What is another word for literal translation? Is a literal translation a literal reproduction of the text or not? What is such a translation
More from Aristov. Note that this is why students learn. Not even translators of artistic texts, but any.
The practice of translators proves that any work can be fully (adequately) translated into Russian while preserving all the stylistic and other features inherent in this author.
In the process of teaching translation, students usually have the question of how much translation can deviate from the form of expression of the original.
Three types of translation should be distinguished:
1) Word translation(literal or subscript).
This is a mechanical translation of the words of a foreign text
in the order in which they occur in the text, without taking into account their syntactic and logical connections. Such a translation most often leads to nonsense and must be decisively expelled from practice, for example:
Pyotr sachet too late, to begin with.
"Peter came too late to start with"
instead of the correct one:
"To begin with, Peter came too late."
2) Literal translation. Literal translation, with
correct transmission of the thought of the translated text, strives
to the closest possible reproduction of the syntactic
construction and lexical composition of the original.
In those cases where the syntactic structure of the translated sentence can be expressed in the translation by similar means, the literal translation can be considered as the final version of the translation without further literary processing, for example:
The substance was dissolved in ether.
The substance was dissolved in ether.
However, such a coincidence of syntactic means in two languages is relatively rare; most often, during literal translation, one or another violation of the syntactic norms of the Russian language occurs.
In such cases, we have a certain gap between content and form: the author's thought is clear, but the form of its expression is alien to the Russian language, for example, the sentence:
Professor Lentz was born in Tartu, formerly Yuriev, in the year of 1804
in literal translation it looks like this:
Professor Land was born in Tartu, formerly Yuriev, in 1804.
Despite the fact that literal translation often violates the syntactic norms of the Russian language, it can be used at the first, draft stage of work on the text, because it helps to understand the structure and difficult places of the original.
Then, however, in the presence of structures that are alien to the Russian language, the literal translation must necessarily be processed and replaced with a literary version.
The transfer of lexical units during translation can be carried out in three ways:
using equivalents, i.e., direct matches that do not depend on the context;
with the help of analogues, i.e. words of a synonymic series that are most relevant to the context;
by descriptive translation, i.e. free transmission of the semantic content of the translated word or phrase *.
3) Literary translation. This type of translation conveys the thoughts of the original in the form of correct literary Russian speech.
In view of the significant divergence in the syntactic structure of the English and Russian languages, as noted above, it is rarely possible to preserve the form of expression of the original in translation.
Moreover, in the interests of the accuracy of the transfer of meaning, it is often necessary when translating to resort to changing the structure of the translated sentence in accordance with the norms of the Russian language, that is, rearranging or even replacing individual words and expressions.
Let us take, for clarity, examples of the translation into English of two titles of famous works:
At the bottom - "The Lower Depths".
From the point of view of the transfer of form, the translation has departed far from the Russian original, but it accurately conveys the emotional content of the title, which would be lost in a formally accurate literal transfer:
"On the Bottom".
Another example:
Quiet Don - "And Quiet Flows The Don".
Here, too, the rejection of formal, literal accuracy made it possible to convey the poetic element contained in the Russian title.
Thus, we see that the exact transmission of the meaning of the original is often associated with the need to abandon verbatim, from an attempt to closely convey the form of the original.
The translator, therefore, if necessary, not only can, but must also swap the members of the sentence, giving the word order more natural for the Russian language, for example:
A lecture on history was delivered at our club yesterday
Yesterday in our club a lecture was given on
torii.[i]
It can change the structure of the sentence:
[i]Not was sent to Moscow.
He was sent to Moscow
omit or replace words:
I took my dinner.
I had lunch.
In the practical work of translating an English text, students can come across four types of sentences: (The classification of sentences is borrowed from S. S. Tolstoy)
First, a relatively small group of sentences whose syntactic structure is similar in English and Russian. Such sentences can be translated literally, for example:
I saw him yesterday.
I saw him yesterday.
Second, the most numerous group of sentences requires, when translating, a change in the syntactic form of the original in accordance with the norms of the Russian language, for example:
There are six ships in the harbor
harbour. slave.
Third group- sentences with idiomatic turns.
Their translation is associated with the need for a radical restructuring of the entire structure and often requires the replacement of many words and expressions:
That cut the matter short, he was hard up and could not get rid of his debtors.
In short, he was short of money and couldn't get rid of his creditors.
Fourth sentence group - long, complex sentences with cumbersome turns.
When translating such sentences, it may be necessary, in the interests of clarity, to divide them into several simpler ones, and sometimes subject them to structural transformations, for example:
The harbor was crowded with many ships of different nationalities, some of them lying alongside, others loading coal from barges, and no one in the port expected a hurri-
cane to break out so suddenly and with such unusual ferocity. There were many ships of various nationalities in the harbor. Some of the ships were moored, others were loading coal from barges, no one in the port expected the hurricane to break out so suddenly and with such extraordinary fury.
In conclusion, we can formulate the main requirements that a good translation must satisfy:
1)Accuracy. The translator must convey to the reader
all the thoughts expressed by the author.
At the same time, not only the main provisions should be preserved, but also the nuances and shades of the statement.
Taking care of the completeness of the transmission of the statement, the translator, at the same time, should not add anything from himself, should not supplement and explain the author. It would also be a distortion of the original text.
2)Compression. The translator should not be verbose
nym, thoughts should be clothed in the most concise and concise form.
3)Clarity. Conciseness and conciseness of the target language,
however, nowhere should one go to the detriment of clarity.
thought, ease of understanding. Complexity should be avoided
ambiguous and ambiguous phrases that make it difficult to perceive
tie. Thought should be expressed in a simple and clear way.
language.
4)literary. As already noted, the translation
must fully comply with generally accepted standards
Russian literary language. Each phrase must
sound lively and natural, without retaining any hints
kov into syntactic constructions of the original, alien to the Russian language.
The author of the scientific and technical article seeks to exclude the possibility of arbitrary interpretation of the essence of the subject being interpreted, as a result of which in the scientific literature there are almost no such expressive means as metaphors, metonymy and other stylistic figures that are widely used in works of art to make speech alive, figurative character.
The authors of scientific works avoid the use of these expressive means so as not to violate the basic principle of the scientific and technical language - the accuracy and clarity of the presentation of thought.
This leads to the fact that the scientific and technical text seems somewhat dry, devoid of elements of emotional coloring.
True, it should be noted that for all its stylistic remoteness from the living spoken language, rich in various expressive means, the scientific and technical text still includes a certain number of phraseological combinations of a technical nature that are more or less neutral in color, for example:
in full blast
the wire is alive,
the wire is dead
This, without depriving the text of accuracy, gives it a certain liveliness and variety.
* * * * * *
Unfortunately, the translation from English into Russian is somewhat different from the translation from Russian into Esperanto.
But the fundamental principles remain the same.
They should not be forgotten.
In translation theory and practice, it has been proved that any text can be adequately translated into a foreign language, moreover, in compliance with all the rules and preserving all stylistic features, if any. Translation may deviate from the original and then it is literary. If the form of expression of the original and the translated text are the same, then we can already speak of a literal translation.
What is such a translation
A translation in which the order of words and the structure as a whole in the original language is preserved is called verbatim. In this case, the words are taken only in their broad meaning. Context is not taken into account. In other words, literal translation is a mechanical substitution of the words of the native language for the words of the source language. The syntactic construction of the original and its lexical composition are preserved as much as possible. Often there is only a gap between content and form, when the idea and the main message of the author are clear, but the grammatical construction is alien to the Russian ear.
What is the difference between verbatim and word-for-word, literal, text translation
Do not confuse word-for-word translation with word-for-word translation. Sometimes it is also called literal, or subscript. In the latter case, the words are thoughtlessly mechanically translated, and their logical and grammatical connections are not taken into account. So, for example, translating word by word the sentence What are you thinking about we get - "What do you think about?" (instead of "What are you thinking about?", if translated literally).
Another example: in German, the particle "not" is written at the end of a sentence. Thus, the phrase "I don't know" will sound like this: "I know not" ( ich weiss nothing). That is, such a translation will be word for word. Such a proposal in Russian looks illogical. Translating literally, we get "I don't know." Thus, in literal translation, grammatical connections are taken into account. The literal tracing of words is not welcome in translation practice and should be banished from the language.
In what cases is this type of translation used?
Often a literal translation violates the syntactic norms of the Russian language (as in the examples above), therefore it cannot be considered as the final version of the work on the text and requires literary processing. However, sometimes, for example in a formal, scientific style, or when it is necessary to translate terms and definitions, this form can be used.
For example, the English sentence This substance is dissolved in water corresponds to the Russian "This substance dissolves in water." The syntactic structures of the first and second sentences coincide and are expressed by similar means. In literary texts, such coincidences are much less common and only in very simple sentences, for example I was here corresponds to the Russian "I was here."
Also, literal translation is a frequently used means in a quick, first translation of a text. A draft version is needed in order to understand the main message, the essence of the proposal. For work at the draft stage, this view is very suitable.
The transmission of words in the translation under consideration
Literal translation is only the beginning of any translation work. Then it is required to reflect the lexical meaning of the words. To do this, there are three ways of translation in linguistics. They are the following:
- with the help of analogues;
- equivalents;
- descriptively.
By the way, the last method cannot be made verbatim, because it implies a free transfer of semantic content. Equivalents are direct matches that are independent of context. For example, the word "package" is translated into English in two words - book parcel. The whole phrase is the equivalent of one word in Russian.
Literal translation can also be performed with the help of analogues - synonymous words that correspond to the context most fully.
Is a literal translation of a song or proverb possible?
Proverbs and sayings are set expressions in the language, otherwise called idioms. A literal translation of them into a foreign language is impossible. It is possible to qualitatively translate idioms only in the following way: it is necessary to find their analogue in the target language. For example, the old English proverb It is raining cats and dogs cannot be translated literally as "it's raining cats and dogs." It would be more correct to say with an analogue of the Russian language: "it pours like a bucket." The meaning is the same, but the rhetoric and presentation are completely different.
When translating a proverb, you need to pay attention to the mentality and thinking of the people into whose language you are translating. A literal translation is an almost identical reproduction of the original language. That is why verbatim reproduction is impossible here.
As a rule, it is also not possible to translate songs verbatim. After all, each song is a complete literary work, a rather extensive layer of text. As a rule, syntactic constructions do not match even if a couple of sentences are literally translated word for word. And what can we say about the translation of the whole song! This can only be done in a draft version, at the first stage of work.
Experienced translators are sure that the literal translation of the text is the lot of novice amateurs. I also thought so naively, but recently we received an angry message, which, apparently, was written by a “great connoisseur” not only of English and Russian, but also of Latin!
Name: Surprised
Email: [email protected]
Subject: wow wow
Message: We should have foreseen this. We must have predicted it. - You invented it, invented it yourself. And they showed that your qualifications are at the level of a high school student. Somewhere we heard something... And let's try... Like a idiot... PREDICT - preDICT... videre = dicere ? Green = far???
The answer was written and sent, but the letter was returned - the author, probably in a fit of righteous anger (or deliberately?), Wrote the address incorrectly. But it was difficult to remain silent, so we decided to answer with an open letter, in the hope that the creator of this epistolary masterpiece will be able to read it, and our inquisitive readers will also be interested. They composed the answer collectively and tried not to stoop to obvious insults, although after such attacks and accusations it was not easy to resist ...
Hello, dear Surprised!
Thanks for your comment.
You are probably studying Latin and decided to sparkle with your knowledge. Succeeded! But when studying Latin, as, indeed, English, they should have explained to you that a literal translation does not always mean the correct one.
Although if we talk about this phrase and specifically about the word predict, then among its dictionary values there are foresee, foresee, predict. And it is used in English speech and texts in this sense quite often. If you do not have the opportunity to chat with native speakers, then just google the phrase must have predicted it and try to translate some of the sentences you find. If you translate right the result will surprise you! Do you like to be surprised?
By the way, in Russian the word predict can sometimes (perhaps a little less often than in English) be replaced by the word foresee. Let's take for example the word predictable in English predictable. Next suggestion: Trump's victory was predictable - Trump's victory was predictable, does not mean that someone predicted it, but it was predicted (or foreseen), however, we use the word before tale mindful or pre dict able in English.
You are good at insulting and distorting the Russian language and probably enjoy it. Well, that's your right, although it would be much more useful to do something more productive. Thanks again for the "deep" analysis of our work.
P.S. The proverb says: He who does nothing makes no mistakes.
Of course, we make mistakes, and we always gratefully accept corrections, comments and constructive suggestions from our kind visitors. Try and you look at life from the point of view of creation and goodness and it will reciprocate.