Literary Translation

Given that subtitles fall into the category of audiovisual translation, it would not do to leave translation studies out of the equation completely. But rather than trying to include the whole of translation studies — which is vast and not all relevant to

audiovisual translation — it would be more appropriate to just focus on literary translation.

For many, style is incredibly important when translating literature. It is generally accepted that the translator is obliged to reproduce both the semantic content and the stylistic content of the source text in the target text (Lefevere, 1992; Wright, 1993).

Words alone are not enough, the aesthetic aspects, poetic techniques and rhetorical devices the author has used must also be transferred as much as possible too. Boase-Beier suggests three reasons for this:

(1) When translation is considered as a form of communication, the important part is not just what the text says, but how it says it.

(2) It is the particular stylistic techniques and the concentration of them found in literature that define it as literature.

(3) The reason for translating a literary work is partly to record the particular features that originally made it remarkable and worth translating (Boase-Beier, 2011).

These observations appear quite logical. It is more or less common knowledge that people are able to adapt the words they use, and thus their communication, according to what they believe is appropriate in a given situation. Words have their own semantic fields and connotations, and even those listed as synonyms have their nuances in meaning, intensity or register. Because of these nuances, changing a word could alter the meaning of an utterance, or at least how it is interpreted. If literature is considered as specially crafted writing, then word choice is particularly important as, ideally, the words will have been chosen with purpose. Secondly, we classify particular vocabulary or usage as “literary” in style or register. Countless books and guides exist on literary devices and terms, implying that there is a certain, expected way of using language that is associated with, and by extension defines something as, literature, that is not (as) present in other text types. And of course, a book is translated by choice rather than chance, and the selection process is likely based on particular criteria. Those criteria could have personal, aesthetic, cultural or economic origins (to suggest but a few), but regardless of where they originated, it does not follow to

completely ignore them when actually translating a book. It would not make sense to translate George Perec’s La Disparition and add all the letter ‘e’s back in, for example.

The form of a work can be as much a part of its identity as the content, and therefore must be kept intact to retain and demonstrate its value.

But the reasons for translating a particular piece of literature are not the only decisions related to the translation process that need to be made. Wittman points out that the strategy used in a translation can depend on other factors such as “the subject, the precision of the original, the type, function and use of the text, its literary qualities, and its social or historical context” (Wittman, 2013, p. 439). How important is the style relative to the content? Who are the readers ultimately going to be? Should the translation be domesticated or foreignized? Has the work already been translated, and if so, why retranslate it? There are so many questions that need to be answered before the translation process even begins. Those answers will clearly influence how the translator will work and, by extension, what the outcome will be. Given the nearly infinite number of permutations that the answers to the above (and further) questions could result in, Lefevere’s comments make sense — “no rules can be formulated as absolute” (Lefevere, 1992, p. 19). Translation is transfer between two different contexts, not “following and applying rules” (Lefevere, 1992, p. 11).

But style is still unavoidable in literature (see the above points from Boase-Beier, 2011) and what’s more, an author can use style to produce connotative meaning beyond the denotative. Nowotna warns that a lack of thorough analysis of the source text could mean the translator does not register or misreads part of its meaning, and so mistranslates it (Nowotna, 2005). This highlights the importance of fully recognising style and how it contributes to understanding the source text. It also implies that, while there are indeed no fixed rules for how to translate expressive texts, there at least needs to be an established analysis stage that precedes the translation stage. Otherwise, as Nowotna says, meaning could be missed and a poor translation could be produced.

Even if a translator ultimately decides that style is not especially important for a particular text, they at least need to be aware of any extra layers of meaning that the style has contributed to the source text.

So, could the way that literary translators go about their own work inspire aesthetic subtitlers? The attitude of aesthetic subtitling advocates certainly is similar to that of literary translation scholars: style is important for how meaning is made; the source text is unique; having fixed rules for the translation process is impossible. Let us not forget either that film has consistently been compared to literature because of the two’s similarities in terms of narrative and expressive power and artistic value (see Metz, 2003; Monaco, 2009). Comments on film style also seem to align with Boase-Beier’s three points on style in literature (Boase-Beier, 2011):

(1) The image in film can add detail, meaning and tone that cannot be portrayed through action alone (Monaco, 2009). The audience’s perception of the narrative can also be guided or affected by the mise-en-scene (Bordwell & Thompson, 2013), so the form greatly influences the way the content is interpreted;

(2) Film as a medium is partly defined by the artistic possibilities it possesses — in film, an image can move and be located in time in a way that other mediums cannot replicate (Phillips, 2012). Or a specific genre could be defined by its style and aesthetic features.

(3) There are indeed elements of a film’s style that are important to its identity and make it noteworthy, and therefore worth translating. Thus it would be a disservice to the film to discount its stylistic value in translation, through subtitles that become a blemish. Indeed, it is perfectly normal for film commentators to talk about a director’s particular style of filmmaking — further evidence that style is closely related to a film’s identity through its maker.

So if both literature and film have a general function as expressive texts in which style and aesthetics are important, it seems reasonable to treat the latter with similar translation strategies and approaches as the former. That suggests that the translation of a film is sensitive to style and attempts to reproduce it where necessary, appropriate and possible. In the case of subtitled film, the subtitles themselves, as they become part of the visual semiotic code, would be the perfect place to do that. It could even be said that the difference between literature and cinema is simply their medium: literature plays with words, film plays with images.

Integrating all the above disciplines — film studies, typography and literary translation — into aesthetic subtitling seems above all appropriate because the theorists and practitioners all resemble each other so closely in terms of the way they approach their respective crafts. There is an overall appreciation for the importance of connotative meaning, and how style and aesthetics generate it. In fact, theorists in all fields feel they have a duty to use and reproduce aesthetics or visual style in order to count their work as a success. Overall, I propose that an aesthetic subtitler with a multidisciplinary perspective should approach the task of subtitling like a literary translator, read film like a filmmaker or film scholar, and create subtitles like a typographer. The subtitler approaches their task like a literary translator: they acknowledge that style is as important as content in the identity and the value of a work, and so they have a duty to reproduce it. This bearing in mind that it is ultimately contingent on the context and purpose of the source and target texts. They read and analyse a film like a filmmaker: they fully recognise the techniques used to create style and how that style produces connotative meaning and affects the audience, the better to transfer it all into the subtitles. Finally, they create subtitles like a typographer: they know how typographic choices can affect and enhance emotional impact, as well as readability, and can purposefully use those choices to contribute to their aims for the subtitles. I would, however, like to add a disclaimer that this does not constitute a call to use these related disciplines instead of established theory in audiovisual translation.

Rather that they should be used as well as. It is a case of complementing and furthering what has gone before in terms of subtitling theory and practice, increasing its scope and flexibility.