AW: [SEELANGS] Translating word or meaning

[Maryna Vinarska]

Well... there is no sense to treat this statement like some rule that is to be always followed. It may fit and may not fit the situation. With documents this is definitely like it should be ("spezkurs" is an example). As to fiction... I am afraid that in some cases the decision on what and how to translate may be a real problem.

I simply recalled the translation of Khlebnikov's "Kuznechik" into German which I happened to come across not long ago. To tell the truth... had it been not the title and the name of the author, I would have never guessed that it was exactly that "Kuznechik"...
And by the way, one of my ex-students made a joke in class, about the original. He said: "Eto zh skol'ko nado bylo vypit', chtoby takoe napisat'?.."  And now imagine that you have to translate smth like this... 

Besides, in this connection I recalled one more situation. It has actually nothing to do with translation problems, but... Teachers in my native city in Ukraine were supposed to have a series of disputes and to conclude on the following: "What is literature? "Uchebnik zhizni" or "iskusstvo slova"?" 
"Oblono" loaded them with this weird task not long ago. It is "veter s zapada"...
Their answer was: "For us it is both, and this is how we have always taught and how we are going to teach literature further. And we are not going to follow your initiative and lead any disputes on the topic because we don't see any sense in this." 
"Oblono", however, issued the guidlines, a little bit later, according to which they have to teach literature exclusively as "iskusstvo slova". But our teachers are like they have always been. They ignore those guidelines... let those guidelines be... they teach literature as both, as "iskusstvo slova" and "uchebnik zhizni"... 
Literature is a very complex phenomenon...

So... my idea is that if it is fiction, and not legal papers, it is better not to separate both notions, "sut' " and "slovo", at all. They are always interwoven with each other.

Regards,
Maryna Vinarska

FIEGUTH Rolf <rolf.fieguth at UNIFR.CH> wrote: "Переводчик должен передавать не слово, а суть" - это звучит гордо, но что, если суть подлинника в его "словесных приключениях" (Набоков)? Ведь даже Достоевский не
 всегда относился безразлично к слову, если подумаете о "Записках из подполья". Страх вообразить себе перевод этого текста, который передает "суть", а не "слово".
Привет,

Рольф Фигут


-----Ursprьngliche Nachricht-----
Von: Slavic & East European Languages and Literature list im Auftrag von Paul B. Gallagher
Gesendet: Do 22.06.2006 14:59
An: SEELANGS at LISTSERV.CUNY.EDU
Betreff: [SEELANGS] Translating word or meaning
 
"Переводчик должен передавать не слово, а суть"
21 июня 2006
Кэрол Аполлонио Флэт, специалист по русской литературе XIX века,
переводчик (США)

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