Examples of Foregrounding

Ser Translation Original Text

Khalid Hassan Hamid Jalal
1. Khushia was thinking Khushia was deep in thought ‫خوشیا سوچ رہا تھا‬
2. Cemented Plinth Wooden Platform ‫سنگین تختہ‬
3. The man opened the car door His friend opened the door ‫خوشیا کے دوست نے ٹیکسی کا‬
and gently pushed Kanta in. and helped Kanta inside. ‫دروازہ کھوالاور کانتا کو اندر‬
Then he banged the door "Khushia -- you?" she almost ‫داخل کر کے دروازہ بند کر دیا۔‬
shut. ‘Khushia! You!’ Kanta shrieked. ‫فوراہی کانتا کی حیرت بھری آواز‬
screamed. ‫سنائی دی – جو چیخ سے ملتی‬
"‫جلتی تھی۔ "خوشیا تم‬

Above are some of the examples taken from the translations of a story ‘Khushia’ written by
Saa’dat Hassan Manto and translated by Khalid Hassan and Hamid Jalal. As the Urdu text is
showing in 1st example that can be easily be translated as Khalid Hassan did but by putting the
word ‘deep’ by Hamid jalal has foregrounded the thinking process. He wanted to say that the
thinking of Khushia was deep inside so he was not thinking only.

In second example lexical choice is simple in the translation of Hamid jalal but in Khalid Hassan
it is very precise which is normally not used in normal stories, but his using of the word
‘cemented plinth’ showing that he wanted to foreground the fact that that ‘takhta’ is a
cemented slab which is a normal practice there.

In the last example Khalid Hassan has foregrounded two things: one is that the other person
was a stranger who took Kanta with him and then he showed that there was no will of Kanta to
sit inside so he gently pushed her but in Hamid jalal’s version the word helped is used and he
also showed that the other person was a friend of Khushia. The last choices of words ‘shrieked’
by Hamid jalal and ‘screamed’ by Khalid Hassan are showing the difference of their ideas which
are shown by the selection of words.