Four-handed Chirping of Birds or, The Adventure of two Hungarian Translators with Flann O’Brien’s Book-web
The essay articulates the specific translation problems encountered in translating Flann O’Brien’s ludic novel At Swim-Two-Birds (1939) into Hungarian in a framework of translation studies, also drawing on research on Joyce in translation. It tackles issues such as the necessity to invent literary s...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Asociación Española de Estudios Irlandeses
2013-03-01
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| Series: | Estudios Irlandeses |
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| Online Access: | http://www.estudiosirlandeses.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Erika_Mihálycsa_8.pdf |
| Summary: | The essay articulates the specific translation problems encountered in translating Flann O’Brien’s ludic novel At Swim-Two-Birds (1939) into Hungarian in a framework of translation studies, also drawing on research on Joyce in translation. It tackles issues such as the necessity to invent literary styles for the book’s embedded style parodies, especially where the ‘originals’ are unknown in the TL culture; and the choice of idiom/ minor language(s) (Hiberno-English, as well as the Finn/Sweeny translatorese), for which a form of the TL that could function as a translated idiom had to be invented. As a possibility, harnessing Transylvanian Hungarian is explored – somewhat similarly to A. Oţoiu’s Romanian version of ASTB (2005), which also resorts to Transylvanian Romanian accents for rendering the same idiolects. Further points of interest are the issue of Gaelic red herrings and direct translations from the Gaelic; the possibilities of foreignizing language use, especially in the frame of Latinate pedantry; the strategies for rendering the (mis)quotes, literary references, Joycean allusions; and, last but far from least, the translators’ adventures with Flann O’Brien’s vicious puns. The essay also explores the four-handed translation process, resulting in a dialogic, and multilayered, Hungarian text that attempts to speak in as many styles and voices as the original. |
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| ISSN: | 1699-311X 1699-311X |