o *

w *

WYDAWNICTWO
NAUKOWE
PWN
WARSZAWA

Aniela Korzeniowska
Piotr Kuhiwczak
Projekt okładki: Maryna Wiśniewska

Redaktor: Barbara Wewiór

Redaktor techniczny: Teresa Skrzypkowska

Zdjęcie na okładce:
A. Szymański
L. Wawrynkiewicz

Copyright © by
Wydawnictwo Naukowe PWN Sp. z o.o.
Warszawa 1994 In order to translate a language, or a text, without
changing its meaning, one would have to transport its
Copyright © by audience as well.
Wydawnictwo Naukowe PWN S.A. (Eva Hoffman, Lost in Translation)
Warszawa 1998

ISBN 83-01-12546-2
CONTENTS

Acknowledgments .......................................... ............................................................... 9

Introduction.................................................................................................................... 11

C h a p ter O n e: T ra n sla tio n : T h e R e le v a n c e o f T h eo r y . ..................... 23

What is translation theory trying to explain?................................................ 23
What is translation?............................................................................. ... 23
Choosing the ‘Right’ Theory ............................................................................. 26
A Brief H isto r y ................................ .................................. ................................ 27
The ‘Cultural Turn’ ............................................................................................. 29
Translators and Their T e x ts ............................................................................. 31
Theory and Practice . ....................................................................................... 33

C h a p ter T w o : T r a n sla tio n a s C o m m u n ic a tio n ....................................... 37

What do we do when we translate?................................................................ 37
The Changing Notions of Translation............................................................. 38
The Third Language............................................................................................. 41
The Third Language and the Lack o f Communication................................ 43
Translating the Language and Translating the M eaning............................. 50

C h ap ter T h ree: T r a n sla tio n an d the S o c io -C u ltu r a l C o n t e x t . . . 51

Language in Daily Encounters . ................................... ................................... 53
Consequences of Careless Translation................................... ......................... 58
Different Cultural N o r m s................................................................................... 67

C h a p ter F our: P o lish -E n g lish T r a n sla tio n in E v ery d a y L ife . . . 70

The Tourist T rade................................................................................................ 71
Culture and the A r t s .......................................................................................... 76
Academia and Science .......................................................................................... 81
Catering ................................................................................................................ 87

7
Chapter Five: The World of Commerce and Business ....................... 93
ESP Courses Versus Translation....................................................................... 95
ESP in Business and Com m erce....................................................................... 96 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Standardized and ‘Free’ Translation................................................................ 97
Precision in Translation....................................................................................... 100
Expressive and Operative T ex ts.......................................................................... 103
Information and P rom otion ............................................................................. 104
Translation in Advertising................................................................................. 107
Mixing S tyles.......................................................................................................... 112

C h a p ter S ix : T h e R o le o f T r a n s la to r .......................................................... 115

The Role of L ingu ist.......................................................................................... 115
The Role of A rtist................................................................................................. 125
The Role of Intermediary.................................................................................... 131
The Role of Rewriter....................................................................................... - 135
We would like to acknowledge that without help from our
colleagues at the Universities o f Warsaw and Warwick, and support
Chapter Seven: Reasons for Mistranslation .......................................... 145 we received from several institutions, the writing o f this book would
Grammatical Misunderstandings................... ................................................... 146 have been much more difficult. We are particularly grateful to the
Lexical Misunderstandings....................................................................*50 University of W arsaw for a research grant and a sabbatical, and to
The Understanding of M etaphor....................................................................... 157
the EC TEM PU S (Warwick—Warsaw— Rome— Bratislava) Joint
The Use of Synonyms.......................................................................................... 162
The Use of Dictionaries . . ................................................................................. 164
European Project for financing our teaching periods at both Warsaw
The Notion o f Untranslatability....................................................................... 166 and Warwick.
We also wish to thank D r. Felicity Rosslyn for her encouragement,
Chapter Eight: Tricks of the Trade............................................ 169
and for all the invaluable work she put into proofreading the
The Process of C h oice............................. ............................................................. 169 manuscript.
Accuracy and Ambiguity in Translation.......................................................... 174
Translation and R itu a l....................................................................................... 179
Translation and P erfection................................................................................. 184
A Successful T ranslation.................................................................................... 188

Suggested R ea d in g ....................................................................................................... 191

Subject I n d e x ....................................>................................................................ > • - 192

INTRODUCTION

In her memoir entitled A Dream o f Belonging Janina Bauman gives

an amusing account of her ability to communicate in a foreign
language during an international film festival, which she attended in
the late 1960s:
No other country from the Eastern bloc had sent a delegation, though a Czech
journalist and the Soviet cultural attache were taking part as observers. These
two men joined us immediately and we became inseparable. They were both
fairly young and easy-going, so we had great fun with them. I spoke Russian
with them and only when we parted at the end o f the Festival did the attache
say how delighted he was that he had been able to understand my Polish so well

It is very likely that thousands of Russians who visit Poland these days
return home thinking like the attache from Janina Bauman’s story,
that Polish resembles Russian much more than they had ever imagined.
And it is even more likely that many Poles are convinced today that
they can speak fluent Russian even if they remember well that in their
final year at school they could barely put together one correct sentence
in this language. Because the two languages are closely related and
communication between the visitors and the natives is usually limited
to relatively simple matters such as shopping and currency dealings,
the Poles and the Russians can happily continue cultivating their
respective illusions. After all, w hat matters is the communication
itself. A successfully completed financial transaction confirms the
validity of linguistic contacts. From the pragmatic point of view this
situation is healthy since, according to recent linguistic theories, what

1 Janina Bauman, A Dream o f Belonging, Virago Press, 1988, p. 152.

11
matters in foreign language learning is not the grammatical correctness
of produced sentences but the fact whether a speaker can achieve his
communicative goal.
It seems that our ’’successful” experience with the Russian language
has set a paradigm for other languages. This concerns both learning
processes and the subsequent use o f the new language. A general
feature of language courses, which are offered both by schools and
some private institutions, is that they are anything but intensive. An
average graduate goes through four years of foreign language tuition
at a secondary school level and then takes at least a three-year course
in a college. It is common th at throughout this period there will be-
a frequent change o f language teachers, teaching methods and
textbooks. The initial high level of m otivation will gradually dwindle
and the majority of students will never achieve the desired proficiency
in a foreign language. In spite of this, many of those who have gone
through such ineffective language courses are convinced that they can
communicate in a foreign language. Paradoxically, in this respect, we
resemble the British people who think that if they speak English very
loudly and, at the same time, employ vigorous gesticulation, any
foreigner will understand them perfectly well. But the British can get
away with this attitude only because in eight out o f ten cases their
interlocutors have at least a very rudimentary knowledge o f English
or, at least, they will try to get hold of somebody who can communicate
in this language reasonably well. Unfortunately, the Polish speakers
have no such advantages, which means that the linguistic method the
British can use practically anywhere in the world we can practice only
on our Slav neighbours.
We can imagine that many readers may ask at this point about the
relevance of these reflections on the pitfalls of communicating in
foreign languages to the issue of translation. After all, most foreign
language learners never intend to translate; they want either to be able
to communicate in a foreign language or at least to acquire the ability
to understand the spoken or written word. The currently practised
teaching methods are specifically aimed at achieving these goals.
Almost from the very beginning, learners are put into a monolingual
context. The use of the native language is either eliminated or
considerably reduced in order to encourage the learners to acquire
both linguistic and extra-linguistic responses, which belong to the new,
12
foreign reality. Such a deliberate elimination o f the learners’ native
language from the process o f teaching and learning precludes, of
course, the use o f translation as a technique in foreign language
teaching. Those who learned a foreign language several decades ago
view this shift in the attitude towards translation as a m ajor revolution.
Once an English or German textbook looked almost like a modern
Latin textbook — every foreign sentence or expression was accom­
panied by a Polish equivalent. Today, the m ajority of Polish language
teachers are using foreign textbooks in which even the most complex
grammatical problems are explained in the foreign language. The
small number o f textbooks written by Polish authors specifically for
Polish learners are rarely seen in the classroom and the students are
actively discouraged from using bilingual dictionaries until they achieve
a high level o f proficiency in the given language.
Both everyday practice and systematic research have shown that
the modern methods o f teaching foreign languages are more effective
than the older methods which allowed for a much more extended use
of the native language in the classroom. One can conclude then that
those of us who have high levels of motivation and happen to attend
well devised courses stand a chance of learning a foreign language
faster and better than people used to do several decades ago. But it is
here, at the point when we think we have achieved the ultimate aim,
that is proficiency in a foreign language, that complications begin.
Outside the classroom, it often turns out that the expectations
concerning our linguistic proficiency go beyond the simple ability to
communicate in a foreign language. The knowledge of a foreign
language gives us advantages at work and helps to facilitate private
contacts. However, we soon realize that w hat is expected from us does
not relate to the skills we acquired during the language course. At
work we may be asked to interpret, translate or write correspondence
in a foreign language, while friends ask us to write letters for them or
help their children with their homework. Gradually, we accept these
responsibilities, even if we know that we are neither trained to perform
the task nor have we made enough effort to develop and perfect the
new skills ourselves.
It seems that translation is the skill most commonly expected of
somebody who speaks a foreign language. It is generally assumed that
being able to communicate in a foreign language corresponds to the
ability to translate from one language into another. In many respects,
this conviction resembles the widespread opinion according to which
every Chinese is an excellent cook. Those who have been trained as
translators or those who have tasted genuine Chinese cuisine in
Taiwan or H ong K ong know well that these assumptions are not
based on empirical p ro o f but on superficial appearances. However, the
popular belief that everybody who speaks a foreign language can
easily translate, encourages many speakers of foreign languages to
undertake translation or interpreting, and, as a result, we encounter
many translators who are convinced they are doing a good job in the
same way Janina Bauman was convinced that she had been speaking
good Russian.
It should be clearly stated here that the criticism expressed above
is not aimed at translators in general. F or instance, we are not dealing
here at all with translation into Polish since it seems to us that the
work of those who translate from foreign languages is verified not
only by copy editors but also by readers and fellow professionals.
Therefore those who translate into Polish stand a good chance of
improving their w ork even if they have not been able to learn their
craft in any form al way. Our main concern here is the movement in
the opposite direction — from Polish into English.
There are several reasons why we have decided to take a critical
look at translation from Polish into English. The m ost im portant one
is that we feel those who translate from Polish into other languages
find themselves working in considerable isolation. It is not only the
isolation which is inherently related to the profession itself; it is
a specific isolation which results from the fact that those who translate
from Polish only rarely have a chance to receive any kind of feedback
when their translations go out into the world. They are usually
commissioned to produce a translation and if the commissioning
institution receives the translation, their contact with the work ends.
The isolation is also reflected in the lack of educational opportunities
for those who translate into English. A part from the Institute of
Applied Linguistics in Warsaw, there is no other institution which
trains language specialists to interpret and translate from Polish.
D epartm ents o f modern languages, being academically oriented, do
not pay much attention to such subjects as translation, even if it is
evidently clear that a t least half of the graduates are employed as
14
interpreters or translators. In fact, it seems to us that the majority of
modern language departments in Poland will have yet to decide about
their role in the new political and economic situation. A t the moment,
graduates from those departments, apart from speaking foreign
languages, often do not have any other specific skills, although it is
expected that they should be able to teach, translate or write literary
criticism.
In her recent article, Elżbieta Tabakowska from the Jagiellonian
University draws our attention to the low status of translators in
Poland, to the material poverty o f Translation Studies at Polish
colleges and to the poor quality of translated texts. She characterizes
the current situation in the following way:
As a result, self-tutored interpreters have only their own intuition to help them.
Translators o f technical texts are thrown back on such specialist dictionaries and
other teaching materials as happen to be available, but with deplorable results,
including hair-raising translations o f official documents and advertisements
promoting Polish products abroad. As to the translation o f literature, Poland’s
way to a united Europe is paved with ’’Western” fiction, the careless and hastily
produced Polish versions of which do little for the reputation of the Western
authors 2.
Tabakowska’s main concern is that before translation and Translation
Studies become respected subjects in Poland, we need to change both
the general attitude to translation and the rigid academic and
administrative structures in the institutions of higher education. But
even if this is achieved, there will still be a long way to go. The number
of people who can teach translation is small and, in recent years, many
of them have left the universities and taken up better paid jobs in the
private sector. Getting them back and attracting more qualified staff
will require substantial am ounts of money. There is also a scarcity of
suitable books and manuals which would make up for the absence of
formal training. In the last two or three years, TEPIS and some other
publishing houses have begun to revive and stimulate publishing in the
field o f Translation Studies3, and we hope this trend will continue.
2 Elżbieta Tabakowska, ‘Translation Studies in Poland’ [in:] The European
Messenger VL, vol. I, issue 2. 1992, p. 17.
3 See: Olgierd Wojtasiewicz, Wstęp do teorii tłumaczenia, TEPIS, 1992; Jerzy
Pieńkos, Przekład i tłumacz we współczesnym świecie, PWN, 1993; Stanisław Barańczak,
Ocalone tłumaczeniu, Wydawnictwo a5, 1992.
15
But those who teach translation today are still struggling with
a scarcity of books and educational materials. In m ost cases, they have
to rely on the older works written by Polish authors who dealt only
with translation requiring a high degree o f conventionality, as medical,
economic or legal texts. Unfortunately, those texts are either outdated
or, which is even worse, they are out of print.
So Polish translators are today in a very difficult situation: they
receive little help and, at the same time, they have to adapt to the new
demands since, due to the economic changes, the texts which need to
be translated from Polish are more expressive and are more consciously
written for the foreign audience than ever before. They have to
translate adverts, prom otional materials, new legal regulations and
conference papers. In all such instances success depends not only on
a knowledge o f strict linguistic equivalence b ut on the translators1
knowledge o f both the source arid target culture. It would be logical,
of course, to advise all those who translate from Polish that, in the
absence o f Polish books, they should resort to theoretical and practical
materials which are available in the language into which they translate.
However, apart from the fact that there are considerable difficulties in
obtaining new publications, the translators need to learn not only
about the difficulties which arise from the target language and target
culture but also about the ways o f approaching the linguistic and
cultural specificity of the source text in the process of translation.
While talking about translating from Polish we must not forget
about several controversial practical points. The first controversy
concerns the formal side o f the translation procedure. There is no
agreement about who is qualified to translate from Polish. M any
believe that such work should be done only by those who are native
speakers of the target language (TL) and have an excellent knowledge
of Polish. Some literary translators fulfil such requirements, but even
in the field o f literary translation, the outstanding quality has often
been achieved under different circumstances (team work for instance,
where only one o f two translators speaks Polish). It is obvious that no
country in the world can afford to hire a sufficient number o f perfectly
bilingual translators to satisfy all the needs. In real life, we seem to be
moving between two opposite poles: the translation is either produced
exclusively by Polish translators or the first version is produced by
Polish translators, while the final say belongs to a native speaker o f
16
the foreign language who, in most cases, does not speak Polish. It is
somehow assumed that the second method is much m ore reliable since
we tend to trust any native speaker of the given target language
although we know very well that there are many native Polish
speakers whom we would never regard as good users of the Polish
language. We shall not be able to offer a practical solution to this
problem because even if such a solution exists, it will be impossible to
fully implement. However, we do not believe that only native speakers
are qualified to put the last gloss on translated texts. W hat matters is
not only whether a translator is bilingual or nearly bilingual but also
whether he or she can make a conscious effort to become bicultural
in order to recognize the fact that adequate translation is a m atter of
successful linguistic and cultural transfer.
However, translating from Polish is surrounded by another
controversy which relates directly to its professional status. Translators
in Poland have traditionally retained a relatively comfortable material
position and it is not a secret that translators who are not particularly
fastidious in accepting jobs can earn a considerable income. In this
respect, freelance translators in Poland have so far been much better off
than their colleagues in many Western European countries. This can be
easily explained by the simple fact that for such countries as Poland or
Hungary, translation is much more vital than for countries like Britain
or France. According to recent statistics, only five percent of all books
published in Britain are translations. In the States, this percentage is
even lower, while in Poland this figure may be as high as fifty percent.
This rosy picture concerns, however, only translation from other
languages into Polish. Those who translate from Polish, though they
may not be worse off than all the other translators in financial terms,
are certainly worse off if we think about prestige, appreciation and also
working conditions. To some extent, these disadvantages are justified
by the very fact that the target audiences the translators from Polish
usually aim their work at are extremely heterogeneous in social,
geographical and linguistic terms. In this respect, the translators
resemble actors who are always cast in one-actor shows in theatres
without an auditorium. They do not risk the chance of being booed at
but they cannot hope for a standing ovation either. A t the same time,
a substantial part of their job is to know what these target a u d fp S S
may be like, what their tastes are, and what cultural and/lmgiiistlc
2— Successful Polish-Engiisii...
conventions one should choose in order to put across a relevant
message which is present in the source text.
If on the target side of the process of translation the translators
from Polish suffer from the lack of constructive pressure, on the
source side they have to cope with pressures which are far from being
constructive. F or those who translate into Polish, the main professional
battleground lies in the field of the Polish language and Polish cultural
context, since a translation succeeds only if it functions within the
target system of linguistic and cultural norms. It is very seldom that
either the author or the legal owner of the source text attempts
a formal critique of the translated text because they either do not
speak Polish or are primarily interested only in receiving royalties. If
such interference occurs, it is, in most cases, triggered off only when
the quality of translation puts at risk somebody’s legal, political or
commercial interests. Usually a translation into Polish is discussed if
not by experts in the field of the Polish language and culture, then at
least by those who want to be seen as experts, and if such a discussion
reveals disagreements, they may be resolved by juxtaposing conflicting
opinions with commonly accepted norms.
A translator from Polish finds himself in an entirely different
situation. A part from the fact that he has to come to terms with the
absence o f the target audience, he has to accommodate the interference
of those who commission the translation. In fact, quite often the
interference comes from the author of the source text, since it is not
unusual that the translator is commissioned directly by him. As we all
know, translators have different views concerning direct contact with
authors of the texts. Some literary translators have been known to
travel a long way in order to consult the authors, while others claim
that the role o f the author ends the moment a text appears in print
and is open to interpretation. However, when it is the owner of the
original text who commissions the translator, the relationship between
the two may be much more complicated. It is natural that, in most
cases, the authors want to know what their text is going to look like
in a foreign language. Unfortunately, this curiosity often takes an
ambivalent form. Knowing that cultures and languages differ from
one another, most authors accept Cicero’s ancient rule which says
„non verbum e verbo, sed sensum exprimere de sensu” . In reality,
however, at least fifty percent of them show considerable anxiety when
18
they find out that even such obvious formal features as length of
sentences or division into paragraphs get altered in the process of
translation. If it happens that the author has some knowledge of the
language into which his work is translated, the level of anxiety and the
extent of interference in the process of translation are even greater.
One can easily imagine how potentially explosive the author—
translator relationship may be if the collaborating partners fail to
define their respective roles and the limits of their professional
responsibility.
The last but not least im portant controversial aspect of translation
from Polish into other languages is related to its social relevance.
It would not be an exaggeration to say that the whole process
has been perceived so far as an insignificant activity. Few people
have really cared about the quality of translation and even fewer
have made attem pts to find out how the translated texts function
somewhere in another country. It has been tacitly understood that
there are occasions when some Polish texts should be translated
into other languages but this conviction has been so tentative
that it has never had any practical implications for the production
of translations. In the past, there always were a small number
of agencies and institutions which actively encouraged and occasionally
sponsored the translation of literary texts. There also was a considerable
interest in prom oting an ideologically correct image of the ‘People’s
Poland’ abroad. But, on the whole, quality mattered only in those
cases when individuals such as academics, for instance, realized
that international recognition and success in their field depended
not so much on their research, as on their ability to present
that research to the outside world in a coherent form.
One of the impulses lurking behind the decision to write this book
was the conviction that efficient communication with the outside
world might determine the speed of Poland’s political, economic and
social transform ation. Genuine communication includes, however,
receiving the messages as well as sending them out. So far, most of the
energy has been put into ensuring that we can all either receive foreign
messages directly or by means of translation. It seems that this idea
stands behind a number of recently set up educational programmes in
the field of foreign language teaching. It is assumed, and quite rightly,
that the widespread knowledge of foreign languages gives access to the
19
civilizationai advancements o f the West. However, many seem to
forget that integration does not only depend on absorbing and
receiving. It also involves collaborative exchange, negotiation and
participation which, in turn, call for the skilful translation of our
thoughts and convictions. We have enough evidence to claim that the
importance of translation from Polish has not been as yet recognized
but it seems th at today, more than ever before, it is becoming clear
that in the world which Poland is trying to join, communicational
skills are valued as much as entrepreneurial spirit.
For the sake of this book we have looked at a wide range of
translated texts — from simple commercial leaflets to rather sophis­
ticated academic articles and literary texts. All the texts we discuss
here are authentic and where it is possible or relevant we give some
information about their authorship and the context in which they
appeared. The fact that we did not need to invent the examples in
order to illustrate a particular linguistic problem tells us something
about the poor quality of the existing translations. However, our
intention was not to criticize particular translators or institutions but
to draw attention to the most common problems which occur in the
process of translation. While suggesting solutions, we were thinking
about a number of factors which might have influenced the translators’
decisions. In some cases the reasons were simple: inadequate knowledge
of structural rules or difficulties in spelling. In most cases, however,
the errors resulted from a complete lack of awareness that translation
is not a simple swap of linguistic utterances, and this is why in almost
every chapter of the book we stress that good translation depends on
a thorough knowledge of source and target languages and cultures.
This conviction is built not so much on theoretical assumptions as on
actual experience. Both of us have been teaching translation in
universities in Poland and in G reat Britain for many years now, and
because of personal circumstances we have been functioning in
bilingual and bicultural Polish-English contexts. The choice of trans­
lation from Polish into English has been dictated as much by our
professional interests as by the fact that the role of English as
a language o f international communication will probably even increase
in the years to come. This means, of course, that more and more
people will be engaged in the processes o f translation although it
appears that only a few of those translators will hold professional
20
qualifications. We are hoping then that our book will be of use
primarily to all those translators who have never had a chance to
attend formal- translation seminars or workshops,
r :The question one may w ant to ask is why this book has been
written in English and not in Polish. Indeed, this was one of the issues
we debated on for some time before the decision was made. Our main
line o f argument is that the book is addressed t o . all those who
translate into English, which means that they are fluent both in
spoken and written English. But there is also another practical reason
for adopting English here. The texts we discuss are written in English,
and the problems we analyse more often concern English culture and
language than Polish, so it seems more natural and more effective to
conduct the discussion in English. Because of the English both of us
speak, and for the sake o f consistency, we have decided to adhere
rather strictly to British English. As can be easily observed, many
speakers o f English and some translators tend to confuse British and
American English. This may be partly due to the fact that American
culture and language have a very strong appeal in Poland these days.
However, the acknowledged or accepted borrowings from American
English in British English is one thing, while an Anglo-American
mish-mash is another. In several instances, we have pointed out the
difficulties which may result from the indiscriminate use of different
varieties o f the English language.
Curiously enough, those who wrote about translation usually
seemed to be divided into two classes: those who believed in theory,
and were above all practical matters, and those who were very
practical but also strictly prescriptive. The one thing the two camps
shared was a strong belief in theoretical linguistics and a conviction
that anyone who dealt with translation should have a strong linguistic
backgroud. In the last few years, however, we have been able to
observe a certain change o f perspectives in the field o f translation. The
new impulses and ideas have been arriving from different directions.
Among others, there was a gradual loss of interest in structuralist
theories in favour of the generative approach to language, and later
cognitive linguistics, or to the various sociologically based language
approaches. M ore or less at the same time, some aspects of translation
attracted the attention of those who specialized in media, com­
munication and cultural studies. As these contributions have opened
21
new perspectives and injected a lot of healthy scepticism into the study
Chapter One
o f translation, we can now feel that we can be both theoretical and
practical while talking about translation, and that in providing TRANSLATION: THE RELEVANCE OF THEORY
solutions to some problems, we do not need to be authoritative and
prescriptive. We do, of course, realize that by adopting the somewhat
m odem eclectic approach we have run the risk of simplifying quite
complex issues. However, as one distinguished teacher o f translation
said, putting thoughts on paper is a bit like translating — it involves
both gains and losses,

November 1993
WHAT IS TRANSLATION TH EO RY TRYING TO EXPLAIN?

Many translators, some of them outstanding, look rather puzzled

when confronted with the term ‘translation theory’ since, for
them, translation is a m atter o f sound judgement and practical
skills. However, when asked what their work consists of, they
are capable of talking extensively about their strategies, choices
and ways of finding out whether the translation is good or bad.
One could say that these reflections make up a credible translation
theory, and if we choose to follow what the translators have
had to say about their work in the last three or four hundred
years, we may acquire a lot of wisdom which will certainly improve
our practical approach to translation. However, according to some
scholars, who are involved in translation studies, the reflections
on translating texts belong to the history o f translation, and
they will firmly emphasize that theory and history are two entirely
different types of knowledge.
If we look through a selection of theoretical books devoted to
translation, we find that their authors differ considerably on the point
concerning translation theory. Here we are listing just a small number
of views in order to show what the range of difference may be:
1. Translation theory explains how it happens that a text written
in one language becomes accessible in another language.
2. Translation theory explains the nature of the relationship
between source text and target text.
3. Translation theory should explain which psychological processes
make translation possible.

23
 4, Translation theory is about the function o f a translated text in
the target culture.
5. Translation theory explains how texts get translated and provides
a model (models) for translating texts.
WHAT IS TRANSLATION?
We hope we have made it clear that translation theory has been for
some time in a state o f considerable confusion. Every author of
a book on translation has his own idea about w hat theory of
translation is or should be, depending on what his or her educatio­
nal background is. Sometimes this creates the impression that,
today, practically every specialist in any field o f knowledge has
something to add to the theory of translation. Therefore, theoretical
works on translation are written by linguists o f different theoretical
orientations, teachers o f foreign languages, sociologists, translators,
specialists in cultural studies or comparative literature, and in recent
years, by philosophers and literary theorists. It is not surprising
then, that if there are so many contradictory ideas about what
translation theory is and what it should do, there will be an equally
vast number o f statements about translation and translating. We
have pointed to this phenomenon briefly in the introduction but
now we would like to look at some definitions o f translation in
order to make it clear that in this area there may be a great degree
of difference.
1. In translation, there is substitution o f TL meanings for SL
meanings: not transference o f TL meanings into the SL. In transfer­
ence, there is an im plantation of SL meanings into the TL text. These
two processes m ust be clearly differentiated in any theory of
translation1.
(J.C. Catford)
2. Translation is a craft consisting in the attem pt to replace
a written message and/or statement in one language by the same
message and/or statement in another language. Each exercise invol-
1 J.C. Catford: Quoted after: S. Bassnett, Translation Studies, Routledge, 1991
(revised edition), p. 6.
24
ves some kind of loss o f meaning due to a number o f factors. It
provokes a continuous tension, a dialectic, an argum ent based on
the claims o f each language. The basic loss is a continuum between
overtranslation (increased detail) and undertranslation (increased
generalisation)2.
(Peter Newmark)
3 . Translation is an activity, both spiritual and practical, related to
the activity of communicating. As a result it shares in all the
characteristic features o f the category o f activity in its broadest sense.
Translation is not a productive but a reproductive activity, not
ą primary but a secondary activity3.
(Margarita Brandes)
4. Beyond the notion stressed by the narrowly linguistic approach,
that translation involves the transfer o f ‘meaning’ contained in one set
oflanguage signs into another set o f language signs through competent
use of dictionary and grammar, the process involves a whole set of
extra-linguistic criteria also4.
(S. Bassnett)
5. Translation can do everything except m ark this linguistic difference
inscribed in the language, this difference o f language systems inscribed
in a single tongue. A t best'it can get everything across except this: the
fact that there are, in one linguistic system, perhaps several languages
or tongues5.
(J. Derrida)
We admit that the variety o f theoretical positions on which these
definitions have been built is bewildering, and it is impossible to say
that one o f these five statements is ‘truer’ or more ‘objective’ than the
others. As we can clearly see, it all depends on how we look at the
problem o f translation.
2 P. Newmark, Approaches to Translation, Pergamon Press, 1982, p. 7.
3 Margarita Brandes, Comprehension, style, translation and their interaction [in:]
Translation As Social Action, Palma Zlateva (ed.) Routledge, 1993, p. 77.
4 S. Bassnett, op. cit., p. 13.
5 The Ear o f the Other, C.V. Me Donald (ed.), 1985, p. 100
25
CH O O SIN G T H E ‘R IG H T THEORY 5. A translation should reflect the style of the original.
6. A translation should possess the style of the translator.
If there are so many theories and so many definitions of translation, 7. A translation should read as a contemporary of the original.
one would certainly w ant to know which of them is better or more 8. A translation should read as a contemporary of the translator.
objective. W ithout being ironic, we could compare this question to 9. A translation may add to or omit from the original.
that posed mentally by customers who need to choose one of many 10. A translation may never add to or omit from the original.
brands of toothpaste available in a big supermarket. It seems that, at 11. A translation of verse should be in prose.
the m oment, the situation with translation theory is such th at the right 12. A translation of verse should be in verse. 6
question to ask is not'which theory is ‘truer’ and more ‘objective’, but
There is no need to say that those who have ever taken such rules
rather which one we find more useful while trying to solve a particular
seriously and experimented with them have soon learned that no set
problem. We realize that this is a purely pragmatic choice which may
of rules can help to produce a good translation. Maybe this is the
have little to do with a theoretical stance, b ut it is the only suggestion
reason why immediately after the Second World W ar many linguists
which seems reasonable to both of us at this moment. The truth is that
began to propagate the idea that if a man cannot establish feasible
Translation Studies is a discipline in a state of flux, which is drawing
translation paradigms, the task should be left to computers or rather
on different fields of knowledge, and it is not very likely that this will
‘translation machines’. However, these hopes have never materialized
change in the near future, The ‘purists’ in the field of Translation
because, so far, nobody has been able to set up a system which would
Studies are worried that this multi- or inter-disciplinary approach
produce ‘a perfect’ translation without the aid of the human mind. It
weakens both the status and the im portance of the subject, but this
is, of course, possible to set up relatively uncomplicated programmes
view is not shared by those who believe that translation, being a very
which allow, for instance, to translate weather forecasts, but it is still
complex phenomenon, can, or perhaps ever should, be pushed into
impossible to engage machines in translating texts with a high level of
a framework o f simple and unambiguous formulas.
ambiguous linguistic items or of complex cultural significance. Today,
To add some optimism, though, we can say that in spite of its
translation machines are used mainly as a very useful aid because they
multifaceted nature, translation theories can be at least divided
can liberate the translators from the painstaking process of building
roughly into two classes: those which describe either the phenomenon
up the stores of equivalent terminology in narrowly specialized areas,
and the mechanics o f translation or those which prescribe rules to be
checking spelling or ensuring that the sentences in the target language
followed. Very often, beginners in the field of translation look for
have correct syntactic structures. However, we are still very far from
prescriptive theories hoping that, in this way, they will be able to build
the days when the subjective element may be eliminated from the
up a store o f good advice. Soon, however, it turns out th at this is
process of translating.
a very illusory pursuit o f certainties since different theories prescribe
different rules. In his knowledgeable book, The Art o f Translation,
Theodore Savory shows very clearly th at these rules not only differ A BRIEF H ISTORY
considerably but they also contradict one another. Here is a list of
The post-war adventure with machine translation and the subsequent
several such rules which the translators are often encouraged to follow:
demise o f the belief in the unlimited power of technology tells us a lot
about some developments in the field of translation theory, seen as an
1. A translation m ust give the words of the original.
integral part o f theoretical linguistics. In the last three decades, there
2. A translation m ust give the ideas of the original.
3. A translation should read like an original work.
4. A translation should read like a translation. 6 T. Savory, The Art o f Translation, Cape, 1957, p. 49.

26 27
have been several attempts to develop a theoretical model which
would explain and describe the mystery of human language. These
attempts have made some scholars believe that having cracked the
mystery o f language, we could get down to setting-up an all-embracing
theory of translation. As we all know, these theories were initially
based mainly on the findings of structuralist linguistics which meant
that they were deeply embedded in certain structuralist dogmas such
as, for instance, that the sentences we produce are generated by a set
of clearly defined rules. As a result of this approach, very little or no
attention was paid to semantics or the cultural and social nature of
language. All texts, as well as translation procedures, were divided
into rigid categories, and non-linguistic aspects of translation were
either ignored or underestimated. M any o f these characteristics can be
identified in a ‘classical’ text from this p e rio d .— J.C. Catford’s
Linguistic Theory o f Translation (Oxford 1965) from which we quoted
one of our definitions of translation.
The gradual moving away from structuralism in the 1970s and the
early 80s led to the formulation or reconsideration of some other
language hypotheses, which eventually had some influence on transla­
tion theories. The work on Wilhelm von H um boldt’s ideas and the
so-called Sapir-W horf hypothesis opened up the issue o f linguistic
universals and linguistic equivalents. Sapir’s famous statement that ”no
two languages are ever sufficiently similar to be considered as
representing the same social reality” , formulated for the first time in
1929, was given a new lease of life. This helped, o f course, to dispel the
illusion that a translated text will always be just a mere m irror image of
the source text.
In themselves, these new developments were highly desirable.
However, a literal interpretation of some hypotheses led to strange
outcomes. Thus, for instance, a debate about a different perception of
colours in different geographical locations led to the formulation of
most improbable theories about the impossibility of translating
anything from one language into another. It was becoming more and
more obvious that translation theory, conceived in strictly linguistic
terms, was neither addressing relevant issues nor benefiting those who
were just practising it at a professional level. In the meantime,
standard criticism o f translated texts had been addressing the same,
and still elusive issues, such as faithfulness or the lack of it, the meaning
28
o f ; t h e original and the meaning of translation. The critics’ attention
'b's'cillated between the source text and the target text privileging either
the. former or the latter, but without explaining how these changing
attitudes were motivated. But, most of all, it was n ot clear w hat exactly
the role and function of translation criticism was supposed to be
because while some critics were concentrating on the descriptive
analysis o f individual texts, others were trying either to establish reliable
systems of ‘quality control’ or to reintroduce prescriptive rules.
, r . It is believed today that the confusion and lack o f progress in the
field o f translation was partly responsible for the relatively recent
change o f perspectives in Translation Studies and for what we could call
here metaphorically “ a return to Dry den” . It was also a happy
coincidence that, at the same time, a similar wind o f change was
sweeping through the field o f linguistics as well as cultural and literary
studies. In linguistics, the unsuccessful search for a perfect structuralist
model of human language led to the renaissance o f a belief that the
most interesting characteristic feature of language was its ability to
ensure interpersonal communication, which meant that language should
be investigated in the context in which it was used by human beings.
What emerged from this reorientation was an interesting marriage of
theoretical linguistics with psychology, anthropology, philosophy and
social sciences. Now w hat mattered most was not the investigation of
some abstract language but the investigation of linguistic behaviour
under different circumstances. The research concentrated on such issues
as the function of language in different social contexts and the relation
between language and action. This change was reflected in a new
terminology. Such terms as pragmatics, sociolinguistics and cognitive
linguistics became characteristic of a new academic discourse.
THE ‘CULTURAL TURN’
The changes in the field of cultural and literary studies, which have
had a considerable impact on translation, have affected the status and
function of all texts — from great works of literature to images, which
belong to popular culture. Particular attention has been drawn to two
aspects o f reading and interpretation: the meaning o f a text and its
understanding by the readers. The debate about reading and inter­
pretation has alerted us to the fact that the meaning is not necessarily
29
found in the text, but more often constructed by the readers, and that the
way we construct the meaning may depend on such factors as our social
position, nationality, political and aesthetic preferences. This way of
looking at meaning has been of extreme help to translators who, as we
know, have always been under pressure to reproduce the exact meaning
of thp original in the translated text. Now with having at our disposal
thesć more ‘liberalized’ attitudes to the phenomenon of meaning, the
translators should find it much easier to argue why it is futile to expect
from a translator to reproduce the meaning in such a way that all readers
will always come up with the same interpretation of any translated text.
The study of the reception of literary texts has shown how the
interpretation of one and the same work depends both on the
particular perspective o f the reader as well as on the historical context
in which the reading and interpretation take place. Striking disparities
occur within the context of one language and one cultural tradition,
yet they are nothing compared to the complications when a literary
work begins to reach foreign audiences. Here the number of possibilities
seems to be unlimited and sometimes they defy all explanation. The
fact that no translation is ever identical with the original work and
that the experiences of foreign readers differ from the experiences of
the readers of the original widen the range of interpretations and
ensure that the literary text receives a new lease of life. A German-
Jewish critic and philosopher, Walter Benjamin, saw this life-enhancing
role of translation as a m ajor cultural force:
It is plausible that no translation, however good it may be, can have any
significance as regards the original. Yet, by virtue of its translatabiiity the
original is closely connected with the translation; in fact, this connection is all
the closer since it is no longer o f importance to the original. We may call this
connection a natural one, or, more specifically, a vital connection. Just as the
manifestations o f life are intimately connected with the phenomenon of life
without being o f importance to it, a translation issues from the original not
so much from its life as from its afterlife. For a translation comes later than the
original, and since the important works o f world literature never find their
chosen translators at the time o f their origin, their translation marks their stage
of continued life. The idea o f life and afterlife in works o f art should be regarded
with an entirely unmetaphorical objectivity 7.
7 W. Benjamin, The Task o f the Translator [in:] Readings in Translation Theory, A.
Chesterman, (ed.), Oy Finn Lectura Ab, 1989, p. 15.
30
TRANSLATORS AND THEIR TEXTS
If the debate about meaning and interpretation has helped translators
to cope with their anxieties about faithfulness and exact linguistic
equivalents, the critical appreciation of what we call ‘popular culture’
and ‘free m arket economy’ has enabled us to realize that in the last
couple of decades (and in Poland very recently) the role of translation
has undergone a considerable change. As a result, the very term
translator has come to mean something different than it used to not
such a long time ago. Once the term was reserved for a description of
somebody who translated mainly works of literature; today, however,
it is commonly accepted that the majority of translators are either
involved in interpreting or translating pragmatic texts. From our own
experience and from the experience of our colleagues, we know that,
like many professionals in Poland, translators are beginning to feel the
pressure o f the m arket economy and we may be sure that, sooner or
later, many literary translators will be forced by circumstances to
accept the translation of less aesthetically pleasing, but more financially
rewarding, offers. There is no doubt that these changes will have some
theoretical implications since, unlike literary texts, pragmatic ones
have more clearly defined functions:
1. They are produced with a clear intention to get across a specific
message.
2. They are aimed at a carefully selected audience.
3. They are supposed either to elicit a particular response or to
prom pt a specific action.
In other words, these texts are very much audience oriented and their
production and, subsequently, translation involve a good deal of
background research into the habits of those at whom the texts are
aimed. This means, of course, that the importance o f intellectual input
in the process of translating has dramatically increased. The expec­
tations concerning translators, as well as interpreters, are very high. It
is not enough to be fluent in a foreign language or even to be bilingual
in order to become a sought-after translator. One has to be both
bicultural and bilingual.
We may more or less know what it means to be bilingual but it
may not be clear what it means to be bicultural. One of the best
31
translation theorists, Eugene Nida, compiled a list of items which THEORY AND PRA CTICE
indicates the areas a translator ought to take into account while
It is obvious, of course, that a single translator is not capable o f fully
learning about both his own and the target culture. Here is a slightly
embracing all that knowledge about two linguistic and cultural
modified version o f N ida’s ta b le 8.
systems and then to utilize this knowledge in the process o f translation.
TRANSLATOR’S KNOWLEDGE What translation involves, then, is a constant process o f selection,
1. Ecology a careful consideration o f w hat can be gained and what should be
climate sacrificed in the process o f translation. Having been told what to do,
terrain a practising translator will undoubtedly ask how to do it, and it is often
flora expected that a translation theory should provide clear and unam ­
fauna biguous solutions. Unfortunately, translation theory, as it stands
2. M aterial Culture and Technology today, is not capable o f providing a list of strategies which will
exploitation patterns (fishing, type of agriculture, hunting, etc.) automatically allow us to produce a perfect translation. Does it mean,
household objects (machetes, Pepsi, etc.) then, that translation theory is based on purely speculative thinking
housing (igloo, brick houses; tents, etc.) and never will lead us to useful conclusions? A majority o f translation
means of transportation (oxcarts, jets, boats, etc.) theorists would say that the role of theory is not so much to come up
technical knowledge (wheel, nuclear power, etc.) with definite solutions but rather to make translators aware that
3. Social Organization translation is not a process of mechanical transfer but a very
classes, kinship categories, sex roles complicated linguistic and cultural transaction — a kind o f intellectual
institutions trade. The role o f theory is to highlight the difficulties and, if possible,
legal system to suggest a number o f solutions which the translator will find helpful.
political system This awareness-raising aspect o f theory is emphasized by Jerzy Pieńkos,
4. Mythic Patterns who is both a theoretician and practitioner:
cosmology It should be stressed here that only translation theory can provide us with
taboos a thorough and comprehensive intellectual system which will be indispensable for
supernatural notions the investigation and adequate understanding of translation processes. Theory
symbolic patterns may also help, both the students of translation and experienced translators, to
realize the intricate nature o f translation, as well as to sustain a debate about its
5. Linguistic Structures
practical aspects. And, finally, translation theory will produce a number of
sound system (very im portant for oral and written literature)
guidelines which may help translators to select the most adequate translation
word formation strategies 9.
word meaning (this is the biggest and most complicated area for
a translator since synonyms for given concepts differ from So Pieńkos, and many other theorists as well as practitioners,
language to language considerably), direct us towards those theories which combine intellectual stimulation
syntactic relations with the utilitarian aspects o f translation. But even this narrower
pronouns. choice still leaves us with a multiplicity o f approaches. In Europe
alone we can distinguish several different theoretical traditions. Some

8 The original can be found in: Eugene Nida, Linguistics and Ethnology in
9 Jerzy Pieńkos, Przekład i tłumacz we współczesnym świecie, PWN, 1993, p. 70.
Translation Problems. „Word 1” (1945), pp. 194— 208.

3— Succcssfu! Poiish-English... 33
32
of them rely heavily on theoretical linguistics (the D utch and German
schools), others stress the cultural aspect o f translation (the Bassnett-
Hermans-Lefevere group) or its social and communication aspects
(most East European translation theorists). Instead of providing
a comprehensive list of them (this in itself is hardly possible) we want
to show on one example how theories are constructed, how they
attem pt to solve the problems and eventually how their weaker points
lead in turn to the development of new challenging points of view.
The theory we w ant to present very briefly has been developed and
presented by M ary Snell-Homby in her book Translation Studies. An
Integrated Approach10. Snell-Hornby is both a translator and a lecturer
in Translation Studies at Vienna University and this is why her
interests are pragmatic, pedagogical, as well as theoretical. In her
book, she concentrates on the relationship between the types of texts
we translate and the techniques o f translation. H er starting point is
that due to the proliferation of a huge variety of multidimensional
texts, the traditional division of translators into narrow specializations
is becoming untenable. It also means th at it is impossible to work on
the principle that once we identify the character of the text we
translate, we shall be able to work out definite strategies for texts with
identical or similar characteristics. Snell-Hornby is convinced that
today a neat classification of texts is almost impossible:
The vast.majority of texts are in fact hybrid forms, multi-dimensional structures
with a blend of sometimes seemingly conflicting features: Shakespeare’s sonnets
contain technical terminology of his day, while modern economic texts abound
in lexicalized metaphor...11
This should not, o f course, bring us to the conclusion that, for
instance* translating legal documents for the electricity board is
exactly same as translating Gombrowicz’s novels. However, this does
not mean either th at for each text we should ‘invent’ a new set of
translation strategies. The difference in approach to such distinct texts
as legal documents and Gombrowicz’s novels is reflected in the
selection o f particular strategies from the wide range of possibilities
which are always available. Thus, for instance, it is obvious that while
10 M. Snell-Homby, Translation Studies. An Integrated Approach, John Benjamin,
1988.
u Ibid., p. 31.
34
translating instructions we shall be paying attention to such features
as relevance, information and standardization. We shall be also trying
to,narrow the scope of interpretation in order to convey a very precise
message. In the case of Gombrowicz, the considerations will be
different. First o f all, we shall not attem pt to narrow the scope of
interpretation, nor shall we make any attem pt to impose standar­
dization of language. Instead, we shall try to recreate the quality of
language by paying attention to such formal features as sound effects,
inetaphor or the creative use of language norms. In spite of all the
differences, there are, however, criteria which are of equal relevance
tb both texts. These are, for instance, the communicative function,
socio-cultural context and the whole range of linguistic criteria
(text-linguistics, sociolinguistics, etc.).
: It is obvious that the two texts we have chosen above belong to the
opposite ends o f what Mary Snell-Homby calls “spectrum or cline” . On
the basis o f this approach to translation, Snell-Hornby has been able to
come up with four hypotheses which have practical implications:
1. If the original text is very "specialized” and ’’pragmatic”, it is much easier to
place it in a specific situation and define the function of its translation in the
target context.
2. If the situation and the function of the original text are very specific, its
translation will be more target oriented.
3. If a text is o f a ‘literary” type, its function and situation depend very much
on its reading and interpretation.
4. If a text is o f a "literary” type, the status o f the source text is usually higher
because it is perceived as a work of art in the medium of language12.
ft seems that so far M ary Snell-Hornby’s approach to translation
has been successful in combining theory with practice and it looks as
if one could indeed use her conclusions in a practical way. However,
as we have said before, every translation theory attracts a lot of
attention and criticism. Snell-Homby’s way of dealing with categori­
zation has not been an exception — it has been widely discussed and,
in some corners, heavily criticized. Here is one such critical voice:
Snell-Hornby is right when she calls for ”a basic reorientation in thinking”, but
she does not go to the core o f the problem when she sees this as ”a revision of
the traditional forms of categorization’. The problem is not the form of
12 Ibid., p. 115.
35
 categorization used, but reliance on cateorization as such. Categories — whether
they are rigid as in traditional typologies or ‘blurred* as in ‘prototypologies’ —
Chapter Two
are helpful for the organisation of data and the description o f phenomena, but
explanation and theoretical penetration require an understanding of the properties
TRANSLATION AS COMMUNICATION
by virtue of which the phenomena interact13.

The scholar who wrote those words proposed, of course, his own theory
of translation which, at first glance, looks very simple and convincing:
What the translator Jias to do in order to communicate successfully is to arrive
at the intended interpretation of the original, and then determine in what respect
his translation should interpretively resemble the original in order to be
consistent with the principle of relevance with its particular cognitive environment.
Nothing else is needed14. WHAT DO WE DO WHEN WE TRANSLATE?

However, this simplicity is misleading because it is not clear how
we are to achieve this easiness in translating at a practical level. And
this shortcoming has been quickly identified by critics:
He does not acknowledge the vagueness o f the very notion, o f relevance, nor does he
evaluate the validity of relevance theory itself. Thus he also fails to acknowledge the
need for further research on relevance in translation, both empirical and theoretical,
which will enable us to make this general framework more elaborate and concrete1S.
We hope that even this superficial glance at the mechanism which
generates new theories of translation has given all o f us an indication
to what extent any theory helps to enhance good practice. It is obvious
that most o f the proposed models lay down the conditions for
a successful translation, and it would be extremely wasteful n ot to take
some notice o f more interesting developments in translation theory.
In the subsequent chapters, we shall be using a number o f ideas
developed by different theorists. However, we would like to make it
clear at this point th at while referring to translation theories, we are
not looking for ready made formulas since we strongly believe that the
function of translation theory is not to provide easy solutions but to
make us aware of the enormous number o f complex issues which
translation involves.
13 E. Gutt, A Theoretical Account o f Translation — Without a Translation Theory,
„Target” 2:2 3990, p. 139.
14 Ibid., p. 157.
15 Sonja Tirkkonen-Condit, A Theoretical Account o f Translation without a Trans­
lation Theory, „Target” 4:2, 1992, p. 243.
There is no doubt that we all know w hat translation is. Generally
speaking, we believe that by translating we put into one language
a thought or a text which already exists in another language. The
theorists o f translation tell us almost the same except that they use
rather more complex and specialized term inologył . While reading
various definitions of translation one is tempted to cóme to the
conclusion that translation is a very simple process, nearly as simple
as mincing meat: we put big chunks of meat into the funnel at the top
of the mincer and, after a while, minced meat comes out from the tube
at the bottom o f the machine. We all know that it is the same meat,
kiid yet its texture and colour are strangely altered. However, when
we move from definitions of translation to the process of translating,
the story is different. We can neither agree about the meaning and
interpretation of w hat is to be translated, nor about the equivalent
value of the translated text. W hat follows from this m ajor difference
of opinion is a whole range of smaller disagreements concerning the
original text and its translation. In her book on translating Homer’s
Iliad, Felicity Rosslyn talks about our mixed attitudes to translation:
When we read a work in translation we normally assume that it is much the same
thing as reading the original, only more convenient. If anyone then challenged us
to explain how a work in one language could still be ‘the same’ in another, with
a different vocabulary, history and spirit, we might go on to concede that of
? course it could not be — that translations are necessarily inferior to original
1 See definitions o f translation in: Jerzy Pieńkos, Przekład i tłumacz we współczesnym
świecie, PWN, 1993 pp. 10—30.

36 37
 writers; but until ail o f us can read all languages, translation will be a necessary
evil. This note of-resignation in talking about translations is so common now
that it may come as a surprise to learn that there was a time when translation
was regarded as a creative art, not a feebly parasitic one, and translators and
original writers were not clearly distinguished 2.
THE CHANGING NOTIONS OF TRANSLATION
The attitude to translation of which Rosslyn is talking at the end of
the quoted passage belongs, unfortunately, to the past. Until the end
of the eighteenth century, those who translated did not worry too
much about such things as faithfulness, perfect equivalence, or 'the
sameness of the effect which the original text and its translation
should have on the respective readers. It was generally accepted that
a translation was bound to differ from the original text because it was
produced in another language, against the background of another
culture and for a different audience. In cases when translation was
produced years, decades or centuries after the text had been written,
a considerable autonomy of the translated text was seen as an obvious
fact. While referring to the translation of the classics into modern
European languages, Desiderus Erasmus had the following to say:
What effrontery would he have then who required us always to speak in
a Ciceronian style? Let him first restore to us the Rome which existed in that
time; let him restore the senate and the senate house, the conscript fathers, the
knights, the people in tribes and centuries... Since then the entire arena of
human affairs has been altered, who today can speak unless he greatly diverges
from Cicero? It seems to me that we are led to a different course. You refuse
eloquence to anyone who fails to copy Cicero. But the actual situation shows
that no one is eloquent unless he avoids the Ciceronian model. Wherever
I tura, I see everything changed; I stand on a different stage; I see a different
theatre.3
So if the great translators did not have concerns like ours, what
was their notion of translation? From past statements on translation
and translated works we leajm that there was a widespread belief in
w hat we call today ‘free’ translation.) However, our notion of ‘free’
translation originates in romanticism and is associated with unlimited
2 Felicity Rosslyn, Pope's Iliad, Bristol Classical Press, 1985, p. IX.
3 Desiderus Erasmus, Ciceronianus, 1528.
38
freedom, spontaneous creativity and divine inspiration.. To pre-
-romantic translators ‘free’ translation appeared differently. The
freedom was-neither unlimited nor divine. The choices were basfed on
specific sets of criteria and the translator never put himself above the
author of the original. The rigours the translators used to impose on
their work were immense and so was the sense of responsibility:
His other important qualification for the job was not so much his knowledge of
the foreign tongue as his judgement, for it fell to him to decide what the effect
o f his author was before embodying it in English; and so the act of translation
was understood to be an act o f reading as well as writing, of interpretation as
well as demonstration4.
It is rather surprising to find out how much our notions of translation
differ from those who translated two centuries ago, and one is curious
to see why the shift in understanding took place. In terms of chronology
it is easy to decide that the change of attitudes must have occurred some
time in the nineteenth century because even a superficial study of
European views on translation tells us what actually happened. First of
all, translation began to lose its artistic status and more and more often
it was perceived as a mere technical operation. In addition to that,
foreign language teaching was based on translation as a pedagogical
method, and it was believed that acquiring a foreign language depended
on a substitution of one set of linguistic structures for another set of
linguistic structures. This in turn encouraged the belief that in order to
learn a foreign language o r to translate a text, one had only to select the
appropriate linguistic equivalent. As a result, the nineteenth century
discussion on translation moves away from the function of the
translated text in the target language and culture to the area of
relationship between translation and the source text. The questions
posed are about fidelity, the difference between translation, imitation
and adaptation, as well as about the need to preserve a ‘feeling of
foreigness’ in translated works. Friedrich Schleiermacher’s writing on
translation exemplifies some of these new attitudes:
What of a genuine translator, who wants to bring those two completely
separated persons, his author and his reader, truly together, and who would like
to bring the latter to as correct and complete an understanding of the original
as possible without inviting him to leave the sphere of the mother tongue? What
4 Felicity Rosslyn, op. cit.p. IX.
39
 roads are open to him? In my opinion there are only two. Either the translator
leaves the author in peace, as much as possible, and moves the reader toward
him. Or he leaves the reader in peace, as much as possible, and moves the author
toward him. The two roads are so completely separate that the translator must
follow one or the other as assiduously as possible, and any mixture of the two
would produce a highly undesirable result, so much so that the fear might arise
that the author and reader would not meet at all.5
One does not need to be a specialist in translation and translation
theory to see that Schleiermacher is miles away from, let us say,
Dryden who firmly believed that his responsibility as a translator was
to produce an excellent piece of writing in his own language. In the
‘Preface to Ovid’s Epistles' he stated: “ I have endeavour’d to make
Virgil speak such English as he woul’d himself have spoken, if he had
been born in England, and in this present Age” . 6
We would like to make it clear at the start that our hearts and
minds are with Dryden and that we believe that translation is
nothing else but the act of communication. This means that, as much
as we respect the source text, we feel that our responsibility as
translators lies first of all with the readers for whom we translate
and, therefore, our task is to make sure that the text we translate is
not a poorer substitute for the original, but a fully functional,
comprehensible and well composed piece of writing in the target
language. After all, the word ‘translation’ comes from trans-ferre, to
‘bring across’, which means that a translator’s first task is to identify
what is in the text that is of worth or should be ‘brought across’.
This perspective has allowed us to accept the fact that translation
involves both gains and losses and that we are allowed to ‘amend’
the text in the target language if we feel that something is getting lost
in the process o f translation.
It must be admitted that our understanding of what translation
should involve is not a prevailing one. As in many other areas, the last
century’s attitudes are still firmly with us. The rapid rise o f non-literary
translation has additionally complicated the attitudes to translation.
While translating a large number of technical or legal texts we tend to
5 Friedrich Schleiermacher, Uber die verschiedeneti Methoden des Obersetzens, 1913
[in:] A. Lefevere, Translation!History/Culture, Routledge, 1992, p. 149.
6 John Dryden, On Dramatic Poesy and Other Critical Essays, ed. G. Watson,
Everyman’s Library, vol. 1, p. 268.
40
be so preoccupied with the terminological precision that very often we
forget that pragmatic texts must also be well written and should
conform not only to legal or technical but also to cultural norms,
which operate in the society for which we translate. In this respect,
literary and non-literary translations are very similar, and it is
unfortunate that translators, as well as theoreticians o f translation,
tend to emphasize that the two kinds o f translation have not all that
much in common.
THE t h i r d l a n g u a g e
In his book entitled suggestively The Third Language, Alan D uff says
exactly what happens to the text when a translator fails to preserve its
communicative function. Although D uff himself is a translator, he
decided to look at the problem from the perspective o f a reader for
whom translations are produced. And here are some of his more
interesting observations:
If translation, particularly in the English-speaking world, does have a poor
reputation, it cannot have been entirely unearned. Nor can it have come purely
from public comment on translation in the press. It must derive also from bad
personal experience: those who come into contact with translation are put off by
what they read. And if there is any single reason for’the English-speaking reader
being put off by translation it is — as I have suggested throughout this book —
that translation does not sound like English. The more often he is faced with what
I call the third language, the less willing he will be to read translation. For
nobody wants to read more than he must o f his own language badly written 7.
We can only but applaud this statement because from our own
experience we know w hat it is to read a badly written text in whatever
language it has been produced. This observation raises, o f course, the
question about the difference between a badly and a well written text.
Theoretical linguistics would probably provide us with a precise set of
criteria according to which we could decide whether the text is well
written or not. Unfortunately, it is often the case that the linguistic
criteria oscillate around the issue o f grammatical and stylistic correct­
ness. The personal experience o f reading tells us that a grammatically
‘correct’ text may still be regarded as a badly written one because the
7 Alan Duff, The Third Language, Pergamon Press, 1981, p. 124.
41
author either was not able to express himself clearly or did not think
about the aesthetic aspects o f writing and reading. To make our
distinctions between well and badly written texts clearer, let us look
at two fragments of critical prose. The first piece comes from a book
on translation theory, the other one from an essay on D ante’s Divine
Comedy.
1.
The Variational concept similarly provides a more finely regulated representation
o f cross-cultural relationships. Instead o f being contingent on individual acts of
creative adaptations, as in the relativist conception, or contractually negotiated
through the neutralization o f cultural differences in the universalist conception,
they will be found to exist in a wide range o f predictable cross-cultural
configurations. These configurations correspond to the various ways variation
ranges can adjust or fail to conform in different cultures. These predefined
options do not exclude creativity in translation nor do they insure the translator
against erroneous solutions; they actually enhance and motivate his or her
practice as a cultural act.
2.
I can still after all these years imagine that a man who opens this Eighteenth Canto
for the first time might feel an obscure sensation like that o f a non-poiitica!
British subject who would wake up one morning to realise for the first time that
there had recently been a change o f government. Most o f the features o f his
ordinary life would be the same as they were in the past, but he would perceive
that there were countless small innovations which, taken together, would
constitute the impression that his country had really changed, and that there was
a new government at work, Dante was, I imagine, when he conceived this Canto,
like the incoming government, keenly aware of his decisive new moves, and,
I imagine, too, that he saw his way ahead for several further cantos, once he had
put his new stamp on this Canto.
W hat we feel while reading these fragments is that, while in the first
case we are trying to figure out w hat meaning may be hidden behind
a number o f abstract words, in the second case we are concentrating
not on the meaning o f single words or expressions, but on the message
which the author wants us to receive. So our time spent on Dante can
be described as an intellectual experience — we are trying to find out
the value and meaning of the m etaphor of the incoming government
as used for the description of the reader’s first encounter with Canto
Eighteen. The style of the first passage makes it impossible to go
straight to the interpretation of the message because first we have to
42
find some way through the maze of highly abstract terms. Expressions
like ’being contingent on individual acts of creative adaptations’ or
‘contractually negotiated through the neutralization of cultural dif­
ference’ require a lot o f heavy thinking. Only at the end of this
‘preliminary’ reading do we begin to wonder whether it was necessary
at* all to use such obscure terminology since, instead of helping to
Understand the message, it has made it impossibly obscure.
One could, of course, say that the first text is more specialist and,
without knowing the whole, one cannot expect to understand a small
fragm ent The counterargument is, however, whether the interpretation
of the Divine Comedy is really an easier task than explaining the
‘variation concept’. We are sure that opinions here will be divided. But
the point on which these two texts differ most conspicuously is the
attitude of the authors to their readers. It is evident that the author of
the second passage must have made a conscious decision to address
his readers in such a way as to communicate his thoughts as clearly
as possible, and this resolution is reflected in the dialogical style of his
prose. The first text, unfortunately, lacks this quality. The author
expresses certain ideas w ithout making an effort to address his
prospective reader. As a result, the text does not relate in any way to
the reader’s interpretive ability and as such it loses its power to
communicate.
, It is generally accepted that writing in a foreign language is the
.most difficult skill for the language learners. But writing well in
a foreign language is particularly difficult also because, as we have
seen above, it is not a natural ability but a skill which even native
speakers have to learn if they want to write well. For translators, the
writing skills are o f fundamental importance since, in order to
translate well, let us say into English, a translator must have a good
idea of what good English style is like.
THE TH IRD LANGUAGE AND TH E LACK
OF COM M UNICATION
As we have said above, the so-called third language appears either
when translators are not well acquainted with the stylistic conventions
which operate in the target language, or when they firmly adhere to
the principle that the stylistic quality of the translated text can be
43
sacrificed for the sake o f close equivalence or faithfulness. On the basis Translation is, of course, a rewriting of an original text. All rewritings, whatever
their intention, reflect a certain ideology and a poetics and as such manipulate
of several examples, we would like to show how texts in a ‘third
literature to function in a given society in a given w ay.8
language’ are produced and w hat their chief characteristics are. The
first example comes from a critical essay about Polish prose: Outside the domain o f literature, the idea o f rewriting is still
perceived as controversial, although there is no doubt that most
What a critic finds most striking when he attempts to encompass the output of
Polish prose over the past thirty years is its great diversity, which is not
translators rewrite the texts they translate even if they would never use
comparable with that o f any previous literary period. Not a few reproaches could the term ‘rewriting’. Our next example will show how necessary it is
be levelled at that prose and indeed this has been done by publicists on various :to rewrite even relatively simple texts if their function is to be
occasions. Nonetheless, the variegation, the abundance of subject matter and transferred and the ‘third language’ is to be avoided.
artistic form, the multiplicity and multiformity of traditional artistic ideas In contrast to the first example, this time we have chosen
undoubtedly constitute a valuable feature of that prose, and a short, and
perforce simplified, account of it should begin with precisely that very statement.
a text with a clearly defined function and a specific communicative
It is not difficult to explain the general causes of this. These causes are due, value. It is a piece of commercial inform ation, which we find
on the one hand, to the processes of political history, the rapid and dramatic oń; most manufactured products. It specifies the ingredients out
changes in the life of the nation over the last several decades... of which a product is made. In this case our product is an Italian-
We have marked the m ost conspicuous inaccuracies and errors, but -made cake — the famous ‘panettone’. We have selected cakes
the interesting thing about this piece is that even if we eradicate the which are made and sold by two different producers. In the left
obvious problems, it will still sound unnatural in English. It is column you can see the Italian text and in the right the English
translation.
bombastic and contains a vast number of unqualified superlatives
which are squeezed into a small num ber o f sentences. Knowing the 1.
character o f the publication in which the text was placed, we know Prodotto da fomo a lievitazione naturale Oven product with natural yeast
that the function o f this essay was to prom ote Polish prose abroad. INGREDIENTI: farina di frumento tipo INGREDIENTS: wheat flour, sultana rai-
But we also know that if a similar essay were written in English, its 0 , uvetta, sultanina, zucchero, scorze sin, sugar, candied orange peels, butter,
style would differ considerably from the style o f this translation. It is d’arancia candite, burro, tuorlo d’uovo, egg yolks, skimmed milk powder, salt,
clear that whoever translated the Polish text did not take this stylistic iaite magro in polvere, sale, lievito natu- natural yeast, emulsifier E 471, monodig-
rale, emulsionante E 471, mono a dig- lycendes, natural and artificial flavours,
difference into account. As a result, the text, in its English version, has
liceridi degli acidi grassi alimentari, aromi
retained its original stylistic features, which are not in keeping with naturali e artificial.
English convention. Instead o f promoting Polish prose, it either puts
2.
the readers off altogether or creates the impression th at if the Polish
prose needs to be praised so much at the very start, it cannot be so Prodotto da fom o a lievitazione naturale Italian cake

very interesting. INGREDIENTI: farina di frumento tipo INGREDIENTS: wheat flour type O,
0, uva sultanina, scorze d’arancia e cedro raisin, candied citron and orange peels,
W hat our analysis boils down to is that in order to preserve or
candite, latte, burro, zucchero, tuorlo milk, butter, sugar, egg yolks, fructose
transfer the communicative function o f a text, the translator must d’uova, sciroppo di frutosio, uova, lievito syrup, eggs, natural yeast, emulsifier mo-
sometimes rewrite the text quite considerably. We realize that to naturale, emulsionante mono a.digliceridi no- and di glycerides, malt extract, salt,
equate translation with rewriting may sound somewhat shocking. degli acidi grassi, estratto di malto, sale, natural and artificial flavours. Preservative:
However, in literary translation the concept of rewriting through aromi naturafi, conservante acido sorbico. sorbic acid.
translation is perfectly acceptable. In one of his recent books Andre
8 Andre Lefevere, Rewriting and the Manipulation o f Literary Fame, Routledge
Lefevere writes: 1992, p. VII.

44 45
W hat we can read clearly from this example is that each translator
followed a different strategy although neither of them was entirely
consistent w ith his choices. Let us have a closer look at some items in
the Italian text and their English equivalents.
Prodotto da forno a livitazione naturale
1. Oven product with natural yeast 2. Italian cake
Farina di frumento tipo O
1. Wheat flour ' 2. Wheat flour type O
Scorze d’arancia (e cedro) candite
1. Candied orange peels 2. Candied citron and orange peels. '
The difference in translating the name of the product tells us straight
away that the translators were trying to decide whether the list of
ingredients is provided for consumers of the cake or for the importers
and retailers who, ap art from thinking about consumers’ need, must
comply with domestic and international standards and regulations.
Translator 1 went for a literal translation and produced a term which
may sound familiar to a professional baker but sounds very obscure
to the average customer, while translator 2, by rejecting the idea of
a simple linguistic equivalent and choosing a culturally functional
phrase, opted for targeting a potential consumer. However, in
translating the second phrase, which we have singled out, we see
a complete reverse. Translator 1 used a common phrase wheat flour
while translator 2 applied a literal translation and ended up with an
English term which, although it may be familiar to a food specialist,
is unknow n to the average consumer. The third phrase poses
a slightly different problem. The Italian name for the particular kind
of citrus fruit has been translated as citron by 2. Although citron is
a linguistic equivalent of the Italian word, we may be sure that nine
out of ten English speaking customers would say that w hat an Italian
producer p ut into the cake was lemon peel. This results from the
simple fact th a t the fruit itself is unknown and not used in many
N orth European countries. Thus the Italian term has, in English,
only a linguistic equivalent, which has no specific cultural con­
notations.
There are also more obvious problems with this translation, such
as the use o f the singular form raisin or of plural in orange peels, etc.
46
Yet it seems to us that the main weakness comes from the poor
assessment of the target context and the confusion of the two
functions this text could potentially fulfil.
. ; Because panettone is now a very well know n product, the
shortcomings in translation have not much influence on the volume
of sales. But with other consumer goods, especially when they
are introduced into a new market for the first time, the story
xnay be entirely different. This concerns electrical goods, for in­
stance, when the translation of instructions involves their adaptation
to' the local conditions (voltage, types o f plugs, conditions of
storage, servicing). In fact, the majority of big and well-known
manufacturers have abandoned the procedure of translating in­
structions from one language into another. Instead, after inves­
tigating local conditions, the instructions are adapted to the needs
of ..the particular market and written straight off in the foreign
language.
; We have seen so far how a translation of a source text into
:ja;*third language’ can lead to a distortion o f the communicative
function o f the text. Using our intuition and having access either
to the language in which the texts were produced or, as in the
second example, to the source text itself, we were able to identify
what the texts were meant to communicate. It must be remembered,
however, that we cannot expect the average reader to undertake
such investigations. In fact, if, in order to understand the message
pf the translated text, the reader is put into the position of
a ; ‘detective’, it means that although a source text is formally
available in the target language, the translation has not really
taken place.
Using our last example we w ant to show how a neglect of
the function of the text and the creation of ‘the third language’
in, the process o f translation make it practically impossible for
the target reader to identify its essential communicative value.
The text, which is a jo b advertisement, has been prepared by
an Austrian company and published in English in one of the
Polish quality dailies.
BUCHER a leading austrian electronic company is now starting its sales
activities in Poland as the authorized distributor of INTEL.
47
 As the man of the first hour you will start as our
SALES MANAGER
Poland
and organize, perform and direct all our activities in Poland, whereby the
development of a qualified customer base is your primary goal.
Your electronic education, an indepth knowledge of the Polish electronic
industry and the PC-retail-business as well as your knowledge o f marketing
and sales will enable you to meet your and our goals.
We have a lot to offer to a highly motivated insider with both entrepreneurial
and practical skills, who is able to organize and negotiate, with an ideal age
between 30 and 40 years, who either speaks fluent German and/or English,
Please contact for details our personal consultant in Vienna by telephone
(or write or send fax), who will then arrange a meeting in Warsaw with you.
Except for removing the company’s address, we have printed the text
without any changes. It is clear that an announcement like this has to
fulfil a certain number of specific functions. The major ones are as
follows:.
1. To make clear what the job is and what it involves.
2. To spell out clearly what is expected of the candidates and what
criteria will be used in the process of selection.
3. To provide general information about the renumeration and benefits
in kind.
4. To announce the procedures which will eventually lead to an
interview and appointment.
Let us now try to place ourselves in the position of the candidates who
may be interested in following up this job offer. The description of the
job is concise but sufficiently clear and we should be able to decide
whether we could do this job or not. The difficulties begin when we
try to assess the personal or professional qualities the company is
looking for. The first question we ask concerns the expression as the
man o f the first hour. W hat does this mean? And why only the man
and not the woman o f the first houń From the description it seems
there is no reason why a woman could not do this job; does this mean
that the company has clear sexual preferences and is not interested in
promoting equal opportunities? W hat confuses us most, however, is
48
the. sentence in which the the company promises to offer a lot to
Ż highly motivated insider. Does this suggest that the interviewing
panel will be’ primarily, interested in candidates who are already
Wórking for the company but would like to be prom oted to the
'pipsition of sales manager for Poland? And, last but not least, we are
wondering what sort o f company it is that requires from the candidates
fluent German and/or English but cannot produce an intelligible
advertisement?
There is no doubt that after reading this job advert we would
not' be very willing to take the m atter further unless we really
needed this job very badly, which goes to show that the advert
lias not fulfilled its purpose. However, being translators we can
look at this text from a different angle. We may presume that
decision to publish it in Poland in English was connected
with the requirement that the prospective candidates should be
fluent in English. However, there is enough evidence in the text
to show us that the advert was not originally written in English
and what we are dealing with is a translation. It does not require
much intelligence to deduce that the source language must have
been German. The expression as the man o f the first hour is
a translation of the idiom der Man der ersten Stunde, which roughly
can be translated into English as pioneer. The English term insider
is used in modern Germany too, but its meaning differs considerably
from the English meaning of this word. In English, the term
is used in reference to somebody who is already inside some
organization and knows all its secrets. In German, the term means
rather someone who possesses a good deal of knowledge in a certain
area but does not necessarily have to be inside any organization.
So what was the translation strategy which produced this disastrous
effect? The first thing, which we have already mentioned, is that
the translator did not consider the communicative function of
this text in the target context. As a result, he concentrated on
translating not the meaning of the advert but its linguistic shape.
His attention was on finding equivalences between the two languages
to such a degree that he failed to check whether the English
equivalents meant anything at all.
4— Sticccssful Polish-English...
49
TRANSLATING THE LANGUAGE
AND TRANSLATING THE MEANING
The last example brings us to one o f the crucial problems in
translating from Polish into English, namely, to the question
about what we translate: the language or the meaning. To many
linguists this kind o f question would not be valid because, according
to several linguistic and philosophical theories, it is impossible
to treat language and meaning as separate entities. On the other
hand, some theories, like Chomsky’s for instance, claim that a sen­
tence may be considered a proper sentence even if it does not
m ake sense. In translation studies, as we have tried to show
above, there is a clear distinction between translating the meaning
and translating the language. The majority of the problems in
the texts we shall be looking at in this book arise precisely
from the fact that, instead of looking for equivalent ways of
expressing meaning in the target context, the translators have
been trying to find equivalences between the linguistic units, as
if not realizing that while interpreting a text in the target language
we are looking not for the meaning of words but for the meaning
of the whole text, its sense and its function. Maurice Pergnier,
who has done a considerable am ount of research in this area,
has come to an interesting conclusion, which we hope will be
appreciated by the readers of this book:
The translation o f language-meaning does result not in translation of the
message, but in interferences between languages. Interfering systems never
produce a translation in the true sense o f the word, they only give birth to
intermediate forms that are neither the original nor the ‘target’ language. One
might say, without being paradoxical, that the more one translates the message,
the Jess one translates one language into another. On the other hand, the more
one attempts to translate (convert) lexical and grammatical structures of one
language into those of another language, the less one translates the message.9 ,
In the subsequent chapters, we shall try to show the practical
implications of this statement.
9 Maurice Pegnier, Language-Meaning and Message-Meaning: Towards a Sociolin-
guistic Approach to Translation [in:] David Gerver and H. Wallace Sinaiko (ed.),
Language, Interpretation and Communication, Plenum Press, 1977, p. 203.
50
Chapter Three
t r a n s l a t io n a n d t h e s o c io -c u l t u r a l
CONTEXT
Today, more than ever before, English is entering Polish life, and
i t is doing this in leaps and bounds. The change over the last few years
alone is so striking that many Poles, who do not know any English at
all, are sometimes having trouble in understanding their own language
because there are so many borrowings. Some people say that this
invasion o f English makes the Polish language more diverse but
a,majority of Polish linguists do not go into raptures over this newly
hatched diversity. Agnieszka Osiecka, who has always been a popular
critic of public m anners in Poland, believes that these linguistic
innovations alter not only traditional forms of expression but also the
traditional social conventions. To support her thesis she shows how
the polite Polish forms of address Pan and Pani are being phased out
from television adverts because of a thoughtless translation of the
English you, your into the Polish familiar forms ly or tw ój.1 It is enough
to take a walk along the main streets of any Polish city or town today to
see how English is encroaching on our shopping, our eating habits, our
choice of entertainment, leisure, our cultural interests as well as our
intellectual sphere o f life. It seems that just about EV ERY TH ING is
being translated from Polish into English whether it happens to be
necessary or not at the given moment, and in the given context.
Before the outbreak o f the First World W ar the signs in Polish and
Russian on most commercial premises was a common sight in many
Polish towns, and today small traders in Eastern Poland seem to be
reviving this long abandoned tradition. But in both cases the reason
1 Agnieszka Osiecka, Pitu, Pitu, „Polityka”, No. 51/52, 1991, p. 8.
51
for the bilingual approach is clear. Before 1914, a large part of Poland
belonged to Russia and Russian was the official language in all parts
of the Empire, while the use o f Russian in contemporary Eastern
Poland results from the fact that the Polish traders are trying to
attract the thousands o f visitors, tourists and small entrepreneurs who
arrive daily from the territories of the former Soviet Union. Because
of Poland’s geographical location the English language can never
serve the needs of ordinary people in the same way as Russian or
German have in the last two centuries. The number of English
speakers who visit Poland will not alter the fortunes of the Polish
retail sector and those visitors who want to taste local ice-cream can
usually manage to find the ice-cream parlours even if the signs on
them say only lody. The question, which one wants to pose then, is
why the Poles have decided to give so much prominence to the English
language in their domestic situations.
There are many reasons for this presence o f English in the Polish
domestic context but it is interesting to observe that most of them
have more to do with the social and political aspirations o f the people
than with the country’s economic or cultural realities. For some, the
presence of English in public life is a symbol of Poland’s break with
the communist past and return to democracy, while for others, the
presence o f English in the streets symbolizes modernity, technological
advancement and the Western way of life.
This peculiar role of English in contemporary Poland has serious
consequences for its practical usage. The absence o f the organically
generated need to use the language makes it very difficult for many
Poles to realize that the use o f foreign terms instead of Polish ones
does not involve a simple process o f substitution. The result is a total
disharmony between the language and reality. Thus, for instance, the
newly established bars where one can drink beer are all called pubs in
Warsaw, although most of them have very little in common with the
English establishments which carry the same name. A similar effect of
contextual displacement is produced when the owners of small
restaurants call their establishments pizza bars or garage owners
display big signs which say car centre. Because the whole situation is
purely artificial, the lack of cohesion between the English terms and
their Polish designates does not confuse anybody. The Polish consumers
have quickly learned that the change of name from Polish into English
52
does not mean anything in practical terms, since the reality behind the
foreign term stays mostly unchanged. The foreign visitors may be
sometimes a little more surprised but even the m ost stupid of them
^ill eventually realize that it would be naive to find a genuine English
pub in the basement, o f a grey and drab apartm ent block.
, The serious consequences o f this language game are revealed in
a situation of genuine intercultural exchange, when harm ony between
the terms and their designates is an essential condition o f successful
communication and when a casual and arbitrary attitude to translation
may lead to misunderstandings and practical disasters. In spite of the
fact that in recent years the importance o f communication with the
outside world has increased dramatically in Poland', there are very few
signs that many of those who are responsible for translation have
realized that translating for a foreign audience differs from the purely
‘ornamental’ translating for domestic purposes. The habit of ‘slapping’
terms on objects and notions still prevails as a method and the
underlying conviction behind this method is that it is better to use any
land of English than no English at all.
LANGUAGE IN DAILY ENCOUNTERS
The first example we would like to discuss here seems to be simple
enough and unproblematic since it concerns the use and translation of
the personal pronoun you, When the English language commercials
reached Polish TV the English you, which does not necessarily imply
a familiar form o f address, was almost without exception translated
into Polish as the familiar form ty. This socio-linguistic error stems
from the fact that the. majority o f Polish learners of English are
delighted to find out that English has no such elaborate forms of
address as Polish, German or French. As a result, they assume that if
the English language has no simple distinction which corresponds to
the Polish opposition between PanjPani and ty, then everybody can
be addressed as you. The final conclusion the learners draw, if they are
not stopped by their teachers before it is too late, is that English
speaking people are straightforward, egalitarian and free from class
prejudice. It is not surprising, then, that many native speakers of
English are struck by the fact that m any Poles, who speak relatively
53
good English, come through as impolite, irritated or even rude. There
is no doubt that this impression is made worse by the difference
between Polish and English intonation patterns, but most of the time,
however, the impression is created by the fact th at the Poles do not
see nuances which rule the English forms of address. The average user
of a foreign language can be excused for not knowing the subtle
shades o f the language he speaks, but the translator must remember
that the lack of simple equivalents means that the situation is complex.
In spite of the structural simplicity, there are many ways of signalling
in English whether, in a particular instance, you means ty or Pan/Pani.
One of the ways o f differentiating between the ‘shades’ of you is the
use o f names. The reason why many Poles come through as rude is
that they tend not to use names when they use the pronoun you. For
instance, there may be a world of difference between the following
polite requests:
Pass me that book, please.
Can you pass me that book, please?
John, can you pass me that book, please?
If John happens to be your supervisor at work, you may be sure that
if you keep using the first two forms of request, he will soon think that
either you are rude or have little respect for him. In fact, one can get
by w ithout using names only in very brief and casual contacts, as in
shops or restaurants. Otherwise, it is essential to learn, remember and
use properly the names of people we meet as this knowledge makes it
possible to differentiate between ‘you’ as PanjPanijPaństwo and ‘you*
as ty or wy. Although it is obvious that this skill is much more
im portant for interpreters than for- translators, the choice of the
appropriate form o f address is also occasionally im portant in written
texts.
It seems that the m ost frequently ‘exported’ texts from Poland
have been cookery books, which is probably due to the fact that
Polish cuisine has always enjoyed a good reputation abroad. However,
m arket research, even on the smallest scale, would probably show that
the people who buy the Polish cookery books rarely use them in their
kitchens. The reason is simple: the majority o f these books have been
translated by means o f putting English labels on Polish words. The
result o f this was described to us by an American who wanted to make
Polish pierogi. He followed the recipe from one of the books published
54
by Interpress and when he put his beautifully shaped pierogi into
a pan of boiling water, they first expanded and then fell apart, leaving
hini with a pot of sticky mess. W hat had happened was that he used
self-raising flour, that is white wheat flour with a certain am ount of
raising agent in it. In Polish, when we write flour we simply mean plain
white wheat flour, and this is w hat the author of the recipe meant. But
in Britain, the United States and many other countries, one cannot
just say flour because there are clear distinctions between the different
lands of flour on the market. The translator of that particular book
translated the Polish word mąka into the generic word flour so any
non-Polish user of the recipe had to figure out what sort of flour one
should use. The choice of flours may be wide. In Britain, for instance,
anyone who writes recipes has the following to choose from: plain
flour, self-raising flour, wholemeal flour (which contains husks from
the grain), self-raising wholemeal flour, strong white/brown flour. In
the States the system is different, and all American cookery books sold
in Britain are adapted to British conditions. The difference between
Poland and the English speaking countries is far greater as far as
cooking ingredients are concerned, and it is essential to take these
differences into account. Unfortunately, this is seldom the case. The
Polish translators tell the foreign chefs to use beans, apples, beets,
iiiits, rice and sugar without specifying what particular kind of
product to use. ...
But it is not only the lack of this knowledge which makes the
polish cookery books pretty useless. Equally mysterious for foreigners
are the Polish methods of preparing meals. The convention within the
English language tells the authors to adapt a simple step by step
method which should be clear to everyone, no m atter what their
familiarity with cooking may be, while the majority of Polish chefs
address their recipes to experienced cooks and do not go into basic
details. Unfortunately, the translators leave the instructions unchanged.
Thus, for instance, in Cooking the Polish Jewish Way, (Interpress,
1988) in every other recipe it is stressed that the ingredients should be
washed and cleaned, but much more im portant steps are omitted or
unexplained. We are asked to mince the turkey meat twice or three
times not being told that the use of a manual and not electric mincer
is implied here, and we are told to boil soup vegetables not knowing
what these vegetables should be. Eventually, we are instructed to
55
 remove the scales, head and fins from the freshly-killed carp as if the
translator did not know that such operations should always be
phrased euphemistically as ask your fishmonger to clean and scale the
fish fo r you. The following recipes from the magazine “Poland Today”
illustrate all the aspects of the cookery book translation which have
just been mentioned: •
Polish barley soup (Krupnik): 250 g of soup vegetables, 200 g of bones, 10 g of
dried mushrooms, one-and-a-half liters of water, 100 g of barley, 3-4 times as
much water as the volume of barley, 250 g o f potatoes, 40 g o f butter or
margarine, salt, one spoonful o f chopped dill and green parsley. Cook up a brew
from the soaked mushrooms, bones and vegetables. Strain. Chop the cooked,
vegetables and mushrooms into strips. Peel the barley grains, pour water over
them, boil them into a pulp and add 20 g of butter. Cook the peeled and diced
potatoes in the broth. Mix the broth with the barley, the mushrooms and the
vegetables, add salt. Mix in the rest of the butter, the parsley and the dill.
Krupnik can be served with raw egg-yoke or cream.
Veal’s brains, Polish style: 500 g of veal’s brains, 40 g of lard, 50 g of onion,
3 spoonfuls of vinegar (3%), 2 eggs, salt, pepper, one spoonful of green parsley.
Bring 1 litre of water to the boil, then add salt and vinegar. Rinse the brains,
and remove the membrane. Put the brains in the boiling water, to which salt and
vinegar were previously added, and leave them to cook for 3-5 minutes. Remove
carefully with a skimming spoon, drain and cool. Peel the onions, chop them into
small pieces, and fry in lard until they take on a light golden colour. Cut the now
cold brains into thick chunks, add these to the onion, beat in two egg-yokes,
then add salt and pepper, mix, warm up and sprinkle with green parsley.
The minor errors and spelling mistakes as egg-yokes, we have left
unchanged. All the other problems have been marked. The case of
soup vegetables has been already discussed. Green parsley is just a label
put on natka pietruszki. In English, parsley is always green because the
word refers to the leaves and not to the root. The brew may be cooked
by the witches in Shakespeare’s Macbeth, while in our ordinary
kitchens we prepare stock. We may cut veg into strips but never chop
into strips. Equally impossible is the attem pt to peel the barley grains;
however, if we have enough time and patience we may try to husk the
barley grains. Raw egg-yoke is a misspelt label put on the Polish surowe
żółtko. In English egg yolks are implicitly raw, and if they are to be
cooked we just say so.
The name o f the other dish is a complete disaster. Veal is not the
name of an animal but a type of meat like pork, beef or Iamb. We can
56
guess that the translator meant c a lf s brains. Whenever the spoonfuls
of any substance are mentioned, it is necessary to specify what spoon
is meant: teaspoon, dessert spoon or table spoon.. Vinegar (3%) is
another utterly meaningless term because we do not know what kind
of vinegar is meant (malt, fruit etc.) and what 3% refers to. We chop
onions finely and warming up is used instead o f reheating or heating up.
The belief that A N Y TH IN G which is written in English can be
understood by speakers of English has also begun to operate in the
fast-developing private sector in Poland. It may be true that some
products manufactured in Poland reach the norms and standards
required by the Western consumers and it is encouraging to see how
some manufacturers have even taken on board the idea that it is the
packaging which sells the product. However, very often the whole
effort is ruined because the manufacturers simply do not believe that
it is essential to provide the consumers with instructions and commer­
cial information written in the language they can easily understand.
To illustrate this phenomenon we have selected one o f these new and
attractively packaged products, which potentially could be sold abroad.
The text we find on the packaging reads:
Cavana Crisp bread. Slim figure and health! 6 month durable from the date of
production. This crispbread is produced with com seeds and sweet corns. In
composition it is like dark bread sorts. It is very good and tastes especially with
butter, jam, sausage or cheese. This crispbread contains very important
components like carbohydrates, protein and vitamins B and PP. 100 g corresponds
to 350 kcal. Date of production is at the seal rim.
There are so many things which have gone wrong with this text that
it is impossible to correct it — one would need to start again. We have
marked the errors which make it very difficult or almost impossible to
figure out what the producer intended to convey. Instead of analysing
this disastrous text in detail, let us look at a similar product made and
exported by a Swedish manufacturer:
Krisprolls. Toasted Swedish cracked wheat rolls. Be good to yourself. Enjoy the
crunch and delicious flavour o f Krisprolls. These original toasted Swedish
cracked wheat rolls are wholesome and high in fibre, scrumptious just as they
are, with butter, cheese, pate, jam or just about anything you care to put on
them. Go on, treat yourself today. Ingredients: Cracked wheat, wheat flour,
vegetable fat, sugar, yeast, salt. No artificial additives. Nutrition information: see
opposite side panel. Best before end: see bottom of package.
57
In principle the Swedish manufacturer tells us no more than the Polish
one, yet it is obvious that great care has been taken to convey the basic
facts. The language is impeccable and one feels that while writing or
translating the introductory passage the author o f the text thought
about the rules and conventions of the market as well as about the
psychology of the potential consumer. This is reflected in the choice
of such words and phrases as: scrumptious, treat yourself, anything you
care to put on them, be good to yourself The style of the text is
informal, the pronoun you is used extensively, but a minimal degree
of formality and respect for the customer are left untouched.
So far, we have concentrated on relatively recent phenomena and'
on the different ways they have influenced the quality of translation.
However, these problems are not new as all the negative aspects of
translation from Polish into English have existed before. The majority
of foreigners who have visited Poland have always had difficulties in
communicating in English. There have also been errors, and when we
take a closer look at them we shall find out that some of them seem
to be occurring more often than others.
CONSEQUENCES OF CARELESS TRANSLATION
Let us now look at a whole range of translated texts and to make this
foray more enjoyable, let us have a look at Poland through the eyes
of a visitor who has only just arrived in Warsaw and can read and
understand only what is expressed in English.
One of the first things an English speaking tourist coming to
Poland does is to buy a map of the town he is visiting and collect as
many brochures as possible on the place, region, vicinity he plans to
spend time in. He will naturally rely on any information he receives
and we should not be ashamed of the way that information is given.
It is true that more and more publications can be found in English
that tell foreign tourists which places are worth visiting, give infor­
mation on famous historical buildings, monuments, statues, describe
parks, squares, etc. It is also obvious that nowadays more effort is
being put into those brochures and guide-books but, unfortunately,
they are anything but correct. It is difficult to write about Polish
history, events, places, people of distinction in English and, at the
same time, make it sound natural. In many cases, it is certainly hard
58
to find equivalents that would not sound totally foreign to the English
ear, but the least we can do is make sure that it is grammatically and
stylistically correct. We want the foreign tourist to understand what
he is reading, and not have to wonder what the writer had in mind!
When discussing this subject; one o f the first questions that crops
up, and is often asked by students, is what should be done w i t h
p r o p e r n o u n s . Our general advice would be: LEAVE THEM
ALONE! There are, o f course, certain names of towns that have their
English equivalents used world-wide, like Warsaw and Cracow. The
Polish Tatry is translated as The Tatra Mountains, and not Tatrian, as
has been used, but the famous Jasna Góra in Częstochowa, translated
as Holy Mountain is going a little too far. For those people who know
Częstochowa and the religious significance of the monastery they
would certainly admit it is not placed on a mountain. One has to go
uphill to reach it, but that is about a ll Furtherm ore, it is one of the
most famous and im portant places in Poland and its own Polish name
should be left untouched.
We can say the same for the names of streets, squares, thorough­
fares. It is really quite sufficient to give their Polish, original names
without adding an English translation. It becomes not only humorous
but also rather pathetic when we encounter Cracow Suburb Street
placed in brackets next to Krakowskie Przedmieście. In the same
guide-book the translator was over-conscientious for just about every
proper noun he came across. Thus we have New World Avenue (Nowy
Świat), Three Cross Square (Plac Trzech Krzyży), Łazienkowska
Expressway (Trasa Łazienkowska), Constitution Square (Plac K on­
stytucji), Kolumna Zygmunta is Column of Zygmunt. A part from the
idiocy o f translating it, the use of the preposition o f here makes it
extremely clumsy. If it has to be in English, then it should be
Zygm unts Column or, if we are to be fully consistent in translating all
proper nouns, Sigismund's Column.
The same applies to W arsaw’s Teatr Wielki. Teatr Wielki is the
theatre’s name, just like the Bolshoi in Moscow or the Metropolitan in
New York. O f course, and unfortunately, it is not as famous as the
other two and some explanation may have to be given. It is the seat
of Warsaw’s Opera and Ballet Companies and it is called Teatr Wielki
and not the Grand Theatre or Great Theatre as can be encountered in
translations.
59
 Just as in the U.K., where pubs have their names that to foreigners
may sound slightly odd, to put it mildly, certain houses and restaurants
in Poland have also got their own characteristic names that sound
quite silly when translated. If you heard somebody talking about
a house Under the Negro, you would probably wonder w hat on earth
the person was talking about. The same applies to House under Firs.
The Polish Dom pod Murzynkiem or Dom pod Jedlami cannot be
translated faithfully. Again, they are names given to those particular
houses and should be left'untouched. Before leaving Warsaw for some
other part of Poland, the Polish Warszawiacy often crops up. As
people coming from other capitals in the world are called Londoners, '
Parisians, for example, it is only natural that we should w ant to have
one word to describe people from Warsaw. Stanisławski, in his
dictionary, suggests Varsovians, and let us keep to that, and not
Warsa wites or something equally strange.
There is something quite specific in the north of Poland, on the
Baltic Coast, and that is Gdansk, Gdynia and Sopot, known as
Trójmiasto (three cities in one). In a guide-book on the Polish coast, we
came across the name Tri-City for the Polish Trójmiasto. Is there really
any need or sense to coin phrases that only cause trouble to the reader?
And especially to one who neither knows Polish nor Poland. While we
are on the subject of Gdańsk and proper nouns, one of this city’s most
famous streets is called Długi Targ, and it should be left as Długi Targ,
just like Regent Street in London or the Champs Elysees in Paris.
Presenting it as Long Marketplace is a bit much to say the least.
Poland’s official Polish name is Rzeczpospolita Polska and it is the
word Rzeczpospolita that tends to cause quite a number o f problems
to the translator, especially as it is not always possible to omit the
word in the given text. Again to quote a guide-book on the subject of
one of Warsaw’s most famous palaces, Belweder, we come across the
following sentence:
Today, it also serves the presidents of the Commonwealth; it is where foreign
ambassadors present their credentials.
The original Polish sentence is:
Obecnie także służy prezydentowi Rzeczypospolitej, tu ambasadorzy składają
listy uwierzytelniające.
60
At this point we are not interested in the fact that the translator quite
unnecessarily used the plural form for president in the English version
where the singular is used in the original, but in his choice of the word
Commonwealth for Rzeczpospolita. The Polish word originated from
the Latin res publica and if a phrase is to be used at all, it should be
this one, and certainly not commonwealth, which has its own specific
connotations. To an English speaking person, and especially if he
happens to be British, there is only O N E commonwealth. Having
Poland in mind, the only time in its history when we could talk about
a commonwealth of nations was when Poland and Lithuania were
united. Otherwise, Rzeczpospolita Polska should be simply translated
as Poland, or if there happens to be such a necessity, the Republic o f
Poland.
The above example also shows how misunderstandings occur and,
unfortunately, many of the mistakes made when translating from
Polish into English are due to a lack of understanding o f not only
English, but very often of Polish as well. And this does not only mean
the two languages in question but the cultures within which those
languages are immersed, and what can be said in a given language in
a given context, and w hat cannot. This does not only refer to
a knowledge of and a feeling for those languages but it requires
THOUGHT on the part of the translator. We have to be aware of
what we are reading and that the end result of w hat we translate also
has to make sense and read well to the recipient.
To go back to the foreign tourist in Poland, misunderstandings
through the above mentioned lack of knowledge and very often
thoughtlessness on the part of the translator can result in various odd
situations. They may be humorous, with people taking things in good
spirit, but they may also lead to total exasperation and a feeling of
utter helplessness. We must remember that the English speaking
foreigners trying to avail themselves o f our English information do
not have to be excellent at guess-work, over-intelligent or educated
linguists! W hat does one make of the following:
Tickets for shows also open the doors of the Museum of the Theatre which...
(Bilet na spektakle upoważnia również do obejrzenia ekspozycji Muzeum
Teatralnego prezentującej...)?
A more intelligible version would be:
61
 With your tickct you can also visit the Theatre Museum which...
While talking about theatres:
Worthwhile shows are put on the Theatre-on-the-Island whose stage is decorated
by “ancient” Muses.
(Na niebanalne spektakle zaprasza Teatr na Wyspie, którego scenę zdobią
„antyczne” ruiny).
Here are a few matters worth discussing. Earlier on, we suggested
not translating the names o f theatres. Here this concerns the open-air
theatre th at is situated on a very small island in W arsaw’s Łazienki
Park. In the same guide-book, the translator also used the phrase:
Theatre-on-the-Isle, and this certainly sounds a little better, if we are
to translate it at all. We can also talk about the Łazienki Theatre or
the Łazienki Open-Air Theatre. The next problem here is the use of
the word worthwhile in the combination worthwhile shows. We can
say shows that are worth our while seeing, meaning that we would not
be wasting our time on them, or it is worthwhile doing sth, but we
cannot say th at shows are worthwhile or theatrical performances and
productions for that m atter, either. A nother very im portant m atter
here, though grammatical and not lexical, is the use o f by in the
phrase is decorated by ‘ancient' Muses, The decor consists of ancient
Muses, or at least part of them, so the stage is decorated with... We
must remember that the Muses themselves did not decorate any­
thing. A possible translation here could be:
Original performances may be seen in the Łazienki Open-Air Theatre, which has
a stage decorated with “ancient” Muses.
While stjll in Warsaw and talking about buildings connected
with our national culture, we can come across the most prestigious
art gallery described as the Edifice of Zachęta. The building
is defined as Gmach Zachęty in Polish and it seems obvious
that the translator felt obliged to translate it word for word.
It would have been quite sufficient and natural to have said
The Zachęta Gallery.
We require n o t only thought from the translator but also a certain
knowledge o f w hat he is writing. He simply cannot afford to make
such mistakes as the following:
62
A walk to the Vistula River leads to Warsaw’s right bank. That is where the
city’s largest Orthodox Catholic Church, the 19th century Church of St. Mary
Magdalene, is sited.
(Jeśli wybierzemy się za Wisłę do prawobrzeżnej Warszawy, warto zwiedzić
największą w Warszawie XIX-wieczną cerkiew św. Marii Magdaleny).
The Polish cerkiew is Orthodox Church, or Orthodox Eastern Church
in English. O f course, we have Catholics who may be extremely
‘orthodox’, in the meaning o f conventional, but there is no such thing
as Orthodox Catholic Church, and written with capital letters! Also in
this sentence, the phrase is sited should be is situated. There is a slight
but significant difference. According to H ornby’s Advanced Learner’s
Dictionary, site: (n) place where sth was, is, or is to be, eg. built on the
site o f an old fort; site ( v) locate, place, eg. Where have they decided
to site the new factory? But: The factory was situated on the east side
o f town.
A very im portant part of W arsaw’s Old Town is the Royal Castle
and, of course, a great deal o f literature is devoted to it. If only it all
made sense!
Since 1945, the director of the National Museum, Professor Stanisław Lorenz,
had been making continuous efforts to obtain the decision about a 2 rebuilding
o f the Royal Castle. His numerous initiatives were crowned in January
1971 when the Citizens’ Committee for the rebuilding of the Royal Castle
was set up.
(Dzięki energicznym i stałym inicjatywom podejmowanym od 1945 roku przez
dyrektora Muzeum Narodowego w Warszawie Profesora Stanisława Lorenza
ostateczna decyzja odbudowy Zamku zapadła w styczniu 1971 roku. Powołano
Obywatelski Komitet Odbudowy Zamku Królewskiego w Warszawie).
How about:
Thanks to the energetic and continuous efforts undertaken from 1945 by Prof.
Stanisław Lorenz, the director o f Warsaw’s National Museum, the final decision
concerning the rebuilding o f the Castle was taken in January 1971. A Citizens’
Committee for the rebuilding o f the Royal Castle was then set up.
While still at the Royal Castle we can read among other oddities:
Now the visitors enter the Castle through the Senatorial Gate in the north wing
from the side o f the so-called Kitchen Courtyard. They penetrate into the vast
2 a means that a word is missing.
63
 Grand Courtyard with elevations which depict the centuries long history of the an international conference in English where Poles are participating,
building. The Gothic elevation of the former Large House brings back the we may take a walk along the main streets o f Warsaw or go into
memories of the first owners of the Castle..,
a restaurant or cafe for something to eat and drink.
(Do Zamku zwiedzający wchodzą bramą Senatorską w północnym skrzydle, od The majority o f the higher class, and automatically m ore expensive,
strony dziedzińca, zwanego Kuchennym. Przez bramę wchodzi się na obszerny
Dziedziniec Wielki z fasadami, które są odbiciem wielowiekowych dziejów tej
hotels, restaurants and cafes pride themselves nowadays in giving
budowli. Gotycka fasada dawnego Domu Wielkiego przywodzi na myśl najstar­ information and presenting their menus in more than just Polish.
szych właścicieli warszawskiego Zamku.) English, of course, is a must, but more often than not, the managers,
ór proprietors, whichever the case may be, do not m ake the effort to
The m atter of the definite and indefinite article, when to use the and
make sure that what is written down in English happens to be correct.
when not, is the bane of the majority o f Poles’ lives, always has been and
It is obvious that not everybody who knows English has also
probably always will. This problem, however, will be discussed later. In
a wonderful knowledge o f the names o f various dishes or what the
the second sentence of the above quotation, though, we have They
English or the Americans would use to describe certain culinary
penetrate into... We can presume they are the visitors but what on earth
concoctions. M any things we translate require research, and this may
are they penetrating? There is more than a subtle difference between
concern both the 3rd o f M ay Constitution as well as the famous Polish
penetrate and enter. The phrase: centuries long history of the building is an
bigos or pierogi. One can understand the translator’s dilemma whether
example of a very common mistake made by Polish translators, showing
to leave such names in the original (leave them in the original!) or to
the trouble they have with certain a d j e c t i v a l p h r a s e s . We can talk
find English equivalents. W hat is difficult to understand and impossible
about an ancient building, a building with a long history, but not the above.
to accept is when basic grammatical and lexical mistakes are made.
In " The Gothic elevation o f the form er Large House brings back the
What is worse, the same mistakes occur over and over again, and
memories o f the first owners o f the Castle... ”, the translator probably
apart from moans and groans brought about by people like us, or
wished to say that visitors to the Castle were reminded of the first owners.
sniggers and laughs uttered by non-Polish speaking visitors, very little
Memories here was probably used with the Polish wspomnienia in mind.
is being done to eliminate those mistakes. With more and more
Unfortunately, this again is an example of misunderstanding the meaning,
English appearing everywhere, it often seems to be getting worse
and also causing misunderstanding, as the outcome of the sentence is that instead o f better.
the first owners of the Castle’s memories were brought back by the Gothic
In a cafe in Toruń we can order beaten cream (bita śmietana),
facade. Rather complicated and hardly what was meant.
while in Cracow we can have miscellaneous ice-cream with fruits (lody
Reading a sentence like this, one becomes totally lost not knowing
mieszane z owocami). If we w ant something to drink, it can be either
who is talking about what. This, obviously, has to be avoided but
black coffee with a spot of milk (kawa z mlekiem), filter bag tea with
examples like this one unfortunately abound, especially if the style of the
lemon (herbata ekspresowa z cytryną) or domestic beer (piwo krajowe).
sentence and the language of the original are not encountered in everyday,
If we are really hungry, we can try to get something more substantial
colloquial speech. We could translate the above in the following manner:
like tripes (flaczki) or hunter’s stew home speciality (bigos staropolski).
Entrance to the Castle is through the Senatorial Gate in the north wing from the It is clear here that the translator had certain problems with his task
side of the Kitchen Courtyard. This Gate leads onto the vast Grand Courtyard and relied totally on the dictionary to help him on his way, resulting
whose facades reflect the ancient history of the building. The Gothic facade of in many common mistakes that occur not only in menus. To put the
the former Large House reminds us of the first owners of Warsaw Castle...
above right, it might be advisable to order: whipped cream, ice-cream
Before going on to art galleries (where now we can often come with fruit, coffee with milk, tea with lemon (or lemon tea), Polish beer,
across beautifully published catalogues in Polish and in English) or we tripe, Old-Polish bigos or, if you really w ant to translate this,
become a more serious and intellectual member of society attending a suggestion could be: traditional cabbage stew. We can ask our guests

64 5— Successful Polish-English., 65
whether they would like a spot o f milk in their coffee, or in conversation
we might say we take a spot o f milk, but this phrase would hardly apply
in a menu. Also worth noting here is that tripe is in the singular only,
fruit is a collective noun, and another error that crops up in various
contexts is the translation o f the Polish krajowy into domestic. We can
talk about domestic flights for loty krajowe, domestic news for
wiadomości z kraju or even domestic products for produkty krajowe. In
connection with the last mentioned item, American English would
probably accept domestic beer but it definitely sounds rather odd to the
British ear. In the U.K. it would always be preferable to say
home-brewed beer, or, in this case, Polish beer. Thus, the very frequently '
used krajowy in the Polish language would have to be simply translated
as Polish. We sometimes say: w kraju i za granicą and here again there is
something different in English: at home and abroad. Eve.ry phrase has to
be taken individually, and unfortunately there is seldom only one
possibility for what we are translating at the given moment.
Walking along the streets of Poland’s capital city, we are aware of
more and more signs, advertisements and notices o f every description
put up in English. It may be interestig to visit one of the newly opened
pubs, but it might be a better idea if the sign on the window said
something other than PUB BECK’S. One can presume this to mean
BECK’S PUB but it certainly requires a little more than simple
deduction on the part of the reader to decipher it. The same apparent
total ignorance concerning the use of the saxon. genitive in English is
evident in the stubborn use of t h e ’s in hot dog’s or hot dogs’. Instead
of the Polish parówka z bułką the phrase hot dog has arrived here to
stay, so why bother with the English plural ending? If necessary, use
the Polish plural and then the use of the apostrophe would be justified.
It is possible to understand why we have guide-books, catalogues,
menus printed in English but it would be interesting to know who
among our many foreign visitors is going to buy a car. M any of the
new car dealers insist on first advertising their wares in English and
then we can read something in Polish, seemingly placed as an
afterthought. Thus we come across CARS CENTRE for a car
showroom, or AMERICAN IM PO R T CAR. A part from the rather
inappropriate use of the word centre here, one cannot use a noun in
its plural form as an adjective. The additional s makes the phrase
totally nonsensical to the English reader. The same would apply to the
66
second phrase. Does it mean: ‘Imported American Cars’ or cars
imported from America that do not necessarily have to be of American
origin? Even presuming that in Polish it is Amerykańskie importowane
samochody, one cannot help but wonder.
DIFFERENT CULTURAL NORM S
Poland not only wishes to attract tourists, sell its products here and
abroad but also to develop its contacts and cooperation in the field of
culture, the arts and sciences. Intellectual and stylistically sophisticated
papers, articles and essays are written nearly always in Polish, which
later have to be translated into English. It is here that we soon become
aware o f not only the great differences in the languages in question but
in thefPolish and British, not to say American, way of thinking, of
presenting and discussing ideas. It is the writers’ whole cultural and
social background that is brought forward in their texts, a background
that has its own sounds, feelings, nuances and, maybe most important of
all, historyjAnd it is here that even a good translator may have problems
and get seriously caught up in the intricacies of language, or get himself
into such a tight fix that he has difficulty in extricating himself.
Many Poles believe that something is worthy of note only when it
is highly sophisticated, philosophical and absolutely beyond the
comprehension of the average person walking the streets of this world.
We translators are required to render this into English and the English
reader expects to understand what he is reading. [It not only has to be
grammatically and lexically correct but stylistically comprehensible as
wellj This becomes difficult when the original Polish is anything but
simple. The following, for example, is taken from an article on the
influence of the French Revolution on Polish affairs:
Na plan pierwszy zainteresowań owego nurtu wysuwało się niewątpliwie
zagadnienie Państwa i terroru, słowem nie okres parlamentaryzmu zwycięskiej
rewolucji, lecz czas pomagający odpowiedzieć' na pytanie o zespól działań
pozwalający władzę przejąć i ją utrzymać. Z tego punktu widzenia historyczna
egzemplifikacja potrzebna była zwłaszcza po to, by za jednym zamachem
uprawomocnić wydarzenia aktualne wizją przeszłości, potwierdzając zarazem
cały miniony ciąg wydarzeń wspólnym związkiem przyczynowym, to znaczy
określoną ideologią przykładaną do faktów niezależnie od icli wewnętrznej
konstrukcji i konsekwencji wynikających z ich wzajemnych relacji.
67
 It requires total concentration to understand the author’s train of
thought here, and the translator is always obliged to understand what
he has been asked to render into the second language. The above, of
course, could have been shorter and much simpler in style but this,
unfortunately, is a characteristic example of quite a common way of
writing in Poland. One way of translating the above is:
What was of main interest here was undoubtedly the issue concerning the State
and terror, i.e. not the .victorious Revolution’s parliamentary period, but the
period that helped to answer the question on the actions permitting the seizure
of power, and how it was held. From this point of view, documentation was
needed mainly to validate present events with a vision of the past, at the same
time confirming all the past events with a common causation, i.e. with a certain
ideology applied to facts independently of their external construction, and the
consequences resulting from their mutual relations.
This is what we could call a faithful translation. From the point of view
of language, it is correct, but the English reader’s reaction to it is
doubtless exactly the same as the Polish reader’s. Would an English
historian write in this manner? Probably not, but then it was a Pole
writing, and should we change his style and make the text more palatable
to the English recipient? Should the translator rewrite the text? Has he
got the right to do this? This is both a difficult and controversial matter,
and will be discussed in more detail in a later chapter.
With texts of the above kind, another problem crops up giving
many a translator sleepless nights. Even those people who are bilingual,
and have no trouble whatsoever in switching from one language to
another, find themselves sometimes subconsciously influenced by the
language they are translating from. In English translations of Polish
texts, we often talk about Polish interference and this can refer to
style, grammar, syntax, idiom. We come across so-called word-for-word
translations, the result being not only a Polish-English text but an
incomprehensible one as well. This can happen in academic papers
such as the above mentioned historical essay, or in a catalogue of
a photographic exhibition, or when talking about formulated and
immanent poetics in 18th century German literature for example.
We can encounter such phrases as: to see the daylight {zobaczyć
światło dzienne) instead of to see the light o f day: Warsaw has had its
flights and falls for Warszawa przeżywała na przemian wzloty i upadki
— Warsaw has had its ups and downs, or if we wish to be more
68
sophisticated: Warsaw has had its good and bad times. A very common
error is the use of how instead o f what for the Polish ja k , as in:
How spectacular triumphs we achieved!
or
How he looked like!
There are always exceptions and they should also be part o f our
education. It is sometimes the wrong use o f even one little word like
how that can spoil the effect o f the whole sentence. Of course the
situation becomes more grotesque when we come across something
like the following m a catalogue on photography:
The most in.potb.nt In Krzysztof Wojciechowska small photographs is that he has
succeeded .„fixing the mood of the street not by talcing p h o L o f „ ^ c r o w d
in the
in t“ not so„ 1far “T ?* ^
a °remote
rl 7 past almost ten years ago. ^ J o fT « *
L ^ S lr ”I ^ nfjWa rn‘l SZa’ Krzi'sztofo'vi Wojciechowskiemu udało się na tych
niewrelktch fotografiach utrwalić nastrój ulicy nie popizez fotografowanie
falujących tiumow czy rozpędzonych manifestacji. Dokonał tego rejestrując
ulotne, drobne na ogól ślady, ślady określonej rzeczywistości, w której przysrfo
nam zyc teraz , wydawałoby * jeszcze niedawno. A przecież ,o p raw i 10 b f
We are sure it would be much better to say:
And what is maybe most important here is that, in his small photos, Krzysztof
Wojciechowski has managed to catch the mood of the street not by photographine
S t r a t a f ° r man‘festations bei”6 dispersed, but by recording fleeting and
nofso
not so Jong ago. R
But? nearly
° f a, real,‘y
ten yearsWhave
hiCh *gone by. t0 lire "°w. ^
hai,pen Lns
The arts in politically conscious countries, where momentous
changes sometimes take place, are not only influenced by the events
occurring round about them, but also have their own impact on what
know'th Mb K translator has t0 understand this phenomenon and
iust^fter hr ab° Ve,text’ for efxamPle>concerns work done before and
just after the introduction of martial law in Poland. We have to
Z nH , bac.kgrmmd o f much that is written in order not to
the orimnrvT translatl0n.s- A S °od knowledge o f language is definitely
ask nf , y ’ aSuwlthout 11 one had better not even attempt the
™i* ^ translation, but understanding and knowing the social and
cultural background o f the given text is one o f the most important
aspects o f what is generally known as the art o f translation
69
Chapter Four
POLISH-ENGLISH TRANSLATION
IN EVERYDAY LIFE
In Art and Illusion, E. H. Gorabrich says “There is no. reality
without interpretation” 1 and in translation we are faced both with the
reality o f the socio-cultural context’of the language o f the source text
as well as th at o f the target language. A t the same time, each reality
may be interpreted and understood in any number o f ways. Very often
we think we understand the text we are reading, when in actual fact
we may be either totally mistaken or we may interpret that reality
quite differently to the other readers, and sometimes translators, of
that same text. T hat is why we can have so many different translated
versions of a given text. This happens most often with literary works,
be it poems, plays or fiction. Each new translator thinks he could do
the task better, imagines he has better solutions to the problems posed
by the original, th at he is better qualified, has more experience in
working with the two languages in question and so on, and so on.
This is all true and it is good that we have new translations of
literary texts, that these translators are trying to be artists and writers
in their own right. The more serious problems start appearing,
however, when we feel we have to translate a variety of texts on many
different subjects into a language that is not our m other tongue, and
the texts have n o t been chosen by us. Furtherm ore, we are usually
limited by the time factor; our translations have to be done quickly
and are often n o t checked properly by us, never mind by another
competent person, before they find themselves in print. This, in turn,
leads to texts appearing very often in a language th at is supposed to
1 E. H. Gombrich, Art and Illusion, Phaidon, p. 307.
70
be English but happens to be rather difficult to understand by a native
English speaker. This is all brought about by linguistic incompetence,
by the already discussed lack o f knowledge of the socio-cultural
background, by a lack of feeling, awareness and understanding of the
text in question, and by the natural problem of Polish interference
when translating from Polish into English.
We do not wish to imply that every Polish-English translation done
by a non-native English speaker has to be faulty in one way or another.
This is definitely not sol We are fully aware of and appreciate all the
excellent translations that do appear in print. However, there are also
a large number that worry us and we hope that-by going into a deeper
analysis of the way many things are translated in our everyday life in
Poland, we shall help our readers avoid maldng those mistakes yet again.
In Chapter Three, we took an English speaking tourist through
some of the problems he faces when confronted with the information
he is given before or after arriving in Poland. Because the tourist trade
is so im portant, we would like to start with this topic here and go into
the m atter more fully, discussing not only our views on how texts on
this subject should be translated into English but also how they should
be written in English. As will be discussed later, we cannot separate
the role o f a translator from that o f a writer. A translator has to know
not only how to translate but also how to write correctly in the target
language. He has to know w hat is expected and accepted by the target
audience. This applies not only to tourists sightseeing, relaxing,
shopping and eating in Poland but also to scientists and academics, as
well as businessmen travelling to this country to exchange views, to
confront new ideas, to learn w hat their Polish colleagues are doing.
There has to be communication between the two groups and for this
to take place, both Polish and English speakers, no m atter where they
happen to come from, have to understand one another. As English is
the predom inant language, it has to be transmitted in style and form
understandable to the recipient. This is o f primary importance.
THE TO U RIST TRADE
Let us take the following passage, which is part of a longer text found
in a tourist brochure, and see what could be done with it in order to
make it more acceptable to English speakers:
71
 Welcome to the Polonia Home in Pułtusk!
We invite you cordially to the ancient interiors of a former residence of Płock
bishops which opened its door wide for guests from all over the world in July 1989.
The castle, being today the Horae for the world Polonia, houses a modern hotel
(86 beds), two restaurants, two cafes, a summer cafe at a riverside hostel,
a night-ciub, dub-rooms (?), conference halls and banquet-hails. There’s also
a possibility to avail oneself of sports and recreational grounds, a landing-place
for sailing boats, tennis courts, a library and a reading-room.
We cannot criticise the grammar used here, nor the punctuation
but, unfortunately, much of the phraseology is a direct translation
from Polish which, though understandable, sounds rather odd. If we
translated it back into Polish, we should have a typical, but quite
correct, text both from the lexical and stylistic point of view. It is
always difficult to avoid Polish interference but we have to try, if it
does not happen to come naturally to us, to distance ourselves from
the source text and, when translating, make sure we are writing in
English and not ‘Polish-English’.
The word Polonia tends to cause translators quite a lot of trouble.
It is certainly understandable to Poles as it means ‘Poles living
permanently abroad’. Although the word is taken from Latin, it is not
used in the English language. If at all, it would be understood as the
Latin term for Poland, which is hardly the case here. Because it is part
of the name of a castle which now serves the needs o f the Polish
community living outside Poland and is used as a hotel and a meeting
place for conferences and the like, we can leave it as it is, i.e. Dom
Polonii, just as we would with the majority of proper nouns. It
becomes slightly more difficult further on in the text, where we have
Home for the world Polonia.
Let us, however, try and see what can be done with the above quoted
passage, and further explanations on why we think certain change and
improvement are essential will come later. O ur suggestion would be:
Welcome to Dom Polonii in Pułtusk!
We warmly welcome you to the ancient interior o f one o f the former residences
of the Płock bishops, which has been open to guests from all over the world since
July 1989. The castle today functions as a home and meeting place for Poles
living abroad as well as a modern hotel (86 beds) with two restaurants, two cafes,
a summer cafe at a riverside hostel, a night-club, and conference and banquet-
-halls. The castle grounds provide sport and recreation facilities, a boat-house,
tennis courts, a library and reading-room.
72
As can be seen from the above which, due to the fact that
we have not got the source text, is merely a correction of the
already translated piece of information, it is usually impossible
to give an absolute word-for-word translation as was done originally.
Without too m u c h . difficulty we could translate the printed text
back into Polish and have a very typical piece o f writing often
found in Polish travel brochures. W ord-for-word translation may
occur, and also may be quite correct in such circumstances as
the above enum eration, but no matter' w hat we translate, we
have to remember about the English phraseology th at would
be used in the given context.
Looking at the passage more closely: cordially is quite a correct
English word but would hardly be used in a m odern tourist
brochure. The expression opened its door wide fo r guests is extremely
clumsy, to say the least! The word Polonia has already been
discussed. The last sentence in this paragraph, however, starts
with: There’s also a possibility to avail oneself of... which is not
strictly incorrect, although it should be: There’s also the possibility
of availing oneself because avail oneself o f sth is a synonym
of to make use o f and the idea here is to give visitors the opportunity
of using the sports and recreational grounds in one capacity
or another. The problem lies, though, in the fact that the expression
is confusing: the possibility o f is colloquial, to avail oneself is
more literary.
For many Polish translators working with the English language, it
is sometimes understandably difficult to know what can be said
when, and what will be read as a natural text evoking the desired
effect on the reader. However, we have to try and aim, if not for
perfection, at least for a piece o f writing that would resemble
a similar text in an English speaking country. We can hardly accept
or permit something like the following, which are excerpts of a longer
article advertising the Vistula River and the attractions of the town
of Wisła itself:
a) The flow of the stream is slowed down once more by the small dam and below
joins with a Malinka tributary. At this moment the river Vistula is born.
Flowing from the south to the north the river is fed by its tributaries:
Gościejów, Kopydło, Dziechcińka, Partecznik, Pinkasów, Jawornik, Gahura.
Most parts of the slopes are covered by woods which absorb dampness and
73
 stop the intensive erosion o f thin, stony soil. When the strong, south foehn
wind blows the air gets very moisty and the heavy rain leaves dangerous scars
in the nature and in people’s memories.
or
b) Nature lovers can find very rare examples of flora as well as a great variety
of erosion forms made by the river in the valleys of Black and especially White
Vistulas (Czarna and Biała Wisełka). The streams in this part belong to the
Vistula reservation and the woods to the Barania Mountain sightseeing
reservation in the namć of Karol Buzek. One o f the oldest brick houses from
the end o f the XIII century is the museum in the name of Andrzej Podiorski
opened in 1964. Housed here is an exhibition showing material culture of
a Highlanders from Beskid Śląski.
The above examples m ay be a little long but the brochure itself is much,
much longer and the style and language of the rest of it do not vary in any
way at all from w hat has been quoted here. One could argue the point
that the text can be understood and the main idea is to render the
meaning. It is certainly true that our main aim in translation is to render the
meaning of the original but this also should be done in a style and language
that would be acceptable to the1TL reader. The above requires a very
patient, understanding and inquisitive reader as well as an extremely well
oriented tourist both from the geographical and historical point o f view.
There is no doubt th at the translation of such texts requires
a certain detailed knowledge of the subject both in English and in
Polish if we are to be really happy with our translation. We have to
be prepared to do extra research if that research happens to be
necessary. M oreover, if the author of the original wanted to give
a detailed description of the Vistula, its origins, and also of the history
of the town of Wisła then we are obliged to translate it in the same
vein. W ithout going into aji analysis of why the above marked phrases
and words are unacceptable, let us try and produce something that
will both read well and will be more natural in English. Once again
we are not translating here but, due to the unavailability of the SL
text, trying to correct and rewrite what has already been printed in
English, in this way hoping to show which phraseology can be used
and which certainly cannot in such texts as the above.
a) The stream’s flow is slowed down once more by a small dam but later joins
the Malinka tributary to form the beginning o f the Vistula river. Flowing
from the south to the north, the river is enlarged by the following tributaries:
74
Gościejów, Kopydlo, Dziechcińka, Partecznik, Pinkasów, Jawornik, Gahura.
The surrounding slopes are mainly forested thanks to which moisture is
absorbed and there is no erosion o f the fine, stony soil. When there is
a strong, southerly wind, the air becomes very damp and, together with heavy
rain, may cause great damage both to the countryside and to the people living
there.
b) Nature lovers can find very rare examples of flora in the deeply eroded valleys
of the Czama and Biała Wisełka. These streams belong, in this part, to the
Vistula reservation, while the forests are part of the Barania Mountain
reservation named after Karol Buzek. One of the oldest brick houses from
the end o f the 13th century is the Andrzej Podżorski Museum, opened in
1964. This has an exhibition presenting the culture of the Beskid Śląski
Highlanders,
With literature written to encourage the tourist to visit our country
with its many cities and varied countryside, we very often find
ourselves in the position not so much of that of a translator as of
a writer o f the required text, of course always taking into consideration
all the data presented in the original. We have to keep in mind that
our role here is not only to translate what has been given to us, but
also to encourage the foreign tourist to visit and enjoy whatever we
happen to be describing. To prove our point, let us now look at two
texts: one written originally in English on Scotland, published by the
Scottish Tourist Board, and the second which is an English translation
of a slightly humorous Polish text on Poland, Poland fo r Beginners by
Olgierd Budrewicz, published by Interpress in 1974.
a) Lively Cities — Colourful Countryside
Even if you choose Scotland’s cities as a base, you will find the countryside
so easy to reach. Glasgow and Edinburgh arc the two largest cities, but Loch
Lomond and the Trossachs, the Borders, Dumfries and Galloway, Ayrshire
and the Forth and Clyde Valleys, with their woodlands, river valleys and
breezy uplands are close at hand.
Northwards lie the grandeur o f the Highlands and the special magic of
the islands. Both Highland and Lowland are a natural play-ground and
setting for a huge range o f sports and leisure activities ashore and afloat...
b) Travel Tips
“The chief lack in Poland is the shortage o f inns and hostelries in which one
can obtain a comfortable night’s lodging.”
These words were written in the middle of the 17th century by a French
visitor to these shores named De Hautville, and it would be pointless to
pretend that he would not have grounds for the same complaint three
75
 hundred years later. The growing stream of foreign tourists and the wanderlust
of the Poles themselves have outstripped the development of hotel facilities. As
a result one o f the facts of life that travellers need to be prepared for is that they
must know every trick, never take no for an answer and leave nothing to chance.
(transl. by Edward Rothert)
As can be seen here, these are two totally different texts from the
point of view of style and attitude to the subject in question. They
have two things in common, though. They are addressed to prospective
tourists and they are both written in very good English. And this is
what we should aim for, whether we are writing, translating or maybe
combining the former with the latter.
CULTURE AND THE ARTS
Let us now have a look at a text introducing an exhibition of one of
Warsaw’s artists in the city’s Centre of Contemporary A rt that took
place very recently.
Edward Krasiński has created in art a unique phenomenon by sticking a piece
of a blue tape in various places always at the same height. Since 1970 it has been
appearing in many places and visual situations constantly intriguing the spectators.
This phenomenon has been analysed by art critics for many times, but still not
everything has been discovered.
The Document Gallery will present the photos which show the course of the
line in the master’s studio, taken in 1975. Those photos are enlarged so as the
presented objects (i.e. the blue line) be of natural dimention. The black and white
photography, though, does not replace the presence o f the taken object. At the
exhibition, there appears the blue line taking part in a kind o f a play between
the document and the reality.
You really have to know something about Edward Krasiński and
his blue tape to guess what is actually meant by the above text. And
the original Polish was not as difficult, either lexically, syntactically or
stylistically, as it is wont to be in writing of this sort. So as to have
a full picture of the situation, let us now have a closer look at the SL
text which appeared together with the translation:
Edward Krasiński powołał do istnienia w sferze sztuki wyjątkowe zjawisko
naklejając w różnych miejscach, zawsze na tej samej wysokości jednakowy pasek
niebieskiej taśmy.. Pojawia się ona od 1970 roku w różnych sytuacjach wizualnych
nieodmiennie intrygując widzów. Fenomen ten wielokrotnie analizowali krytycy
sztuki, a ciągle jeszcze nie wszystko zostało odkryte.
76
W Galerii Dokumentu zaprezentowane zostaną, wykonane w 1975 roku
przez Krzysztofa Wojciechowskiego fotografie, pokazujące przebieg tej niebieskiej
linii w prącowni-mieszkaniu Edwarda Krasińskiego.
Niektóre fotografie powiększone są do takich rozmiarów, by przedstawione
. na nich przedmioty (a przede wszystkim niebieska kreska) były naturalnej
wielkości. Jednak czarno-biała fotografia dokumentacyjna nie odtwarza rzeczywis­
tego koloru linii, dodaje go nasza wyobraźnia. Na wystawie pojawia się także
właściwa niebieska linia, uczestnicząc w rodzaju gry między dokumentem
a rzeczywistością. Swą obecność w Zamku Ujazdowskim Edward Krasiński
zaznaczył ponadto odautorskim komentarzem, nie pozbawionym ironii.
Over the last few years, it has become more and more common to
find texts of various sorts accompanying art exhibitions, in catalogues
and brochures on the artists in question, on their ideas, attitudes and
even behaviour. Everybody, both the artists and critics, seem to have
a great deal to say, and because they also wish to propagate and
advertise their work abroad, the English language comes into play
here as well. Sometimes, as can be seen from some other examples
quoted by us, the Polish texts tend to be unnecessarily complex
making it oftentimes difficult for the Polish reader to understand the
meaning, never mind try to render it into English in a satisfactory
manner for all concerned.
We shall try here to present a corrected version of the translated
text and explain why we have decided on the given changes:
Edward Krasiński has created a unique phenomenon in art (to create what,
and then where: position of the adverbial phrase o f place in a sentence) by
sticking up a length o f blue tape in various places, (stick up... in could be an
analogy with posters); and always at the same height, (and is added here
consciously in order to link the two phrases together). Since 1970 it has been
appearing in many different situations and never ceases to intrigue the public.
(Here we have to change the sentence due to the rather vague Polish expression:
sytuacje wizualne. In order not to repeat the word place we can use situation
without adding visual. The situation seems to be obvious here. Again we have
used the conjunction and in order to connect the two clauses. The Polish word
widz is very general and can be used in any number o f situations. In English we
have various synonyms for this word: viewer, spectator, audience, public, even
visitor, but the words cannot always be used interchangeably. We have to
remember which can be used where. We are not spectators when we visit art
exhibitions. Another possibility here, which might be closer to the Polish
original, would be: Never ceasing to intrigue the public, it has been appearing in
many different places since 1970. This phenomenon has often (there is no
possibility of being able to combine for with many times) been analysed by art
77
 critics but not everything has been discovered yet. (the stylistic use of still and
yet in a forami text of this type).
The Document Gallery will present photographs (due to the plural
form o f the noun, the definite article is not essential here. In texts of
this sort it is again preferable to use the full word, i.e. photographs,
and not its abbreviation), taken in 1975 by Krzysztof Wojciechowski, (again
the posiition o f the adverbial clause in the sentence has to be changed,
and the photographer’s name should be included just as it was in the
SL text. We cannot take liberty over this type of information.) which
show the course o f this blue line (this blue was omitted in the translation.
The phrase the line immediately evokes the question: which line? In the
Polish text this is clearly stated.) in Edward Krasinski’s studio flat. (The
translator probably used the word master so as to avoid mentioning the
artist’s name once again although it was used in the Polish text. Without
questioning the artistic creativity of Krasiński here, we think we should
be a little more careful whom we address as master).
Some of the photographs are enlarged to such an extent that the objects
(especially the blue line) presented in them arc of natural size. (The changes
introduced here are mainly for the sake of clarity.) However, the black and
white documentary (this was missing in the translation) photography does not
recreate the natural colour of the line. (The choice of recreate here instead of
reflect may be of a personal nature.) This is added by our imagination. (The
translator obviously tried to solve the problem of this sentence in his own
way). At the exhibition, the real blue line also appears (word order) taking part
in a kind o f game (the different use and meaning of the nouns: play and game)
between the document and the reality. Edward Krasmski’s presence at Ujazdów-
ski Castle is also accompanied by his own ironic commentary. (This was
omitted altogether).
After this very detailed analysis, let ns present our corrected
version as a whole. We would like to stress here that we have changed
only what we believe to have been absolutely necessary.
Edward Krasiński has created a unique, phenomenon in art by sticking up
a length of blue tape in various places, and always at the same height. Since 1970,
it has been appearing in many different situations and never ceases to intrigue
the public. This phenomenon has often been analysed by art critics but not
everything has been discovered yet.
The Document Gallery will present photographs, taken in 1975 by Krzysztof
Wojciechowski, which show the course of this blue line in Edward Krasmski’s
studio flat.
Some o f the photographs are enlarged to such an extent that the objects
(especially the blue line) presented in them are o f natural size. However, the
black and white documentary photography does not recreate the natural colour
o f the line. This is added by our imagination. At the exhibition, the real blue line
78
also appears, taking part in a kind of game between the document and the
reality. Edward Krasmski’s presence at Ujazdowski Castle is also accompanied
by his own ironic commentary.
When dealing with culture and the arts, the majority of texts
translated from Polish into English in Poland today concern artists
and their work, exhibitions of various kinds, the activities of different
Polish cultural institutions scattered throughout the world. It is with
texts of this sort that we. are mainly interested in as everything else,
i.e. film, theatre or book reviews, translations of fiction or poetry are
usually done by native speakers or it is a result of a Polish-English
cooperation where two translators are involved. Furtherm ore, those
texts are written and published in English speaking countries where
they are checked and double-checked before they appear in print.
In Poland the English speaking audience is smaller, but many of the
texts are also translated for the purpose o f sending material abroad, and
no m atter whether it is to go to the Scandinavian countries, China or the
U.S.A. it should appear in flawless English. If it cannot be understood,
the whole translation process turns out to be pointless. Translation itself
is of prim ary importance, but the careful printing of the text is also
a matter that cannot be overlooked. A well-translated text can be spoilt
totally by an overabundance o f printing mistakes. Here we are concerned
with a catalogue prepared for an exhibition the subject of which were two
sacred images: O ur Lady o f Częstochowa and Our Lady of Guadalupe.
The exhibition was held in Poland but many of the artists involved were
foreign and the literature on the subject had both English and Polish
versions. The Polish, unfortunately, is full of misprints, showing total
carelessness, and lack of respect, on the part of the printers, while the
English, when it has obviously been a translation, leaves much to be
desired. It was published by the Guadalupe Institute in Arizona, U.S.A.
As an example, let us look at the following:
The picture presenting a Virgin Mary with the Child was painted on a piece of
wood. It was brought to Częstochowa in the year 1382. The Paulites monks were
invited from Hungary to protect the picture. Hie word on miracles by the Black
Madonna spread around, and as early as the beginning o f a 15th century and the
picture was already famous in Poland and in neighbouring countries...
Here we have the usual problem with the definite article, with nouns
in their plural form appearing as adjectives (see: Paulites) and the
79
above marked sentence showing unnecessary brevity that leads to
obscurity.
Another interesting passage is:
She spoke io him in his native Nahuatl language. She told him she was Mary,
Mother of the True God and that she urgently desired that a church be built on
the site. She urged him to go to the Bishop of Mexico City with this message.
When Juan Diego recounted this experience to the Bishop who listed carefully
but took no action and acted as lie didn’t believe hint.
Returning to the hill and the Lady, Juan Diego reported on his mission, H is
lack of credibility and suggested She send someone o f more influence...
The marked sentence here is incomplete because of the unnecessary
use of when. We can presume that listed is a spelling misprint, but the
omission of appropriate punctuation marks also may lead to misun­
derstanding. In the final paragraph, His is totally unclear and requires
quite a lot of guesswork on the part of the reader, while the translator
has shown a mistaken understanding of the usage of the word
credibility. Here failure to be believed is meant.
In order to spread information on our history, our culture and art
forms, it is necessary to use language that is clear, correct and fully
comprehensible to the average reader. This often turns out to be even
more important when the texts are translated into English for a foreign
audience where many of the ideas may be new or may sound rather
strange. It is here, in translation, that we must try to avoid being
obscure. In completing this section let us present a corrected version
of the two excerpts quoted above:
The picture representing the Virgin Mary with Child was painted on a piece of
wood. It was brought to Częstochowa in the year 1382. The Paulite monks were
invited to come from Hungary to protect the picture. Word about the miracles
performed by the Black Madonna spread rapidly and the picture was already
famous in Poland and in neighbouring countries as early as the beginning of the
15th century...
She spoke to him in his Nahuatl language. She told him she was Mary, Mother
of the True God, and that she urgently desired that a church be built on the site.
She urged him to go to the Bishop of Mexico City with this message.
Juan Diego recounted this experience to the Bishop who listened carefully
but took no action. He seemed not to believe what had happened to Diego.
Returning to the hill and the Lady, Juan Diego reported on his mission. He
stressed the Bishop’s lack of belief in what he had told him and suggested she
send someone o f more influence...
80
ACADEMIA AND SCIENCE
Another aspect of our everyday life, at least o f the life o f intellectuals
and academics, are international projects, lectures, meetings, conferen­
ces and congresses that are being held all over the world, Polish
scientists and scholars are part o f the exchange process that is taking
place and as English has unquestionably become the international
language, more and more emphasis is being placed on literature in
that language. Articles, essays o f various kinds, and papers that have
to be delivered at conferences nearly always nowadays have to appear
in English. And this is where the problems start cropping up.
Polish scholars very often have the tendency' o f writing in an
extremely long-winded and complex style, believing, sometimes sub­
consciously, that the more sophisticated the paper the better. The idea
of simplicity is ignored altogether. If it is a strictly scientific paper,
with a great deal o f statistical data, the m atter is not so complicated!
It is much worse when the text in question is concerned with the
humanities, especially when it is on philosophy, literature or the arts.
The translation o f such written material into English is sometimes an
extremely difficult task even for the most experienced translator.
Before going into and presenting certain examples, the traditional
and very common question arises. Should we, as translators, try and
be as faithful to the original, and as loyal to the author as we possibly
can, of course keeping to all the norms of the English language, or
should we feel free to manipulate the text, abbreviate where we think
it is essential, simplify the author’s ideas to make them more
comprehensible to the audience, clarify what happens to be obscure?
This very controversial question appears over and over again, and
translators and translation theorists throughout the world also* have
different answers to this question. We, in turn, believe in a middle way
and what we do with a given text often depends not only on its subject
matter but also to whom it is addressed. Sometimes we have to take
on the task o f clarification if we w ant the author’s ideas to be
understood at a conference where there is no time for reading a paper
over and over again so as to glean some meaning out o f it. Time is
a very im portant factor here. Even very complex philosophical notions
can be presented simply or at least in a manner that would be
immediately comprehensible to the reader or listener. I f we are
6— Succcssfuf Potish-Engfish...
81
translating a book, we can argue more forcibly about holding faithfully
to stylistic and structural obscurity if it happens to appear in the SL
text. M any people believe our task is not to correct the author.
This is certainly true, and we should never try to change or correct
the author’s ideas, no matter what our own are. We have no right to
do this. We have always to keep in mind that primarily we are to
render the meaning of the original, even if we think it is the most
stupid thing that has ever been written. But in transferring the
meaning, we must also try'to satisfy the linguistic norms of the target
language. The various roles a translator takes on while performing
this task will be discussed in more detail in a later chapter.
A t present, though; let us look more closely at some texts that
pertain to the area discussed above but are also, varied in subject-matter
and would not necessarily be addressed to the same type of reader. We
are often asked to translate information on some scientific or academic
centre, institute or organization. In such a situation, we have to be
extremely careful not to miss out any of the data or to misunderstand
any o f the information included in the text. Absolutely everything is
im portant and we cannot take it on ourselves to change anything.
The following are two passages taken from a very much longer text
on the Institute of Librarianship and Information Science at Warsaw
University. These are examples we would like to recommend as they
show th at in translation you can satisfy the requirement of faithfulness
in rendering the meaning, keeping to the appropriate style, and also
be clear and correct in your English. Here our markings are to draw
your attention to the translator’s specific choice of vocabulary in this
sphere. This is also of great importance. We are presenting both the
Polish original and the English translation:
a) Instytut Bibliotekoznawstwa i Informacji Naukowej (IBIN) jest najstarszą
w Polsce placówką akademickiego kształcenia bibliotekarzy. Chlubne tradycje
dydaktyki księgoznawstwa w Uniwersytecie Warszawskim sięgają XIX w. —*
wykładów Joachima Lelewela (1820-1821) i Karola Estreichera (1865-1868).
Dzieje Instytutu rozpoczynają się od października 1951 r., kiedy to powołana
została w Uniwersytecie Warszawskim Katedra Bibliotekoznawstwa. Obecnie
Instytut Bibliotekoznawstwa jest jedną z 6 jednostek organizacyjnych wcho­
dzących w skład Wydziału Historycznego.
The Institute of Librarianship and Information Science is the oldest university
department in Poland to train librarians. While the traditions of promoting
82
knowledge about books at Warsaw University go back to the lectures of
Joachim Lelewel (1820-1821) and Karol Estreicher (1865-1868), the Institute
of Librarianship dates back to October 1951, when the Chair o f Librarianship
was established at Warsaw University. Currently, the Institute o f Librarianship
is one of six departments within the School of Historical Studies.
b) Zakład Bibliotekoznawstwa
Grupuje pracowników zainteresowanych sprawami współczesnego biblio­
tekarstwa i książki. Ich szczególna uwaga skierowana jest na zagadnienia
dotyczące: 1) funkcjonowania bibliotek w systemie kultury i edukacji,
organizacji bibliotek szkolnych i pedagogicznych; 2) działalności informacyjnej
w dziedzinie edukacji; 3) organizacji badań i czytelnictwa w odniesieniu do
dzieci i młodzieży, a także specjalnych kategorii użytkowników: niewidomych,
głuchych, niedostosowanych społecznie i osób starych; 4) bibiioterapii;
5) literatury dla dzieci i młodzieży; 6) roli książki w procesie komunikacji
społecznej oraz 7) działalność marketingowa na rynku książki. Zakład
wspólnie z placówkami oświatowymi kształcącymi bibliotekarzy organizuje
corocznie sesje naukowe dotyczące problemów będących w kręgu zaintereso­
wań zakładu. Zakład jest wydawcą czasopisma „Guliwer” poświęconego
sprawom literatury i bibliotek dla dzieci i młodzieży.
Division o f Librarianship
This division groups staff interested in problems of contemporary librarianship
and books, who focus on issues concerning 1) the functioning o f libraries
within the system of culture and education; 2) information in the area of
education; 3) organization o f research on readership among children and young
adults, as well as special categories of users — the blind, the deaf, the socially
unadjusted and the old; 4) bibliotherapy; 5) literature for children and
adolescents; 6) the role o f books in the process o f social communication; and
7) book marketing.. In collaboration with librarian training institutions the
division organizes annual seminars on topics of mutual interest. The Division
also publishes the journal „Guliwer” devoted to literature and libraries for
children and young readers.
(transl. by Stefan Sikora, 1991)
M aybe the most interesting fact here as far as lexical items are
concerned, is the choice taken over the English equivalents for the
Polish word młodzież which is repeated three times in the above
passage. It is worth noticing that the translator decided not to use the
more common word youth but young adults, adolescents and young
readers. Please also draw attention to the translator’s decision as to
sentence structure and the situations where he either decided to link
sentences or abbreviate them without changing the meaning. Of
course, with every text there can always be a number of versions but
83
it is definitely worth studying at least one version that satisfies all the
requirements we are trying to propagate.
The following texts, though, required a great deal of change,
correction and improvement as they could not be printed in the form
they had originally been translated. They were part of a collection of
summaries of papers delivered at a Polish symposium on the “Town
walls in Gliwice in the fortification system of medieval Upper Silesian
towns” .
We would now like to present the original translations and then
our own corrected versions (in c) to show what has to be taken into
consideration and how many common mistakes can be avoided when
a little extra thought and care is put into what we are doing. Let us
first look at the Polish original, then the first translations, and finally
our own versions.
I. a) Gliwickie mury obronne — stan wiedzy i badań, rodzaje źródeł i przeka­
zów
(Streszczenie)
Praca ta omawia literaturę dotychczas niewykorzystaną przy opracowaniu
dziejów miasta. Stanowi jakby część wstępną do artykułu E. Bergman.
b) Town walls of Gliwice — condition of knowledge and study, sorts of
sources and transmission.
(Summary)
This work treats about the bibliography of wasting an opportunity up to
the present, by working out a history of the Town. It makes as if a preface
part of article of E. Bergman.
c) Gliwice fortifications: our knowledge, types of sources, and their trans­
mission.
(Summary)
This work discusses the literature that has not been used so far in surveys
of the town’s history. It is as if a preface to E. Bergman’s article.
There is really no sense in going into a detailed analysis of the
first translation here as, apart from spelling, absolutely everything
else is a total mess. This, unfortunately, is no exception to what is
printed and sent out into the world. It is of no surprise, then, that
foreigners very quickly give up even trying to understand such texts
even if they should be interested in the rather specific, subject-
-matter.
84
In the following, which is slightly longer, we tried not to rewrite
the. whole passage but simply correct w hat had originally been
translated,
II. a) Most przy Bramie Raciborskiej na Pi. Rzeźniczym w Gliwicach w świetle
badań archeologicznych
(Streszczenie)
Artykuł przedstawia rezultaty badań archeologicznych prowadzonych
w 1985 i 1986 roku. Badania te pozwoliły na odkrycie pewnych fragmentów
Bramy Raciborskiej w Gliwicach.
Odkryte relikty są pozostałościami tejże budowli, funkcjonującej
przez wiele lat, w czasie których jej wygląd ulegał znacznym zmianom.
Dalsze badania określiły miejsce istnienia mostu prowadzącego do tej
bramy oraz pozostałości dwóch budynków wartowniczych.
b) Bridge at the Gate of Racibórz on the Butcher’s Square in Gliwice, in the
lights of archeological studies.
(Summary)
This article describes the results of archeological studies, which were
carried out in the years 1985 and 1986. These studies allowed to revelation
of certain fragments of Gate of Racibórz in Gliwice! The discovered relicts
are the leftover of the same building, which were functioning for many
years, daring which its appearance did change very much. Further studies
appointed the place where the bridge existed, which was leading to that
gate and to the leftover o f two guardhouses.
c) The bridge at the Racibórz Gate in Plac Rzeźniczy in Gliwice, according
to archeological studies.
(Summary)
This article describes the results o f an archeological excavation carried
out in the years 1985 and 1986. It revealed certain fragments of the
Racibórz Gate in Gliwice. The discovered relics are what has survived of
this building,* that functioned for many years during which time its
appearance changed greatly. Further studies defined the place where the
bridge had been situated and which had led to the gate and to the ruins
o f two guardhouses.
In both of the above texts the Polish sentences are brief and
informative. They satisfy the norms o f w hat summaries should be like
no m atter which language they happen to be in. In our translations,
we are obliged to do the same, also making sure that our English is
both clear and correct.
Before we end this section, let us look at yet another type of
85
academic text that was originally written in Polish and had to be
translated into English for the benefit of the international reading
public. This time it concerns art and was written by one of the leading
art critics o f the day. The following is only a fragment of a much
longer text:
? Artysta, jego racjonalne ‘ja’, jest momentem, w którym następuje rozdzielenie
tego co twórcze i współczesne, od tego co stereotypowe i historyczne. Sztuka,
? jej pojęciowa struktura i procesualna funkcja destrukcji, wyznacza obszary
? przynależne metafizyce czystej wtzuałności i społecznej konsumpcji. W tym
sensie zawieszenie czasu przez artystę i odnalezienie neutralności przez sztukę
mając wszelkie cechy ‘chwili’ (błysku, iluminacji) dokonują się w racjonalnym
akcie koncentracji twórczej i emocjonalnej kontemplacji artystycznej, w któ-
? rych dzieło zdaje się określać swój stopień zero. Poza nim w sztuce istnieje
? jedynie dialektyczny proces, ustawiczna zmiana, stała transformacja: stereo-
typizowanie i destruowanie.
(Andrzej Turowski, 1991)
Even for someone who knows something about the history of art
and the direction it is taking today, the meaning of the above is rather
difficult to grasp. We immediately want to ask a number of questions,
hence the question marks, because, without fully understanding it, we
cannot be sure we will not produce a totally bungled translation.
Unfortunately, many Polish texts are like this one, and in such cases;
we should not be afraid to ask for help if we are in any sort of doubt.
We cannot afford to make a mistake because fortunately, or unfor­
tunately, it is our translation that is going to be read abroad, and not
the original. It is in such cases that we advise a certain elimination of
obscurity for the sake of both the text and the translator. If the author
benefits from the process as well, all the better. The following is one
way o f dealing with the above passage, although we realize the English
version is still far from clear:
The artist, his rational ‘I’, is a point where the creative and contemporary are
separated from the stereotyped and historical. Art, its notional structure and
function of destruction (which is a process), marks the spheres belonging to the
metaphysics o f pure visibleness and social consumption. In this sense, the
suspension o f time by the artist and finding neutrality through art, having all the
features o f the ‘moment’ (of a Hash, o f illumination), take place in the rational
act o f artistic concentration and emotional, artistic contemplation in which the
work seems to define its ‘zero degree’. Apart from this, in art there exists only
a dialectic process, a continuous change, a permanent transformation: creating
stereotypes and destroying them.
86
CATERING
„Inevitably, it is the flaws in translation rather than the finesses that
are the most likely to attract public comment” . 2 Unfortunately, this
happens only too often, hence even this book to try and help future
translators avoid some of those flaws that keep on occurring. Different
aspects of catering, that include cookery books, names of bars, pubs,
cafes and restaurants of various types, menus that can be found
therein, have already been mentioned or even discussed by us in
greater or lesser detail, depending on w hat we thought was relevant to
the topic in question. We would, however, like to say just a little more
here as it is so very much part of our everyday life, and English can
be seen and heard everywhere although we are not inhabiting an
English speaking country.
In his book The Third Language, Alan D uff quoted after Nigel
Rees a menu ‘made up of misprints and mistranslations observed in
restaurants as far afield as Rome, Paris, Barcelona, and the Caledonian
Road’:
Half fresh grapefuit
Satiated calamary
Hen soup
Hard egg with sauce mayonnaise
Frightened eggs
Dreaded veal cutlet
Spited rooster
Battered codpieces
A kind o f long utmost of chicken
Chicken with cold
Veal Gordon Bleu
Raped carrots 3
O f course, we can treat the above humorously knowing that this was
compiled from many menus throughout Europe, and nothing like this
could appear here in one restaurant. Let us hope that nothing quite
like the above has or will actually be printed but mistaken translations,
unfortunately, keep on appearing and the flaws are often commented
on and loudly laughed at by English speaking customers. Foreigners
2 Alan Duff, The Third Language, Pergamon Press, p. 124.
3 Ibid. (p. 125) after Nigel Rees, Quote... Unquote, George Allen and Unwin,
87
are prepared not to understand anything in a menu that is written in Obiad
a language that is not their own, but if they find menus translated badly Półmisek firmowy
into English, not all o f them are able to take it with a pinch of salt. It is Flaczki wolowe
Parówki
also not always pleasant to hear their comments. The following is the
Bigos staropolski
English translation o f a Polish menu found in one o f the Cracow hotels:
Desery
Breakfast sets Naleśniki płonące
1) Black coffee with a spot of miik Tort rzymski
Cheese Edam style Owoce z kremem
Brealand rolls ? Lody mieszane z owocami
or
2) Filter bag tea with lemon Breakfast Choices
Scrambled eggs on butter/ham 1) CofTee with milk
Brealand rolls ? Cheese
Bread rolls
Lunch
Cold meat house special dish ? 2) Lemon tea
Tripes Scrambled eggs with or without ham
Hot dog ? Bread rolls
Hunter’s stew home speciality ? Lunch
Desserts A cold meat platter
Pancakes flamed Tripe
Layered cake Roman style Frankfurters
Fruits with cream Old-Polish bigos — a traditional cabbage and meat stew
Miscellaneous ice-cream with fruits Desserts
Pancakes fiambe
Some of the above mistakes have already been quoted and discussed
Roman layer cake
in the previous chapter, but here we have marked what cannot be left Fruit salad with cream
without correction. Knowing Polish we can guess a lot but the cold Ice-cream with fruit
meat house special dish or the hunter’s stew home speciality are real
mysteries even to us. They could mean absolutely anything. To solve Whenever we are asked to translate menus, recipes, even whole
the mystery, we would like to present the Polish version which was cookery books, we have to apply the same rules as with any other type
given in the same menu, and also our suggestion as to how to cope of translation. We try to be as faithful as possible but, when in doubt
with such a translation. (as with the półmisek firmowy, for example) some research has to be
made. In this case, we go to the hotel kitchen and find out exactly
Zestawy śniadaniowe
what they are serving. Ser żółty is another rather specific Polish
1) Kawa z mlekiem
Ser żółty phrase. We cannot translate it into Edam cheese unless we are
Bulki absolutely sure that is the type o f cheese that is going to be served.
2) Herbata ekspresowa z cytryną We also have to keep the addressee in mind, and n ot only his language
Jajecznica na maśle/szynce but also his customs, traditions, mentality and last, but not least, what
Bulki is and w hat is not accepted in his language. We have to make

89
ourselves understood and the only way to do this is to write and speak used by the translator here, is not part of the English vocabulary. If
in the way that he is accustomed to. He would be expected to do the we are faced with a word where bilingual dictionaries do not help us
in the least, as with mintaj, we cannot solve this problem by
same in our language.
In order not to always find flaws in translation, we would also nice nonchalantly adding an English ending to a Polish word. The
to show how some restaurants are coping with their bilingual menus. equivalent here is pollock or pollack (also known as lythe), but this
The following is an example that it can be done although it is also indeed required quite a lot of research on our part. N ot every fish has
worth remembering about the existence of French and how Eng ish its equivalent name in other languages as a great deal depends on
gourmet cooking likes to use this language nowadays. where the fish has been caught and also whether it is sold fresh, salted,
A business lunch offered at one of the leading Warsaw hotels. smoked or pickled. A lot also depends on customs and traditions,
hence the kipper in the U.K. and wędzony śledź or even pikling in
Carp in jelly Poland. The original fish in question may be a herring, but the way
or o f smoking the herring in the two countries is completely different.
White Borsch The same can be observed when we wish to discuss the various cuts
Fillet o f Mintay Bonne Femme of meat. Even very experienced housewives are often totally lost when
with vegetables and potatoes . they go into a butcher's shop in another country. When they are
or confronted with the different names presented by the butcher, the
Boiled smoked loin of pork
with vegetables and potatoes
situation gets even worse. As far as beef is concerned, for example, we
may be partial to polędwica which is translated as sirloin steak. In
Creme caramel
or
English, however, we have a number of other types of steak such as
Strawberry Roulade skirt or chuck steak, and rump steak. These steaks may also be known
Tea/Coffee generally as beafsteaks. In Polish, on the other hand, befsztyk is
treated more as a dish than simply as a cut of meat. This type of
Karp w galarecie
lub
culinary complication also appears here with the word roulade which
Biały barszcz is used rather when describing a meat dish, i.e. a slice of meat rolled
Filet z mintaja
around a filling and cooked. O ur suggestion here would be: Strawberry
z warzywami i ziemniakami sponge roll but not having eaten the dessert ourselves, we are also only
lub guessing at w hat the Polish rolada truskawkowa might be. In such
Gotowana wędzona polędwica wieprzowa cases, it must be remembered that before we hand over our translations
z warzywami i ziemniakami to anybody, they must be checked and double-checked. As far as
Krem karamei dishes are concerned, we have to know exactly w hat is being served,
lub and then try and find out w hat the closest equivalent might be.
Rolada truskawkowa
The same hotel advertised a special St. Valentine’s offer in both
Herbata/Kawa
English and Polish. It is worth noting how the two texts have been
By quoting the above, we do not mean to say that this is the one and written:
only way of translating the included Polish menu. We have certain
doubts as to the Fillet of Mintay Bonne Femme. Mintaj, although
a relatively new fish in Poland, has become quite popular and is served
in high-class restaurants. The word mintay, however, that has een

91
90
 VALENTINE’S LOVE
WEEKEND
A special offer addressed to all people in love.
Romantic candlelight gourmet dinner at our restaurant at 8.30 p.m.
Dancing to live music and recital by Hanna Banaszak... etc.
ST. VALENTINE’S
WEEKEND DLA ZAKOCHANYCH
Elegancka kolacja przy świecach w restauracji hotelowej od godz. 20.30.
Dancing przy dźwiękach romantycznej muzyki i recital Hanny Banaszak... etc.
Let us accept the above English version of the special offer as it
stands. It is correct and thought has obviously been p ut into the
translation. W hat draws our critical attention, though, are the titles
given to both the Polish and English texts. In English, we have
Valentine’s Love Weekend. It is customary to say St. Valentine, and
Love Weekend is impossible ( Weekend fo r Lovers) while in the Polish
version it is rather odd to find a combination of St. Valentine s (even
the saxon genitive is included here!) with the following weekend dla
zakochanych. February 14th has never held any significance in the
Polish calendar and trying to introduce it now for material gains
requires a little more thought in the use of language.
Chapter Five
THE WORLD OF COMMERCE AND BUSINESS
It is clear that the boom in foreign language learning, which we
have been witnessing in the last three years, is very much connected
with the recent political changes in Poland. However, in some quarters
it is believed that it has been stimulated not so much by the present
economic realities as by the expectations of a future prosperity. It is
probably too early to say where the truth lies and to w hat extent the
recovery o f the Polish economy may depend on the population’s
ability to communicate in foreign languages. The one certain thing is
that although we may laugh at the fact that the English language is
often used in our country in situations when Polish would do, there is
no doubt that the Poles will have to use foreign languages while
communicating with their more or less distant business partners.
Since the collapse of the Communist world there has been quite
a lot of speculation in the British media about the changing linguistic
situation in Eastern Europe. The majority o f com mentators seem to
be convinced that w hat we are witnessing in the East is a major
linguistic reorientation. The change concerns not so much the in­
digenous languages in the region as the operating lingua franca. The
shift has been, o f course, from Russian to English or German. As
a result, almost all East European countries, including Poland, have
drastically reduced the teaching o f Russian at all levels and intensive
preparations for a massive expansion in the teaching o f West European
languages have been undertaken. It is not a secret that, to some extent,
the changes have been stimulated by Western governments and
governmental agencies because some politicians believe that while
learning English, for instance, the student is, at the same time, learning
93
about the British/American way of life and about the workings o
Western-style democracy. ... m
All these complex issues translate into a basic practical dilem .
how to teach foreign languages, who is going to teac em a
kind of linguistic competence will be required in t e u ure ro
who decide today about the kind of course t ey s ou ' cate w ithout resorting to translation? In their book English fo r Specific
recently it was traditional in Poland for learners to a e up
intensive language course without a clearly de me PurPos''^
with different needs were usually placed in the same
and, at the end o f the course, nobody was really receiving wha y
had wanted in the first place. Generally speaking, olie coul^ sayJ
the two cardinal sins of the majority of courses were the insistence on
grammatical correctness and the negligence of live corniini ,. •’ •
L last two or three years there have been signs that something ,
about to change in this traditional teaching met o . its ’ .„it is, or should be axiomatic that nobody can properly translate what he does
can observe a growing demand for very intensive courses, w
equip learners with basic communication skills within a limited p
of time. The second symptom of change is a eman . »
which are tailored to the needs of the learners. Ajnong teachers^ of
English such courses are defined as ‘English for Specific Purposes
(ESThCe ° m S i t y o f Polish university tram edlanguageteachcrsicnow
very well w hat ESP courses are and how they should ^ d e s ig n e d .
ESP COURSES VERSUS TRANSLATION
A t this point, one would wish to ask what the relationship of ESP
teaching is to translation. Does the proliferation of ESP courses mean
that professionals w ant to have direct access to foreign texts or does it
mean that they want to use the language actively in order to communi­
Purposes, A. M ountford and R. M ackay claim that ‘the need to teach
foreign students of sciencć and technology to read English efficiently
arises basically because o f the failure of a translation programme to
cope with the needs of practising scientists’ \ They point to the fact that
the am ount of new information produced every year imposes require­
ments which cannot be easily met by translators and, as proof of that,
they quote a UNESCO report in which it is clearly stated that:
not understand; hence satisfactory technical translating can only be done by
someone with the requisite technical knowledge and practice in technical
reasoning, to follow technical arguments in the required speciality and to bridge
over gaps in such an argument. The kind of competence required to do this
depends not only on the nature and subject matter of the original text, but also
on the kind o f reader for whom it is intended.
In order to translate papers written by and intended for scientists engaged in
original research at the frontiers of knowledge, the translator must himself be
familiar with those frontiers.2

However, it has n ot been till very recently t at e e f . , It seems, then, that ESP courses were developed in order to avoid
courses has resulted in offers of ESP courses for such Professionals as the problem of translation, and indeed for some time the teachers of
physicians, engineers or economists. In most cases e . English were discouraged from using translation even as a supplementa­
organized either by professional associations or | ry pedagogical method in the classroom. This, of course, created
centres, but one would hesitate to call this; a p r o i e^ a paradox because the professional knowledge, which the students had
courses. In this respect Poland has stayed behind most West European accumulated in their native language, had to be learned yet again but —
countries where a substantial percentage of foreign language teaching in English. Fortunately, teachers o f English soon became aware of the
has, for a long time, now, served the very specific needs of learners. comic aspect of this pedagogical process and today translation is
Thus, for instance, one can ‘design’ a short ratenswe course m l tal ^ recognized as a valid method in designing and teaching ESP courses so
for a group o f English archaeologists who are g°mS . - students can relate their professional knowledge to the process of
Italian libraries or an English language course for French st" d“ ts learning English as a foreign language,
law, who are going to spend one term as trainee so ici °
The range o f such courses seems to be unlimited and
1 R. Mackay, A. Mountford, English for Specific Purposes, Longman, 1978, p. 11.
are based on linguistic data bases composed by means of computers.
2 Op. c i t p. 12.

95
94
 The pending question is whether the ESP courses have eliminated
the need for translation? So far it has been difficult to find proof that
such is the case. It may be true, o f course, that members of the same
profession communicate in one common language without resorting
to translation. However, such communication can occur only when,
let us say, mathematicians from different countries meet and discuss
a specific problem in English, for example. So the more narrow the
discipline, the easier it is to communicate in lingua franca with the
representatives of this discipline. However, from our everyday practice,
we know that this is not normally the case because most professionals
function in a w orld where there is a need to convey quite complex and
specific ideas to people who have neither appropriate professional
training nor the ability to speak a foreign language. So, although
mathematicians or physicists may happily talk about their field of
interest in English, businessmen or economists operate in an environ­
ment where they have to address not only their professional colleagues
but also ‘ordinary’ people such as customers, investors, shareholders,
lawyers and politicians. If such communication takes place across
cultures, translation remains the only method of communication.
ESP IN BUSINESS AND COMMERCE
One of the most popular trends in ESP has been ‘English for business
and commerce’. It is not our task here to discuss the usefulness of such
courses. W hat we want to stress, however, is the basic difficulty which
the teachers and learners involved in such courses encounter. First of
all, it is obvious that any course entitled ‘English for business and
commerce’ cannot be as specific as let us say English for m ath­
ematicians’. Commerce and business are very general terms and
people working in these two areas need foreign languages for different
reasons. Thus, for instance, the requirements o f a banker or a broker
will differ from the needs of an advertising agent, financial auditor or
contract negotiator. This difference is not only a m atter of vocabulary
but, first of ail, of the language skills each of those professionals
needs. Thus, while the contract negotiator needs to use language
actively in a direct process of negotiation, the financial auditor will be
happy to familiarize himself with relevant terminology and the system
of running accounts in a foreign language and culture.
96
It is, of course, possible to diversify ESP courses in such a way that
every learner will receive very individual treatm ent, but in our
circumstances this would be both difficult and very expensive. It seems
then that in the foreseable future business and commerce will be
depending as much on translation as on the use of foreign languages.
STANDARDIZED AND ‘FREE’ TRANSLATION
Every translator knows that the choice o f ari appropriate translation
strategy is determined by the text which is to, be translated. Some
translation theorists claim that the more specific, non-literary and
informative the text is, the more conventionalized and more literal its
translation will be. 3 W hat is needed in such cases is simply a knowledge
of ‘conventions o f conversions’. On the other hand, the texts which
are literary, expressive and more reader-oriented require from a trans­
lator a great deal o f flexibility. One would think then that the
translation o f the first type of texts should be relatively easy because,
as Marilyn Gaddis-Rose says:
A translator can make art initial expenditure of time and energy to learn them
{i.e. terminologies) and henceforth keep up with them. This is why translators
need professional training in the Held(s) they translate and often have a doctorate
or professional degree in that area.4
Unlike technical translation, the range of texts in business and
commerce is very wide indeed. In many cases, we deal with texts the
translation of which depends on the appropriate ‘conventions of
conversions. These would be, for instance, legal documents ranging from
parliamentary legislation to birth certificates, trade agreements or forms
and documents used in banking and book-keeping. But business and
commerce also include such activities as selling, buying, advertising and
promotion, and here very often we are dealing with texts o f the second
type, that is more expressive, reader-oriented and sometimes even literary,
like TV commercials and newspaper advertisements. Thus, it seems that
no translator who is thinking about work in business and commerce can
assume that this is going to be a straightforward and easy task.
3 M. Gaddis-Rose, Translation Types and Conventions, [in:] Translation Spectrum,
M. Gaddis-Rose (ed.), State University o f New York Press, 1981 d 36
4 Ibidem.
7— Successful Polish-English...
97
 If the translation of specific and highly conventionalized texts
depends on learning a finite number of terms, conventions and
expressions, then there should be no problem with the efficient
translation of such texts. However, the conversion of such texts from
one language into another is easy only if we know not so much which
is the possible equivalent but also which one is acceptable in the
language into which we translate. A good example in this respect is
the problem we encounter while translating into English the seemingly
straightforward Polish word adwokat. The difficulty is that in English
there is no single word which we could choose as the only correct one.
The words we have at our disposal are lawyer, solicitor, and barrister,
simply because the English legal system does not allow one person to
undertake all legal duties as it is in Poland. So, while translating
adwokat into English, we should find out who in the English iegal
system will be competent to deal with the specific problem in the
document we are about to translate. A closer look shows that there
are more such ambiguous cases than we think and translators have
many problems with choosing the acceptable term. Let us look at
some examples.
The sentence below comes from a notary deed — that is, from
a document which is highly conventionalized and should be translated
with the greatest precision if the trade partners involved want to avoid
potentially serious legal problems.
Akcje pierwszej emisji będą wydawane po cenie nominalnej, objęte zostają przez
założycieli i pokryte wkładami pieniężnymi.
Shares o f the first issue will be issued at the nominal price, will be covered by the
founders and covered by cash contributions.
It is clear that something has seriously gone wrong here and in order
to sort out the meaning one has first to alter the faulty syntactic
structure o f the sentence-
The first share issue will be issued at the nominal price, covered by the company
owners and covered by cash contributions.
This sounds better, but it is still not clear what the legal meaning of
this sentence is. The crucial word here seems to be covered and any
English speaking person will be wondering why covered is repeated
twice and w hat the legal intention of the sentence is. Does it mean that
98
the shares will be financially secured by the company owners’ cash
contributions or perhaps mysteriously covered by the owners and then
secured by somebody else‘s cash contributions? The Poles, who have
no legal training, may at least deduce that the shares issued initially
will be bought by the founders and the founders will have to buy them
with their own money. However, it is very unlikely that a foreign
businessman will ever manage to figure out these details from the
English text.
Another paragraph of the same deed promises the following:
Akcjonariusze wyrażają zgodę na korzystanie przez spółkę w zakresie objętym
przedmiotem jej działania ze znaków firmowych i towarowych akcjonariuszy
i w razie potrzeby do udzielania spółce niezbędnych licencji. Korzystanie ze
znaku instytucji dopuszczalne jest jedynie przy działalności związanej z filatelis­
tyką. Instytucja zobowiązuje się do nieudzielania prawa korzystania z jej znaków
innym firmom konkurencyjnym wobec Spółki.
Shareholders express consent for the use by the company in the sphere covered
by the subject of its activities of the trade marks and brand names of shareholders
and In the case of the need to supply the company with essential licenses. The use
of the Institution s trade mark is permissible only in activities connected with
philatelist activities. The Institution agrees not to grant the rights of use to its
trade marks and brand names to other companies competing with the company.
We sincerely doubt whether any businessman would be able to figure
out what this statement is about. The first sentence looks like an
attem pt at linear translation, but the problem is that what can be
easily expressed in Polish becomes unclear in English. The reason is
that a well-developed morphology of Polish allows us to build long
and complex sentences with several subordinate clauses.5 In English
it is impossible, because soon we begin to realize that the logic of the
sentence is lost on us. And this is exactly what happens in the first
sentence o f this passage. The number of ofs is so high that it is hard
to understand how the clauses relate to each other, and when we get
to the last part o f the sentence beginning with in the case, the meaning
is entirely lost. But the unacceptable syntax is only a tip of the iceberg
here. There are incorrect expressions like: to express consent instead of
to give consent, permissible instead of permitted or to supply the
company with licenses instead of to grant (give) the company a licence.
5 See: O. Wojtasiewicz, Wstęp do teorii tłumaczenia, TEPIS, 1992, pp. 58-60.
There is also a great deal of clumsiness, as for instance in the
expression agrees not to grant the rights o f use. The translation we
would suggest may look like this:
Shareholders give the company the right to use their trademarks, and brand names
and whenever such a need arises the shareholders will grant the company the
' nccessary licence. The use of the Institution’s trademark is permitted exclusively in
philatelist activities. The Institution accepts the obligation to refuse the right to its
trademark to any company with which the Institution remains in direct competition.
This is only a suggestion and we cannot guarantee that this translation is
correct from the legal point of view. In order to avoid ambiguities, many
years ago a number of professional associations and political bodies in
the West came to the conclusion that the only way to ensure quality and
precision in translation was to introduce international terminological
standards. This means that, in some countries, translators and institu­
tions have agreed to use only one equivalent for a certain foreign word
instead of leaving the choice to the individual translator. In Europe, the
biggest project on the standardization of terminology has been initiated
by the EEC and the Council of Europe. In Poland, the first steps m this
direction are now being taken and recently TEPIS (Polskie Towarzystwo
Tłumaczy Ekonomicznych, Prawnych i Sądowych) has published the
first Polish-English dictionary of standardized legal terminology. There
is no doubt that further publications of this kind will make the
translators’ task much easier. Thus it may turn out that what we have
regarded as a correct equivalent in our translation of the above passage
may become unacceptable when the translation equivalents between
Polish and English become established and generally recognized.
PRECISIO N IN TRANSLATION
Adequate translation is not only a matter of accepted equivalents.
Before we agree on standard equivalents, we must define what certain
terms mean in the source language and then find out how the meaning
we want to convey can be expressed in the target language. Anybody
who has lived for some time in one of the EC countries or has taken
some interest in the economic integration of Western Europe will
know that finding a definition of even the simplest things may be
extremely complicated. For instance, it would seem that such simple
100
words as juice and jam are easily translatable into any European
language. However, it has turned out that juice in one country cannot
be sold as juice in another country and, what is more, the retailers have
no right to call such a product juice. The same applies to jam and
hundreds of other seemingly simple goods. Everything depends on what
the product contains or what it consists of. In order to call juice juice, it
must be pure and cannot contain added water, sugar or any other
additives. As one businessman has told us, the EC definition of juice is
four hundred pages long; and in order to avoid costly mistakes the
specialists have come up with such terms as juice drink, fruit drink J ru it
juice cocktail and half a dozen others. The same concerns jam . In any
supermarket in Britain we have to choose between ja m , extra jam , fru it
spread, etc. Each o f these products is different and on the producers and
retailers rests the legal responsibility o f making sure that the fruity
substance in the jar carries the correct label. This may sound to us like
a fairy tale but sooner or later we too shall be asked to consider what
Polish ‘marm alade’ is and how, if at all, it is related to the English
marmalade . Only after this is sorted out can we begin to think how to
translate marmolada into English and marmalade into Polish.
The area where these considerations are of particular importance
includes trade regulations. Let us look at one example which is
a translation of Poland’s recently changed customs regulations:
There are no obstacles in free export from Poland o f pieces of fine arts (paintings,
sculptures, bas-reliefs, etc.) made of popular materials. They may be exported
both by Polish nationals and foreigners provided that the conditions specified
under the Protection of Cultural Item s and M useum s A ct o f 15 February 1962
are satisfied. The same refers to anim als usually kept at homes and with hunting
trophies. Previous limitations in the field of transfer of the carriers of information
across the State border have been lifted.
The majority of this text requires correction, but we should like to
devote space mainly to certain phrases that definitely cannot be
applied here, either because they are totally incorrect or because they
are ambiguous. Thus the expression pieces o f fine arts should be art
objects or objects o f art. We can talk about fine arts (sztuki piękne) as
in Akademia Sztuk Pięknych (Academy o f Fine Arts) but not when art
objects, such as paintings, are to be exported, and, w hat is more, if
they are made o f popular materials. Here the question is how we
understand popular materials. For us it may be linen, wood or clay but for
101
 EXPRESSIVE AND OPERATIVE TEXTS
a rich tourist from Saudi Arabia it may e ; ^ ^ t g t h a t l s non-precious,
materials, can be So far we have been concentrating on literal and source oriented
and also includes such items . reeuiations the different items translation in which precision and professional knowledge are
named as ordinary. A'so m expor - ^ detalled manner. absolutely essential. But while translating in the field of business and
mentioned are usna“^ ' * S* ked is animals usually kept at homes. commerce, we shall also come across a number of texts which are
The next expression we marice ^ , , impiiCations expressive and more literary. In fact, in countries with a well-
One does not need to be a hngws COUntries, different animals -developed m arket economy, such texts are more common than texts
of such a statement may be IndtfererU cou ^ ^ a on of the literal type. These may be promotional materials, adver­
are kept at home, and even m „ „ „ n t be kept at home. Agam, tisements, commercial information, and many other types of pub­
a list of animals which either ca faave to figure lications. The function of such texts is different from the functions
if we wanted to take an animal out ofPoland,, * ^ ^ It is fulfilled by the texts we have looked at above. Sometimes they may be
out for ourselves what this strange p . ; d rather than informative but, in the majority of cases, they express some point of
very likely that the legislator had — e QUt our ^ view or conviction, or are devised to either alter our behaviour or to
domesticated animals, whi . anc| goats. To cheer us influence our choices. While translating such texts, we should take
(dogs, cats, gold fishes etc.) u n . the field o f transfer o f the into account a number of factors which we have not taken into
up, the legislators tell us ^ J ^ fta te border have been lifted. The account while attempting linguistically ‘faithful’ translations. First of
fflrriCrS o / B ! f » m « « . clumsy with the carriers o f all, we should realize that a text of the expressive kind is geared
expression the field ‘ J comes from the Polish norniki towards an audience, and, in the majority of cases, this is not a general
information, which as w - ^ ,g ambiguous; it may refer audience but a carefully selected segment of society. W hat follows
informacji Iri Enghsh Z ,^ ^ frombythis
testing
is thea need
number
to find
of out what style and register this selected
to technology bu also as knowledge audience accepts and w hat other non-linguistic factors seem to be of
informants, people posses g ^^ uncIear and incorrect. importance to them. We should also decide or, even better, be
The act quoted m the abov p B cannot be translated informed what the role/function of the text is supposed to be in the
Cultural is yet one more wor win a]ways give cultural as the language and culture into which we translate. Stephen Straight neatly
literally although bilingua ic ^ jnvoived in cultural studies formulates w hat the translation of expressive and operative texts
Polish equivalent of c u lw a l heritage. Thus a painting, entails:
or we can talk about a y ural heritage and has to
sculpture or rare print may be part o if need be. Such decisions about how ‘faithfully’ to render the original are heavily influenced
be duly protected, aIso by ^ ^ ^ {o suggest a possible by the translator’s perception of the audience for the end product. And I believe
that it is by focussing upon this issue that the notion o f the ‘purpose’ can be
AftBof thUcustoms^regulation’ ll must be remembered, however, given some stable basis for- use as a criterion for evaluation of translation.
Decision about which facets o f the original are to be conveyed in translation
that'we do^iot have a c c e sf» the original Polish text. cannot usually be made relative simply to the entire language-and-culture matrix
into which it is to be placed, since not enough guidance is usually contained in
The free export from Poland of ^Th'ey'may ^exjwrled^botli by^PolU^ this matrix for making the specific decision that must be made. Instead, the
made from ordinary ^ ^ ^ translator must choose among translational alternatives on the basis of an
nationals and foragriers. pre m 2 are satjsfied. The same applies to informed judgement concerning the specific background knowledge, sensitivities,
Heritage Protection Act of 15th Febra ty, restriclions as l0 the transfer and motivations o f the people who would be expected to read the translation.
Often such a specification o f the intended audience is ready at hand: a scholarly
the poush botder havc been
103
102
 work should be translated for scholars, a children’s book for children a shop
manual for mechanics. But sometimes such obvious signs are not availa e, and
the translator must dccide the matter in one way or another.
W hat becomes clear after reading this passage is that while translating
expressive or operative texts, we translators m ust not only ate but
„ko ‘adiust’ and ‘rewrite’ the texts, m order to meet the readers
requirements. One could say, then, that while undertaking the transla­
tion of expressive texts we have access to a bigger range of translation
strategies However, it must be remembered that having more rightsi and
possibilities means automatically having a greater share o f
for the final product of translation. In the world of bus ness and
commerce, this responsibility extends farther
because what counts at the end of the day is whether a translated text
has had the desired impact on the target readers. In practice it means,
for instance, whether the advertisement has brought new customers or
increased the volume of sales. If a promotional text or a leaflet does not
sound — I or is full of mistakes and typographical errors, then every
foreign businessman will think twice before initiating contacts wi
a P o l h partner who is not capable of promoting his own image abroad.
The extensive use o f English by Polish companies is a relatively
recent phenomenon and it is not surprising that the quality of Enghsh
language texts produced is very mixed. Therefore, it is too early o
offer comprehensive authoritative advice on how to
translate commercial texts. Instead, we have taken a representative
samole of printed materials, which have been available either m
Poland or abroad, and on the basis of these texts we shall try to show
how it is possible to avoid a number of errors, mistakes and cultural
misunderstandings.
IN F O R M A T IO N AND PR O M O TIO N
It is obvious that any country, government or business organization
which wants to attract foreign investors, has to provide and
information about the conditions for business activity and trade. Since
6 c c^iph, Knowledge Purpose and Intuition: T h re e Dimensions in the Evaluation
<*•>M- ° “ddis-Rosc' sta,e "
New York Press, 1981, p- 46.
104
the purpose of such publications is to attract foreign partners, they
must convince them that the place or business environment is attractive
and that the investment will bring good returns. T he minimal
requirement then for those who write and translate such texts is that
they must produce a piece of writing which reads well, contains
essential inform ation, exudes confidence and conviction and is idio­
matic and grammatically correct.
Let us look a t a couple o f examples. The first fragment comes from
a larger article on one of the m ajor Polish cities. The aim o f the article
is to convince • foreign investors that the place offers excellent
opportunities to them. The fragment we quote is about the sad legacy
of the communist rule:
Inadequate investment over a long period resulted in negligence of development
of the technical infrastructure — the sewage and water-supply systems, city
transport, and so on. Neither did the years of communist power exercise
a beneficial influence on the development of housing construction. Like in
a majority of Polish cities ghastly concrete housing estates were built. Their
interior architecture was very poor. They lacked a social infrastructure —
nurseies, not repaied for decades, fell ino ruin. Fortunately, the reconstruction of
once-heautiful Art Nouveau buildings was been started a few years ago. The work
is going slowly as it is necessary to make up for long-time neglect.
This is by no means the worst piece of writing we have come across.
However, we would like to show that by neglecting relatively small
things, we create a negative overall impression. W ithout going into
a very detailed analysis of the text, let us look at the first sentence.
The problem here is a familiar one and involves a translation of quite
acceptable long Polish sentences into utterly unacceptable English
sentences. Instead of using two ofs, one could say that inadequate
investment over a long period o f time resulted in negligence o f the
infrastructure. The words development and technical are not necessary
here at all for ag adequate expression o f the meaning, although it is
quite likely that they occur in the Polish version o f the text. As we
read on, we see that in English we would say interior design rather
than interior architecture. The expression the service, gastronomic and
retail network is simply incorrect. The sentence should read like this:
Services, restaurants and shops were scarce. This may sound less
technical than retail or catering (not gastronomic!) but at least one can
ty or understand w hat it is all about. The words nurseries and repaired are
105
misspelled. After this we enter the zone of grammatical problems. The
sentence about Art Nouveau buildings should read correctly as the
rr /„ honutiful Art-Nouveau buildings was started
reconstruct,on f ten4 defeats our
rather puzzling because one wonders why
»*»?-? ST 7 isf
it is necessary to make up fo r a long-time neglect? It: surely mus m
that the work is going well but, due to the neglect, the amount of work
involved is enormous. . _ If i
Another sample o f a promotional text is much more specific. It has
been produced by an association of Polish businessmen and its turn is
to attract firms and institutions which would be mteres e d m
operating with the association. The text is long, so we shall limit our
analysis to small fragments and single sentences. At the outset we are
hit with the following sentence:
K is the first Polish organization comprising of representatives o f Polish business
conducting their activities based solely on Polish capita .
Yet again a long sentence in which the meaning gets lost Why not say it
on Polish capital. The next mistake, or maybe just error, is rather amusing
since either the translator or the printers confused the word statute with
statue and the outcome looks like this: Acceptance o f the statue and
e k c L o f temporary authorities - June 20.1990. Much more difficult to
S is the last paragraph, and this is why we are quotmg it in full.
• • • * m mooeration with IPHIP are asked to give
Firms and '"?ut“ll0ns our address. We are interested in
U.dr applications, „ueshons and fadlitating of Polish private
active cooperation in creating an g ^ D ■
business with foreign partners annd foreign investments m Poland.
The first sentence is .so inadequate and discouraging that one wonders
whether anyone ihas responded to thid
tms invitation.
invuatiu Under no circum-
t hi vIher application, because it is both
stances do we ask anyone to give hisj tier app tp tjip v
an mcorrect and impolite phrase. We want to believe that IPHIP s
intentions were good and that they wanted to communicate the
following thought: Firms and institutions interested m cooperation a, e
invited to send (or forw ard) their membership applications, enqimie
and comments to our address listed below.
106
TRANSLATION IN ADVERTISING
This is probably the most difficult area for translators and we can
understand why it is so. First o f all, genuine advertising techniques
have only just arrived in Poland and, in many ways, we have just
begun to learn how and under what circumstances advertising can
help to sell products and services. From the technical point of view, it
is much better if the advertisements and commercials are not translated
but written in the language of the the target audience. We can easily
see the difference between the TV commercials which have been
translated from other languages into Polish and those which have
been written in Polish. The reason here is that successful adverts and
commercials very much depend on skilful linguistic manipulation, on
the knowledge of idiomatic expressions as well as on the use of specific
contextual associations, and it is only natural that a native speaker of
a given language is the best person to write or translate advertisements.
Here is an example, which we hope, will convince everybody that
rewriting adverts in a foreign language is much more effective than
simply translating them ‘faithfully’ from one language into another.
A British company producing electric equipment has been recently
advertising its electric kettle like this: Hand built, by George. No
wonder it’s Classic. The accompanying illustration shows a shining
electric kettle and an old fashioned watch' For the English consumer
this association is obvious since the linguistic play depends here on the
double meaning of the phrase by George. Normally the phrase
expresses surprise and adm iration, and it corresponds roughly to such
Polish expressions as Coś podobnego! or Niemożliwe! However, the
English by George! is very much class-bound and slightly old fashioned
. (possibly like the Polish Niebywale/), so few ordinary people would use
it today as it is associated with the upper middle-class life style. On
the other hand, by George may also mean literally that the kettle has
been hand-made by a man called George. So, the implication is that
if something has been hand crafted by George, it must be as reliable
as an old fashioned and expensive watch. And because the expression
by George is class-marked, the association is with old fashioned upper
class quality — that is why the manufacturer decided to call this kettle
a Classic. The linguistic and semiotic interplay here involves two
different linguistic and social connotations of the same expression and
107
is restricted to a particular cultural context. So, if we want
translate this advert semantically into Polish, the idea on which it has
been built would be immediately lost because a literal translation of
by George would not carry over th e. intended set of linguisticand
cultural associations. Thus, the only way here is not a direct translat o
but the invention of a Polish text which would have a similar effect on
the Polish consumers. . in Europe, Asia, the United States and Latin America. ZPR: the largest and most
One could say that the example presented above is a Particularly
complex one and that in' most cases we are dealtag
simpler texts. Although this may be true, it often turns
seemingly simple texts are not as simple as they look. Here is a go
example. An institution called ZPR or United Entertainm ent
Enterprises has produced the following advert in Polish and
English:
N a szą działalność charakteryzuje duży dynam izm i bardzo dobra
finansow o-ekonom iczna. S w ó j, d ziałaln ości, Z P R o b ejm u j, » " l e g o
poprzez 10 organizacyjnie wyodrębnionych oddzm łow
dziesiąt wyspecjalizowanych jednostek organizacyjnych,
całego kraju. ZPR prow ad zątów n ież działalność poza . products and services. In order to make them, one would have
naszego działania jest Europa, Stany Zjednoczone, Am eryka P » ^ m o v » . kraje
azjatyckie. ZPR są największym przedsiębiorstwem w sferze szeroko rozum .
kultury.
Our production is based on a dynamic organization and a sound
economic situation. In Poland, with 10 independent regionalbran<
specialized outlets, we cover all regions of the country, is a so
of Poland, in Europe, South America and Asia. ZPR is a large rp
active in the area of a mass culture in Poland.
The Polish text is neither metaphoric nor particularly complex. In fact
we could say that this is one of the least imaginative advertisements
we have come across. It is written in baroque, bureaucratic and
corrupt Polish which, until recently, had been favoure y read the following sentence:
communist politicians and party controlled media We suspecUha th
translator must have realized that this was not the style to ^create
English. As a result, the English text is a rewriting of the Polish
version. However, the rewriting is not radical enough, and, as a result
we are dealing with a text which is neither stylistically acceptable nor
grammatically correct. The first response of any reader would be to
correct the obvious mistakes but even then it would not be clea
108
what the message of this short text is. This is why, instead of
‘improving’ this passage, we decided to suggest n o t so much a new
translation but a functional equivalent of the Polish text, which
may look like this:
We are dynamic and our finances are sound. Our 10 major branches and
numerous agents are strategically placed all around Poland. We are also active
versatile artistic agency in Poland.
This is, o f course, a radical rewriting, and one could ask if we can still
call this text a translation, and whether we translators have a right to
make a good piece o f writing out of a badly written source text. Our
opinion is that while translating for advertising agencies we should not
ask such questions, because w hat matters here is not ‘faithfulness’ but
the correctness and effectiveness o f the text which we want to produce
for the consumer.
ta ft After specifying the basic requirements for translating adver­
tisements, we should not be surprised to find so few effective,
“ correct and interesting English language adverts of Polish institutions,
J
to be bilingual, bicultural and competent in modern advertising
techniques. The other, much better, but very expensive option,
is to hire a qualified foreign expert, who could write an advert
targeting the relevant consumer group in their own language.
. However, it will take time before we are able to afford it, and
this is why we propose to look at the texts which are circulating
now. We shall try to find out whether it is possible to do better
under the existing circumstances.
The first example we want to look at is a one-page ORBIS
advertisement. H alf the page is taken up by a photograph of a blond
woman, who is trying to look very friendly and inviting. Below, we
We are happy to provide.you with friendly service and full information.
There is nothing wrong with this sentence grammatically, yet one
instinctively feels that it is not right: it is too long, betrays a certain
hesitation and reads like a translation. W hat we need here is something
snappy and assertive, maybe something like this:
109
 We provide friendly service and full information
or
We offer friendly service and information.
Only when we read such a declaration do we know that the
translator/writer of this text has made an effort to convince us in our
own language th at ORBIS is really the right company for us.
Another transparent case of translation in the same advert is the
phrase reservations in the residences o f Polish Noblemen. Here only
a Pole can explain that this means that ORBIS is simply offering to
book rooms or accommodation in Polish stately homes. The text ends
with the sentence: Discovr the beauty o f Poland with O R B IS where
discover is spelt wrongly. A t the bottom , in small print, it says that the
services are offered by O R B IS Incoming Bureau. Now, again, Poles
will understand w hat it means because this is a semantic translation
of the Polish Biuro Przyjazdowe ORBIS, but to a foreigner, who is the
addressee of the message, this expression means nothing and is very
puzzling. The functional equivalents of Biuro przyjazdowe O R B IS,
would be travel office, travel agent or tourist board.
Let us leave ORBIS and look at other companies and institutions.
In recent years, we have witnessed a fast growth of the Polish financial
and banking services and new banks are keen on attracting foreign
investors. One of the recently set up banks is advertising its services
in the following way:
Wc are pleased to inform, that we have been in operation for 5 years, which in
case of Polish banks, is not at all a short period. We have manged to strenghten
our position among financial institutions both in Poland and abroad. Due to wide
contacts with Western banks and international financial organizations for which
we are reliable we have become a perfect partner for expansive Polish business.
The first sentence has misplaced commas and there should be
a pronoun you after inform as well as a definite article before case. We
would also prefer to say that we have been operating instead of we have
been in operation. The words strengthen and managed are misspelled
and the expression among financial institutions is clumsy; one would
instantly w ant to say the world o f finance or just simply: we have
become well jknown in Poland and abroad. However, the m ajor problems
begin in the next sentence because it is not really clear what it means
110
a.t all. One cannot be reliable fo r something, and we wonder whether
the word the translator had in mind was not responsible, because one
can be responsible fo r contacts with organizations (misspelled again!).
The problem is, however, that responsible does not fit here, either! So
our next guess is that perhaps the bank wants to say that in Poland
they i epresent the interests o f (some) Western banks and organizations
and this is why they are a perfect partner fo r expanding (not expansive!)
Polish business. Unfortunately, this in only our subjective interpretation
of the message because it is really impossible to figure out what the
intentions of the Polish text had been in the first place.
Now, let us look at the range of services the new banks are
offering. One of them declares:
The bank offers:
handling bank accounts and carrying out financial operations,
favourable interest rate o f time deposits
— giving credits, granting loans
professional and efficient foreign exchange services
— providing bank guarantees
— acting as a broker in selling securities.
W hat we notice immediately is the expression time deposits which does
not exist in English. The correct term is fix e d time deposits. But what
we object to in this list o f services is both the style and the form of the
offer: it is wordy and clumsy and as such it will rather deter than
attract foreign investors. W hat we would suggest is the following:
The bank offers:
— bank accounts and financial operations
— good interest rates on fixed time deposits
— credit and loans
— efficient foreign exchange services
— bank guarantees
— professional assistance in selling securities.
The unnecessary wordiness is a common characteristic feature of
almost all advertisements prepared by Polish banks. They also contain
obvious and self-explanatory phrases such as the bank operates bank
accounts or services domestic and foreign financial settlements and
takes and places deposits in Poland and abroad. Bank accounts can be
either closed or opened and there is no need to say that they will be
operated. The second expression means probably that we can settle
111

bills through our bank account and in the third expression there is no
need to say that the bank takes deposits, since it is clear that in or er
to place them somewhere they must take or receive them m the tirst
place. „ , A .
Unfortunately, the problems we have talked about seem to be very
common and we suspect it will take some time before we see better
texts.
m ix in g s t y l e s
In this chapter we have been trying to show that a good translation
of any commercial text depends on a skilful selection of appropriate
stylistic features and that an effective advert or leaflet must loolc and
sound like a text written by a qualified native speaker. .It should be
stressed, however, that a text in which we find a mixture of incongruous
stylistic and cultural conventions may be as ineffective as a text m
which the conventions are not observed.
There is a whole range of translated texts which we could call
‘hybrids’. This means that translators knew some conventions but they
did not know how and when to use them. As a result, we come across
texts in which there are contradictory stylistic features and, as a result,
it is not clear to whom the text is addressed and what its tone is. The
most common ‘sins’ here are: the mixing of American and
English, the unsuccessful imitation of the style used by the tabloid
press, the inappropriate use of colloquial style, and, finally, the mixing
of different styles (‘high’ and lo w ’, for instance) m the same piece of
Wn Let us look at two fragments from an article which is supposed to
promote a Polish musical.
, I HAVE
TAKEN
A RISK
BATAX owner
spills the guts
In spite of many difficulties that Polish bureaucracy creates for foreign investors
more and more western business people are deciding to start commercial
ventures in Poland.
112
Witold Kubiak, a Swede of Polish origin, owner of BATAX Ltd., an international
corporation located on the 18th floor o f the luxury Marriott hotel in downtown
Warsaw, is one o f these energetic people whom the bureaucratic machine did not
scare.
2. When in London or New York I try not to miss many important performances.
In Warsaw I met a wonderful team of artists: Janusz Józefowicz — actor,
choreographer and director, and Janusz Stokłosa, a composer. We became
friends then decided to do something together. To the libretto o f Maryna and
Agata Miklaszewski, Janusz Stokłosa created ravishing music and Janusz
Józefowicz was the man who put all the pieces together and completed this
e x t r a o r d i n a r y show.
There are obviously some basic mistakes in these passages. For
instance, one should have said those energetic men, and in the second
passage there should be a comma after We became friends. It would
be also much better to say that the intention of the interviewer, and
probably o f the interviewee, was to convince us that a musical
produced in Warsaw may be as good as any musical produced either
in London or in New York. The style of the article is supposed to
reflect the cosmopolitan and worldly atmosphere of the Polish capital
and its show business. However, the first doubts arise when we look
at the title. We assume that the snappy phrase I have taken a risk is
supposed to exude energy and optimism. Unfortunately it does not,
because of the choice of grammatical tense and an indefinite article.
I have taken a risk translates into hesitation because the speaker is
telling us that he has just taken an unspecified risk and does not really
know what is going to come of it. This is certainly not what M r
Kubiak intended and what the western show business people would
like to hear. W hat the foreign readers would like to hear is / took the
risk, which means that the speaker decided to do something daring
and succeeded in doing it. W hat we are talking about here is a subtle
grammatical difference, but this subtle difference can radically change
the meaning and the tone of the intended message. Equally problematic
is the subtitle of this interview. In British English one can say to. spill
the beans, meaning ‘to reveal unknown facts’ or, according to The
Oxford Dictionary o f Current English, to give the show away. We can
suspect that the writer’s/translator’s intention was to achieve the same
effect but the expression to spill the guts is not interchangeable with to
spill the beans, simply because it does not exist in English.
8— Successful Polish-English... 113
 The cosmopolitan character o f Warsaw is also implied in the
phrase an international corporation located on the ISt i floor oj e
luxury M arriott hotel in downtown Warsaw. Unfortunately, downtown
Warsaw produces a comical effect here, because it is a typica y
American phrase, and we rarely say downtown while referring to
ElUThe second passage is an interview and the style becomes even
more colloquial but, as before, we come across which do
e x p r e s s . o n s
not belong here. Thus, one cannot create r a v i s h i n g music to l le h’’
— music can be brilliant but never ravishing, and libretto is too formal
here; one should have simply chosen words. Another 'n“PP™Pr‘^
phrase we come across is to put all the pieces together.
colloquial expression indeed. However, in order to apprecia e 1 ,
m ust know w hat pieces the interviewee had in mmd: pieces of mu 1
or pieces o f stage design? As it is, the phrase does not make much
SeDOne could say, of course, that these mistakes are mjnor as they do
not obscure the meaning. But it must be remembered^ th at texts like
this one have other, more important, functions than the imparting of
information. Their role is to advertise something or to co n v .n ^
a group o f people (sponsors or clients) that they are dealing
experienced professionals. If a promotional or a commercial text is to
achieve this objective, it must show that it has been written and
translated by professionals.
Chapter Six
THE ROLE OF TRANSLATOR
M uch stress has been placed by us so far on the importance of
a translator’s knowledge of the social and cultural context of the
works in the source language as well as that of the target language
which, as has also been mentioned, does not always in Poland happen
to be the translator’s mother tongue. Because Poles are very often in
the rather awkward position of being obliged to translate from their
own language into English, and not vice versa, they should be aware
of the extremely varied role they play when rendering a text from one
language into another. It is only natural that we would primarily like
to emphasize the translator’s role as a linguist due to the multitude of
badly translated Polish texts we are inundated with in our everyday
life, but there are also a number of other roles every translator is faced
with when confronting a text, be it well or poorly written in the source
language. M any of those roles are controversial, have already been
questioned and discussed by translators, translation theorists and
writers themselves throughout the ages, but it might be useful to pose
some of those questions anew in our own Polish context today, at the
same time trying to come up with some answers and advice as to how
we should act, and which role we ought to adopt in a given situation.
TH E RO LE O F LINGUIST
The translator’s role of linguist is unquestionable. M any of the
problems encoutered in texts translated from Polish into English were
touched upon in previous chapters. Some of them, as well as others,
require more explanation and development in order to try and show
115
that one of the basic requirements of a good translation is that it is
correct linguistically. This includes grammar, syntax, style, even
spelling. Many Poles who write in English and attem pt to translate
into that language forget, or do not realise, that the wrong use o f the
definite or indefinite article, the omission of a comma or the misuse of
a preposition can not only ruin the sentence but also make it even
sometimes incomprehensible to the reader. If we are going to write
anything at all in English, we can but try to place the right words in
the right place.
There is no doubt whatsoever that the and a are two little words
that give Poles writing in English many a sleepless night. M any people
have difficulty in believing this but the usage o f the and a in nine cases
out of ten boils down to the basic rule. O f course, there is always the
exception or the case where even native speakers, who .often tend to
rely rather on intuition than on rules, will differ in their opinion as
whether to use an article in a given situation or not. This is w hat is
both extremely worrying to the non-native English speaker, as well as
difficult to understand and accept. However, there are certain situations
in which, if a mistake is to be made, we can be sure it will be.
It is customary to believe that if we are mentioning something for
the first time, we have to use the indefinite article a or an. On the
whole this is true, but if we are defining something at the same time,
the definite article the has to be applied. An example o f such a mistake
occurring can be found in the following sentence:
I met Dominique Mazeaud in June of 1986, We were both participants in
a conference ‘Now and Beyond Time’ organized by a young painter, Tomasz
Sikorski.
In the given text, this conference is mentioned for the first time but
when its title is given, it automatically becomes defined. The young
painter, who is the organizer, is also presented by name, so the should
be used here as well. Another example, but in the plural form, is:
... the present painting is a reconstruction made by a modern artists, Łucja and
Józef Oźminowie.
We know who the artists are and that is why the has to precede
modem artists. In the following, on the other hand, another common
problem occurs:
116
King Stanisław August wanted to convey a message that a power and wisdom
o f the nation...
The message in question here is described and that is why it has to be
the message and not a message. The second mistake in the quoted first
part o f the sentence is the omission o f the in front o f power and wisdom
of the nation... Because power and wisdom here belong to the nation
they automatically become defined. When something is OF something
else, it is defined (even if.it is mentioned in the text for the first time) and
has to be preceded by the. In many texts translated into English, a is
either used in such cases or both the and a are omitted altogether. In an
article describing plans for an exhibition, we can find such a sentence:
In our conversations and letters there appeared and matured a project of an
exhibition described as a meeting of the two Madonnas...
The project is described here so it has to be the project
In the field of history and famous buildings, we quite often come
across such examples:
During the reign of a monarchs of the House o f Vasa...
or
It was then that the castle took a shape of a sumptuous building...
Omissions o f this sort are, unfortunately, an everyday occurrence.
A nother situation in which Poles are sometimes undecided whether
to use the or not is before such phrases as: Virgin Mary, Black
Madonna, King, Tsar, Teutonic Knights, etc. As people are taught not to
use articles before proper names, and quite rightly so, they sometimes
become confused with nouns generally when they have to be written
with a capital letter. In reference to the above phrases, let us look more
closely at the following sentence taken from a recently published text:
The copies o f a Black Madonna picture...
We talk about the Black Madonna of Częstochowa and so on.
When a given king’s or tsar’s name is presented as, for example,
King Stanisław August or Tsar Nicholas II, then of course it would
be a mistake to place the before their names, but even when we are talking
about a specific king or tsar and using capital letters, then we have to have:
117
 The paintings, according to the King’s order... ,
or
...and after the collapse of the November Insurrection it became a seat of the
Tsar’s governors.
and not:
The paintings, according to King’s order...
and
... and after the collapse of the November Insurrection it became a seat of
a Tsar’s governors.
We say the Teutonic Knights because there were different types or
groups of knights in the past and the adjective ‘Teutonic’ describes
a specific order that had so much to say in Polish history.
Because the past, and the Polish past in particular, is discussed and
written about so much, we also have, to remember that we always say
the 17th century or the 19th c. By saying which century it is, we are
defining it, thus the necessity of the.
Another case where the is invariably omitted, but should be used,
is after the word all, in the Polish meaning o f ‘wszyscy, wszystkie’, e.g.:
All a rooms, however, are furnished...
When all means ‘caly’ as in all day (‘cały dzień’) then the definite
article is omitted, e.g. I spent all day doing it.
The and ajan do not have their equivalents in the Polish language
and this results in so many problems, the most common of which have
been mentioned here. The use of the preposition ‘o f, denoting the
genitive case is, as we have seen, also connected with the above. Much
of the clumsiness or glaring faults occurring here, together w ith ’s, or
saxon genitive as it is generally known, is something we have to be fully
aware of and is also worth discussing in slightly more detail. Please look
at the following Polish sentence and then at its English translation:
Nie tak dawno Krzysztof Penderecki otrzyma! nagrodę Grammy, nie zapom­
nieliśmy jeszcze o skandynawskim festiwalu Lutosławskiego...
Krzysztof Penderecki received Grammy’s Award, we have not yet forgotten
about Scandinavian Lutoslawski’s Festival...
118
This is an example of a beautiful mix-up as far as a number o f matters
are concerned. W hat Penderecki received was the Grammy Award (the
award does not belong to Grammy!) and it was the Scandinavian
Lutosławski Festival. Somebody else decided to write: the Lutoslawski’s
festival. This is one of the most common mistakes involving the
definite article and the saxon genitive we come across. One excludes
the other. If Lutosławski appears here as a proper noun, then the
cannot precede it. If the composer’s name is used as an adjective,
which is entirely possible, then it cannot take the saxon genitive. Thus
we can either say: the Lutosławski festival or Lutosławski’s festival.
In another text we seem to have an identical example to the one
just quoted, but in correcting it we are faced with yet another problem
concerning the saxon genitive and o f with which many people have
difficulties in coping. We cannot accept, for example:
During the Stanislaus Augustus’ time...
A part from the grammatical mistakes discussed above, we have the
problem o f the word times which sounds rather awkward in:
During Stanisław August’s times...
Here our suggestion would be:
During the times of Stanisław August.
And thus we come to the very im portant, and for many, very difficult
issue of the little word o f in the genitive case.
One cannot help but cringe at coming across such translations in
one o f the most famous and prestigious Polish palaces. One would
expect beautiful English to match the beautiful interiors. The Gallery
o f Polish Portrait is presumably to mean The Polish Portrait Gallery.
A court secretary of Jan III and his first architect of Wilanów Palace...
In a case like this we definitely should use the saxon genitive:
Jan I ll’s court secretary and, at the same time, Wilanów Palace’s first archi led...
or
...the first architect o f Wilanów Palace...
On the other hand, many people feel they should try to avoid using
119
the word o f in a sentence too many times, which often results in
phrases like the following:
... but aiso as a seat of the Commonwealth o f the Two Nations’ Seym.
... private enterprises’ development included...
or
...particularly after Jasna Góra nation’s vow in 1956...
The first two quotations are the easiest to correct as they involve
a clumsiness easily understood. Here o f has to be used in place of s’
which results in:
...of the Seym of Two Nations.
or
... the development of private enterprises included...
and there is no need to fear this sort of repetition. It is slightly more
difficult with the third example as it takes a little extra thought on the
part of the reader to decipher what the translator actually had in
mind. The original Polish was:
... zwłaszcza po jasnogórskich ślubach narodu w 1956 r....
It really takes some talent to make such a mess o f a relatively simple
phrase. Is it so difficult to come up with a version like:
... the vows made by the nation at Jasna Góra in 1956.
The saxon genitive is in the same place but the ordering of words in
the sentence is changed. It is absolutely essential to remember what
goes after what and w hat belongs to what in an English sentence.
Besides of being part o f the genitive case in English, it is one of the
many prepositions that cause translators rendering Polish texts into
English a number o f problems. The most common mistakes seem to
involve in, on, at, by, o f
The Polish sentence:
W okresie Królestwa Polskiego powstało natomiast wiele projektów dotyczących
generalnej przebudowy Zamku.
was translated thus:
120
Many plans of the genera! rebuilding of the Royal Castle were created during the
existence of the Kingdom of Poland.
We do say plans o f a given building, etc., but in this case it would be
advisable to use for instead o f of and rephrase the whole sentence as
the clumsy use of the preposition is only one of the many problems
here. Our suggestion would be:
Many plans for the general reconstruction o f the Royal Castle were made during
the ‘Kingdom of Poland’ period.
When it comes to Time and Place and the use of prepositions, we
can be'sure that on or in will often be used instead of at. Please look
at the following two sentences:
1) The 17th c. beamed ceiling was discovered during preservation works in the
palace on the turn of fifties.
2) In the end of the west wing we Find...
The phrase in the end means ‘finally, at last’, and that is why, in the
above, we have to say at the end o f just like at the end o f the garden, or
at the end o f the path. In the first sentence quoted, the m atter is slightly
more complicated. The Polish phrase is na przełomie lat pięćdziesiątych,
and we could say the above was a direct translation. The problem lies in
the fact that in English we have to say: at the beginning o f the fifties or
at the end o f the forties and beginning o f the fifties. It is only in
connection with centuries that we say at the turn of the century. As the
Polish in this case seems to be more precise, it is also necessary to
remember that e.g. na przełomie X IX i X X wieku is at the turn o f the 20th
century. Some people tend to get this slightly mixed up.
All sorts of funny things occur when phrasal verbs are being used
in translations:
Stanisław August ws.tąpił na tron w 1764 roku.
The English version of this was:
Stanisław August Poniatowski climbed onto the Polish throne in 1764.
Maybe the king sometimes felt as if he were climbing onto his throne
in the purely literal sense o f the word, but here it would definitely be
better to say that Stanisław August Poniatowski became king in 1764.
121
He occupied the Polish throne from 1764 can be used if the translator
feels he absolutely has to use the word throne. We can also say
Stanisław August Poniatowski came to the throne in 1764.
On the other hand, the preposition is sometimes omitted completely
and, in the English text, we have to guess at w hat the meaning of the
sentence actually is. We must remember that even in writing or
translating i t is t h e l i t t l e t h i n g s t h a t r e a l l y m a t t e r .
Let us take the following example into consideration:
They turned a to be a great help to architects engaged in the task of rebuilding
the capital.
To make the sentence correct and readable we have to insert that little
word out after turned.
W hen speaking about the importance of the ‘little.things’ in our
translations, we have to keep in mind th at just as we can spoil
everything by using the instead of a or vice versa, we can bring about
the same negative effects by using the wrong prepositions.
The following text was taken from a catalogue on a contemporary
Polish photographic artist’s exhibition in one of the Warsaw galleries.
It was in Polish with an Enghsh translation added.
L ekkie Przesunięcie
1. Wyszedłem na balkon —
2. Mógłbym też zejść na dół i spojrzeć w górę —
3. Zobaczyłbym siebie, stojącego na balkonie —
4. A będąc na balkonie...
5. ... widziałbym siebie na dole —
A Slight Transfer
1. I went out at the balcony —
2. But I also could go down and look up —
3. I would see myself standing at the balcony —
4. ... and standing at the balcony...
5. I would see myself down.
A part from the title, which certainly requires thought, it would really
be hard to find a simpler text to translate. And those five short
sentences ju st come apart because of the wrong use of at. We always
stand on balconies and we see whatever — ourselves too, if we so wish
it — down below. In this context, the word down cannot be left
standing as if in mid-air at the end of the sentence. The title of the
122
text is problematic, but it would definitely be more advisable to use
the word shift: A Slight Shift (or A Small Move). Transference is
^synonym o f shift and would not be incorrect if used, but transfer can
be found in rather different contexts. We can transfer, move something
or somebody from one place to another. It is a definite action that
m ay also take the passive voice, e.g. The boy was transferred to a new
school. The ambassador was transferred to a different country in
Europe. This cannot be done ‘slightly’. Every single word in a text is
im portant and we always have to try our best to choose the right one.
This is not always easy.
Translators, unfortunately, sometimes get totally lost in their own
work, and this does not only concern the use of prepositions. Let us
look, however, at the following:
Zawieszono je (podobizny Czarnej Madonny) więc w domach, przypinali je
w czasie bitwy rycerze i zabierali w podróż ludzie wszystkich stanów.
Thus, they were hung in houses, pinned by noblemen during battles, and carried
around by travellers.
The indicated part of the sentence has been translated directly from
the Polish, but in English it is totally incomprehensible. You have to
pin something on something. Here we get the impression that while
fighting, the noblemen (by the way, rycerze are knights) were busy
pinning something goodness knows where. This cannot be. The
translation has to make sense, especially if the original is intelligible.
In this case, we suggest: worn by knights in battle.
Quite a lot has been said here about the little words in English that
help to make up the language. Sentences are also put together with the
help o f punctuation the use o f which, unfortunately for us, tends to
differ in the two languages we are interested in. The problems, of
course, usually concern the comma, and this is one more very little thing
that, if wrongly applied, may result in total incomprehensibility on the
part of the reader. In sentences translated from Polish into English, we
often find the comma placed in exactly the same places as in the Polish
text, although, in English, they are not supposed to be there at all:
According to the legend known, from the very beginning of the sanctuary’s
existence, to the masses of the picture’s admirers, the picture is the work o f St.
Lucas. The legend also said that it was the picture itself that chose the
Częstochowa mountain being called Jasna Góra (Holy Mountain).
123
The Polish original version of the above sentence is:
Według legendy, od zarania istnienia sanktuarium znany szerokim rzeszom jego
czcicieli, obraz jest dziełem Świętego Łukasza, sam też wybrał sobie za siedzibę
górę, na jego część Jasną nazwaną.
It might be better to refrain here from any comments on the Polish
but the English is written so carelessly, with the commas added in such
a haphazard manner, that the whole sentence just does not make
sense. Let us try to clarify the punctuation, also correcting the English
as we go along.
According to the legend, known from the very beginning of the sanctuary’s -
existence to its vast number of worshippers, the picture is the work of Saint
Luke. According to the same legend, the picture chose that place for its home,
which was called ‘Jasna’ in its honour.
Here, not only some of the commas have changed position but the
extremely awkward Polish sentence has been divided into two slightly
built up English sentences in the hope that the text will become a iittle
more understandable to the English reader.
It goes without saying that the way words are put together to form
phrases and sentences, and the punctuation marks that help them all
become an intelligible whole are what can make or break a text. It is
difficult to fully accept the following translations of these two Polish
sentences:
1) W podziemiach świątyni spoczywają książęta mazowieccy i wybitni Polacy:
laureat Nagrody Nobla Henryk Sienkiewicz i pierwszy prezydent Polski
niepodległej, Gabriel Narutowicz.
The church’s crypts contain the graves of the dukes of Mazovia, and eminent
Poles. Henryk Sienkiewicz, the winner of a Nobel Prize, and the first president
of an independent Poland, Gabriel Narutowicz.
2) Po stronie przeciwległej mieszkał twórca opery narodowej Stanisław Moniusz­
ko, a dalej laureat literackiej Nagrody Nobla — Władysław Reymont, po
wojnie zaś twórca zespołu „Mazowsze” — Tadeusz Sygietyński.
...While across from it is where the creator of Polish national opera, Stanisław
Moniuszko, lived. Somewhat farther on lived Władysław Reymont, Nobel
Prize for literature winner; Tadeusz Sygietyński, creator of the „Mazowsze”
Song and Dance Company, also lived there after the war.
In the first quotation, we can presume that the full stop instead of
a colon was a printing error, but in both sentences we are dealing with
124
Nobel Prize Winners. Władysław Reymont was the Nobel Prize Winner
for Literature. The Polish word twórca always seems to cause problems
tas it is used to describe anybody who creates anything, while in English
we have to be extremely wary about using creator. M oniuszko was
a composer who certainly played a very im portant role in the
development of Polish national opera. Sygietyński, on the other hand,
was the founder of the above mentioned Song and Dance Company.
It is also always advisable to first give the name o f the person we are
writing about and then the rest o f the information. Thus, for example,
Gabriel Narutowicz, the first president of independent Poland and Stanisław
Moniuszko, the most significant composer of Polish national opera.
THE ROLE OF ARTIST
We always have to be aware of how the languages work, w hat lies
behind them, w hat we can do with them and how far we can stretch
them. T hat is why the traslator not only has to be a linguist but also
very often takes on the role of writer, creator — yes, this word is being
used consciously here — manipulator, and interpretive artist. Just as
writing is an art, so is translating. In whatever one does, one has to
be creative, artistic; one has to use one’s intellect and aesthetic values
in order to produce translated texts that will primarily render w hat the
author o f the original wanted to transm it to the reader. This is a task
which often requires so many different roles from the translator, roles
that he is sometimes not even aware of. However, in order to fulfil any
of these roles, or sometimes all o f them, he definitely “ must have the
kind of sympathy a writer has, including a love for words and
a delight in their possible combinations. These powers are unpredictable
and mysterious, but without them no true translation can take
place.” 1 The translator has to know how to work with words, how to
juggle them around very often. Karl Dedecius calls translation a game,
and games mean m ovement.2 M ovement is action, active thinking. We
1 Frank MacShane, The Teaching of Translation {in:] The World of Translation
(Papers delivered at the Conference on Literary Translation held in New York City in
May 1970 under the auspices of P.E.N. American Center).
2 Karl Dedecius, Notatnik tłumacza (trans, from the German by Jan Prokop),
Wydawnictwo Literackie, 1974, p. 148.
125
have to know how to think over and about what we are translating.
In the process of thinking, we begin to interpret. When we interpret,
we become artists in our own right, and it is in this sphere that a good
translator’s work also becomes a work of art. It is often his
manipulation of words, his play with the text in front of him, that
finally results in what he is aiming for.
We often feel and believe that art is synonymous with freedom,
that an artist, an author is free to do and write anything he
wishes, while a translator cannot enjoy this freedom as he is limited
by somebody else’s text. He cannot change anything, he should
not try to improve the text, and he should be careful not to
ruin something that was originally good. The limitations are certainly
there but also thanks to those limitations we are not responsible
for the content of the text. It is not ours. W hat is purs, however,
is the English we use in our translation of Polish texts. And
it is in our use of the English language, in our interpretation,
that we can be artists or total failures. Dedecius says: „Przekład
ogranicza swobodę, ale żąda sztuki. Autor może. Tłumacz musi.” 3
Translation may limit our freedom but it requires art from us.
An author may be an artist, a translator must be one. We come
across the same opinion expressed by Krystyna Tarnowska in
her paper „Translating into Polish” where she says, „the translator
must be not only an artist aware of his task in assimilating a foreign
work, but also an informed reader of the literature of his own
and other countries.” 4 Tarnowska was concerned with translating
from a foreign language into Polish, i.e. into your own tongue.
Here we are dealing with the opposite situation: translating from
Polish into, English. The same rules, however, apply, although
to a modified degree. If the target language is not your own,
you have to be doubly aware of not only the language you are
using but also of the whole system of aesthetic features that are
linked up with the language of the translation.”
In other words, we also have to be artists. This role can be
understood from various angles and it can take in the translator-artist
3 Ibidem.
4 Krystyna Tarnowska, Translating into Polish [in:] The World of Translation.
Papers delivered at the Conference on Literary Translation held May 1970.
126
as creator, adapter, remaker, m anipulator or even mediator. Whatever
we are at the given moment, we must remember about the final result,
about w hat Tytler said in 1790, that translation should have all the
ease of the original composition. O f course, the original composition
m ay not have any ease whatsoever.
However, no m atter what the text is like, whether we are happy
with it or not, whether we appreciate it for its merits or think it is
a waste o f time translating, if we do undertake the task, we should do
our utm ost not to bring shame on ourselves as linguists and artists.
T hat is why “ the modern translator, like the modern artist, strives
after self-expression, although the self-expression may well be a not
too literal expression o f the self. The translator is a literary artist
looking outside himself for the form suited to the experience he wishes
to express.” 5
Let us look at an artist’s written form of expression. The following is
a text displayed at an exhibition in Wroclaw’s Perfamo Gallery in 1973:
OCEAN
— unicestwić odruch wartościowania,
— przyjąć banal w najzwyklejszy sposób, bez akcentowania egzotyki co­
dzienności,
— utożsamić się ze światem zewnętrznym, by pozbyć się fałszywego poczucia
wyższości w stosunku do otoczenia,
— odrzucić przekonanie o składaniu ofiary z siebie na rzecz sztuki,
— porzucić myśł o doskonałości wyzbycia się wszystkiego,
— być.
The English published version is:
An Ocean
— to annihilate the reflex of evaluation,
— to accept banality in the simplest way, without accentuating everyday
exoticism,
— to identify oneself with the outside world in order to get rid of the false sense
o f superiority in relation to the environment,
— to reject the conviction o f sacrificing oneself for the sake of art,
— to abandon the thought about the excellence of getting rid o f everything,
— to b e.6
5 Renato Poggioli, The Added Artificer [in:] On Translation, Harvard University
Press, 1959, p. 141.
6 Zbigniew Dłubak, Wybrane Teksty o Sztuce (Selected Texts on Art) 1948-1977,
(trans, from the Polish by Aniela Korzeniowska), ART TEXT, 1977, p. 49.
127
 Here we are translating what a painter-phOtographer expressed in
words, every word being for him of the greatest importance. We also
have to be artists but we are not free to reject the slightest word here.
The responsibility o f such a text weighs on us heavily as we know
that the slightest misunderstanding may change the meaning of the
original. Here we are artists, not in the sense of having total freedom
to do what we like with the text, but in working on it to the very best
of our ability, to keep to the original meaning and to make it
comprehensible in the target* language. The English version quoted
here is just one possible way of translating such a text. Other
possibilities, especially in the third sentence, come to mind im­
mediately. This can be done quite correctly and without changing the
meaning, e.g.
— to identify oneself with the external world so as to do away with a false sense
of superiority in relation to the environment.
This, however, is always the way. The more we ponder over a text, the
more ideas we may have. We could keep on trying to improve what
we have already written and it is sometimes difficult to decide which
is better, which should be the final version. It is always good, and
certainly advisable to go back to our translated versions if this is at
all possible, but we do not think it is good to go back too often. We
will never be truly satisfied. This, of course, applies especially to
perfectionists.
Before going on to discuss the translator-perfectionist, the example
cited above brings to mind a structural problem that often occurs in
the translating o f such passages. Let us look at a quotation from
a handbook on Poland published by Interpress:
The Polish Academy of Sciences has the following duties over and above the
conduct of scientific research:
(1) to assure appropriate conditions for general progress in Polish science...
(2) determining the directions of scientific research...
(3) cooperation with... state organs...
(4) representing Polish science at home and abroad.
There is a striking lack of consistency here and “ of the three different
structures used, (to assure, determining and representing and co­
operation), the first is probably the most appropriate, since duties
imply action and this is m ost strongly conveyed by the infinitive form.
128
It would, therefore, have been preferable to retain this form through-
out.
These two examples have the same structure, although they concern
totally different ideas. The first is philosophical in content, the second
purely informative. In both, however, we have to try to be as good as
possible. The understanding o f this concept may vary greatly from
translator to translator. Adam Czerniawski, the translator of a great
■deal of Polish literature into English, believes that “ translation is out of
necessity a duplication of the original” but „if translations survive it is
purely due to their artistic values”.8 A translation “ must identify itself as
an artistic entity” although at the same time it “ transfers contents”.9 In
his works, whether he is translating poetry or prose, he is both concerned
with the artistic-aesthetic values as well as with transferring the content
of the original. As “it is inherent in the nature of language that it conveys
meaning” 10let us look at two examples of Czerniawski’s translations of
Cyprian Kamil Norwid’s writing, one of a poem and one of prose.
1) Slla ich
Fraszka
Ogromne wojska, bitne generały,
Policje — tajne, widne i dwu-plciowe —
Przeciwko komuż tak się pojednały? —
Przeciwko kilku myślom... co nie nowe!
Their Strength
Epigram
Commanders valiant, armies fully trained,
Police: male, female, uniformed and plain,
United against whom?
A few ideas that aren’t new!11
Translating poetry is one o f the most difficult tasks translators
sometimes face. Some believe poetry is simply untranslatable and
because o f this do not even attem pt it, others believe only a translator—
7 Alan Duff, The Third Language, Pergamon .Press, 1981, p. 62.
8 Adam Czerniawski, Cyprian Kamil Norwid, PoezjajPoems, Afterword (trans,
from the Polish by Zbigniew Suszczyński), Wydawnictwo Literackie, 1986, p. 115.
9 Ibid., p. 117.
10 Ibid., p. 119.
11 Ibid., pp. 8-9.
9— Successful Polish-English... 129
poet can translate poetry, while yet others believe poetry can be
translated but they themselves are not up to it. Due to this rather
singular situation, we also do not think we have the right to criticise
if we cannot correct or improve what has already been translated.
However, an unanswered question continues to rankle: Couldn’t the
above have been done better? The English version is undoubtedly
good; t h e m e a n i n g is there, it has d u p l i c a t e d t h e o r i g i ­
n a l , the contents have been t r a n s f e r r e d , but there is something
missing. The original comes from the 19th century and is burdened
with historical context. The translation is contemporary and could
apply anywhere in the world. Thus we can say Norwid s poem is
excellent, the translation is good. The original forms an artistic entity,
the translation is a much poorer duplicate. Is there any way of solving
this problem?
Norwid was also concerned about the emancipation of women.
The following is a fragment from his work on this subject:
2) O niższości kobiety nazbyt wiele- pisanym i głoszonym było tak u nas, jak
i gdzie indziej, aby godziło się jeszcze tym formalnym zajmować paradoksem.
Filozof Trentowski mniemanie to do godności krytycznej podnosi mówiąc, że
„ICobiety wszystkie szyją i kuchnie robią, a jednakże skoro o dobrze uszytą
szatę idzie lub o dobry obiad, wtedy nie do szwaczki albo kucharki (żeńskiej),
lecz do k r a w c a i k u c h a r z a odnosimy się.”
Niźli odpowiedzieć i na to acerbum dictum postaramy się, przyznać
trzeba, źe jest dowcipne, lubo to jest pod piórem filozofa zaleta niewielka.
From “Emancipation o f Women”
Too much has been written and said both in Poland and abroad regarding
the inferiority o f women for anyone still to engage with this formal paradox.
The philosopher Trentowski raises this assumption to critical respectability
whdn he says that “All women sew and cook, yet when we need a well-sewn
garment or a good dinner, we choose a tailor or a chef, and not a seamstress
or a cook” .
Rather than reply to this acerbum dictum, let us agree it is witty, although
this is not a weighty virtue in a philosopher. 12
Comparing these two examples, we can quickly see how much easier
it is to translate prose, especially if we decide to contemporize the
target language. This is also a controversial matter that has been
argued over by more than one translator. Czerniawski himself believes
12 ibid., pp. n o - l i l .
130
that if the works of writers of the past were dressed in ancient
language they would be “like a twentieth century ‘antique’ patterned
after the original Chippendale” . 13 It is certainly difficult not to agree
with him here, especially if the main function of our translation is to
transpose meaning, and the contents of the original text. It is
undoubtedly better to make the translated text understandable and
familiar to the modern reader than to try archaisms we may know
very little about.
This m atter brings to mind the translations and dialects used in the
most recent film version of Choderlos de Laclos’ Les Liaisons
Dangereuses, directed by Stephen Frears. Here we are digressing from
the Polish-English issue to the French-English one, but this is of minor
importance. The French nobility use beautifully correct standard
English while the peasants and servants to the nobility speak broad
Scotch! It is only natural that the language of the two social classes
differed, especially in the 18th century, but can we really peacefully
accept such blatant linguistic discrimination?
It is extremely difficult to know what to do for the best in such
situations. There are so many issues involved here: cultural background,
social differences, the various dialects of the original language which
in no way whatsoever correspond with the second language and the
dialects used by the people apertaining to that language and culture.
Dialectal differentiation has to be made but the question remains as
to how we do it, what should we decide upon and how far, as
translators, we should go. This also touches upon the m atter of
jargon, idiom, m etaphor that will be discussed in fuller detail in the
following chapter.
THE R O LE O F INTERMEDIARY
Jan Parandowski said that ‘‘the translator attains the highest dignity
when he is aware of his mission as an honorable intermediary in the
exchange of goods...” i4 There is no doubt whatsoever that because in
our translations we try to exchange goods we are intermediaries but
we also w ant to produce texts that would be pieces of art in their own
13 Ibid., p. 117.
14 Jan Parandowski, cited by Krystyna Tarnowska, op. cii.
131
right, and would convey the same meaning intended by the author.
With many Polish texts published in the past as well as today —
maybe even more so today — the translator is faced with the task of
not only being an intermediary, an artist, a writer. In order to
perform all those roles, he primarily has to u n d e r s t a n d the
author’s ideas, to be able to follow his line of thought, to be aware
that he cannot misunderstand the original. This is easier said than
done, as many Poles involved in writing today, especially when it
concerns scientific and scholarly texts, believe that the more sophis­
ticated, difficult and complex the style, the better. They forget that
there really is not much sense in writing if nobody but they themselves
can understand their train of thoughts. We, however, as translators,
are faced with this problem when we are asked to translate articles,
essays, papers that are to be delivered at international conferences,
etc. And here the questions start mounting up at a terrific rate. How
far and to what extent are we to be faithful to the original? Can we
abbreviate? Are we allowed to simplify the text? Should we rewrite it
to make it more comprehensible to the foreign reader/listener? How
far can we go?
These questions arise again and again. The answers to them may
also vary considerably. The point is that we cannot really go very far.
A great deal depends on the text we are translating, whether it is
a poem, a novel, a play, a script, i.e. fiction, or whether it is a scientific
treatise or a philosophical dissertation. A lot also depends on the
audience the translated text will be addressed to. This does not apply
when we are translating poetry or fiction but it may apply when we
know the text will be delivered at a conference or will take the form
of a lecture. In such cases, it is sometimes to the advantage of the
author’s reputation if we take it upon ourselves to simplify matters.
Let us look at the following example that is quite comprehensible to
the reader but is unnecessarily long:
Regardless of the form and extent to which shorter working hours are introduced,
whether this takes the form of a five-day week or a shorter working day, or
occasional free Saturdays, shorter working hours mean more free time from
work and in consequence longer rest from work.
(Poland, a handbook,
Interpress Publishers, Warsaw 1974)
132
The amended version is:
Regardless of how shorter working hours are introduced —- through shorter
working days, five-day weeks, or occasional free Saturdays — the gain is the
same: more spare time and greater leisure.15
In a situation like the above, there is a certain am ount of
redundancy that we can do well without, and the original text has only
benefited from it. It is part of a descriptive-informative piece of
writing and we can presume that its main aim is to inform the reader
how Poland in the early seventies was trying to organize a shorter
working week with more leisure time for its people. The corrected
version has not changed the meaning o f the original. It has simply
clarified it. This is very im portant, and in cases like these we can
hardly criticise the translator for any form of transgression.
However, there are sometimes texts that no m atter how hard we
try to make them comprehensible in our translated versions, they will
continue to remain difficult. The style, the choice of vocabulary, the
structures used are all complex, and in such situations the translator
does not have the right to change something that is heavy, sophis­
ticated, even incomprehensible into a piece of writing that is light,
simple and totally lucid to even those readers who do not know the
first thing about the subject in question. Some writers are just made
that way and we, unfortunately, are the translators of their works, not
their editors or rewriters. Although we are operating in a language
that may be totally different to the source language, we remember that
the meaning, style, rhythm o f the original is rendered in the translation,
even if our own feelings on the m atter are different. In this we are
limited but our awareness of the languages in question and our
understanding o f how to use them can, and should, result in separate
artistic entities.
One of the many daunting problems a translator faces when
confronted with the type o f text mentioned above is understanding the
printed word. The author is strongly convinced that it has to be
written in such a manner and very often cannot even understand why
the translator is asking stupid questions, or is so obviously ignorant
about his line of thought. The translator may not have the same
15 Alan Duff, op. d r ., p. 117.
133
knowledge of the subject in question — this is only natural
— but he has to understand in order to translate. And this
is what is often so difficult. Joseph F. G raham says that “ translation
is an art of compromise” 16 but we would also add th at translators
themselves have to acquire the art of compromise and tolerance.
It is sometimes difficult when our nerves are at breaking, point
over something that need not have been written as it was. The
following sentence is taken out of context but it presents the
above issues very clearly: ■
W praktyce malarskiej i fotograficznej dotyczy to zbanalizowanych swym
formalizmem, związków między barwami i tonami, kontrastami i fakturami,
płaszczyznami i przestrzeniami, a także równie trwałych różnic między wypowie­
dziami (malarstwem i fotografią, prowokowanych bądź ruchomym i akomodacyj-
nym widzeniem oka, bądź statyczną kamerą), czy też gatunkami; w malarstwie
współczesnym czystą wizualnością sztuki nieprzedstawiającej, w fotografii
przedstawieniem widoków rzeczywistości.
(Andrzej Turowski,
Poza porządkiem formalnym, 199!)
Mustering all our powers of concentration it is possible to
understand what has been written here, but when we have to do this
for fifteen pages, very often forgetting what was at the beginning of
the sentence by the time we have reached the final punctuation mark,
we start wondering what we can do with this, and how far we can go.
Let us see how best we can render it into English:
In painting and photographic practice, it concerns the relations between colours
and tones, contrasts and structures, surfaces and spaces that have been made
banal by their formalism. It also applies to the equally permanent differences
between expressions (between painting and photography provoked either by the
eye’s mobili ty and accomodational quality, or by the static camera), or genres;
in contemporary painting by the pure visibility of non-figurative art, in
photography by presenting views of reality.
This translation is as faithful as it is ever going to be. In articles
on philosophy and art, as in the majority of scientific dissertations,
every idea, every formulation is of importance to the writer. Every
word is there for a purpose and it is our task to find the closest
16 Joseph F. Graham (ed.) Difference in Translation, Cornell University Press,
1985, p. 205.
134
equivalent possible. It is not always easy, and that is why we can say
that translation is both an art and a compromise.
We very often would like to apply what Jiri Levy calls the minimax
strategy: “The translator resolves for that one of the possible solutions
which promises a maximum of effect with a minimum of effort.” 17
Sometimes we do apply this strategy but Jan Pilar in his article „Tri
aspekty umeleckeho prekladu” talks about the great care we take in
trying to achieve simplicity and naturalness when translating. Thus the
requirements we face are'm uch higher than a philological equivalence
of the text. It means the art of transferring a linguistic and artistic
structure into an often totally different structure not with the help of
verbal equivalence but in the spirit of the original. This reconstruction
must result in us being able to read it as if it were an original w o rk .18
THE RO LE O F REW RITER
In order to achieve a translation that would read as if it were an
original work, and also by applying Levy’s minimax strategy, we often
find ourselves manipulating the language to suit our own purposes.
Nabokov calls a translation the “wilful reshaping of a text” . This is
sometimes unavoidable, as no m atter how hard we try to duplicate the
original, a certain am ount of our own rewriting and creativity seeps
into the translation. Rewriting, however, if condoned and taken to the
extremes, can only cause trouble as could be seen in the first English
translation of M ilan K undera’s The Joke. Kundera very often works
together with his translators and for him rewriting is a crime: “ Now,
more and more, translators have become rewriters. I spent three
months with the manuscripts o f the American translation of The
Unbearable Lightness o f Being, and what irksome months they were!
My rule of style is: the sentence should be of maximal simplicity and
originality. The rule observed by my poor translators: the sentence
should appear rich (so that the translator may exhibit his linguistic
faculty, his virtuosity) and as banal as possible... And yet for
17 Jifi Levy, Die literarische Ubersetzung. Theorie eitter Kimstgattung. (trans. Walter
Schamschula), 1969, cited by Susan Basnett-Mc Guire, Translation Studies, p. 37.
18 Jan Pilar, Tri aspekty umeleckeho prekladu (trans. Jadwiga Bulakowska), [in:]
Przekład Artystyczny. O sztuce tłumaczenia II, Ossolineum, 1975, pp. 261-270.
135
a translation to be good it takes so little: to be faithful, to want to be
faithful/’ 19
It would be interesting to observe K undera’s reaction to the
manipulation that so obviously took place in the translation of the
following text:
Każda rzecz ma swój początek, który waży na dalszym biegu wydarzeń z nią
związanych — jak chwila i miejsce urodzenia waży na przyszłości człowieka.
Dlatego dzieje 1939, dzieje kampanii polskiej, która rozpoczęła obecną wojnę
światową — mają i będą miały do końca kataklizmu jaki przeżywamy, znaczenie
wielkie i szczególne. Poznanie ich, poznanie prawdy o Połsce walczącej, prawdy
o wydarzeniach jakie rozegrały się w roku 1939 nad Brdą, Wisłą i Bzurą, jest
obowiązkiem wszystkich narodów walczących z przemocą — a przede wszystkim
samych Polaków. Propaganda wrogów Polski, będących jednocześnie wrogami
ludzkości i cywilizacji, a może w pewnej mierze lekkomyślność emigracji polskiej
— uczyniły wszystko, aby blask bohaterski polskiego ognia od którego zapłonął
świat — przytłumić. Wiele trzeba książek i słów, aby naprawdę na nowo na
wierzch wydobyć, ażeby dzieje 1939 roku we właściwym ich sensie dotarły do
świadomości społeczeństw i wyparły uprzedzenia Polskę krzywdzące, a oparte na
kłamstwie i niewiedzy.
(Jerzy Pomian,
Z ziemi polskiej do szkockiej, 1944)
Everything has a beginning which determines to some extent the course of the
events which are to follow. The Polish campaign of 1939, which began the
present war, will always have a direct and unique bearing on the more
spectacular dramas we are witnessing today. It is my opinion that the events of
September, 1939, are worth knowing about and worth remembering for all those
nations who have had to face aggression. Much water has flowed under bridges
since then and much ink has been spilt — especially by the enemies of Poland,
who have done their best to obscure the suffering and the gtory of those
seemingly far-off days. Much more will no doubt be written before the truth of
the happenings shines clear through the rubble of misrepresentation.20
In studying these two texts very closely we can see how very
controversial the matter of translation is. Quite a lot has already been
said and stressed about rendering the meaning of the original. Here
the meaning has definitely been rendered. We cannot criticise the
19 Milan Kundera, "Fictive Lightness, Fictive Weight". Two interviews with
ICundera. „Sałmagudi, a quarterly of the humanities and social sciences”, No. 73, 1987,
p. 18.
20 George Pomian, Eagle and Tartan, (trans, from the Polish by R. Pearce), The
Polish Library, 1944, p. VII.
136
language used, as it is certainly not what Alan D uff would call a third
language. It is correct, it reads well, but it is undoubtedly what
Leonard Forster would call “a new product, that, is to say it is the
result of a re-creative process” . 21 We can accept this re-creative
process as being something positive in the art of translation. However,
in the above case, we feel this process has gone a little too far. Here
a number of issues come to the foreground: redundancy, faithfulness
or lack o f it, our understanding of equivalence and of what a literary
text should consist of. In reference to the' above translation, we can
also revert back to the question already posed in this chapter: How
far can we go?
Redundancy very often occurs in Polish academic texts. The
more long-winded they are, according to some scholars, the better.
To make them comprehensible to the English reader and listener, it
may be to the advantage of the text to abbreviate, to reduce it
slightly, to even clarify certain points. The above is not a historical
treatise but the first half of an author’s preface to a novel. It is
a literary text, the writing of which was to serve a specific purpose.
The style is very typically Polish: the sentences are long with many
inserted clauses which an English translator may believe to be totally
redundant. If our aim is to transmit information only, then we can
discard, if we think it so essential, everything that is not relevant to
the main topic in question, but here, no m atter how creative we may
wish to be, we must remember that “a translator has to pull in the
reins on his fantasy. The author’s art, just like every other art, is
egocentric. The same applies to the art of the translator, but, besides
this, it must renounce itself, become subordinate to someone else,
absorb w hat belongs to someone else and permit oneself to be
absorbed” 22.
We may often feel inclined to cut a text, to get rid of what we think
to be totally superfluous. But are we really allowed to do that? The
above text was written by a Pole whose feelings and emotions are in
full evidence in this preface; his repetitions, emphasis and elucidations
are there for a purpose. We do not have the right to deprive liim of
21 Leonard Forster, Aspects o f Translation, Studies in Communication 2, The
Communication Research Centre, University College London, 1958, p. 23.
22 Karl Dedecius, op. cit., p. 147.
137
his own text. There can be both creativity and fidelity in what we do
as translators and it is an art in itself to know how to combine the two.
In his essay “The Evaluation and Use of Translation” , Frederic
Will said that
we must require o f translations a complex accuracy to their original. It is clear
that we will expect a translator of literature to be far more than a good linguist,
though capable linguist he must be. He will have to be an initiate in the poetic
use of language, and incidentally, be able to distinguish between the prosaic and
poetic elements of the work he translated. Neither of these two abilities, we
believe, presumes in the translator a strong creative faculty. Yet the third
requisite for accuracy, a fidelity to the whole conception of what he translates,
does suppose a creative faculty in the translator... it requires that he keep the
precarious balance, here between his own creative power and the persistent,
dominant ‘other*, to which he must remain faithful.23
Let us look at a passage from the translation of Stefan ŻeromskFs
Wierna Rzeka done by Stephen Garry and published in London
in 1943.
...Przybyły zawołał, lecz stary człowiek nie obejrzał się. Zawołał po wtóre —
i również na próżno. Wtedy, wyciągnąwszy kostur, z lekka potrącił go w plecy.
Starzec drgnął i obrócił się gwałtownie. Był już bardzo wiekowy, niemal
zgrzybiały, lecz rozrośnięty w barach, kościsty, prędkich ruchów i, widać, mocny.
Twarz jego o kolorze żywej rdzawości zimowego jabłka była zbiegowiskiem
nieprzeliczonych zmarszczek, które przecinały ją we wszystkich kierunkach, jak
ślady cięć tasaka na kucharskiej desce, tworząc istne promieniska dookoła ust
i oczu. Biała jak śnieg, gęsta i zwarta czupryna nad tą twarzą zoraną, pełna
potęgi i wiedzy o życiu, jaśniała w zmierzchu. Wielkie ręce były jak narzędzia
zużyte i zdarte od pracy. Na widok przybysza twarz starego stała się sroga
i okrutna. Wszystkie zmarszczki zbiegły się ku krzakom brwi i jamom oczu
otaczając je niby las igieł najeżonych.
The arrival called out, but the old man did not look around. He called a second
time — and equally fruitlessly. Then, stretching out his staff, he tapped him
lightly on the shoulder. The old man shuddered and abruptly turned around. He
was obviously very aged, almost decrepit, but massive across the shoulders,
large-boned, with brisk movements, and evidently very strong. His face, the vivid
russet colour of a winter apple, was a concourse of innumerable furrows, which
criss-crossed it in all directions like the marks of a chopper on a kitchen
chopping-block, and gathered in groups of starry radiations around the mouth
23 Frederic Will, The Knife in the Stone, Essays in Literary Theory, “The Evaluation
and Use of Translations” (first published in Wisconsin Conference on the Teaching of
World Literature (1959) pp. 23-30), p. 83.
138
and eyes. Above that furrowed face, expressive of power and knowledge of life,
his hair, snow-white, thick and heavy, gleamed in the semi-darkness. His great
hands were, like instruments worn and torn with labour.
At the sight of the new-comer, the old mans’s face grew severe and cruel. All
the tiny furrows ran together towards the bush of eyebrows and the pits of eyes,
surrounding them like a forest of bristling needles 24.
This example fully supports the view presented earlier here by
Frederic Will. There is accuracy, fidelity, and the translator’s creative
faculty is evident throughout. The only matter he took full liberty with
was the division of paragraphs. The author’s were different, as can be
even seen in the above, but due to this fact no wrong has been done
to the text. It has not suffered because the translator felt that, in the
English version, he had to go about this slightly differently than
Żeromski did. The division of paragraphs does tend to vary sometimes
in both languages. These differences should also be taken into
consideration.
The whole idea of equivalence has been widely discussed over the
years and the different views on this issue vary greatly as well. Some
believe that translators can deal very freely with their originals while
others th at they m ust be very, as it is called, ‘literal’. We can certainly
be ‘literal’ in such texts as the one quoted above. The possibilities are
quite obviously there and there is absolutely no need to let your
imagination run away with you in the process of translation. Within
your use o f the language, you are free to choose and be creative. This,
of course, becomes much more difficult with texts that offer resistance
to translation. In his essay “Translation and Criticism” , Frederic Will
connects resistance to translation with what he calls scene-language,
the language o f the day that just does not want to yield to a different
lingo. He gives Jarosław Iwaszkiewicz’s story Fama, with its strongly
socialist context, as a good example here.25
Fama is a story written in 1952 Poland where the author is being
wonderfully ironic about socialist realism and the mentality of some
people during that period in Polish history. However, it is not the
language of the day that resists translation (it is relatively simple) but
2* Stefan Żeromski, The Faithful River (trans, from the Polish by Stephen Garry),
Minerva Publishing Company, 1943, p. 15.
25 Frederic Will, op. tit.; “Translation and Criticism”, (first published in Iowa
Review (1971) pp. 97-108), p. 120.
139
the socialist context that would probably be totally incomprehensible
to the majority of readers in the English speaking world. On the other
hand, it would be understood and undoubtedly highly appreciated by
the other Eastern Bloc countries that were undergoing similar
innovations in their life-style, and culture.
We may have socialist realism behind us but the problems of
translating texts that are strongly embedded in tradition and the
culture of the given country appear over and over again. Even if
translated well from the point o f view of language, they often sound
odd, awkward, foreign. The situation is made worse when there are
lexical mistakes and it is very obvious that the translator neither
fully understands nor feels the words he is using. The couplets
written by Wojciech Młynarski in 1991 for W arsaw’s most recent
production of Wojciech Boguslawski’s Krakowiacy i Górale (Craco-
vians and Mountaineers) were translated thus in the theatrical
programme:
Solidarni w konspiracji i pierwsi na szańce
w czas pokoju wyczyniamy kłótliwe łamańce
nie od dzisiaj prosta z tego nauka wynika,
żeśmy w zgodzie, gdy wspólnego mamy przeciwnika.
Solidary in conspiration and eager to go to entrenchments
In peace-time we do envious acrobatics
And a simple lesson that history has taught us for years it is that
We are brought to harmony by a common enemy.
There is no doubt whatsoever that this is a very difficult text for
a number of reasons: language, rhyme, historical and cultural back­
ground. Even very good translators would be apprehensive about
translating it, but the printed result may leave one speechless. To say
it is a disgrace is really putting it mildly.
We are sometimes faced with the necessity of translating poetry
because it just may happen to be part of a longer piece o f prose
writing. If we cannot manage the rhyme and metre, then it is advisable
to either use blank verse or simply prose. Anything would be better
than the above mess. There is no such word as solidary, or conspiration
for that matter, and, even figuratively speaking, it is difficult to
imagine envious acrobatics. Entrenchments of course exists, but is it
really the most appropriate word here for the rather obsolete and
140
poetical szańcel Let us try to do something with this and see if it is
translatable at all:
At one in conspiracy and the first to go to battle
In peace-time always so full of argumentative prattle,
Today is not the first time we learn the simple lesson
That only in danger do we come to a concession.
We think the above proves that with a little thought and effort a great
deal can be done. There is no doubt that creative faculty, linguistic
intuition, as well as fidelity, can be brought together to produce a text
that should not bring shame to the writer-translator. However, “ the
translator can never be sure of himself, he must never be. He must
always be dissatisfied with what he does because ideally, platonically,
there is a perfect solution, but he will never find it. He can never enter
the author’s being and even if he could the difference in languages
would preclude any exact reproduction. So he must continue to
approach, nearer and nearer, as near as he can, but, like Tantalus, at
some practical point he must say ‘ne plus ultra’ and sink back down
as he considers his work done, if not finished (in all senses of the
word)” . 26 If we w ere■to refer here to the above translation of
Mlynarski’s couplets, the phrase that is extremely meaningful and
strongly relates to one of the rather negative traits of the Polish
nation’s character is zawistne łamańce which has been translated
rather mildly as argumentative prattle avoiding the word envious
altogether. To many Poles this may be a controversial m atter because
the word zawiść or zawistny is used very often and it has a much
stronger connotation than the English envy or jealousy, and to some
it might be of great significance here.
We must remember that, in our work as translators, we will never
find total equivalence nor a perfect solution. It is also necessary not
to worry about this fact. Just as in the above couplets, where there
could be many different versions, some better and some worse, we
must also realise and accept that so much depends not only on our
knowledge, abilities but also on our own interpretation of the text in
the source language. We can but try our best, remembering that
a translator “works with images and words which, like a grafted
26 John Biguenet, Rainer Schulte (ed.), The Craft o f Translation, “Translation as
Metaphor” by Gregory Rabassa, The University o f Chicago Press, 1989, p. 12.
141
branch, or even a transplanted tree, still owe their new life to a seed
planted elsewhere by other hands” . 27
Keeping this in mind, let us look once more at Stephen G arry’s
translation of Stefan Żerom skie Wierna Rzeka. The English version
is a pleasure to read, but when one looks closely at the endings of the
text in both source language and target language, one cannot help but
wonder at the interpretation o f the translator. The final paragraphs
are simply different in meaning and the question arises whether Garry
misunderstood Żeromski (which is extremely difficult to believe) or
whether he quite consciously decided to make the ending more
comprehensible to the reader. Żeromski’s conclusion is ambiguous, its
duality in meaning worrisome, while G arry’s, though as sad, quite clear.
Szła zwolna ku domowi. Lecz na jakowymś drobnym kamyku potknęły się jej
stopy. I tak tam padła twarzą w ów mokry piach.
Stary Szczepan wstał, jako co dnia, o świcie i szedł po wodę z wiadrami do
stoku, co tam pod gruszą bił od wieków. Mruczał do siebie stary kucharz
i poskrzypywał wiadrami jako co dnia. Skręcił z drogi na ścieżkę prowadzącą do
źródełka, gdzie było bliżej. Aliści — zda mu się rzucić okiem na drogę — leży
cośik czarnego. Tknęło go wnet złe czucie, że toto będzie jakaś bieda od polskiej
strony. Już się był nawet cofnął, żeby ta przecie ktoinsy spotkał... Ale z samej
ciekawości podszedł ostrożnie. Gdy się zaś dobrze zbliżył, cisnął wiadrami na
ziemię — i do niej co duchu w gnatach. Podjął ostrożnie z ziemi grubymi rękami
bezsilne ciało — zachylił zwisłą głowinę sobie na ramię i niósł do domu zwolna,
pojękując:
— Cóż ci też to, chudziąteczko — cóż ci to? Oj, wiedział stary, oj, wiedział...
Dogodziły ci, widać — trafiły cię, oj, celnie — da postrzeliły celnie*...
She walked slowly towards the house. But her feet stumbled over some little
pebble. And so there she fell with her face in the damp sand.
Old Stefan arose at dawn as on every other day, and went with buckets for
water to the spring which had flowed for ages beneath a pear-tree. The old cook
walked grumbling to himself and with buckets clattering as always. He turned
off the road on to the path leading to the nearest turn o f the spring. But — as
he cast his eyes along the road, he thought he saw something black lying there.
He was at once troubled with the foreboding that it was yet another unhappy
wretch from the Polish rising. He was even turning to go back, leaving someone
else to come upon that wretch. Yet out o f very curiosity he cautiously
approached. But when he was quite close he flung his buckets down and ran to
her with the speed of the wind. With his great rough hands he carefully raised
the strengthless body from the ground and, with her head hanging limp over his
arm, he carried her slowly to the house, crooning:
27 Renato Poggioli, op. d r., p. 139.
142
What is’t then, my pretty, what is’t then? Your old father knew, ay, he
knew... You was fond of him, wam’t ye? An’ he had thee sure enough... Ay, he
had thee after all!
Our reflections dwell here on the final paragraph, but we have
quoted the whole passage so that it may be a little easier to
understand what was actually happening. F or those who do not
know the book or have totally forgotten the plot, it may be worth
recalling that the above mentioned female, Salomea, fell in love with
Prince Józef Odrowąż,’ a seriously wounded insurgent whom she
saved, cared for and brought back to health. Her love was recip­
rocated, but because his mother could not accept a daughter-in-law
from a lower social class, she worked on the young girl’s love so
cleverly and manipulated events in such a way as to tear him away
and prevent such a socially unacceptable marriage taking place.
In the original text, the old servant refers to Salomea’s father
who had guessed w hat was happening between the two young
people. And his ‘dogodziły ci, widać — trafiły cię, oj, celnie
— da postrzeliły celnie!...’ is his way of speaking, of describing
the aristocracy and how they could hurt, injure in order to
achieve their own ends. He probably did not understand the
intricacies of the m atter, that her tragedy had been brought
about by Józefs mother, the princess. He was simply summing
the aristocracy up as a whole and w hat the outcome of the
encounter was.
Now when we look at Stephen G arry’s version: “An’ he had thee
sure enough... Ay, he had thee after all!” he places emphasis on an
event th at actually happened and refers to he, the prince. They had
been lovers. It is a conclusion brought about by the events that had
taken place previously, summing up w hat was most important, that
she had lost her lover and her world had fallen apart. This is a more
personal interpretation, looking at what had occurred between two
young people. In the Polish version, the emphasis is on the wrongs
done to her by a different social class.
It is difficult for us today to know why Garry decided on such an
interpretation. Was it a conscious act or did he simply misunderstand
Żeromski? M aybe such an understanding suited the translator better
from a personal point of view and he thought it might be clearer to
the British reader? There are a number of possibilities here but,
143
whatever the answer is, we can see on the basis o f this example how Chapter Seven
many roles a translator has. Here he has appeared as a very good
linguist, as a writer, as a creative artist, a manipulator, and, last but REASONS FOR MISTRANSLATION
not least, as an interpreter. We cannot judge him; we have to accept
that all these roles are inherent in us when we undertake the task of
translating anything. We just have to remember to interweave them
together so intelligently as to produce a text that will continue to give
pleasure for many years to come.

In the previous chapter much was said about the translator’s

various roles. Often he is unaware o f those roles and many of the
decisions taken are subconscious. That is also why we should be
careful about judging him and his decisions which may have simply
been different to the ones we might have taken in a given situation.
We can, however, express our opinions, and very loudly indeed, if we
see that source texts have been misunderstood and that the translator
is totally incapable of coping with the task he has undertaken.
U N D E R S T A N D I N G w hat we read is of prim ary importance
and one of the main reasons for mistranslation, or translating something
wrongly which, in turn, leads to misunderstanding on the part of the
recipient. Because the majority o f Polish texts translated into English in
Poland today are done by Poles for whom English is a second language,
this leads more often than not to what Alan D uff calls a third language1
and w hat is described by Peter Newmark as ‘translationese\ The latter
explains this term as literal translation that makes little sense or is
unnatural2. Whether we call it a third language, translationese, or simply
mistranslation, it involves work that is being written, printed and
propagated which is often lacking in sense, is unnatural and, what is
more im portant in our Polish context, is frequently incorrect from the
point of view o f grammar, sentence structure, style, choice of vocabulary.
The last mentioned also concerns the understanding and choice of
idiom and metaphor.

1 Alan Duff, The Third Language, Pergamon Press, 1981.

2 Peter Newmark, A Textbook o f Translation, Prentice Hall, 1988, p. 50.

10— Successful Polish-English... 145

 As far as grammar, style and structure are concerned, the main
problem lies in an inadequate knowledge of the English language and
o f so many people not realizing that they should not even attem pt to
translate at all, never mind into a language that is not their own.
A more subtle problem is the misunderstanding of idiom and metaphor,
and of the meaning of lexical items in general, that is caused by not
being fully aware o f the different nuances of language, by not realizing
S Y N O N Y M S usually cannot be used freely and interchangeably,
that cultural conventions have to be also known and understood, and
that we, as translators, are often faced with expressions, phrases that
have to be translated and seem to be untranslatable. A writer can
choose w hat he writes and how he goes about it, while a translator is
always limited by somebody else’s text and is responsible for the
solving of all those problems. It is in this chapter that we would like
to go into the above issues in greater detail, and not only discuss the
reasons for mistranslation but try and show how those mistakes can be
avoided.
GRAMMATICAL MISUNDERSTANDINGS
Although gram m ar as such has already been touched upon by us in
our discussion on the role of a translator as linguist, many grammatical
mistakes are made by the translator due to his misunderstanding of
the SL text, or inability to treat the SL as one thing and the TL as
a totally separate entity, at the same time making sure that both texts
render the same meaning and have the same impact on the reader.
Let us take a fragment of a relatively easy Polish text that
a number o f aspiring young translators rendered into English, and see
where grammatical problems occurred:
Narrator ludzkich namiętności
Byłem właśnie w połowie Jego autobiografii Miłość i wygnanie, gdy dowiedziałem
się, że umarł. Miał łat 87. Ale będąc jeszcze zanurzony w jego losie, w jego
intymnościach, w jego myślach i słowach „zobaczyłem” ten fakt niejako jego
oczami. Cóż to właściwie znaczyło, że umarł? W pewnym sensie stało się to już
bardzo dawno, on sam opisywał siebie w jednym z pierwszych opowiadań,
a może w pierwszym, jako trupa, który przebywa wśród żywych, bo nie wie, że
jest trupem...3
3 Mirosław Ralajczyk, Narrator ludzkich namiętności, „Gazeta Wyborcza”, 1991.
146
TITLES as such tend to be problematic and more will be
said on this further on in the chapter. However, looking at the
above, the main grammatical problem that occurs is with the
genitive case. Should we use o f or should we try and find
some other solution? The majority wrote A I T h e N a r r a t o r
o f H u m a n P a s s i o n s and this is also what we would recommend
here. W hether to use a or the, or to omit it altogether, is also
questionable but whichever we choose here will not lead to either
incorrectness or misunderstanding. Awkwardness creeps in when
we try to abbreviate the title by using the saxon genitive, e.g.
Human Passions’ Narrator or we treat human passions as an adjectival
phrase qualifying narrator, e.g. Human Passions Narrator or Human
Passions Story-teller. Unfortunately, there is no one rule as far
as titles are concerned. The general idea is usually to keep them
as brief as possible. In this case, emphasis is placed on the
word narrator and then we elucidate as to what type of narrator
he was.
Analysing the text further, the first sentence caused some unexpect­
ed problems, showing tptal loss on the part of some translators. It is
hard to presume a lack of understanding of the SL text here but the
following renderings did appear:
1) I was just through a half a his autobiography...
2) I was just half way through of writing his autobiography...
In both cases, we can talk about obvious carelessness but such
examples o f carelessness are very often copied and printed for the
whole world to see. We can guess that in 1) the second indefinite
article (a his autobiography) was a slip o f the pen, appearing here
instead of o f but the first a in a half shows a misunderstanding of the
use of half and of when we say a half half or half-way. As far as 2) is
concerned, the very common mistake of using writing instead of
reading occurred here, but why o f is used is a question that cannot
help but arise. We can be half-way through doing something or
through something. There is no other possibility.
The Polish word właśnie tends to cause trouble. Its meaning varies
depending on the context and although the common translation of
this word in the above sentence was ju st:
147
 I was just half-way through (reading) his autobiography (by the way, reading is
totally redundant here)
is this the closest we can get to the Polish original? In this case, właśnie
means a certain coincidence. O ur suggestion here would be:
It so happened I was half-way through (or in the middle of) his autobiography...
Grammatical misunderstandings very often occur due to the
English SEQUENCE O F TENSES. Still quoting the above sentence:
It so happened I was haff-way through his autobiography Love and Exile when
I heard that he had died.
He died before I learnt about the fact, so the past perfect tense has to
be used. We can, however, avoid using it altogether in this sentence
by saying:
...when I heard about his death.
The sentence: Ale będąc jeszcze zanurzony... is definitely meta­
phorical and because the word zanurzyć brought about quite a list of
synonyms, this will be referred to later in the section dealing with
dictionaries and the problem of synonyms.
There were problems even with the following very short question:
Cóż to właściwie znaczyło, że umarł?
and with a similar question that appeared later in the text but has not
been quoted above:
Cóż znaczy zatem wiadomość, że Izaak Bashevis Singer nie żyje?
These caused an unbelievable number of problems, both grammatical
and lexical, leading to something even more than just translationese.
The words właściwie or zatem are used for a purpose in the Polish
sentence and that is why we feel obliged to find an equivalent in
English. The idea, however, is to find a word that would be most
suitable and not come up with something like the following:
What does it thus mean that Isaak Bashevis Singer is dead?
or
What it therefore means that Isaak Bashevis Singer is dead?
148
We can link the above with a rather im portant grammatical error, that
of how we construct questions in the English language. A nother
version was also
What meaning bis death had?
It goes w ithout saying that these are unpardonable mistakes and
should never appear.
While still dealing with the same question, the Polish word znaczy
appeared to have different connotations for different people. It is
slightly surprising to encounter:
So, what does it really matter that Isaak Bashevis Singer is dead?
or
What did it really involve that he had died?
The above two versions have significantly changed the meaning
of the Polish sentence and are examples o f mistranslation. They
have been brought about not so much by a lack of understanding
o f the ST as by inadequate knowledge of the TL. The above
should be translated thus:
So what did it actually mean that he had died?
A well-known problem that causes trouble to even good speakers
o f English are TENSES, their usage and the occasional difference
between Polish and English. In the last sentence quoted in the above
fragment:
W pewnym sensie...
the following problems occur:
In a sense it happened long ago when he described himself in one of his first
stories, or maybe in the first one, as a living dead man who stays in the world of
living people because he does not know he is a dead man.
From the grammatical point of view, we must remember about the
sequence of tenses in English. Although in speech forms we are
sometimes careless about this, in writing it is still im portant to keep
in mind that if we have the past tense in the main clause, we also have
past forms in the subordinate clauses. It is different in Polish, but
149
when writing in English, we have to keep to the English rules and
regulations. In this same sentence, there is also a different type of
problem — that of the words: living, dead, and what can be connected
with what and where. In the Polish version, we have the word trup
and there is no reason why we should try and find a euphemism in
English for corpse. Thus we can have:
... in one o f his first stories, or maybe even in his first one, he described himself
as a corpse still in the land of the living because it did not know it was dead.
LEXICAL MISUNDERSTANDINGS
In translation, we invariably face the problem of which word, phrase,
expression should be chosen in order to render the SL text into the
TL text as closely as possible. We come up against something that can
be called linguistic untranslatability as well as cultural untranslatability.
J.C. Catford says the former “is due to differences in the SL and the
TL” , whereas the latter “is due to the absence in the TL culture of
a relevant situational feature for the SL text.” 4 These differences
always exist no m atter which languages we are working with, but the
whole notion of translatability or untranslatability can, and is, often
disputed. This will be discussed more fully later in the chapter as it is
also strictly connected with our understanding or misunderstanding of
lexical items which, in turn, are closely linked with ID IO M and
METAPHOR.
M any misunderstandings, however, occur simply through an
inadequate knowledge of the languages we are dealing with. Every
language is idiomatic but the very idea of IDIOM , and what it entails,
can be best explained by the following:
1) A speech form or expression of a given language that is peculiar to itself
grammatically or that cannot be understood from the individual meanings of
its elements.
2) The specific grammatical, syntactic, and structural character of a given
language.
3) A regional speech or dialect.
4) A specialized vocabulary used by a group of people; jargon, legal idiom.
4 J. C. Catford, A Linguistic Theory o f Translation, Oxford University Press, 1965,
quoted by Susan Bassnett, Translation Studies, Routledge, 1991, p. 32.
150
5) A style of artistic expression characteristic of a given individual, school,
period, or medium: the idiom o f the French Impressionists.5
From the above, it can be seen how idiom and language cannot be
separated and when we are translating from one language into
another, we more often than not do not treat individual words as
separate entities but we take whole expressions and phrases, sometimes
even jargon and dialect, into consideration.
Throughout this work we have often stressed the m atter of
linguistic and cultural awareness. This is also connected with IDIOM
and trying to avoid lexical misunderstandings. Advertisements, even
here in Poland, often happen to be written or translated into English.
Advertising uses language that is peculiar to itself and thus is
idiomatic. Let us look more closely at the following:
Nigdy nie mówimy nie — sprawdź nas!
The English printed translation was:
We never say no — try to test us!
It is true that one of the English equivalents of sprawdzać is to test but
we can have our eyesight tested, for example, or the remedy was tested
among the different races throughout the world. We can test or
examine somebody’s abilities. However, in the above quotation, the
Polish sprawdź nas is definitely idiomatic, it is characteristic of the
situation and we have to find something in English that will catch the
reader’s attention and bring about the same results. There are various
synonyms for test, like check or verify for example. Here we could say:
We never say no — check for yourself!
or
We never say no — see for yourself!
To see something for yourself is to check up on the given matter, to
find out in order to be convinced or satisfied.6 It is also all idiomatic.
s The American Heritage Dictionary, Second College Edition, Houghton Mifflin
Company, 1985.
6 A. S. Hornby, Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary o f Current English, Oxford
University Press, 1985.
151
As translators, we cannot be afraid to digress slightly, to try and find
something that will have the same impact. So-called one-to-one or
direct translation is very often simply impossible. Once we realise this,
translating advertisements, signs or notices becomes much easier.
In Polish we use the word skontaktować in ads offering employment,
e.g. Skontaktujemy się w sprawie rozmowy kwalifikacyjnej. Here we
cannot say:
You will be connected for the interview.
as was printed in one o f the Warśaw newspapers. It would not have
been so surprising if the translator had written: You will be contacted
due to the link between kontaktować and to contact. In such situations,
contact is often used but the most common and accepted term is
notify, e.g.:
You will be notified as to the time and place o f the interview.
Please also look at the second part of the sentence and the choice of
phrase, which is idiomatic. It is a choice prompted by what would
normally be accepted in this context, and, as Alan D uff says, “ one
needs to distinguish between idiomatic expressions that are c o m m o n
to both the source and the target language (...) and those which are
peculiar to one of the languages.” 7 He goes on to explain that “in
translating expressions o f the second kind, the translator should not
feel constrained to render idiom for idiom.” 8 In our Polish-English
context, this maxim also holds true. Not every idiom can be translated
into another idiom; it all depends on the possibilities of the English
language, w hat can be applied and would be accepted by the English
speaking reader. The wrong use or understanding of an idiom or
idiomatic expression may lead to mistranslation but the same may
happen with lexical items that do not seem to be idiomatic at all. They
may not be in themselves but become so when used in set phrases, and
are peculiar to the source language.
Such an expression in various contexts in Polish is the common
verb: stwierdzić, translated as state, e.g.:
Stwierdził, że na pewno pójdzie do szkoły.
7 Alan Duff, op. cit., p. 90.
8 Ibidem.
152
He stated (that) he would definitely go to school.
It becomes slightly more problematic in the sentence:
Przegląd literatury pozwala stwierdzić...
It has been translated as:
A review of literature permits one to conclude...
It is true that before we stąte anything we have to draw certain conclusions
but, in the above sentence, the Polish stwierdzić is a very strong expression,
while the English conclude would, in this context, mean: ‘to arrive at
a certain belief or opinion’. In other words, it is much milder, resulting in
us first concluding and then stating. Thus our final version should be:
A review of literature permits one to state...
This all concerns strength which also happens to be a very im portant
aspect o f language and translation.
Still in connection with the verb stwierdzić let us have a closer look
at the following sentence:
Stwierdza się, że osoby przebywające w kraju nielegalnie muszą opuścić teren do
końca bieżącego miesiąca. .
Translating stwierdza się here as:
It has been confirmed that...
is wide o f the mark. Such announcements are very common in
newspapers and legal documents, and sometimes have to be translated.
The above English equivalent would probably be:
People remaining in the country illegally are requested to leave by the end of this
month.
It is also quite common to have:
W tym dokumencie stwierdza się, że...
Our translation suggestion in this case is:
We hereby state that...
In Polish, common sayings also often start with twierdzi się or
mówi się, as in the following:
153
 Twierdzi się, że ludzie nieszczęśliwi są sami winni swojemu nieszczęściu.
In English the twierdzi się or mówi się can also be translated
impersonally as:
It is said that unhappy people are to blame for their own unhappiness.
The translation seems to be as close as we can get to the original, but
if we said:
Unhappy people have only themselves to blame,
it would convey exactly the same meaning and would be more natural.
As can be seen here, forms and idiom vary from language to language.
What has to be remembered is that we try and apply the appropriate
form and idiom to the required situation.
Let us take two common English words that are often used
wrongly in translations. They are recipe and prescription. The Polish
word recepta usually means ‘prescription, which is a doctor’s written
order for the preparation and administration of a medicine’. The
Polish word is very often mistaken for the English recipe which is
direction for preparing a cake, soup or meat dish. The origin of the
English and Polish word is the same — Latin — and although in
Polish we can also say recepta kulinarna or the idiomatic recepta na
życie, in English we have a medical prescription and a culinary recipe.
As far as recepta na życie is concerned, we are faced with a very
common Polish figurative expression which in English would be
expressed by philosophy o f life (or maybe way o f life, which would
probably be closer to the Polish). However, we can ask, for example,
have you got a recipe fo r a good Iif el This is quite correct.
There was a time in Warsaw in the not too distant past when we
could quite often come across such notices on the doors of chemist
shops:
Recipes realized here.
O f course, the Polish would have been:
Recepty realizowane tutaj,
but English-speaking foreigners would probably have had quite
a problem deciphering the meaning. Having already discussed the
word recipe, let us now look at realize, which is another word that has
154
its direct equivalent in Polish and is commonly used in that language
but, unfortunately, cannot always be applied in the same contexts.
Just as recepty realizowane tutaj would have to. be translated as:
Prescriptions accepted here (or: Doctor’s prescriptions accepted here),
realizować nearly always has to be rendered differently than by the
English realize. The only time it overlaps in both languages is when
we say:
I realized my hopes, plaps, ambitions...
In Polish, of course, we can also say:
Zrealizowałam swoje nadzieje, plany, ambicje...
Usually, however, the English realize is the Polish zdawać sobie sprawę
(z czegoś). We also cash a cheque in English which, in Polish, is
realizować czek. The example of the word realize is only one of many
existing in both languages, but where it does not always register the
same meaning.
It would be impossible to mention all the lexical items that cause
similar problems when translating from Polish into English but it might
be worth our while to discuss just a few more that crop up over and
over again in texts that concern the humanities. Throughout the world,
specialization in a given subject is becoming narrower and narrower,
and many of us talk and write in Polish about specjalizacja. In English it
is more common to say that we specialize in something, where in Polish
it would be nasza specjalizacja jest... . O f course, the noun form
(specialization) exists in English, but in medicine, where it would
normally be used most often, we do not use specialization but
specialty j speciality (both spelling forms are accepted), e.g. his specialty
is cardiology. In Polish medical texts that are translated into English,
this is a most frequent error and is caused by people thinking that every
word having the same root must have the same usage in both languages.
Let us look at the following two examples which also illustrate the
use of the word speciality in English, but have different meanings and
nothing in common with medicine:
a) I found myself having to teach biblical exegesis and ecclesiastical history, in
neither o f which I was properly qualified, as well as dogmatic theology, which
was supposed to be my speciality.9
9 David Lodge, Paradise News, Penguin, 1992. p. 184.
155
 b) We had eaten nothing with the champagne except a small dish of potato
crisps, a speciality from the island of Maui, thick and gnarled like tree bark.10
As can be easily noted here, in a) speciality has the same meaning as
specjalizacja in Polish, while the same word in b) means specjalność.
This difference in meaning is worth keeping in mind.
A similar misunderstanding, which results in mistranslation, often
occurs with the Polish word autor. Automatically, everyone wishes to
use the English author, but unfortunately the solution is not as simple
as it may seem. In Polish, you can be an autor o f practically
everything, while in English we usually apply author to the writer of
a literary work or to the originator of an idea or project. In Polish the
word has much wider connotations. Thus we can say quite correctly
autor rzeźby, while in English he would be a sculptor. If possible, it is
also advisable to use playwright, dramatist, poet, essayist, critic, etc.,
depending on the context, whereas in Polish it would probably be:
autor sztuki, wiersza, eseju, recenzji, etc.
The same can be said for twórca which has extremely wide usage
in Polish and is often treated synonymously with autor. O f course, the
English equivalent o f twórca is creator, and although somebody may
also be the creator o f an idea in the same way as we have twórca
pomysłu in Polish, it is customary to use the word Creator in the
meaning of ‘G od’. (It is then written with a capital letter). Also the
Polish word twórczość, which bilingual dictionaries translate as creation,
results in such sentences:
He belonged to the few whose life and creation became one entity.
(Należał do nielicznych, których życie i twórczość stały się jednością.)
In English we talk about work, literary/artistic output, but the creation
o f the world or the creation o f great works o f art. Hence, in the above
we should use the word work and not creation.
Another lexical item, that is frequently misinterpreted by translators
of texts on art or the post-war history o f art, is socrealizm or
socrealistyczny. These words appear constantly in Polish articles on
literature and art of the first half of the fifties. Because Socialist
Realism became the official trend in the arts at the time, it is necessary
10 Ibid., p. 233.
156
to remember the English equivalent and not mix it up with Social
Realism, which is so often the case. The different English versions that
appear in translated texts are certainly full of invention, but in order
not to cause misunderstanding in the reader’s reception o f the article,
we have to take care not to get our facts mixed up. In Polish, the
adjectival form, i.e. socrealistyczny certainly does cause problems in
translation, because the would-be English ‘Socialist Realistic’ is rather
too much to swallow. There is simply no adjectival form for this
phrase, and this is an example of how we have to work round this
problem in our English translations.
THE UNDERSTANDING OF METAPHOR
“ Idiom and m etaphor are similar in that both involve the figurative
use of language. (...) The difference between them lies (...) in the
strength of the imagery: in idiomatic expressions the words c o n v e y
rather than illustrate the meaning: in metaphorical expressions the
words colour the meaning.” 11 Alan D uffs explanation of thedifference
between idiom and m etaphor should make this rather complex
linguistic issue a little more comprehensible.
As has already been mentioned above, an idiom need not necessarily
be translated with an idiom because what is part and parcel of the
source and target language is of primary importance. If we have an
appropriate idiom in the TL that would render the meaning of the SL
all the better, but we should be particulary aware of what can and
what cannot be said in the target language. It is our knowledge of this
that is of great significance.
When we take metaphors into consideration in our translations,
we have to remember that we are dealing with figurative language that
has been consciously chosen by the author of the text we are working
on. His metaphors are there for a purpose and we, as translators,
should do our utm ost to render those same m etaphors in the target
language. We may disagree with the writer, we may think nobody
would write in such a manner or would choose such figures of speech
in English, but we must respect his choice. We have also to keep in
mind that although we are not the authors of the text in question, we
11 Alan Duff, op. tit., p. 89
157
 are responsible for understanding it in full, and this includes its Jak wiadomo bowiem, w każdej beczce miodu musi się znaleźć łyżka dziegciu.
figurative language. The colour and intensity of the language is a very
There are no English proverbs that would have the same meaning and
important integral p art of the text. We also have to try and preserve
also have ho?iey and birch-tar in them. However, we do have:
this colour and intensity in our translations.
Peter Newmark divides metaphors into two groups: the single — There is no garden without its weeds.
one-word m etaphor and the extended m etaphor, which can be
If we had translated the above Polish proverb literally, it would have
a collocation, idiom, sentence, proverb, allegory or a complete
led to a total lack of understanding on the part of the reader. The
imaginative te x t.12 As can be seen here, the extended m etaphor can be
whole meaning of the text would have been lost and, of course, blame
just about anything, and thus we are often faced with whether to opt
for this would be laid at the translator’s feet.
for “sense or image” 13 in our translations. This means that there are
Unfortunately, mistranslation often occurs because the translator
many cases in which we find ourselves deciding between giving a literal
fails to understand his own language. This is happening only too often
translation of the ST or our own interpretation of it. Before we make
nowadays when so much literature written in English is being translated
the decision, however, we have to understand the metaphorical
into Polish for' the Polish reading audience. There is something far
meaning, and to quote Newmark yet again, “ any word can be
wrong if one has to have a good knowledge of English to understand
a metaphor, and its sense has to be teased out by matching its primary the Polish version.
meaning against its linguistic, situational and cultural contexts,” 14
In an American cookery book translated recently into Polish, we
Here we come back to our own Polish context and rendering
come across the expression:
Polish metaphorical language into English, and the choices we have to
^ make in the process. Throughout this work, we keep placing stress on mieć coś na końcu swoich palców
' what to us is of vital importance, and that is of feeling and The English idiom is:
i understanding the source text, every aspect of it. We may not always
be correct in our understanding of ‘what the author wanted to say’, to have something at one's finger tips.
because there is always the aspect of interpretation that is also at play,
In English this means to have a thorough knowledge of something,
but we have to be as sure as we possibly can be of the sense of the
but in Polish it would literally mean to have something on the tips of
text. This, o f course, involves idioms and metaphors, whether single
one’s fingers. Because of this blunder, the whole sentence fell apart
or extended, similes, cliches, expressions that are characteristic of
and raised more than one eyebrow! It is obvious here that the
a particular language only. In this list we should also include
translator neither understood the English nor did he understand what
PROVERBS which are part of a nation’s culture, and cannot be
he was writing in Polish.
translated literally. A nother idiom that is used more and more frequently in the Polish
As with the translation of idiom, the same idea applies here. If we
media, but which is not always understood even by educated Poles, is
can find a proverb in English that would render the same meaning as
trup w szafie. We could call it a new Polish expression that has appeared
the Polish proverb does, then we can use it. If we are unhappy about
recently, probably due to the old and generally accepted English
it, then we should simply render the meaning o f the proverb in
skeleton in the cupboard. Thus we have an example, whether we are
a sentence of our own. The following appeared in a Polish review:
happy about it or not, of strong English interference in Polish idiomatic
language. It would be interesting to see if this kind of interference could
12 Peter Newmark. op. c i t p. 104. work the other way round in an old Warsaw idiom such as:
13 Ibidem.
14 Ibid., p. 106. Zupa z trupa, nagła śmierć z buraczkami

158 159
We suggest trying to translate that one into English!
While on the subject of corpses, let us look at what is happening to
Agatha Christie’s detective stories in their Polish translations. TITLES
OF BOOKS are often idiomatic or metaphorical and Agatha Christie
liked using parts o f nursery rhymes as titles for her books. Five Little
Pigs, Hickory Dickory Dock, A nd Then There Were None are just three
examples. M any of her detective stories are now being translated into
Polish, with the translators having obvious problems. One of the most
recent renderings on the Polish m arket is: Pierwsze, drugie, zapnij mi
obuwie. The original English version is again part of an English rhyme
used by children in their games: One, Two, Buckle M y Shoe. We can see
the translator certainly did make the effort to compose a rhyme with
drugie meaning to rhyme with obuwie, but that is about all the credit we
can give him. It is extremely clumsy, it arouses no connotations in the
Polish reader whatsoever and literally cries out to be changed. Although
the mystery does involve a buckle and a shoe, it is the English title itself
that first awakens interest. It is mysterious and, thanks to its rhyme, it
flows off one’s tongue. This is totally lost in the Polish version.
TITLES are certainly a difficult problem, often causing translators
sleepless nights and headaches. In the above, however, we are concerned
with the idiom and figurative speech of a language that should not be
distorted by a translator’s lack of knowledge and understanding. If
there is no equivalent, or something that would be at least similar in
the target language, then we look for something else that will render
the same meaning and have the same intellectual and emotional
impact on the reader.
Let us look at yet one more title: Raj tracony. This is the title of
an art exhibition and of a text written for the catalogue of Andrzej
Różycki’s works. The English translation was Paradise in Process o f
Losing. A part from the fact that somebody somewhere forgot about
the definite article before process, the English version is totally
incomprehensible. It is paradise that is being lost, while if we say
paradise in the process o f losi?ig we are asking ourselves what paradise
is losing. Admittedly, this is a difficult title and because it is raj tracony
and not utracony, we cannot copy Milton. Paradise is in the process
of being lost but that again is too long. A suggestion here could be
Losing Paradise. It is short, it renders the meaning and the same
metaphoric impact is present.
160
TITLES as such are closely connected with idiom and m etaphor
and, as has already been mentioned, can be one o f the m ost difficult
tasks a translator faces. If we can render idiom for idiom, and
metaphor for m etaphor, then the problem is solved to everyone’s
satisfaction, but as many examples show it is not always so simple. It
is here yet again that stress has to be placed primarily on understanding
the title in question, bn understanding why the author chose such and
such a title and not any other. A literal translation is also often
impossible and that is why translators are entitled to give their own
titles to works that would at least try to evoke the same impact on the
reader as the original did in the source language.
Just as with crime stories, the daily press tends to have short,
catchy titles that consist of only those lexical items that are to draw
the reader’s attention. The more sensational it sounds the better! Also,
the shorter the better. O ur translations should evoke the same
sensations, feelings, excitement as the original did, and it is the task
of the translator to achieve this. Let us take one of the Polish dailies,
„Gazeta Wyborcza” , from 14th July, 1992, and look at some of the
titles: Z nożem na obrazy, „Polski rosół” w Niemczech, Termos wrócił,
MIG-iem do sądu, Ścigany A x l Rose, Kredyty za zaciskanie pasa. As
can be seen, some are a little simpler than others, but they all require
a careful reading of the text in question in order to find out \vhat is
being discussed. In English, they also have to be short, and we have
to cope with such terms as ‘Polski rosół5, MIG-iem, zaciskanie pasa.
How about:
1) Slashed Pictures
2) “Polish Soup” in Germany
3) Thermos is back
4) Flying into the Courts
5) Axl Rose Hunted
6) Credits for Tightening its Belt.
All the titles are controversial and can be treated in various ways.
It all depends on whether we wish to try and be as close to the original
as possible or whether we give ourselves a free hand. In 1) a knife is
necessary if we wish to slash pictures, resulting in Slashed Pictures,
2) ‘Rosół’ is actually chicken soup, at the same time being a very
traditional Polish dish, totally different to the English chicken soup.
11— Successful Polish-English... 161
Here it is used in inverted commas because it is metaphorical, means
liquidized heroin, and, being Polish, is linked with ‘com pote’ made
from Polish poppy-seed. Because the chicken is quite superfluous and
would make the expression in English far too long, we end up with
“Polish Soup” . 3) The Polish termos is taken from the English
Thermos which is a trade m ark for a vacuum flask. It is used
metaphorically here to describe Jacek K uroń, who always carries
a flask around with him. In this case at least, we need not be afraid
o f a literal translation. 4) Here the situation is more complicated
because a pun is used. The Russian M IG planes and the Polish
migiem, meaning very quickly, can be played upon beautifully in order
to receive MIG-iem. In English it is much more difficult. Thus the
decision to simply find an equivalent of migiem. We can say Flying
into the Courts, because it was due to those planes that the accused
had been arrested. 5) This is a one-to-one translation but 6) is not as
easy as it seems at first glance. Zacisnąć pasa in Polish has exactly the
same idiomatic meaning as to tighten.one’s belt in English. Here idiom
can be rendered by idiom. The problem, however, lies in one’s. The
article concerns Russia and the correct way to translate this would be
Credits (for Russia) fo r tightening its belt but this is far too long and
also tells us a little too much. Hence the decision to have Credits for
Tightening its B elt.
T H E U SE O F SYNONYM S
“Translators are crazy about synonyms” I5,says M ilan K undera, who
rejects the very notion o f synonym, believing that “each word has its
own meaning and is semantically irreplaceable” 16. This is a very
im portant observation as we only too often feel obliged to search for
synonyms, if we happen to believe that such a notion does exist, iu
order not to repeat the same word two or three times in a given text.
R EPE T IT IO N S and the use of repetitions in a text are one thing,
while our search for the right word is something totally different.
K undera quotes N abokov who “points out that at the beginning
of the Russian text of Anna Karenina the word house occurs eight
15 Milan Kundera, The Art o f the Novel, Cox and Wyman Ltd., 1990, p. 147.
16 Ibidem.
162
times in six sentences and the repetition is a deliberate tactic on the
author’s part. Yet the word house appears only once in the French
translation of the passage and no more than twice in the Czech.” 17 It
is similar in the Polish text. Translators often feel the compulsion to
find different words for a phrase that was used a number of times by
the author. If it was repeated by the writer, it was done for a purpose
and the translator should not try and improve on this. O f course, the
example of house in English can be problematic. In Polish we have
dom, while in English we have house and home, which for some may
be slightly difficult to distinguish. Here again appears the importance
of not only knowing but also feeling the language, being aware of
when we use house and when home. The main thing to remember,
though, is not to be afraid of repetitions and to honour what the
author has written.
SYNONYMS, and their use, can be more problematic. Just as
some authors consciously apply the notion of repetition in their
writing, others, and this is also for a purpose, consciously seek
different words that would render similar meanings. No two words are
completely alike in meaning and that is also why we can never talk
about total equivalence in translation. We use dictionaries of synonyms
to help us find words that, in translation, would be as close to the
original as possible. If we understand the source text and are fully
aware of the intricacies o f the target language, we should be able to
pick out the word or expression that, at least according to us, would
be most suitable. It will always be a very individual matter, and we
should not be afraid of either this individuality or responsibility in our
choice o f words.
Stress is being continually placed here on understanding but we
also cannot avoid the fact that very often we do not understand what
the author is trying to say, and this is not because we do not know
much about the topic being discussed. “ Questions not answered by the
writer cannot be answered by the translator; what is obscure in the
original is likely to be even more obscure in the translations.” 18 This,
unfortunately, will always happen and no m atter how many synonyms
we search for the obscurity will remain, unless we rewrite the text.
17 Ibid., p. 146.
18 Alan Duff, op. c i t p. 3.
163

THE USE OF DICTIONARIES
Although our credo is that in the process of translation we primarily
have to understand the source text and have an excellent knowledge
of both source and target languages, we also have to be on friendly
terms with dictionaries, encyclopaedias and every other type of
reference book. They are a translator’s tools and no m atter how good
we are, we should never be afraid to use and consult them. The
problem, however, often liefs in how they are used.
Many up-and-coming translators believe that it is quite sufficient
to have a bilingual dictionary, and that dictionary will solve all their
problems, answer all their queries. Unfortunately, it is not so. As far
as bilingual dictionaries are concerned, we have really no choice in
Poland but even if we had the choice of at least ten, the principle
would be the same. We should treat every bilingual dictionary as
a reminder, never as a bible. If we come across a word or phrase that
is completely new to us, we should always check its meaning in
a unilingual dictionary. If we are translating from Polish into English,
it is essential to be well equipped with an English dictionary. There is
no harm in having a good Polish dictionary either, as we may not
always be fully acquainted with all the vocabulary used in the source
text, even if the source language happens to be our native tongue.
Once we have a total understanding of what we are translating, our
task becomes much easier. We are then able to judge better whether
or not we are choosing the right words and expressions.
In the previous section, there was mention of synonyms and
dictionaries of synonyms, which can help us in our choice of the right
lexical item. Here again, though, we have to remember that before we
choose a word from Roget’s Thesaurus or from any other dictionary of
synonyms, we have to understand not only the meaning of the word
we are choosing but we also have to know the context in which the
given word can be used. And here again we are faced with the need
of reaching out for a British or American unilingual dictionary.
Other reference books, like encyclopaedias, should not be too far
away, as we very often have to check the accepted form of previously
translated titles, works of art, or even the English spelling of Russian
names, for example, and so on. We are not walking dictionaries or
encyclopaedias ourselves, and that is why we should have no qualms
164
in consulting them to make absolutely sure that what we are putting
down on paper is not only accepted in the English speaking world, but
is also correct.
Let us look at a few sentences where, through lack of understand­
ing, there were obvious problems in choosing the appropriate lexical
item, but where dictionaries had obviously been used. The Polish
sentence was:
Ale będąc jeszcze zanurzony w jego losie, w jego intymnościach, w jego myślach
i słowach „zobaczyłem” ten fakt niejako jego oczami.
It was translated thus:
a) As I was penetrating his life...
b) But sunk in his life, in his privacy, his thoughts and words...
c) Being, therefore, deeply submerged in his life...
d) Still being deep inside his fate...
e) But as I have plunged into his life story...
f) i ‘saw’ this fact as if with his eyes, since I was deepened into his intimate life,
thoughts and words...
g) Still sinking in his life...
We can presume that the lack of understanding mentioned above does
not apply here to the Polish sentence which, though metaphorical, is
extremely clear. It is, however, primarily because of the word zanurzyć
that so many problems occurred. We can see that in all the above
suggestions a dictionary, maybe even a dictionary o f synonyms, had
been consulted, but because the English words were not fully
understood, the final outcome was a disaster. This is a very good
example o f how we have to check the words in an English dictionary
to learn in w hat context they can or cannot be used. The one English
word which has not appeared above and means zanurzyć, both
literally and figuratively, is immerse. Thus we can have:
But being still deeply immersed in his fate, in his most intimate feelings, in his
thoughts and words, I “saw” this fact as if with his eyes.
A nother lexical item that very often appears in travel brochures
and invariably leads to mistranslation, and thus to misunderstanding,
is the Polish schrofiisko. In a couple of articles translated into English
quite recently, it has appeared as hospice, shelter, or shelter-home —
in other words, everything but w hat it should have been in the given
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context. Again we can see that dictionaries were consulted but the end
result was anything but satisfactory. The translators were searching
for a word th at would be the equivalent to schronisko — budynek na
szlaku turystycznym służący jako miejsce odpoczynku i noclegu dla
turystów ... (PW N) The English equivalent to this is hostel — building
in which board and lodging are provided. Youth hostel — (and this is
closest to the Polish institution) — one fo r young people walking,
riding, cycling on holiday tours... (A.S. Hornby).
There are, of course, other meanings of the Polish word schronisko
like schronisko dla psów — a dogs’ home — but in the above context
we have to be careful about using hospice because in contemporary
British English it means a ‘hospital/home for dying people’. The
archaic meaning of the word was admittedly ‘a house of rest for
travellers’ (A.S. Hornby) and Americans still use the word today,
although again mainly in the following context: A shelter or lodging
fo r travelers, or the destitute, often maintained by monks . ( The American
Heritage .Dictionary ). Shelter , on the other hand, usually implies ‘an
enclosed, area that protects temporarily against a specific threat, such
as a storm or air raid’ (The American Heritage Dictionary).
O ur aim of going here into certain detail concerning synonyms and
the appropriate choice of certain words is to make our readers more
aware o f the significance of dictionaries and of how to use them. Once
again, emphasis has to be placed on context and knowing which
lexical item, idiomatic or metaphorical phrase can be chosen in a given
situation.
T H E N O TIO N O F UNTRANSLATABILITY
In her book Translation Studies , Susan Bassnett states that „exact
translation is impossible” and that we should both “ accept the
untranslatability o f the SL phrase in the TL on the linguistic level” as
well as “ accept the lack of a similar cultural convention in the T L .” 19
The word untranslatability appears in many scholarly works on
translation but it tends to be understood and treated in various ways.
Levy, the Czech translation scholar, for example, believed the translator
“ had the responsibility of finding a solution to the most daunting of
19 Susan Bassnett, op. cit., p. 22.
166
problems” 20, and Ralph Mangeim, the translator of Nobel Laureate
Elias C annetti’s memoir The Play o f the Eyes states that “everything
is translatable. The question is whether it can be translated well.” 21
William Weaver, on the other hand, who helped to make Umberto
Eco’s The Name o f the Rose such a fantastic success in the English
speaking world, “ isn’t sure he agrees. He considers the Renaissance
poet, Ariosto, for one, to be untranslatable” 22, while in his article, On
Linguistic Aspects o f Translation, Roman Jakobson notes that:
Both the practice and the theory o f translation abound with intricacies, from
time to time attempts are made to sever the Gordian knot by producing the
dogma o f untransiatabiiity.23
We are definitely not going to produce a ‘dogma of untrans­
latability’ as we believe, like Levy, that it is a translator’s responsibility
to try his very best to solve even the most difficult problems. No
m atter which language you are translating from or into, there are
always problems and for the less experienced translator, they sometimes
seem to be unsurmountable. We have to try and accept the fact that
when translating from Polish into English, we will always come up
against such questions concerning what to do with words like pogodny,
for example, as in:
a) Ona ma takie pogodne usposobienie.
or
b) Ona jest zawsze taka pogodna.
or vice versa with English words such as:
c) nuisance — John is a terrible nuisance when travelling long distances.
d) fussy — Mary is such a fussy person.
or
e) fuss — Whenever anybody comes Jane makes such a fuss.
All the sentences are extremely simple and can be commonly heard in
20 Ibidem.
21 Ambassadors o f the World, “Newsweek”, Nov., 3, 1986.
22 Ibidem.
23 Roman Jakobson, On Linguistic Aspects o f Translation [in:} R. A. Brower (ed.),
On Translation, Harvard University Press, 1959, p. 234.
167
everyday speech. They also contain words which do not have their
equivalents in English (a, b) or in Polish (c, d, e). O f course, we could
give up and proclaim the dogma of untranslatability but, on the other
hand, we are responsible for those simple sentences and we have to
translate them. F or pogodny a Polish-English dictionary will give:
cheerful, buoyant, hopeful, serene, which in actual fact is a load of
rubbish, because the Polish word gives us quite a different picture to
any of the adjectives mentioned above. We could add quite a few more
to the list but it still would not actually render the meaning we are
searching for. One way of getting round the problem is by not taking
the sentence out of context (as has been done here), but looking at it
as part of a longer text and choosing a phrase or expression that, in
its overall meaning, would show what we mean by pogodny in Polish.
The above is one of many, many examples that show and prove
that we cannot talk about total equivalence in translation and also
that we can come so close to mistranslation so easily. The English She
is always so serene (or: cheerful, hopeful, bouyant, good-natured) would
only cause misunderstanding on the part of the reader. It is simply not
the same, and we have to accept the fact th at a little more thought and
work has to be put into our translation of a given text.
Chapter Eight
TRICKS OF THE TRADE
Throughout this work, we have tried to portray the various aspects
of translating from Polish into English and the numerous translation
problems faced by non-native English speakers. By pointing out, on
the basis of examples that were all authentic, the most common
mistakes made by Poles when writing and translating into a tongue
which is not their own, we hope to have brought at least some of the
problematic issues to the attention of inexperienced and future
translators.
Many people, both writers and translators, believe that you cannot
learn to be a translator, nor can the art of translation be taught. You
either have it in you or you do not. To a certain extent this is true,
but if we are interested in language, in the use o f words and the
manipulation o f words, if we feel and understand the two languages
and cultures we are dealing with, we can work on our translation
abilities, we can continue to improve and learn more and more tricks
of the trade.
TH E PR O C ESS O F CH O ICE
Gregory Rabassa, the famous Garcia M arquez translator, says that
the process of translation is one of choice. H e also talks about
translation as guided creative writing. When we look more carefully at
these two notions we can see how closely linked they are although it
may seem that the choice we have would exclude any guidance we
might be subjected to.
If we do n ot know how to write in English, we shall never be good
169
at translating into that language. We are guided in our writing as we
are limited by the author’s text, by his ideas, style, mood. We have
a responsibility towards the author of the text we have undertaken to
render into another language. We must remember that it is his text
and not ours, they are his ideas, his style and although we always have
to take the cultural context of the source language into consideration,
and the stylistic and syntactic norms of the target language, we are not
writing a text th at is solely ours.
As writing and translating are inseparably linked together, we have
to keep in mind th a t because writing is creative, the same, despite the
limitations imposed on the translator, apply to those of us who
translate. We have a choice in how we do it, which words we choose,
how we structure our sentences, how we work with idiom and
m etaphor. We are guided by the author, but we undergo a process of
choice, and in our choice, we are creative. We have to work on this
creativity and, connected with choice, it results in the best translation
we can produce at the given moment. A translation is never really
completed as, with our possibility of choice, we could go on for ever.
We have to know when to stop as there always seems to be room for
improvement.
Because o f the differences in languages, no m atter which two
languages we are working with, there are innumerable situations
where we are n o t dealing with idiom, metaphor, or proverbs and we
still feel we cannot find the word or phrase th at would render the
meaning o f the SL to our satisfaction. In the previous chapter, English
words like nuisance, fuss j fussy, or the Polish pogodny, were mentioned.
There are many lexical items that could be added to this list, both in
Polish and in English, and it is in situations like these that we have to
decide on something, on another word in the TL that would be as
close as possible to what we feel and understand in the SL. We come
to a decision through a process of choice that also involves elimination.
Let us take a phrase' th at was used as a title for a book: Zwierzenia
rodzinne. It seems simple enough, quite comprehensible, although
anything but easy when it comes to rendering the phrase into English.
It is the word: zwierzenie that causes trouble here. It is a little easier
with zwierzyć, which Stanislawski’s dictionary1 translates as to confide,
1 Jan Stanisławski, The Great Polish-English Dictionary, Wiedza Powszechna, 1970.
170
to unbosom, to disclose, to tell sb sth. in confidence. Zwierzyć
się komuś is indeed to confide in someone. It has the same con­
notations in English and Polish. With the noun: zwierzenie, however,
it is surprisingly different. The phrase zwierzenie rodzinne is quite
norm al and fully acceptable in Polish, meaning that someone
is talking about his family, about w hat goes on or went on
within the family circle. He often talks about these family affairs
in confidence because he would not like the m atter to go any
further. Family secrets may also be revealed, but on the other
hand they do not necessarily have to be “ skeletons in the cup­
board” .
The Polish word is much wider, while the English choice is
undoubtedly narrower. But we have to try at least to find a word or
phrase that would satisfy our understanding of the Polish expression.
We, the translators, have to choose. When it concerns the titles of
books, we translate the title after becoming fully acquainted with the
work in question. A catchy title here would be Family Secrets and
probably would be the most appropriate, but we come to this choice
through elimination, and it does not necessarily mean that we are
indeed satisfied with our choice. The other equivalent found in our
bilingual dictionary is confidence. We confide in someone but we share
confidences with somebody. If we said Family ‘Confidences’ it would be
rather ambiguous, meaning rather that members of a given family
were confiding in one another. Thus, through the process of choice
and elimination we make our decision. This is also one more example
of why it is so difficult to talk about total equivalence or faithfulness
in translation. There always seems to be a catch in everything we
translate, and we simply have to accept the fact that no m atter how
hard we try, we may always have certain doubts.
Another very popular Polish word that appears in various types of
literature is: opracować or opracowanie. We come across opracowanie
tekstu, opracowanie danych dla potrzeb książki, opracowanie indeksów
i haseł przez..., słownik opracowano w.... The majority of the expressions
suggested by our above quoted bilingual dictionary: to work out (a
plan, scheme, etc.), to elaborate (a literary work, theory, etc.), to
compile a dictionary, to work up (a subject)... do not solve our problem
at all. Except for 1to work up\ which has a totally different meaning
and is used mistakenly here, everything else suggested by Stanisławski
171
does in fact ex ist2. However, we have to be aware of what
is used in a given context and what is customary in the English-
-speaking world. We certainly compile dictionaries and if we
take the famous Hornby Dictionary o f Current English, we can
see that everybody responsible for this work is called a contributor,
with A.S. Hornby himself being the general editor. The general
editor may also be called editor-in-chief and all the contributors
are the editorial staff.
Looking at all the above mentioned phrases that include opraco­
wanie in them, let us try and choose an English version for them that
would be both acceptable and fully understandable to a native English
speaker. There is, of course, the usual problem of these phrases being
taken out of context, but opracowanie tekstu or, in its basic form:
opracować tekst is to edit a text', opracować dane dla potrzeb książki —
to compile (or to collect and arrange) the data for the needs of the
book. We also compile indexes, entries, etc. We can work on a book,
an essay, treatise, etc. in order to produce a version that would be to
our satisfaction.
As can be seen here, our discussion of lexical items and translation
could go on indefinitely as every item 'v e come across has so many
possibilities in both languages. It has to be our knowledge and
awareness o f the nuances of the two languages that leads us to make
our choice, although we may never be fully satisfied.
This proces of choice is always part and parcel of the process of
translation as a whole, and applies not only to more complex or
specific words but may also cause us difficulties with extremely
common lexical items. Although we are primarily interested in the
Polish-English relationship, let us look at one of the most commonly
used English words th at does not bend to translation easily, i.e. the
wprd nice. School children often go through the craze o f calling
everything nice. It can be used as a substitute for many other
adjectives, when those adjectives are at the back of your mind, while
nice is on the tip of your tongue. It can have dialectal or regional
connotations because it is used more commonly in certain parts of the
U.K. and by certain social groups more than by others. The most
2 See A.S. Hornby, ,,Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary o f Current English for
the difference between ‘work up sth’ and ‘work sth up’”.
172
common translation of, for example, she is such a nice girl or he is ever
such a nice boy would be:
a) To taka miła dziewczyna.
b) To taki miły chłopak.
Sometimes, of course, we translate the word as przyjemny, uprzejmy,
or even grzeczny, depending on the situation. Whichever word we
choose in Polish, however, it will never be quite the same as the
English nice. There are certain translations, though, which are hardly
acceptable. In Polish, we can say: Kraków jest miłym miastem but it
would not be the appropriate translation for Cracow is a nice city.
This was a translation heard recently on television (the English version
was quite audible). In this case, the closest Polish Word for nice would
be przyjemny. Here again, the context is most im portant and knowing
which adjective would be most suitable at the given moment.
The given mom ent also brings about freshly coined words and
phrases which, in translation, often lose their original flavour or we
have to coin our own phrase in the target language. Both cases require
a conscious choice from us. We have to decide on something, even if
we originally think the phrase is untranslatable. Let us look at the
following Polish sentence taken from a much longer article on those
who are only too eager to demolish such buildings as the Warsaw
Palace o f Culture and Science:
Chciałbym tutaj pocieszyć naszych burzymurków, że gdyby nawet Pałac Kultury
umknął im spod kilofa (...), to i tak dla ich dziejowej misji celów nie zabraknie.
It is obvious here that burzymurek is a word humorously coined by
the author of the text as such a word was necessary to satisfy his aims
in that very context. W hat can we do with it? How can we, or should
we, translate the above sentence? A possible version could be:
Here I would like to cheer our building-wreckers up as even if the Palace of
Culture were to escape their pickaxes... there would still be many other buildings
left for their historic mission.
Here the process of choice comes into play again and we also have to
coin a phrase for the Polish burzymurek. The above English version is
certainly close but it is not a direct translation nor has it the warmth
of the Polish hum our, due to the possibility o f using a diminutive form
in Polish but which simply does not exist in English. This is also an
173
example of where the original effect is slightly lost in translation.
There are many other examples, however, where the situation may be
quite the opposite, where the translation has been acknowledged to be
better than the original.
ACCURACY AND AMBIGUITY IN TRANSLATION
In reference to the above idea about a translation being better than
the original, one reviewer argued that Ralph Manheim, who translated
Elias Cannetti’s memoir The Play o f the Eyes, “ so improved Cannetti’s
‘complex and occasionally circuitous Germ an’ that the English version
makes smoother reading without (so far as I can see) any loss in
accuracy” 3.
Accuracy is a notion th at is strictly connected with translation but
which tends to arouse much controversy among some of the b e st-
known translators of our age. Although we ourselves would propagate
accuracy and permit the encroachment of inaccuracies only when they
have no overall effect on the completed translation, Ezra Pound
“contemptously dismissed those who criticized him for inaccuracies in
his translations, pointing out that if accuracy were the principal
criterion o f a good translation, then any fool with a bilingual crib
could produce just such a result” 4.
We know from our own experience, and we have tried to prove
this throughout, that a bilingual crib, or dictionary, is anything but
sufficient to produce an accurate translation. Every translation is an
interpretation of the original and is based on the shaping of that
interpretation.5 This in turn may lead to what certain critics believe
to be either accuracies or inaccuracies. W hatever the view, Pound’s
translations are still read and admired today and the reader is not
unduly concerned about all the details of the original. It is, in fact, the
end result th at is of vital importance.
Ezra Pound also translated poetry, where the rules tend to be
slightly different from the rules for prose. In his article A Basic M axim
3 Ambassadors o f the World, “Newsweek”, Nov. 3, 1986, p. 54.
4 Susan Bassnett, Andre Lefevere, Introduction: Proust's Grandmother and the
Thousand and One Nights: The Cultural Turn' in Translation Studies [in:] Translation,
History and Culture, Pinter Publishers, 1990, p. 12.
5 Susan Bassnett, Translation Studies, Routledge, rev. ed., 1991, p. 100.
174
fo r Practical Translation, Leo Hickey states that: “ A translation must
never say w hat the original does not say, but it may sometimes omit
what the original includes.” He goes on to explain that the former
involves textual accuracy and correctness, while the latter mainly
concerns the expectations of the envisaged readers.6 In any translation
we do, we always should take the addressee into account and that is
why the accepted forms, customs, linguistic and stylistic norms of the
TL are taken into consideration. That is why we can agree with
Hickey’s statement that we “may sometimes omit what the original
includes” . We cannot, however, omit information or im portant data
that would change the overall meaning of the text, and we are not
allowed to add our own ideas and reflections to what somebody else
has written. One of the basic and most im portant rules of translation
is that no m atter w hat our views are on the given subject or what we
think of the text as a whole, we have to honour the author and be as
accurate as we possibly can in our rendering of his text.
Accuracy, though, is something that is threatened by close contact
with ambiguity. Leo Hickey begins his above mentioned article with
the following: “A translator must never be wrong; he need not always
be right; the difference between the two may be critical” 7. Accuracy
and the notion of not ever being wrong are strictly connected but, at
the same time, it may be no fault o f our own that we are not always
right. N ot everyone publishing texts, or literature generally speaking,
is a good writer, well versed in his own language and capable of
expressing his thoughts in a lucid manner.
Ambiguity sets in very often and the translator, who is always
required to fully understand w hat he is translating, comes face to face
with something that is obscure or can be understood in more than one
way in the source language. This ambiguity becomes even clearer in
translation, and to avoid it the translator yet again has to undertake
certain conscious decisions.. If, on the other hand, ambiguity is an
intended act on the part of the author, it should remain in the
translation.
In our Polish-English translation experience, we also sometimes
6 Leo Hickey, A Basic Maxim for Practical Translation [in:] “The Incorporated
Linguist”, vol. 24, No. 2, Spring 1985, p. 106.
7 Ibidem.
175
come across ambiguities in the SL text but one of our main
problems, which was discussed more fully earlier in connection
with the translation of academic texts, is that the Polish is so
complex, obscure, long-winded, and often even incorrect, that
it takes us first a great deal of time to decipher what the author
had actually in mind, and then another long period of time
to try and say the same thing accurately and without ambiguity
in the target language. Let us look more closely at the following
text that was the introduction to a catalogue published on the
occasion of a well-known contemporary Polish artist’s retrospective
exhibition:
Skala i wszechstronność przedstawienia w Centrum Sztuki Współczesnej twór­
czości Zbigniewa Dłubaka są wyjątkowe wobcc tradycji wystaw indywidualnych
tu organizowanych. Wystawa ta otwiera program prezentacji oraz rozważania
szczególnych przykładów etosu drogi twórczej artystów polskich drugiej połowy
dwudziestego wieku. Tym samym chcemy wskazać właściwą rangę postaw
i postępowania, wiążącego konsekwentnie sprawę odwagi i klarowriości decyzji
twórczej z jej logiką motywacyjną. Zbigniew Dłubak, zajmując tak wyraźnie
określone miejsce w historii najnowszej sztuki polskiej, stanowi równocześnie
godny przykład jej oryginalnej obecności w procesie przemian sztuki światowej.
If we concentrate very hard, we may just manage to understand
what the author of the above text wanted to say. Putting it bluntly, it
is a mess, and it is a shame that such a piece of writing should be at
the beginning o f an otherwise very successful catalogue. This, however,
happens only too often when people, who are not writers themselves,
feel obliged to put pen to paper. The values of clarity and simplicity
does not seem to penetrate. Texts may be difficult from the point of
view of subject matter, and the author may even have his own more
complex style, but if the work is written well, it is also possible to
render a good version in the TL without acquiring a headache in the
process.
We do not wish to go into a detailed analysis of the Polish here,
limiting our comments to marking the questionable or even incorrect
phraseology. We would, however, like to present first the printed
English translation of the text, showing where the translator had
obvious difficulties, and then to give our own version with an
explanation of why we decided to translate it as we did. We can see
that in the following translation a great deal of effort was put into
176
understanding the Polish and, at the same time, the translator wished
to be as faithful and accurate as possible. The inaccuracies present are*,
linguistic, while the obscurity is due to the SL te x t..
The presentation of the art of Zbigniew Dłubak in the Centre for Contemporary
Art, viewed in the context of the tradition of the so far organized individual shows,
is exceptional in its range and diversity. The exhibition initiates a programme of
presentation and reflection on examples of the specific ethos of Polish artists in
the second half o f the XX century. Hereby we want to emphasize the proper rank
of such attitude and conduct which consistently unite courage and a clarity of
the artistic decision with the logic of its motivation. Zbigniew Dłubak, whose
place in the history of the most rccent Polish art is so clearly defined, is also
a distinguished example of its original presence in the world art in its process of
change.
As has been often emphasized in this work so far, the first step we
always have to take in the process o f translation is to understand the
SL text, and then we can proceed to render it into English so that it
is both readable and comprehensible to the Enghsh speaking audience.
The controversial aspect of whether in this case we should rewrite the
text, abbreviate it, try to make clear w hat is obscure, will continue to
remain controversial for many people. We believe, however, that the
audience is very im portant and it is the audience that should be able
to read the translated text with pleasure, even if the style or form may
be slightly ‘foreign’. It should not produce the agony the above
invariably does.
This is w hat we suggest could be done with this text:
The range and diversity of Zbigniew Dhibak’s artistic output presented at the
Centre o f Contemporary Art is exceptional when compared with the one-man
shows traditionally organized here. This exhibition opens a series of presentations
showing the specific ethos of Polish artists from the second half of the 20th
century. It portrays the importance of attitudes and forms of behaviour that
consistently link courage with logical, artistic decisions. Zbigniew Dłubak, who
holds such a clearly defined position in the Polish art o f today, distinguishes
himself also by being present in the process of change taking place in art
throughout the world.
We hope that here we have been accurate in rendering the meaning
o f the original, that we have made it more readable to an English
audience and we have preserved the formal, academic style although it
is, admittedly, slightly different to that o f the SL text. In all these
12— Successful Polish-English... 177
aspects we have been faithful to the original although we have quite
consciously attempted to eliminate the obscurity present therein. We
think that such decisions have to be taken sometimes.
In the following example, taken from a totally different text, that
was well written and fully comprehensible, there is ambiguity in the
original Polish version which might cause misunderstanding leading to
a change of meaning in the English translation. In order to understand
the problem better, it is necessary to quote a larger fragment of the text:
Cóż znaczy zatem wiadomość, że Izaak Bashevis Singer nie żyje? Należał do
nielicznych, których życie i twórczość stały się jednością. Mówić o książkach
Singera to mówić o Singerze, i na odwrót. Jego książki ocalają to życic. Kiedy
stajemy przed tajemnicą istnienia, wiary, miłości, cierpienia — stajemy przed jego
tajemnicami; tworzymy kolejną powieść, opowiadanie, historię.
Let us first look at:
Jego książki ocalają to życie.
and how it was translated. Two versions, both extremely misleading,
were:
1) His books save life.
2) His books saved his life.
Here we have an example of where we cannot take one small sentence
out of context because additional ambiguity is bound to set in. It is
ambiguous enough as it is. Ocalić certainly means to save but here
Singer’s books are n ot saving either his life or anybody else’s for that
matter. By writing about a life, a world that no longer exists, Singer
managed to keep that world alive for us. In his short stories and novels, he
brought it alive once again for ail those who came into the present world
long after the previous one was destroyed. In this passage, however,
Singer and his own life are in the foreground. He is the focus point.
In the last sentence o f the passage we have:
... stajemy przed jego tajemnicami...
and here jego is far from clear. It can mean Singer or it may mean life
because, throughout the text, Singer and life are one. In English,
however, we have to solve this ambiguity as we have to use either his
or its. There is no way we can have this ambiguity in the translated
text. Thus our suggestion for translation here would be:
178
So what does the news mean that Isaac Bashevis Singer is dead? He belonged to
the few whose life and work became one. To talk about Singer’s books means
to taik about Singer and vice versa. His books keep him alive. When we stand
before the mystery o f existence, faith, love, suffering, we stand before his secrets,
and create yet another novel, story.
As with so many notions, accuracy can be understood in a number
of ways but the following sentence is definitely an example of where
inaccurate translation can lead to misunderstanding. The Polish
sentence started thus:
Wcześniej Jan Olszewski spotkał się z...
and was translated in this way:
Earlier that day Jan Olszewski held a meeting with...
It is im portant to understand here that Olszewski neither organized
any meeting nor was he directly responsible for the meeting taking
place. He simply met with...
We may have our own interpretation for the written word, the
written word may be obscure, difficult to fathom, there may be
ambiguities that have to be clarified. All this is simply part of the
translation process.
TRANSLATION AND RITUAL
“ Both in speech and writing, much language is bound by ritual. Thus,
for instance, news broadcasts in all languages employ a set terminology,
which can be adapted almost without change to cover the many
different incidents that occur from day to day” 8. Due to the search
for objectivity in European news broadcasts today, whether it is in
Britain, Poland or France, the manner of delivering information is
similar, it follows a certain ritual, but a ritual that is common to all
three countries. Thus the translation o f such broadcasts, if the need
should arise, would not be overproblematic. It was, however, slightly
more difficult in the past where the news in Poland was presented in
a more subjective, one-sided manner, where a certain choice of
adjectives, such as friendly, brotherly, were in common use. This was
8 Alan Duff, The Third Language, Pergamon Press, 1981, p. 104.
179
characteristic of the language and accepted norms o f certain circles
and although not common in English, this ritual would have had to
be preserved in translation.
D uff continues to say that “ ritual contexts, such as speeches of
thanks, introductions to books, abstracts of articles, brochures on
tourist resorts, record sleeves, inevitably generate formula thought and
formula language” 9. Every culture and language has its own way,
which is like a ritual, o f delivering thanks, for example, or o f writing
letters, whether formal or informal, presenting inform ation in travel
brochures for tourists. There is a certain way o f saying things, an
accepted style that is natural and normal to the native reader, but
when translated too literally, often jars, seems odd, sometimes even
humorous. Although the word ritual was not used by us in the
previous chapters, the notion of awareness, of knowing what to say,
and when to say it in a given culture and language, was discussed at
length.
There are certain aspects o f the problem, however, which
are worth recalling, mentioning yet again or bringing to the fore
here as they are closely connected with w hat can be termed
as ritual in a given culture. There are countries which are known,
more than others, for their bureaucratic ways, for having to
have everything down in writing, for insisting on umpteen forms
being filled in, for everything being signed and stamped by at
least one person in authority. A part from the specific language,
or jargon used, there is also a certain style th at has to be followed
and in order to translate your curriculum vitae, for example,
you must not only know the appropriate terminology in the
TL but also know w hat is expected, and accepted, by the target
language reader.
When we are translating fiction, poetry or drama, we are not only
limited by the contents o f the given work but we always have to take
into consideration the author’s style, rhythm, form of writing. With
a business letter, on the other hand, we have primarily to transfer
information and adopt the accepted norms of the TL in that specific
sphere of writing. We have to know that just as in Polish there are
certain set phrases which are always used in formal letter-writing,
9 Ibidem.
180
there is also an accepted phraseology which has to be applied in
Enghsh formal or business letters. The main problem, however, lies in
the fact th at there cannot be any one-to-one translation here. You
simply have to know how to write such a letter in English and transfer
the necessary inform ation. This is w hat we understand by ritual. There
is a certain ritual in every culture and language and that ritual has to
be acknowledged and honoured. Otherwise your translation may
simply arouse ridicule, and w hat is even more im portant, may not be
properly understood by the recipient.
Let us look at the following English translation o f a letter that was
simultaneously an advertisement in a magazine printed specifically for
foreign tourists and businessmen visiting Poland:
Dear Sirs,
We are pleased to inform you that we are present since a year in the field of
Management and Executive Search in Poland.
We would like to take the pleasure informing you about the change of our
address. Our mother company, the Neumann Group, as the First International
Executive Search Firm with its Head Office in Vienna a established its
subsidiaries in East Europe and in major business centres all over the world...
You advertise because you wish to sell your wares, whether it is
business advice or w hat you think is the m ost interesting tourist
attraction in town. It has to be written correctly in the target language
so th at the reader understands the ad fully and reacts as you would
like him to react. The above quoted fragment o f a letter, advertising
a well-known M anagem ent consultancy, shows that much o f the text
was translated literally from Polish without undue effort going into
the form and language applied in such cases. Let us try and improve
on the English here:
Dear Sirs,
We have pleasure in informing you that for a year now we have been active
in the field of Management and Executive Search in Poland. We would also like
you to take note of our change of address. The Neumann Group, as the first
International Executive Search Firm, with its Head Office in Vienna, has
established subsidiaries in Eastern Europe and in major business centres all over
the world...
Everybody advertising wishes to gain customers, clients, patients
(doctors and dentists also advertise their services) and tourists and
181
that is why everything in the ad has to be correct from the point of
view o f language, e.g.
Jewellery
Silver
Gold
Leather
and a great variety of souvenires.
This should be: a great variety o f souvenirs. These may be two very
little mishaps but they are definitely important. They simply should
not be there.
The same would apply to the ORBIS TRAVEL AGENCY, which
has offices worldwide but happens to be guilty o f advertising thus:
All sightseeings and recital in Łazienki are operated by ORBIS motorcoach with
English speaking guide.
The style here is brief and only the most im portant information is
included. Sightseeing appears in the singular form only, while many
recitals take place in Łazienki. Can sightseeing be operated by
anybody? Sightseeing tours can be organized, but then again the piano
recitals that take place in the Łazienki Park are free of charge and
have nothing to do with ORBIS. The travel bureau, however, can
organize your trip in such a way that you visit the park, palace and
attend a recital during one outing. We also cannot help but ask
whether all sightseeings here means different sightseeing trips through­
out W arsaw with Łazienki and the recitals as being just one o f those
tours, or whether it only means visiting Łazienki and listening to
a Chopin recital. This is far from clear, and having a knowledge of
the English language does not really help here at all. One would think
that the aim o f the advertisement would be to tell English-speaking
foreign tourists th at they can do something like the following:
Visit Łazienki and listen to Chopin with ORBIS! Coach trip with English-speaking
guide.
“ The best defense against error, everyone seems to agree, is
a translator who knows the current idiomatic use of the language,
knows the culture o f the country... G ood translators often have to
rewrite whole passages rather than translating word for word; otherwise
phrasing penned by professionals or technicians might appear as
182
gibberish” . 10 Gibberish, unfortunately, appears only too often and it
is mainly due to word-for-word translation. This is why we continue
to stress the im portance o f a translator’s knowledge of TL idiom as
well as that o f the culture o f the given country. If the translator feels
at sea here, then he should do as a Janapese recruit at an American
translating office did when given the jo b of translating a vacuum
cleaner m anual into English. These are excerpts from the letter he
wrote to his employer: “ Some o f the terminology in the manual are
somewhat confusing as I have never heard of... Instead o f becoming
a menace to you and your well organized office, I am giving you my
resignation in supine surrender m anner” . 11
In order not to be a menace, and also not to have to resign from
the task we have undertaken, we must remember that, when advertising
crosses national borders, it m ust not only be translated, but made to
fit each culture.” 12 It is this very strong link between translation and
culture that we have to continually keep in mind if we wish to produce
works, whether they are ads, notices, pieces o f inform ation, that both
transfer the meaning and read well and naturally in the target
language. This is of prim e.importance.
While talking about culture, let us look at a brochure issued by the
Polish Cultural Institute in London containing inform ation on various
exhibitions and concerts that were to take place there in the immediate
future. Out o f the three texts included in the brochure two of them
were obviously translated from Polish with results such as:
During her (Poland’s) complicated historical path she contributed however to the
constitution o f many rich colonies o f artists, who either on their own will, or by
forcc, found themselves working abroad. This phenomenon has always been
monitored with great interest and sentiment by those living on the banks of the
Vistula River.
Those, of course, who know Polish can understand what is meant
here, but that is hardly the point. In this case, the text was translated
for the English reader who is hardly required to practise guesswork
and no doubt wonders at a certain translator’s incompetency. In the
above text, just like in any writing we do, we have to remember about
10 G. Christian Hill, Language fo r Profit, „The Wall Street Journal", Jan. 13, 1977.
u Ibidem.
12 Jonathan R. Slater, When the Medium is Translation, Mould the Message.
183
appropriate punctuation, and also that certain Polish cliches such as
na brzegu Wisły or the sentence Coraz to powieje nad Wisłą Wielkim
Światem, appear extremely often in texts that are later translated
into other languages. Let us now try to .rewrite the above passage,
but w ithout changing its meaning, in order to make it sound more
natural:
Throughout its complicated history, Poland has contributed, however, to the
forming o f many colonies of Polish artists abroad who either left the country of
their own free will or were forced into exile. This phenomenon has always been
observed and followed with great interest and sentiment by those at home.
As can be seen from the above, we have avoided using the word
Wisła or Vistula altogether. In Polish it is often used in the meaning
o f the country as a whole, and not just the Vistula as being the main
river in Poland. It is a manner of speech that would not be used
naturally in English. London lies on the banks of the river Thames
but we would talk about this river literally, from the geographical
point of view, but hardly in the figurative sense. The Thames,
although very im portant, is just one of many rivers, while the Vistula
has many extra connotations to the Polish nation. This is yet another
example o f where our knowledge of the culture, of idiom and
m etaphor o f both SL and TL is so very im portant in any translation
work we undertake.
TRANSLATION AND PERFECTIO N
“All translations seem to me to be simply an attem pt to solve an
insoluble problem ” , said H um boldt.13 In translation this very often
seems to be the case but, as we have also tried to show, views on this
m atter vary greatly, from Ralph Manheim, who says that everything
is translatable, to W alter Benjamin and Vladimir Nabokov, who were
known to be extreme literalists because their view was that translation
was impossible and “ if attempted at all, it must be as literal as
possible” . 14 The whole idea o f translatability or untranslatability is
controversial. Some translators and translation theorists share the
above views, while others feel that, although they should be able to
13 Theodore Savory, The Art o f Translation, The Writer, Inc. 1968, p. 75.
14 Peter Newmark, A Textbook o f Translation, Prentice Hall, 1988, p. 45.
184
solve the most daunting o f problem s,15 there are situations,, especially
when translating poetry, in which they will never solve
problems they face. .^ ^
The cliche that nobody is perfect cannot help but come tó inind
here, and we could also say that no translation is perfect, as there is
always bound to be something in the work that could be better.; It* is
also true th at we, as translators, could do better, we could keep on
changing and trying to improve on our work, on the text we are
translating. It is only natural to feel dissatisfied with w hat we have
produced as we continue to feel we could do better. As Alan Duff
says: “Translation is a process o f thought and afterthought. The best
ideas may occur later.” 16 Unfortunately, very often we do not have
the opportunity to go back and change our ideas. Translations,
especially non-literary ones, are also invariably done in haste, and in
our haste we have to be as good as we possibly can. We certainly have
to search for perfection, although it is only natural that through our
own self-criticism we may feel this goal impossible to achieve. We
have, however, to try consciously to do our best and that is why we
should also try never to undertake a task if we know from the very
beginning th at we are going to fail.
There will always be critics only too ready to prove our incom­
petency or th at our translations, no m atter w hat they are of, are an
extremely long way away from being perfect. The very notion of
‘perfection’ is subjective. So much depends on our own expectations,
on what we have become accustomed to. A very good example of this
are the two translations o f Winnie-the-Pooh by A. Milne. The first
one, done by Irena Tuwim, has become so much part of the literature
read and loved by Polish children that certain expressions used by the
translator have not only entered the linguistic culture of quite a few
generations of Poles but also it is often forgotten that it was
a translation in the first place. The title is known to everybody, both
young and old, the translator’s name is known to many, the poor
author’s name is often forgotten. In such a situation, it was only
natural th at there should have been an outcry when a second
translation appeared a few years ago. The translator did not stand
15 Susan Bassnett, op. c/r., p. 36.
16 Alan Duff, Translation, Oxford University Press, 1989, p. 15.
185
 a chance here, although it does non mean she did not do an equally
good job o f translating this children’s classic. It was simply different,
and people did not want to know.
Richard Howard, one of the best, contemporary translators of
French literature into English, believes “ there is no such thing as
a definitive translation” and maintains that “ all great works need to
be retranslated in every generation to keep pace with changes in
English usage.” 17 This, of course, would apply to every language and
every great literature, although with much popular literature, as the
above example concerning Winnie-the-Pooh has shown, this is not
always the case. However, over the years, we have had many Polish
translations o f one o f the greatest in English literature — Shakespeare
— but only a few o f the translators have become household names
and have met with full acceptance by their contemporaries. It is
possible to mention Józef Paszkowski from the 19th century and
Maciej Słomczyński from the 20th. Stanisław Barańczak, a Polish poet
and writer who is very much part of the latter half of this century, is
gradually producing his translations of William Shakespeare’s complete
works in a language th at is both appreciated, understood and accepted
by the contem porary Pole. Here we can say that he has ‘kept pace with
changes in Polish usage’.
In his famous Essay on the Principles o f Translation (1790)
Alexander Fraser Tytler (Lord Woodhouselee) saidr“ the best trans­
lators have been those writers who have composed original works of
the same species” . In this quote we can clearly see the strict connection
between writing and translating, and it is the importance of this link
that we have also tried to emphasize, if a translation is to prove
a success. Before undertaking any form of translation one has to know
and be fully aware of the two languages to such an extent that one
becomes totally immersed in them while being in the process of
translating. The stress, we have tried to place on understanding the
source language text, and also a full understanding of the target
language, is of vital importance. W ithout this knowledge, awareness
of language, culture, customs, mannerisms, we shall never come
anywhere near the goal o f achieving perfection, no m atter how we
understand this term. First and foremost, however, one has to know
17 "Ambassadors...” op. cit., p. 54.
186
how to write in the target language, and to write well in order to be
able to cope with translation.
1“A perfect translation, it has been said, conveys the spirit of the
original author by giving us the words that he would have used had
his language been that into which his writings are about to be
translated. The finding o f these words, it may be added, must take
into account the author’s style, which depends on his personality as
well as the time and the special circumstances in which he wrote” .
Theodore Savory goes on to say that this is a “manifestly impossible
dem and” as “ it expresses the theory that a translator’s function is to
transfuse the character of the original author into the translation” . He
believed that only in a few exceptional circumstances, “a translator
should concern himself with the words before him; they themselves
should sufficiently display their author” . It is what the author wrote
that is of primary im portance.18
If we were to analyse the different views propagated on this matter,
we would see once again how extremely varied and subjective they
happen to be. This applies to those considering this problem many
centuries ago and also today, when it is not only great works of
literature that are being translated. Because this book has been dealing
primarily with the many diverse problems Poles have when translating
into a language that is not their mother tongue, we have tried to show
how to avoid mistakes that mainly concern language, and also how to
translate so that the language used does ‘sufficiently display’ the
author o f the original text. By transferring the words, ideas and
meaning of the SL text we may, and should try to, achieve a correct
translation, but in order to try and achieve a piece of writing that is
close to a perfect translation requires a “ little” more. Correctness is
totally sufficient when dealing with the majority of the texts we have
mentioned and quoted throughout this work, texts that are very often
strictly informative, and have been translated for a specific need and
purpose. They have to be correct from the point of view of language
and transferring the sense o f the original. The style we adopt is also
directed by the original, hence the difference between an advertisement,
a formal letter and an academic dissertation, but we are always limited
by the style and form that is acknowledged and accepted by the target
18 Theodore Savory, op. cit., pp. 138— 139.
187
language audience. T hat is why we have to know that audience, its
mentality, its cultural background, w hat is said and done in th at given
culture, and what would be totally unacceptable there. We have tried
to elucidate this, on the basis o f numerous examples, in the previous
chapters.
Little has been written here about translating great works of
literature, i.e. fiction, poetry, dram a from Polish into English, because
it is here, more than anywhere else, that native speakers are needed.
And it is in English speaking countries that certain Polish works are
translated and read. In the majority, it is contemporary literature, and
the need for such translations arises in particular circles abroad. The
translators also usually come from those countries, and in many ways
the Tytler quotation would apply here. Every translator is a writer in
his own right but his specific originality is bound to come to the fore
in longer works of literary art than when translating a menu in
a restaurant. However, with ‘belles-lettres’, the style and atmosphere
of the original, and not only the language and meaning, are also of
vital importance, and although our own specific style of writing may
encroach into the work we are translating, we have to remember that
the perfection we are trying to achieve may actually occur when the
translation itself is n ot noticed. “ It might suggest that it has an
excellence of its own” , said Howard, and “maybe being overlooked is
a compliment” . 19
A SUCCESSFUL TRANSLATION
The above discussion concerning perfection in translation is strictly
connected with success in translation. As we have repeatedly pointed
out, our aim has been to help others achieve success in their
translations, which means producing English texts from Polish originals
that are read, fully understood and appreciated by the target audience.
N o m atter w hat we are translating, we have to keep the envisaged
reader in mind. If it is for a prospective buyer, instructions on
a product have to be clear, linguistically correct and the idiom used
has to be that of the target audience. An advertisement has to attract
attention, inform ation in tourist brochures has to be lucid and
19 ’’Ambassadors...” , op. cit., p. 53.
188
enthusiastic enough to make tourists want to take sightseeing tours,
visit historical monuments, travel into the country, attend concerts or
try the local culinary specialities. I f we wish our knowledge on certain
scientific problems to be known and appreciated abroad, they have to
be translated in such a way that the reader or listener o f papers
delivered at conferences will fully understand our train of thought.
Here emphasis should be placed on meaning and clarity. This has to
be transferred if we are to achieve our original goals.
Alan D u ff in Translation quoted Henry G ilford who said: *The
first law of translation is clear: nothing can be taken as final” . 20 This
is only too true as, like with the achievement o f perfection in
translation, we could keep changing our versions indefinitely, and
every rendering o f a work, done by different people in different
periods o f time, are either accepted by all or are sometimes overthrown
straight away. Even those th at are acknowledged, and become part of
the literature generally read by the public, become archaic after the
passage of time and seem to call out for a new rendering, although the
SL text is still printed as it was originally written.
There is no way to avoid criticism, expecially as “ there are no
rules, no laws, there cannot be an absolute right or an absolute wrong.
There can be errors (and even the most experienced translator has an
occasional mishap), there can be lapses in tone. The worst mistake
a translator can commit is to reassure himself by saying, ‘that’s what
it says in the original’, and renouncing the struggle to do his best” . 21
If we are to be a success, we always have to do our best and that is
why the translator has very often to do more than just convey
information. T hat is why he has also to be a writer, hence the
emphasis on our mastery of the language we are translating into, and
our awareness that it is not only our knowledge o f the TL that will
produce a successful translation but our immersion in everything that
concerns the target audience. T hat is why we are very often not only
mere translators, but also writers, even rewriters, m anipulators and
mediators. It takes time to gain this experience.
We would also like to share Weaver’s view that translation is
20 Alan Duff, Translation, Oxford University Press, 1989, p. 14.
21 William Weaver, The Process o f Translation [in:] The Craft o f Translation, ed. by
John Biguenet and Rainer Schulte, University o f Chicago Press, c. 1989, p. 118.
189
something you łeara only by doing and encouraging those who are
interested, those who wish to achieve success in the field o f translation,
to keep working on it. It takes more than a few m onths to learn how
to translate. It often takes years and a great deal o f practice, devotion
and sacrifice. It comes easier to some than to others but it is only total
involvement in the w ork you are doing that will finally help you
produce texts acknowledged as being successful because they are read
naturally, are understood, satisfy the requirements of the target
audience, although they may concern matters that are totally foreign
to them. translation is a success when we do not encounter SL
interference, linguistic incorrectness, obscurity and when we, as readers,
become naturally engrossed in the content without thinking or even
realising that we are reading a translation.
In our writing here we have tried to draw attention to the problems
and mistakes that invariably occur when inexperienced translators
attem pt to render Polish texts into English. We hope that by discussing
these matters openly, by explaining why so much bad translation is
evident in our everyday activities, there will be more successful
translation in the future. Although we would prefer to call translating
an art, there are tricks o f this trade that can be learnt, and combined
with practice will always produce good results.
SUGGESTED READING
1. Barańczak, Stanisław, Ocalone w tłumaczeniu, Wydawnictwo a5, Poznań 1992.
2. Bassnett-McQuire, Susan, Translation Studies, (rev. ed.), Routledge, London 1991.
3. Biguenet, John and Schulte, Rainer, (eds), The Craft o f Translation, The University
o f Chicago Press, Chicago and London, 1989.
4. Catford, J.C., A Linguistic Theory o f Translation, Blackwell, Oxford 1965.
5. Dedecius, Kari, Notatnik tłumacza (trans, from the German by Jan Prokop),
Wydawnictwo Literackie, Kraków 1974.
6. Dzierżanowska H., Przekład tekstów nieliterackich, PWN, W-wa, 1988.
7. Duff, Alan, The Third Language, Pergamon Press, Oxford 1981.
8. Duff, Alan, Translation, Oxford University Press, 1989.
9. Gaddis-Rose, M. (ed.), Translation Spectrum, State University of New York Press,
New York 1981.
10. Hoffman, Eva, Lost in Translation, Minerva 1991.
11. Newmark, Peter, Approaches to Translation, Pergamon Press, Oxford 1982.
12. Pieńkos, Jerzy, Przekład i tłumacz we współczesnym świecie, PWN, Warszawa 1993.
13. Pollack, Seweryn, (ed.), Przekład artystyczny. O sztuce tłumaczenia II, Ossolineum,
Wrocław 1975.
14. Savory, Theodore, The Art o f Translation, Pergamon Press, Oxford 1957.
15. Snell-Hornby, Mary, Translation Studies. An Integrated Approach, John Benjamin,
Amsterdam 1988.
16. Wojtasiewicz, Olgierd, Wstęp do teorii tłumaczenia, TEPIS, Warszawa 1992.
17. Zlateva, Palma (ed.), Translation as Social Action, Routledge, London 1993.
 idiom 49, 131, 145, 146, 150, 151, 152, misunderstanding 64—66, 145, 146 i47
154, 157, 162, 170, 183— 185 150— 152, 165, 178, 179
inadequate knowledge 149
SUBJECT INDEX inaccuracies 174, 177 obscurity 82, 86, 123, 176, 190
incompetence 183 one-to-one translation 152, 162
incorrectness 147, 190 operative texts 103
interference 50, 68, 71, 72, 190 original 30, 174, 175,. 177, 187
intermediary 131, 132 overtranslation 25
interpretation 30, 31, 174, 179
interpreter 144 perfect .translation 187
interpretive artist 125 perfection 184, 185, 188, 189
invention 108 perfectionist 128
phrasal verbs 121, 122, 181
jargon 131, 150 popular culture'28, 30
accepted equivalents 100 — norms 53, 54, 175 pragmatics 29
accuracy 139, 174— 176, 179 — studies 20, 24, 51 lexical items 150, 152, 166, 170, 172 precision 100, 101
adaptation 47 — system 67 lexical misunderstandings 150, 151 prepositions 116, 118— 123
adapter 127 — transfer 18, 19 lingua franca 93, 96 pronouns 53, 54
adjectival phrases 64, 147 — untranslatability 150 linguistic proper nouns 59— 61, 72, 119
aesthetic values 129 — associations 107, 108 proverbs 158, 170
ambiguity 174— 176, 178, 179 degree of conventionality 14 — background 19 punctuation 123, 124
articles 64, 116 dialectal differentiation 131 — behaviour 27
artist 125, 132 dictionaries 149, 164, 165 — competence 94 re-creative process 137
direct translation 108, 152 — culture 186, 187 redundancy 133, 137
bicultural context 18 duplication 129, 193 — discrimination 131 reference books 164, 165
bilingual context 18 — equivalence 14, 18 relevance 35, 36, 39
elimination 170, 171 — equivalents 26, 30, 45, 46, 56 remaker 127, 190
categorization 36 encyclopaedias 164 — innovations 51 repetitions 137, 162
choice 169, 171— 173 equivalence 44, 46, 114, 137, 139, 163, — intuition 141 responsibility 39, 40, 104, 163, 167, 168,
clarification 81 168, 171 — norms 82, 175 170
cognitive linguistics 19, 29 ESP 94—97 — reorientation 135 rewriter 133, 135, 189
conventions 97 expressive texts 103, 104 — system 9 rewriting 44, 45, 107, 108, 109, 135
comma 116, 123, 124 — transfer 15 ritual 179— 181
communication 9, 17, 18, 20, 34, 37, 43, 96 faithful translation 103, 109 — untranslatability 150
communicative function 41, 44, 47, 49 faithfulness 28, 44, 68, 82, 109, 137, 171 literal translation 145, 158, 162 saxon genitive 66, 118— 120, 147
contextual associations 107, 108 fidelity 138, 139, 141 scene language 139
correct translation 187 flexibility 97 machine translation 27 semantics 50
creativity 13, 135, 138 ‘free’ translation 38, 39, 43, 44, 97 manipulation 136 sequence of tenses 148, 149
creator 125, 127 functional equivalents 110 manipulator 125, 127, 144, 189, 203 social connotations 107
cultural mediator 127, 189 social context 51, 53, 67
— associations 107 generalization 25 metaphor 34, 131, 145, 146, 150, 157, 158, social relevance 17
— awareness 108, 187 genitive case 66, 118, 119, 120, 147 162, 170, 184 socialist realism 139, 140, 156, 157
— context 108, 158 grammar 146 minimax strategy 135 sociolinguistics 29, 53
— conventions 48, 49, 112, 113, 146 grammatical misunderstandings 146, 147 mistranslation 87, 125, 145, 146, 149, 152, spelling 28, 116
— misunderstandings 104 156, 159, 165, 168 standard equivalents 100

192 13— Successful Polish-English... 193

standardization 35
structuralism 28
structuralist model 29
structuralist obscurity 82
structuralist theories 19
styles 112
stylistic convention 112
stylistic obscurity 82
substitution 52
synonyms 146, 148, 162— 164
syntax 68, 115
tenses 149
the arts 76
third language 41— 49
titles 141, 160— 162, l^Q, 171
194
transfer 15
transference 24
translatability 150, 167, 184
translation studies 12, 13, 23, 26, 27, 29
translation theory 23, 24, 26, 27, 36
‘translationese’ 145, 148
understanding 71, 145, 163
undertranslation 25
untranslatability 145, 150, 166— 168, 184
word-for-word translation 68, 73, 183,
184
writer 71, 75, 125, 132, 144, 189
writer-translator 141
Wydanie drugie
Arkuszy drukarskich 12,25
Skład: Foto type, Milanówek
Druk ukończono w lutym 1998 r.
Druk i oprawa: Wrocławska Drukarnia Naukowa
Polskiej Akademii Nauk