An Analysis of Literary Translation Arabic/English

Lataiwish, Muftah S (1995) An Analysis of Literary Translation Arabic/English. PhD thesis, University of Glasgow.

Abstract

This study is concerned with an analysis of the process of literary translation from Arabic into English, using as basic source material a number of short stories by Yahya Haqqi and Nagib Mahfuz and their English translations by M. Badawi, Denys Johnson Davies and Akef Abadir and Roger Allen, respectively. This thesis consists of five chapters. The first is a review of the relevant literature, and involves the introduction and discussion of a set of concepts fundamental to the field of (literary) translation, most notably the notion of equivalence and formal correspondence vs. translation equivalence. Also approached in this first chapter is the problem of equivalence in translation and its relation to contrastive analysis. We conclude this chapter with a discussion of the adopted approach, the significance of the present study and the formulation of a number of working hypotheses. Chapters two to four examine Badawi's translation of The Three Orphans and A Game of Cards. Davies's The Ditch and Zaabalawi, and Abadir and Allen's God's World , on the one hand, and students' translations of the same works , on the other. These chapters highlight the syntactic , semantic and cultural problems identified in the analysed material and seek to explain the linguistic and cultural aspects of these problems. While we have used a broad structural approach in dealing with the linguistic problems , the cultural problems have been dealt with in the light of the dynamic equivalence approach in literary translation. A conclusion highlighting the findings of our analysis and relating these findings to the working hypotheses formulated in chapter one concludes the analysis of each the selected short stories. Chapter five tackles the manner in which standard published translations handle cultural problems in literary translation especially in the area of such sociocultural norms and issues as belief, verbal behaviour, proper names and cultural metaphor. This chapter continues its examination of the cultural element in literary translation through a discussion of the question of target language audience response , relying fundamentally on the reactions and responses expressed on the part of some native English speakers towards extracts from the selected standard published translations. The thesis offers a final conclusion together with a set of recommendations designed with a view to helping and guiding students of English as a Foreign language, in general, and those learning it for translation purposes, in particular.

• Item Type: Thesis (PhD)
• Qualification Level: Doctoral
• Additional Information: Adviser: John N Mattock
• Keywords: Translation studies, Middle Eastern literature, Language arts
• Date of Award: 1995
• Depositing User: Enlighten Team
• Unique ID: glathesis:1995-75305
• Copyright: Copyright of this thesis is held by the author.
• Date Deposited: 19 Nov 2019 21:16
• Last Modified: 19 Nov 2019 21:16
• URI: https://theses.gla.ac.uk/id/eprint/75305