francophone readership. I therefore decided to investigate the nature of the French translations of these books. The main questions I set out to answer are:
What is understood by the problematically- definable genre known as children’s literature? Does it consist of common textual features, similar characters and predictable plots? Or have contemporary authors such as J.K. Rowling transformed a marginalized genre, by challenging its possibilities and its readership’s demographic profiles?
The most important question was that of determining the nature of the translation of these novels from SL English to TL French. How closely did the French translator adhere to the authority of the ST? Can his rendering be regarded as ST-oriented in nature, and thus as an “adequate” translation in Toury’s (1995) conceptualisation of the term? Or is it, rather, based more on TT norms and thus more appropriately classified as an “acceptable” set of translations from the viewpoint of the Target addressees?[1] Or does it occupy the middle ground between adequacy and acceptability?
To answer such questions, the major part of this research consists of an analysis of a sample of the parallel corpus of STs and French TTs of the six Harry Potter novels published to date. This analysis aims to ascertain the types of translational shifts evident. This helps to reveal the norms of translation likely to have influenced the translator.
I have thus attempted to characterise the general orientation which was evident in these translations, through the lens of the individual norms adhered to, according to various theoretical models of translational norms, developed by such theorists as Toury (1995). All such models are inscribed within the domain of Descriptive Translation Studies, hereinafter referred to as DTS. This is a sub-domain of ‘pure’ translation studies, according to the Holmes/Toury ‘map’ of Translation Studies, as discussed by Munday
( 2001, p.10). Toury (1995) has proposed a methodology for DTS, defined by Munday (2001,p.108) as “a non-prescriptive means of understanding the ‘norms’ at work in the translation process and of discovering the general ‘laws’ of translation.”
Using polysystem theory, as developed by Even-Zohar (Munday, 2001:109), I also decided to examine the position of Rowling’s novels in the literary polysystems of the Anglophone SC and the Francophone TC.
1.2 Norms of Translation
This research thus aims to yield insights into the normative system affecting the translation of the Harry Potter novels into French – norms are understood here as the cultural values and beliefs about translation which influence the translation process.
1.3 Research Objectives and Benefits
The following are the principal aims and expected benefits of this research.
· Understanding should be provided as to how the ‘Harry Potter’ novels were strategically translated for French audiences. What were the evident translational shifts as isolated from a representative sample? What do these alterations on the journey from donor text to receptor text teach us about the normative factors operating beneath the surface of the translation process?
· How might we classify the Harry Potter novels as a literary genre?
· Can the Harry Potter texts be regarded as canonical?
· I ask if there is scope for an element of prescriptivism or translational quality assessment in Toury’s DTS model.
I also seek evidence of stylistic contrasts between English and French in the corpus being examined.
1.4 Research Summary
I thus intend to examine how the TTs function as translations, both on the microscopic level of individual textemes, and on the macroscopic level: are the TTs openly portrayed as translations; are they unabridged renderings; is the translator acknowledged; why was this series of novels chosen for translation, and are these translations marketed as children’s texts, or also as adult literature?
1.5 Reasons For Personal Interest In Literary Translation, and Personal Views of Literary Genre Boundaries
As a child, I enjoyed all forms of literature, including texts aimed at older readers. I also engaged in creative writing in my childhood and teens. This is why a topic such as the translation of so-called young people’s literature interests me. Coupled with my love for literature is a passion for French, thus making this dissertation topic an ideal personal choice.
I always considered literature for younger readers to include not only works written for children, but any text which caught the interest of a young reader. Therefore, I regard as ‘children’s texts’ any material consumed by younger readers, though it may not originally have been intended for that age group only, or even at all.
1.6 Does Children’s Literature Even Exist as a Valid Category?
I therefore feel that there should not be a strictly defined genre known as children’s literature, as people of all ages have always read a variety of subject matter, aimed at different ages. The fact that the Harry Potter novels are enjoyed by all ages is testimony to the fact that certain works contain multiple semantic layers. They appeal on different levels to different age groups and display features associated not just with young readers’ texts, but also with darker, disturbing texts which challenge adults.
Furthermore, works such as Rowling’s contain a high linguistic register and a depth of characterisation which presume an able child reader. They simultaneously address a more experienced reader, alert to their deeper symbolism. I therefore reject the category of a separate or inferior genre labelled children’s literature.
1.7 Chapter Outline
Following this Introduction, my opening chapter of the dissertation went on to describe the structure of the dissertation:
Chapter Two surveys the literature dealing with the core theoretical concerns of this dissertation. It discusses DTS, translational norms and translating for children. It presents the methodology used in analysing the ‘Harry Potter’ corpus, a method based on Toury’s (1995) model of DTS. I therefore provide a set of methodological tools for Chapter 3, which is the chapter presenting my Findings. Chapter Two also comments on certain themes and features of the Potter novels, explaining why they may be regarded as a ‘hybrid’ literary genre.
Chapter Three presents the findings of the comparative analysis of segments of the STs and TTs. It describes the translational shifts and offers hypotheses as to the norms thought to underlie them. It seeks to integrate these findings, in order to propose an overall concept of translation for the corpus.
Chapter Four is the concluding section. It evaluates the usefulness of Toury’s DTS model in analysing the corpus and in developing valid, useful findings. It suggests amendments to the DTS model to improve its usefulness. I conclude by suggesting areas for continued research in the domain of translational norms in contemporary youth fiction.
1.8 Conclusion
Having summarised the research aims and benefits, I now go on to discuss the major theoretical concepts of DTS, norms and so-called children’s literature, thus providing a conceptual framework for this study.
In a future posting, I will speak more about DTS, norms and children's literature in general. I hope that this posting has helped explain and contextualise my reasons for coming to Descriptive Translation Studies and literary translation studies in general.
Ultimately, Rowling Translation Studies led, for me, to Verne Translation Studies, but I continue to enjoy many different authors, eras and novels in both English and French.
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