Топик: Translatioin of Political Literature
2) transposition
3) omission (ellipsis)
4) supplementation
Substitution is one of the grammatical relations among the parts of the sentences. In substitution , an item (or items) is replaced by another item (or items), ex:
I like politics. And I do.
In this example, do is a substitute for like politics . Items commonly used in substitution in English include do, one, and the same , as in the following examples from Halliday and Hasan:
You think US will start the war against Iraq? – No one does.
We make use of substitution while translating a piece because of several reasons: absence of similar construction in Russian language, unconformity in usage of corresponding forms and constructions and some lexical reasons, which include different word usage and different norms of combinability in English and Russian and the absence of the part of speech with corresponding meaning.
An attempted overthrow in Peru.
Попытка совершить переворот в Перу.
In Russian we do not have the conforming participle II of the verb пытаться. And this made us change the part of speech; the participle attempted was translated into Russian by the noun попытка. The expression попытка переворота does not conform to the norms of Russian language that’s why we have to apply additional word совершить.
While translating the following text we will have to use substitution several times.
On the whole the “popular’’ press – with the New York Daily News as its cheer-leader – is vociferous in its support of the President’s policies and merciless toward those who attack them. But among the so-called “quality” papers led by the New York Times there is a growing mood of doubt and questioning.
В общем «массовые» газеты, во главе с Нью-Йорк дейли ньюс», громогласно поддерживают политику президента и беспощадно обрушиваются на тех, кто критикует её. Но среди так называемых «качественных» газет, возглавляемых «Нью-Йорк таймс», всё больше растут сомнение и неуверенность (в её правильности).
In the first sentence are used the verbal noun, verb link and two predicative parts expressed by adjectives with object clauses. In this translation verbal nouns very replaced by predicative ones (именные сказуемые были заменены глагольными): поддерживают and обрушиваются. Both predicative parts of the sentence have been translated by adverbs: громогласно, беспощадно. In the second sentence the introductory construction there is was translated by predicative verb and the participle growing was transformed into the function of an attribute. The noun mood was omitted and its attribute of doubt and questioning was turned into its object.
The transformation of ‘active’ into ‘passive’ is also when a translator uses substitution.
More light was shed yesterday on the effect of C.S. gas, which was claimed by Pentagon to be virtually harmless to health.
Вчера поступили дополнительные сведения о вредном действии газа C .S ., который, по утверждению Пентагона, якобы не опасен для здоровья.
The phraseological unit more light was shed was translated by means of lexical transformation and the passive construction was replaced by an active one. The passive construction in the object clause also undergone lexical transformation – verbal construction was substituted by substantive one: по утверждению .
This example can illustrate the fact that lexical and grammatical transformations are closely related with each other.
Transposition, that’s, change of structure of the sentence may be caused by several reasons. But the main of them, as it has been mentioned before is the difference in the structure of the English and Russian languages. The fixed order of words in English bears hierarchic character, first come the primary parts of the sentence; noun, predicate followed by secondary parts. In Russian the word order is not fixed but one can observe the tendency to locate the main information at the end of sentences expressing it be the noun. The academic grammar of Russian points that the word order in Russian sentences follows the model: adverbial modifier, predicate and then the noun – that’s the order absolutely opposite to English. In Russian, the secondary part of the sentence can stand at the beginning if it represents the starting point of expression and introduces theme of given information, ex:
Вчера в Вашингтоне состоялась пресс-конференция .
The essence of the information is пресс- конференция – which is expressed by the noun located at the end of the sentence. Nevertheless, this word-order is not obligatory, ex:
Премьер- министр выступил вчера по телевидению.
Here we find the main essence at the beginning of sentence.
In English, according to fixed word order, the noun of the sentence stands at the beginning of clause. One of the prominent English linguists, Halliday marks that, usually (but not always) a starting point is intrinsic to English sentences.
Still in many cases the English sentence happens to be the center of informative message, compare A Press Conference was held in Washington yesterday. Usually it happens when the noun of the sentence is expressed with an indefinite article. Something, semantically new has got to be expressed in the sentence, and the earlier one should be opposed to the new one, which is being expressed. Therefore the indefinite article functions represents this new information, introduces it.
A smash-and-grab raid on two of the most important nationalized industries is being organized by the Tory Party.
Консерваторы собираются обрушиться на две самые значительные национализированные отрасли промышленности.