Masaryk University Faculty of Arts

Department of English and American Studies English Language and Literature

Bc. Anik Fzkov

An Analysis of Creativity and Normalization in the Czech and Slovak Translations of Arundhati Roys

The God of Small Things

Masters Diploma Thesis

Mgr. Renata Kamenick, Ph.D.

2009

I declare that I have worked on this thesis independently, using only the primary and secondary sources listed in the bibliography.

.. Authors signature

Acknowledgement I wish to express my thanks to my supervisor Mgr. Renata Kamenick, Ph.D., Mgr. Zn Vernyik, Ing. Peter Fzk and Ian Wienert, B.A. for their technological help.

Contents
Contents ................................................................................................................................. 4 Introduction ............................................................................................................................ 5 1. 1.1. 2. 3. 3.1. 3.2. 3.3. 3.4. 3.5. 3.6. 3.7. The God of Small Things ........................................................................................... 9 The Translations....................................................................................................... 13 Theory ...................................................................................................................... 21 Analysis.................................................................................................................... 30 Names....................................................................................................................... 31 Sounds ...................................................................................................................... 36 Metaphor .................................................................................................................. 42 Compounds .............................................................................................................. 48 Creative translation .................................................................................................. 53 Repetition ................................................................................................................. 57 Compensation........................................................................................................... 62

Conclusion ........................................................................................................................... 67 Bibliography ........................................................................................................................ 72

Introduction
Translation is an art: it requires a certain experience, a certain education and a substantial amount of talent. Despite all these requirements, translators are undervalued, underpaid and their status in society is a rather complicated one. They receive minimal credit and almost no attention from readers and from critics as well. Their work is viewed as being of second order, and it is considered as a reproduction of the creative original. Nevertheless, translators must invest a considerable amount of time and skill to create a good and valuable translation. First of all, they have to read the source text. The next step is to understand the source text perfectly. The final stage is to express the message of the source text by means of the target text. In some cases this is not such a difficult task, nevertheless in cases of literary translation which employ a vast array of poetic devices, verbal and sound games, the translator faces a serious challenge. In order to transfer all the functions and meanings of the text, the translator must not only have perfect skills in his/her mother tongue, but s/he must understand and feel the small nuances between different words and the different meanings of the same word. If the translator misunderstands the source text or s/he creates a fuzzy sentence, s/he can alter the meaning of the whole sentence. This change is the central topic of this analysis. This work presents an analysis of the strategies of creativity and normalizations in two different translations of Arundhati Roys novel The God of Small Things. The Czech translation was done by Michaela Lauschmannov and published in 2001. The Slovak translation was created by Veronika Redererov and it appeared in 1998. The two translations were published within a few years of each other, nevertheless they are very 5

different, employing different strategies to achieve the same means and transferring certain phenomena to a varying degree. Their experience with translation differs considerably, however the translations show that the less experienced translator has a better command of her mother tongue than the experienced one. The study of creativity is possible only if the translations are creative to a certain degree, but the creativity of translations depends on that of the source text. The God of Small Things is a creative work full of unusual phrases, rhymes, metaphors, alliteration and other verbal games. Arundhati Roy created an original work adjusting and mending English according to her needs. All these devices form a part of the message and help to direct the readers attention and to force them to read carefully, not to miss anything that the text says. The difficulty the translators had to face lies partly in the language of the source text and partly in choosing the proper devices to express the message and the style of the original by means of another language. The work starts with a chapter introducing Arundhati Roy and her novel The God of Small Things. It talks about Roys life, her style, the book, its characteristic features and its content as well. The next part of this chapter provides a short introduction to the two translations presenting their general tendencies along with their shortcomings. At this point, it talks about the problems of the translations, because their creativity will be studied in a greater detail in chapter 3. The next chapter presents the theoretical background of the analysis introducing and describing the concepts employed during the study of these translations. The most important concepts used in this work are: Ji Levs dichotomy between faithful and beautiful translations, Peter Newmarks approach to metaphors, Friedrich Daniel Ernst 6

Schleiermachers dichotomy of domesticating versus foreignizing methods of translation, some of the concepts introduced by Geoffrey Leech and the notion of translation universals primarily as introduced in the Routledge Encyclopaedia of Translation Studies. The third chapter contains the analysis proper. It is based on the study of creative passages of the book. During the compilation of this analysis we used the following secondary sources: British National Corpus, esk nrodn korpus, Elektronick lexikn slovenskho jazyka, Prun mluvnice etiny and kolsk slovnk spisovnej sloveniny. They proved especially useful when looking at the common uses of words or phrases, definitions of words and when comparing the structures of the translations with grammatical rules. The passages included in this work were chosen on the basis of their originality or because they presented the translators with particular difficulties. The examples are taken from different parts of the book representing various kinds of narratives and situations. To avoid confusion when locating the citations in the translations, they are located with the help of the following two abbreviations: Roy CZ and Roy SK. These refer to the page numbers of the Czech and Slovak translations, respectively. This chapter is divided into seven parts, each concentrating on one phenomenon. It always starts with an introduction of the context from which the studied sentence or sentences come. This part will explain the situation described in the book, the means the author uses to achieve the desired effects, and the influence of these effects on the sentence and on the text as a whole. Then we look at the sentence as written by Roy followed by the Czech and the Slovak translations, respectively. The relevant parts of the source text and the relevant parts of the version using the creative approach are set in bold type. Then we 7

continue with the analysis of the two translations introducing their advantages and disadvantages. Finally, we look at the solutions of the two translators, how they coped with certain phenomenon and compare their strategies and the success and appropriateness of these strategies. In general, we concentrate on the means used by the author of the source text, explain their consequences and their implications for the sentence and the text as a whole. We analyze creative phenomena found in the text, look at their structure, how creativity is achieved, why it is employed and how it influences the text. Then we look at the solutions presented by the two translators, first explaining whether they use creative or normalizing strategies. Then we explain what the strategy is based on, how it corresponds to the message of the source text. What are the functions and meanings of the translation and how these meanings and functions correspond to those of the source text. Finally, we look at the changes and influences present in the translation. We talk about the changes present in the target text when compared to the source text; we look at the degree of their influence on the translation and the consequences for the reader. It is important to us what the readers are able to understand and what they cannot understand or deduct from the text. Sometimes, it is possible to omit or imply certain features without greater loss, at other times there is no other possibility than to circumscribe the phenomenon in the text, but these normalizing strategies can influence the message, and in some cases the quality of the text to various degrees. We will talk about the degree to which the translations differ from the original and about their consequences for their readers.

1.

The God of Small Things

First of all, let us take a look at some basic information about the author of this book,

namely Arundhati Roy. Ganapathi Reddy in his article describes her as a Polemicist, gamine, political figure, essayist, coming of the age of feminism, icon of the voiceless (Reddy). What is more, she was the first Indian woman to receive the prestigious Booker Prize award. Arundhati Roy was born on November 24, 1961 in Bengal. Her father was a tea planter (just as the father of Estha and Rahel) and her mother taught in her own school. Her mother divorced her father, which made her an outcast in her village of Ayemenem (Flynn). In one of her interviews, Roy explained that it was very difficult for her to grow up without a father, because the lineage of a person is derived from his or her fathers family (Barsamian). Nevertheless, she emphasized how much she admired her mother to have gotten a divorce in such a country and to raise Arundhati on her own. She further enjoyed living without a dominant male authority which is usually rather cruel in Kerala (Tikkanen). Her mother was a social activist as well. She challenged the inheritance law of the Syrian Christian Church, which granted women an unequal share of their fathers inheritance (Barsamian). Arundhati Roy started to attend school when she was ten. She was the first student of her mothers school, which later became very successful. This school was very informal and it led children to think independently. This influence can still be seen on Roy as well as on her writing, which is unconventional and free. One of the results of this independence was that Arundhati left home at the age of sixteen and lived in a small hut. She earned her living by selling empty beer bottles (Flynn). Then she started attending a boarding school in southern India. She earned her degree at the Delhi's School of 9

Planning and Architecture, where she met her first husband. Together they moved to the seaside and lived an ordinary life selling cakes to the tourists, but their marriage ended after four years. After returning to New Delhi she met her second husband, the film director Pradeep Krishen (Flynn). Together they started to write screenplays for television series. The first series was discontinued after the first episodes were shot. Nevertheless, the other screenplays brought success to the couple including films such as: In Which Annie Gives It To Those Ones and Electric Moon (Tikkanen). Roys popularity was rising, until she was imprisoned symbolically for one day for lowering the courts dignity. After the trial she retreated to work on The God of Small Things which was a great and overwhelming success. After this success she decided to use her popularity to publicise controversial issues of politics, environment and war. Arundhati Roys first book The God of Small Things was an immediate success. More than 350,000 copies were sold within the first three months after publication. It has been distributed in thirty countries and translated into twenty-four languages (Tikkanen). The reactions to this novel were mostly positive throughout the world. Nevertheless, in India it received widespread criticism. One of the main criticisms was its topic. The novel talks, among other things, about politics, religion and caste, topics that people normally do not talk about. The second major criticism was her description of the love between Velutha and Ammu. Roy was accused of obscenity and faced a trial in India. It is quite interesting that even though the affair between Velutha and Ammu were not the only scene that talked about illegal love (there is also child abuse and incest), these scenes infuriated the public most. It was probably not so much because of sex, but because Velutha was from a lower caste than Ammu (Tikkanen). 10

The novel has a non-linear plot which jumps back and forth between the past and the present. This strategy helped to create a very interesting and gripping story. Almost from the first lines, the readers are being prepared that something bad has happened in the family, but receive only small pieces of information at a time and they have to read carefully to be able to put the story together (Truax). Roy uses many different techniques to underline the rising tension and to show the readers what is important. For some of her techniques she was compared to Salman Rushdie, certainly a strong influence in India, in the British press (Nishant). Her approach to English is very free, a consequence of her mothers informal education, and her use of language is exquisite. She shapes, adjusts and mends English according to her needs (Flynn). Arundhati Roy uses italics and capital letters in the middle of the sentence to show what is important or to show that a character said something with a particular intonation or in a special way. The next strategy Roy employs to show emphasis, or to create a certain mood is the use of compounds. She creates compounds by joining two words together or by inserting a hyphen. An important part of the meaning is also conveyed through sounds: Roy makes extensive use of alliteration, repetition and rhymes. These features create or support the mood of the passage, they also show emphasis and they often convey small hints and underlying meanings directing the readers attention into the desired direction. Not even the narrator in The God of Small Things is conventional. The story is mainly told from the perspective of the twins, and sometime involves a third omniscient narrator. Seeing the events from the perspective of a seven years old child explains why some events and attitudes are only implied in the text while others are described imperfectly. The novel is partly autobiographical and Rahel can be seen as the representation of Arundhati Roy herself. 11

The God of Small Things talks about the history of a ruined middle-class family. The book starts with the introduction of the first incident that started a chain of tragic events: the funeral of Sophie Mol, the cousin of the main heroes Estha (Esthappen) and Rahel. They were fraternal twins of a divorced mother, Ammu, who after leaving her husband came to live with her parents and her brother Chacko. The book provides its readers with many examples of the local customs, religion, political scene, the oppression of women and the difficulties connected to the caste system. The most active character is Velutha, an Untouchable worker in the familys pickle factory. He belongs to the lowest caste, which means that his life is full of restrictions and without possibilities of advancement. The Kochamma family admires his skills, yet he is still subordinate to them. Velutha tries to break the laws: he has a better job than is suitable for his caste and he is a member of the Communist Party as well. These are small things for ordinary people, but not for an Untouchable, that is why Velutha is The God of Small Things. The first part of the book contains many descriptions and sidetracks and the story evolves slowly, introducing the characters, the settings, the past and the present. Suddenly, the story starts to gain speed and the events follow in short succession. As the narrator puts it: [t]hings can change in a day (Roy 202). Sophie Mol joins the twins during an attempt to run away from home, but she drowns in the river. Veluthas father tells Ammus mother, Mammachi, about their childrens relationship, consequently Velutha has to hide. His hiding coincides with Sophie Mols death and he is accused of killing her and kidnapping the twins. The twins and Velutha hide in the same house, where the police beat him almost to death. Mammachi forces Estha to lie that Velutha kidnapped them. Estha makes the false accusation at the police station, but never speaks again. Velutha dies in prison, Ammu has 12

to leave Ayemenem sending Estha to his father and leaving Rahel with the family. The book ends as it started with the meeting of the estranged twins Estha and Rahel trying to find their way back to each other.

1.1. The Translations

The two translations are completely different. Their difference lies primarily in the contradicting approaches they took. The Czech translator chose a foreignizing method transferring all idiosyncrasies of the original, while the Slovak translator employed a domesticating method adjusting the text to Slovak traditions (for further detail see chapter 2). The next difference is due to the disparities in the linguistic abilities of the translators. The Czech translator tried to transfer as many features of the original as possible, not to omit a rhyme, metaphor or an instance of alliteration. In comparison, the Slovak translator often omits these features, frequently translating them with common phrases or by paraphrasing. Nowadays, translators are undervalued; their work is thought of as unimaginative and secondary. That is why there is almost no information about the translators. The only available information is the list of books they have translated until the year when their translation of The God of Small Things appeared. The Czech translation was done by Michaela Lauschmannov and it was published in 2001. Roys book was her first published translation, which is amazing if we consider how skilfully she worked with the Czech language. It was a very courageous decision to choose Roy as her first translation; nevertheless, her linguistic skills and her creativity exceeded all expectations.

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The translation of Michaela Lauschmannov is very creative and original. She was able to mend and adjust the Czech language to a similar degree as Roy mends the English language, even though she was using the means and the possibilities of the Czech language. Lauschmannov managed to transfer most metaphors, similes, rhymes, alliterations and other creative features of the original. Her text contains many translations of Roys unusual descriptions and compounds. The examples of her creativity can be found in Chapter 3, so we will not talk about them now. Now we will introduce some tendencies that are not included in the analysis. They are omitted mainly because these tendencies are specific for Lauschmannov and they do not occur in the Slovak translation. There is, however, one exception, and that is omitting information. This phenomenon can be found in both translations. Nevertheless, its occurrence in this translation is very low in number. The second reason for not including this common feature in the analysis is that we cannot compare creativity in connection with a phenomenon involving only normalizing strategies. As we have already said, only very little information is omitted from this translation and these are only details, not influencing the message of the sentence. For example: In those early amorphous years when memory had only just begun, when life was full of Beginnings and no Ends, and Everything was Forever, Esthappen and Rahel thought of themselves together as Me, and separately, individually, as We or Us (Roy 2). V tch ranch letech, kdy vechno nejasn splvalo a pam teprve ponala, kdy ivot byl sam zatek a dn konec a vechno bylo navdy, vnmali se Esutappan a Rhel spolen jako j, a oddleni, kad zvl jako my (Roy CZ 14). 14

Even though the translation omitted the last part of the sentence, the readers would certainly understand the main message of the text. What they would miss is the emphasis added to the fact of the twins joint identities. Nevertheless, this information has no decisive influence on the message of the sentence or the book now, since it is clearly visible throughout the book. There are also a few instances when whole sentences were omitted, but it looks as if they were omitted by accident. They do not contain any passages that would be difficult to translate. The next recurrent shortcoming of this translation was its language. Even though the verbal and sounds games were mostly transferred, some sentences of this translation were strange. They either contained something unusual (a phrase or just a word) or the sentence itself sounded strange. Let us look at an example: There was lemon soda in thick bottles with blue marble stoppers to keep the fizz in (Roy 62). Byla tam citronov sodovka v tlustch lahvch s modrmi mramorovanmi ztkami, aby nevyprchaly bublinky (Roy CZ 71). The initial phrases are the same in both sentences, but it sounds strange in the translation and shows a strong influence of the source text. There are some more examples in the book, but this is one of the most characteristic mistakes showing the influence of the source text. It is interesting to see that some of these sentences occurred at places where the source text was not difficult to translate. This phenomenon might be the consequence of the translators effort to translate as many features of the original as possible, staying close to the source text, and at some cases the translation was probably too close.

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Cultural references present the next problem of this translation. There are some cases where culture-specific issues were not translated or were translated improperly. For the name of the rubber band holding Rahels ponytail, Love-in-Tokyo (Roy 106), the translator supplied a word-for-word translation. This did not tell the Czech readers what it exactly was, yet it was understandable, because the author explained that it was holding Rahels hair. Unfortunately, the readers of the Czech translation could not imagine what exactly it was and how it looked, and it would have been useful for them to imagine it, because it was Rahels symbol just as the puff was Esthas. The last disadvantage of the Czech translation is the few cases of misunderstanding. Lauschmannovs translation contains a few examples where the translation differs from the original, to a greater or lesser degree. These cases look as if Lauschmannov misunderstood the source text. Some shifts in meaning might be caused by the difficult structure of the sentence, while others were simply caused by misunderstanding. For example, the English question Did he gobble? (Roy 106) was translated as Vydval krocan zvuky?(Roy CZ 111). The shift of meaning lies in the use of a different meaning of the word gobble. The original talks about behaving improperly during eating, while the translation asks whether he made sounds similar to those that turkeys make. The message of the original was to ask whether he behaved properly when he ate, but the Czech translation does not talk about eating, it talks about making strange sounds. The meaning is more general and does not explain what the word refers to. Despite all the shortcomings listed above, the translation is creative, its language is original, reflecting the point of view of the young narrators and creating a similar effect on the readers as the source text.

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The Slovak translator, Veronika Redererov, had considerable experience with translation before she published her translation of Roys book. Nevertheless, they were mainly popular literature, such as Robin Cook, John Grisham and Dick Frances. These books usually do not involve such a degree of originality of language and they do not use poetic devices to such an extent as Roy. Consequently, even if Redererov had some experience with translating, she certainly did not have to face such a challenge as she had when translating The God of Small Things and her translation reflects this. In comparison to the Czech translation, the Slovak translation is much freer; it does not try to transfer every play on words, rhyme or metaphor. Veronika Redererov opted for the domesticating strategy, consequently, her translation looks like a beautiful Slovak text with not too many linguistic signs of its foreign origin. While the language of this translation is beautiful, it is by far less creative than the original. Redererov blurs the characteristics of Roys style presenting the readers a beautiful and readable text omitting many manifestations of Roys attitude to language. Redererov uses different strategies to transfer the creativity of the original. Some of these strategies will be introduced in Chapter 3. Now we look at the general tendencies present in this translation that are not included in the analysis, because they are unique strategies used only by the Redererov, not comparable to the other translation in terms of creativity. As we have already seen, omitting information and sentences is a common phenomenon found in both translations; however, they are employed differently by the two translators. The Slovak translator, when omitting information, sometimes leaves out some unimportant detail of the story, but there are also some cases when she drops phrases that are difficult to translate, e.g. wormridden (Roy 1) or She smiled and coaxed (Roy 323). She employs a similar 17

strategy when she omits whole sentences; most sentences omitted are difficult to translate without long circumscriptions, e.g. Did he? (Roy 106). Omitting in the translation of Redererov is a quite often occurring tendency, nevertheless the omitted sentences usually do not play an important role from the point of view of the book and readers would not miss anything important. We can regard this strategy as the sign of a lesser linguistic skill than the authors. Even though we think that translation is undervalued and translators are not regarded as creating anything new, in this case we think there is a possibility for the translators insufficient command of her mother tongue. Not transferring all the metaphors and plays on words can be seen as the result of the domesticating strategy, but omitting difficult passages is certainly not part of this strategy. Redererov has her own specific attitude towards poetic devices, verbal and sound games in the original: she translated almost all similes (e.g. Heads twisted around like bottle caps (Roy 100). Hlavy sa obracali ako vrchniky flia (Roy SK 89)), she did not translate all the metaphors (e.g. The slow ceiling fan sliced the thick, frightened air into an unending spiral that spun slowly to the floor like the peeled skin of an endless potato (Roy 132). Stropn ventiltor sa pomaly krtil a presekval hust, strachom nabit atmosfru, o sa v nekonenej pirle pomaly spala na zem ako donekonena obkrajovan zemiakov upka (Roy SK 114)), she translated a part of the wordplays and omitted most of the alliteration (e.g. Black-haired backs of heads became faces with mouths and moustaches (Roy 100). ierne vlasat temen sa menili na tvre s stami a fzmi (Roy SK 89)) and other plays on sounds. Omitting at least a part of all these creative tools may be another sign of her lesser linguistic skill, compared to Arundhati Roy. In some cases it is not known if she has seen and understood the role these phenomena play 18

in the text, but at least they certainly belong to the authors style. One of the possible reasons for transferring only part of the metaphors is connected to the next tendency found in this translation: explicitation (for further details see Chapter 2). There are a lot of cases when the translation is more explicit than the original. This tendency seems to have three main reasons: additional emphasis, additional information and explaining. Redererov uses explicitation to emphasize certain events or facts; sometimes emphasis is achieved by using diminutives, by adding an adjective, an adverb to the emphasized noun, e.g. Unfurnished (Roy 1) Nikde nijak nbytok (Roy SK 9). The Slovak sentence emphasizes that there was no furniture at the verandah, even though there is no obvious reason for it. Explicitation is one of the most visible tendencies in this translation probably stemming from the effort to make the text understandable. The following two uses of explicitation reflect this effort more visibly. The translator sometimes added new words to the text to make it easier to understand. These words sometimes convey information retrievable from the context, but in some cases the information is irretrievable and not obvious from the context. A boy played with the wooden Doctor is IN-Doctor is OUT sign on the wall, sliding the brass panel up and down (Roy 132). Chlapec pri dverch sa hral s drevenou tabukou s npismi: Doktor JE prtomn a: Doktor NIE JE prtomn tak, e posval mosadzn okienko z jednho na druh (Roy SK 114). We know that the sign was on the wall, yet it does not necessarily have to be near the door. This is a completely new piece of information irretrievable from the context.

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Explaining is employed in cases where the original is not clear or the sentence structure is too complicated, e.g. Past floating yellow limes in brine that needed prodding from time to time (or else islands of black fungus formed like frilled mushrooms in a clear soup) (Roy 193). Nevenoval pozornos ltm limetkm v slanom nleve (ktor treba z asu na as premiea, lebo in sa okolo nich zan tvori ostrovy iernej plesne ako ksky nariasench hb v rej polievke) (Roy 165). The Slovak translation explains that he did not look at the limes, while the source text only says he went past them, taking no notice of them. The original puts the emphasis on the persons state of mind: walking mindlessly, thinking about recent events, whereas the translation draws the readers attention to the fruits and vegetables in the factory. We would not like to say which translation is better or more precise. Both are completely different, mainly because the two translators took different stances on the source text transferring its singularities to different degrees. The translators had previously different experience with both their mother tongue and the language of the original and with translation itself, which formed their skills and attitudes differently.

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2.

Theory
The discipline of translation has always been a rather intriguing issue. Ji Lev

identified the main problem of translation as its hybrid nature: the source text comes from a particular culture using its own language, and the translation has to convey its meaning through the target language. So the translation is under a double constraint: the message has to be the same, but it must be conveyed by different means (95). Creating a translation is not an easy task, especially if the culture and the language of the source text are not only geographically but also conceptually distant from the target language and the target culture. Translators have to make choices all the time as to what is important for the author, what effect should it have on the readers and so on. These decisions can sometimes influence the whole text and the readers as well. This is one of the reasons why translators try to transfer as much of the original as possible. But what if something simply cannot be transferred? Another series of difficult questions arise such as: what must be transferred and what features can be omitted? There are many possible answers to these questions depending on the purpose of the translation, the possibilities of the target language and on the abilities of the translator as well. Passages containing some strange or unusual phrases force translators to employ their creativity and create something original too. During the history of translation studies, a large number of different theories, approaches and schools emerged, all trying to understand, define and influence this discipline. Some of them are general rules of how a good translation should look like and what relationship it should have to the source text, others question the translatability of texts in general, and so forth. Bearing in mind this works needs and objectives, the most 21

useful will be the ones offering strategies for the translation of concrete problems. Many theorists have come up with dichotomies or even trichotomies to solve the dilemma of faithful versus beautiful translation. There is no need to introduce all of them; however, to illustrate our point, we would like to introduce the four approaches which proved useful during the study, assessment and analysis of the above introduced translations. The first approach was the contribution of Ji Lev. He created a dichotomy with two opposing translation strategies founded on the basic opposition between faithful and beautiful translation. Lev argues that a translation must meet both the criterion of faithfulness and that of beauty. According to their adherence to one of these criteria he introduced two types of translations: faithful and free1 translation (88). The first type concentrates on the faithful reproduction of the message of the original, while the second type is an attempt to create an aesthetically valuable piece of art conforming to Czech literary traditions. Please note that Lev emphasizes that his faithful translation procedure does not mean word-for-word translation, it is rather a transfer of all important and characteristic qualities of the original. The important criterion is that the translation should have a similar impact on the readers of the target text as it had on the reader of the source text (89). The beauty of a translation is judged on the basis of the conventions and traditions of Czech literature. He also talks about the translators conscious or unconscious tendency to make the text more beautiful2 by adding some features to the text or by correcting it at certain places (92).

Our translations of Levs book originally written in Czech.

1 2

vrn a voln (Lev 89). Pekladatel maj pirozenou snahu originl opravovat a pikralovat (Lev 92).

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Lawrence Venuti approaches the problem from a different perspective: by introducing the concept of the invisibility of the translator. He describes invisibility as the term we will use to describe the translators situation and activity in contemporary Anglo-American culture (1). He argues that translation is an art and that a translator must have some talent. Unfortunately, this kind of art is undervalued and translators are given almost no recognition (Venuti 1). Susan Bassnett supports this claim stating that Translation has been perceived as a secondary activity, as a mechanical rather than a creative process, within the competence of anyone with a basic grounding in a language other than their own (2). In contrast, Ji Lev in his book entitled Umn pekladu argues that a translator is usually less of an artist than the author of the original3 (92) further undermining translators complicated situation in society. By invisibility Venuti refers to the difficulties and the secondary status of the translators. The author presents many issues and situations in which the translators are invisible, e.g. legal status, financial aspects, etc., but the area relevant for this work is the translators invisibility in the translation proper. According to Venuti, a translation is successful and good if it is fluent, because fluency is one of the basic requirements for a good translation, and the absence of the characteristic features of the author of the original creates an appearance that the work was written originally in the target language. Nevertheless, Venuti points to the contradiction that The more fluent the translation, the more invisible the translator (2). By which he means that the more the translator adjusts the text to domestic standards and conventions (i.e. the more s/he changes or domesticates the text), the less visible s/he is. Venuti claims that this

...pekladatel tak bv zpravidla men umlec ne autor pedlohy (Lev 92)

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paradox might be a consequence of the widely accepted belief that only the original work is a piece of art and the translation is only a transfer of the authors creative imagination (6). These two concepts would be highly useful in understanding the intentions and decisions of the translators during the process of translation. The God of Small Things is not an easy work to translate. It is full of interesting, unusual and creative phrases and descriptions. When translating these passages, the translators had to decide whether to transfer all the meanings and functions of the original and thus create a faithful, but not really Czech or Slovak text, or to omit some allusions or connotations of the original, but create a nice and fluent domestic text. As we will see, the Slovak translator decided to create a Slovak text which is readable and beautiful as the term is understood by Lev (88) by omitting certain features and information that is not so important for the overall message of the text, so it can still be understood and appreciated. On the other hand, she has changed the text to a noticeable degree and weakened Roys characteristic style and other features. So here we can see Venutis paradox: although the translator visibly normalized Roys text, she stays invisible in the translation. The Czech translator, in comparison, decided to create a faithful translation by trying not to omit any detail of the meaning of the original, creating a text that is at certain places difficult to understand and sometimes even sounds strange, yet it reflects the characteristics, attitudes and techniques of the source text. We think that she has fulfilled Levs requirement that a text should have a similar impact on the reader of the translation to what it had on the reader of the original (89). The Czech translation is faithful in the categories of Lev and visible in those of Venuti.

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The last approach we will look at forms one of the basis of Venutis theory about invisibility, namely the dichotomy distinguishing between a domesticating and a foreignizing method4 of translation introduced in 1813 by the German philosopher Friedrich Daniel Ernst Schleiermacher. He described these methods as bringing the author back home and sending the reader abroad (qtd. in Venuti 20). The first method means that the translator adjusts the text to the domestic cultural and literary traditions producing a nice and readable target language text. In comparison, a translator employing the second strategy adheres to the original, transfers the foreign elements of the text and keeps the readers aware that they are reading a translation. This text may not be so fluent and easy to understand, but it will certainly enrich the readers. If we take a look at the translations from this point of view, we will see that the Slovak translator used the domesticating method, adjusting the text to the domestic literary tradition: the translation resembles a work of art originally written in Slovak, it is fluent, sounds good, uses conventional Slovak phrases, includes few unusual constructions, many explanations and various devices for greater readability and easier understanding. In contrast, the Czech translator employed the foreignizing method introducing many foreignizing elements reminding the readers that what they are reading is a translation. As Lev said, Even a small detail is enough for the reader to notice that the work is transferred from a different land5 (97). The Czech translator has decided to show the readers as much of Indias culture and traditions as possible. This translation is probably

Concepts that run parallel with those of Lev. I mal detail sta, aby tene upozornil, e te dlo pesazen na ciz pdu.

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not so fluent and easy to understand, but [t]he important thing that is created is new knowledge. Readers come away from a novel or a poem feeling that they have been given some knowledge which they did not possess before, or, very often, that they have experienced a new insight into some familiar problem or theme (Fowler 21). The translation shows, from the beginning, that it was written in a foreign country by a foreign writer, not attempting to conform to the domestic traditions. This widening of the readers knowledge is also part of the translators creativity, as we will see later. Before getting to the analysis, we will look at the basic concepts according to which the analysis was carried out. As explained above, the main objective of this work is to study creativity and normalization in translation. Let us, then, start with a tentative definition of creativity. Pisarska defines creativity as the capacity of all speakers of a language to produce and understand sentences that have never been uttered before (84). Geoffrey Leech divides creativity into two categories: the first means using available linguistic devices to create something new, and the second category includes instances creating new figures, devices and features not yet existing in a language (A Linguistic Guide to English Poetry 24). Roger Fowler defines creativity as something new in a special way, the most important criterion according to which he judges creativity is that the text should create new knowledge(21). In his view, the readers should feel that they have gained new knowledge from the book. This is the case of the Czech translation of Roys book. Michaela Lauschmannov decided to foreignize the text, i.e. to send the readers straight to India showing them the local culture, traditions and everyday life. So the readers of this translation may really feel enriched by new wisdom. Creativity in my analysis is, however, a much wider term based partly on creating new or unusual phrases, partly on presenting an 26

old item or event in a new light, partly on individual instances of creative transfer and partly on the translators ability to transfer the creativity of the author. The most visible passages where the translators creativity can be seen are metaphors. They rely on visual images as well as on culture which makes them hard to translate. Since different cultures see the world differently, serious problems of equivalence arise not only at the lexical, but also at the conceptual level. From the linguistic point of view, metaphor is the representation of one idea in a perspective normally associated with another (Fowler 213). Dagut defines metaphor from the literary perspective as an individual flash of imaginative insight ... which transcends the existing semantic limits of the language and thereby enlarges the hearers or readers emotional and intellectual awareness (qtd. in Pisarska 46). The God of Small Things contains a lot of creative and unusual metaphors, which force the translators first to decide how important it is to the general message of the book, then to the overall meaning of the sentence, and finally they decide whether to transfer or omit the metaphor. This is a difficult process and there are very few cases when the same metaphor exists in both languages. There are many approaches to translating metaphors, but we have decided to introduce only the one according to which we will assess the strategies employed by the translators. We have decided to compare these strategies with the categorization proposed by Peter Newmark. He introduced seven methods for translating metaphors, and these are: transfer of the same image, replacement for a domestic image, translation by simile where the image is retained, simile plus sense (stress on the meaning), paraphrase, deletion of metaphor and metaphor plus image (87-91). Later on we will look at some metaphors and analyze them according to these strategies to see if they work, and if they do, we will look at how they work. 27

The last phenomenon in connection with creativity is compensation. Briefly, it means that one may either omit or play down a feature such as idiomaticity at the point where it occurs in the source text and introduce it elsewhere in the target text (Baker 78). There are two kinds of compensation: one is compensation within a sentence or a phrase, and the second is compensation within a text as a whole. We will see compensations of both kinds, but the second type is more frequent. This practice stems from the translators attempt to transfer as many of the characteristic features of the original as possible. Translators employ omission or paraphrase only as the last resort, and if something is lost, they try to introduce the special or unusual technique elsewhere in the text. Compensation is a creative strategy for two reasons. First, because it produces something new and original, and second, because the translator is able to introduce a creative element at places where there is nothing creative in the original. Nevertheless, Lev warns us that compensation should not be a tool for translators to display their linguistic ability at the expense of distorting the overall message or the style of the original (133). Later on we will look at some instances of compensation in more detail. The next, fourth, useful approach is that of translation universals. They are described as linguistic features that typically occur in translated texts rather than original utterances and which are not the result of interference from specific linguistic systems (Universals of Translation 288). The issue of translation universals is a rather problematic one because it is not easy to define them. The categories are clumsy, there are no absolute rules of their use or emergence, and they are subjective. That is why we use them mainly as secondary tools.

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Sara Laviosa-Braithwaite defined three basic universals: explicitation, simplification and normalization. Vinay and Darbelnet define explicitation as the process of introducing information into the target language which is present only implicitly in the source language, but which can be derived from the context or the situation. (Klaudy 80) This universal involves mainly addition of cohesive elements, addition of emphasizers, explanations, etc (Klaudy 83). We have used explicitation to identify the instances where the translator explained the meaning of the sentences or introduced additional emphasizers. The second universal we will work with is normalization. Laviosa-Braithwaite uses normalization to refer to the translators sometimes conscious, sometimes unconscious rendering of idiosyncratic text features in such a way as to make them conform to the typical textual characteristics of the target language (Corpus-based Translation Studies 54). This is the widest and most common category including a great variety of devices, e.g. unusual punctuation is standardized, text is ordered more logically, spoken language is represented as the language of written prose, old-fashioned expressions are replaced by modern ones, etc. We will use this term to account for all the instances where something from the style or other characteristics of the original is omitted or weakened (Universals of Translation 288-289).

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3.

Analysis
Creativity is a subjective term involving many aspects, such as aesthetic value,

faithfulness, the translators linguistic abilities, the objective of the translation, the translators attitudes towards the original, the characteristics of the original text itself, the possibilities of the target language, and so on. Arundhati Roy took a very free approach since she twists and reshapes language to create an arresting, startling sort of precision (Halder). As said before, it is not always possible to transfer every feature of the original, and there we can think about some kind of loss. The technique of normalization is, unfortunately, very widely used in the Slovak translation. Nevertheless, the example sentences are organized to show the creative and the normalizing techniques of both translators. This chapter, carrying out the analysis of the Czech and Slovak translations of Arundhati Roys The God of Small Things, is divided into seven sub-chapters, each presenting an unusual and creative phenomenon used in the book illustrated by two examples representing different approaches and translation strategies. The analysis will always start with brief information about the passage the sentence comes from, followed by a short summary of the functions and objectives of the phenomenon in the source text and supplemented by an explanation of how creativity is achieved in the sentence or sentences. The next part of the analysis will introduce creative translation. Most examples present one creative Slovak and one creative Czech translation to see the different strategies of the two translators to achieve creativity. The analysis of creative translation will include information on how creativity was achieved, how it precisely conveys all the meanings and 30

functions of the original and how it works in the target language. We will discuss the advantages and disadvantages of the strategies, too. The third part will analyze the normalized translation described in a similar way to the creative one, even though it will contain more disadvantages and more criticism. The last paragraph of each sub-chapter will elaborate on the meaning and the consequences of the creative translation and normalization of the studied phenomenon looking at these strategies in the context of the whole book. The examples will always include the original sentence or sentences and the Czech and Slovak translations respectively. The creativity in the source text and the relevant parts of the creative translation will be in bold type.

3.1. Names
This category includes the creative translation of names of people and places. The author keeps the readers aware that the book, even though written in English, talks about people for whom English is still a second language. The author mends and adjusts the language to her needs: direct speech is often informal, there are many compounds, and the children especially use English in a particularly creative way. It is this attitude that makes the translation of the text so difficult. The target languages have freer word order, but on the other hand they have inflections, affixes and other devices which complicate the process of translation. The first example is the title of the first chapter of the book: Paradise Pickles & Preserves. The word paradise in the title of the chapter plays an important role in the text. The chapter starts with an idyllic description of the country and the old house in 31

Ayemenem. The first lines introduce the setting as a part of paradise on earth with ripening fruits, clear nights and a relaxed atmosphere. The weather is hot and everything seems slow, but even here we can see some minute allusions that something bad is going to happen. This setting introduces Ayemenem as paradise; however, we will shortly realize that it is far from being such a nice and peaceful place. Let us now look at the sentence: Paradise Pickles & Preserves (Roy 1) Konzervrna Zavaen Rj (Roy CZ 13) Raj Demov & alamd (Roy SK 9) As we can see, the Czech name of the factory is creative and explicit at the same time. Zavaen Rj explicitly talks about the place, i.e. the factory and its close surroundings, as of a paradise. In addition, it explicitates that the title of this chapter is also the name of a factory, a piece of information that is not yet said in the original. On the other hand, the two other languages describe the factory from a different perspective. The source text emphasizes that the preserves are as good as if they came from paradise (a good advertising slogan), but the description of the place as paradise is only of secondary importance. Creativity in this sentence lies mainly in the name Zavaen Rj which underlines the mood of the introductory passage and creates a pleasant image for the readers. The translator created a beautiful, original, readable and understandable Czech name. In spite of all these qualities, it must be noted that everything comes at a certain cost. Here the disadvantage is the explicitation of the fact that this is the name of a factory and the explicit association of Ayemenem with paradise. The translator leads the readers into a 32

different direction than the source text by emphasizing the positive features of the setting. The second and more serious handicap of this translation is omitting alliteration. Even if the translation sounds good it surely misses a part of the meaning. Paradise Pickles and Preserve is certainly an outstanding name for a factory with implications mentioned above. Roy used alliteration to draw attention to this place, to show that it is important and not just part of the overall description of the country. This factory is important throughout the story connecting people from different castes (owners and workers), it is also the sight of events which have serious effects on the story (here Estha decides to run away), and so on. By alliterating the name of the factory the text makes the readers notice the importance of the factory and to follow the people connected to it. This is a strategy quite often employed by Roy as we will see later in the analysis. The Slovak translation succeeded in transferring most of the meanings of the original in that it describes the place as paradise for the preserves, while only indirectly suggesting that Ayemenem itself is a paradise. The translator also managed to introduce the setting without explicitly stating that it is a factory. As in most parts of the text, she created a beautiful and easily comprehensible Slovak text. The only criticism might be about the use of the words alamda which is the result of the translators domesticating strategy. It is not probable that they were producing what a Slovak reader would call alamda. These are preserved vegetables as well, but not the same ones that the word refers to. There are many instances in the book where the translator explains the text to a greater degree than is necessary to make sure the readers will understand. This shift is probably one of these instances. The translator presumably wanted to use a term that is known to Slovak readers so that they can imagine the factory more easily. 33

The second example in this sub-chapter is the mock name of Rahel which Estha uses to infuriate her. This name allured to the fact that as children they were thin and resembled a stick insect with a thin body and long thin hands and legs. It is a common practice for children to give each other mock names which are usually not very kind most often emphasizing a negative feature of the person and thus are especially shaming, but at the same time they are creative as well. Rahels mock name is the more infuriating since it was made up by her brother who knows her very well. When they fought, Estha called Rahel a Refugee Stick Insect (Roy 62). Kdy se hdali, Esuta nazval Rhel uprchlou napchnutou mouchou (Roy CZ 70). Pri vzjomnch kriepkach Estha nazval sestru posmene Sahovav Sarana (Roy SK 58). In this example it is the Slovak translation that is creative. The basic message is transferred: sarana is an insect anyone can imagine, so the allusion to her thin body is clear. The next quality of this translation can be seen when we say the name aloud. The translator employs alliteration, even though this poetic device is no longer used in Slovak or only rarely. This translation uses the technique of compensation as well: the translator introduced this poetic device at a place where it is not present in the source language. The translation also refers to the fact that children often create mock names which rhyme or contain similar sounds, even if the Slovak convention would probably create a mock name including Rahels name. Although this translation is creative, it involves normalization to some extent. The word refugee is translated too, creating an original, interesting, and surely infuriating 34

mock name. The disadvantage of this change of meaning lies in the connotations attached to these two words. The English word refugee describes people in a difficult situation who must flee from their homes, often involuntarily, into a different country. These people usually get to camps where they are safe, but the standard of these camps is rather low and problems with basic supplies often arise. They are seen by the recipient country as undesirable, being poor and often uneducated. The Slovak word sahovav refers to people who are restless, always moving, always travelling. The main difference is that these people move voluntarily at their own expense. They are usually not so poor and they represent freedom and adventure. The word refugee in this sentence talks about the children and their mother, Ammu, being refugees. As Ammu left her husband she had nowhere to go and so returned to her parents house. She lives there at their mercy and from their money submitting to their rules and decisions in exchange. The children have always felt that they do not belong to the Ayemenem house, nevertheless, this feeling deepened considerably by the arrival of their cousin Sophie Mol. She was valued, loved, adored and spoilt by all adults, and the twins started to realize more and more their difficult position in the family: being unwanted refugees tolerated by the family. The Slovak translation omitted this aspect of the mock name. Roy often indirectly points to things that were already explained or shown in the text forcing the readers to read the book carefully to understand all allusions and implications. As we can see, the Czech translation employs circumscription. It transferred the main message of the phrase with most of its connotations; nevertheless, it does not reflect the originality of the source text. The words are translated, the message as well, but it still does not have the same effect on the readers as the original. It is extremely difficult to translate a 35

name which includes words that have different connotations and different use in the target language, so the translator had to decide how to cope with this problem. The translator managed to transfer the conceptual meaning (Semantics 9) of the sentence by explaining that Estha created a mock name for his sister, nevertheless it failed to transfer its connotative meaning defined by Leech as the communicative value an expression has by virtue of what it refers to, over and above its purely conceptual content (Semantics 9). So the Czech readers would not feel that this mock name refers also to the twins status in the family. The last drawback of this translation is connected to the image it creates in the readers. The original talks about stick insect with thin body and long thin legs. In contrast, the translation calls Rahel a fly, which has different connotations: it has a larger body with thin legs, so it does not correspond to Rahels looks. Nevertheless, it also implies annoyance and undesirability. From the perspective of the whole story, the name does not constitute an important part of the message, even though it helps the reader to imagine the childrens relationship. It is, of course, better to transfer form as well, but the translator knows that this is a translation, so it must behave like one, i.e. it must subordinate everything to the transfer of the message. If we are to chose, it is a smaller loss if we transfer only the meaning, than if we transfer only the form.

3.2. Sounds
Sounds play an important role in the book of Arundhati Roy. The author uses clusters of similar sounds to stress the mood of a situation or an event or to stress an interesting or important event. Sounds are used also for creating short rhymes as well. Translating 36

sounds, rhymes and alliteration is a difficult task, especially if we try to transfer both meaning and form. Alliteration is an interesting issue, because this technique is no longer used in Czech and Slovak literature. Nevertheless, it is quite easy to recognize and the readers are able to appreciate it. The main problem is that in most cases a word-for-word translation does not contain similar sounds. Once again, the translators are faced with a dilemma: whether to transfer alliteration or not. As we have seen before, decision making is a long procedure including several stages, all underlying the rule that the main objective of the translation is to transfer meaning. Unfortunately, this sub-chapter will show only the creativity of the Czech translator, because the alliterations, rhymes and other games with sounds are in many cases normalized throughout the Slovak translation. The first example of the creative use of sounds is from the very beginning of the book. It is part of the description of Ayemenem already introduced above. To sum up, the description presents the country as a nice and peaceful place where nature and the elements in particular, have a strong influence on the lives of the characters. Our example talks about Rahel coming back to Ayemenem after a long time to meet her brother Estha. The image of a person coming home after a long time in the rain is commonly used in movies as well, usually implying repentance and tension created by the fear of the reaction of the family. The dominant sound used in our example is the sound [s]. It refers to the hissing of a snake, as well as to the sound that heavy rain makes when it touches the ground. Here, alliteration is used to foreshadow the difficult past of the family, the allusion to hissing prepares the reader that something bad is going to happen, and it is also one of the small hints at the beginning of the description that indicate that Ayemenem is not such an idyllic place as it

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might seem at first glance. The translators have chosen different strategies to cope with this occurrence of alliteration: Slanting silver ropes slammed into loose earth, plowing it up like gunfire (Roy 1). ikm stbit provazce det bily do uvolnn pdy, rozrejce ji jako palba z kulometu (Roy CZ 13). Strieborn povrzky daa ikmo ahali mkk zem a vybuchovali ako drobn rapnely (Roy SK 9). In this case it was not such a complicated task to transfer alliteration, since the target language equivalents of the words do contain similar sounds. The question is whether to transfer it or not. From the point of view of the whole message it would not change the meaning if it was translated by a paraphrase, but the small hints should not be omitted. The Czech translation is creative, and it even manages to create a similar sound at the beginning of the words. The translation stays close to the original using the same device while transferring the meaning as well. The creativity in this example is based on the successful use of the same device with a similar aesthetic effect on the reader. What is more, the translator has managed to describe the slanting character and thus specify the image of the rain. The slanting of the ropes adds emphasis to the heavy rain which stays in ropes even in the wind. We can consider the Czech word det as part of the alliteration, although the similar sound is not at the beginning of the word. The last point we should consider is the sound proper. The Czech alliteration uses a [] sound which does not refer to snakes, but it nevertheless conveys a meaning similar to that of the original, only using different concepts. It certainly fulfils Levs requirement that the translation 38

should have a similar affect on the reader as the original (89). This sound in Czech refers to whisper and the sound of the wind. The sound of the wind is often an indicator of tension and creates an impression that something bad will come. It works similarly to the hissing sound in the original, i.e. it helps to describe an atmosphere where the reader feels that this place is not really a paradise and gives rise to an expectation of something bad that is to come. The reference to whisper further underlines the notion of a secret, of something hidden under the surface. People usually whisper when they talk about a secret or about things which are hidden from others. This translation is a good example where the message, as well as the form, of the source text was transferred, while using the same device to create the same effect on the readers. In contrast, the Slovak translation omitted alliteration. The message is transferred and the form does not have such a crucial influence on the sentence at first sight. Nevertheless, if we take a closer look at the sentence we will see that something is missing. What we miss is the small hint preparing the readers for the rather sad story to come. The readers of this translation will not see that there is stress and sorrow in Rahels heart. It looks so simple: it is raining heavily, yet the message of the sentence is more complicated than that. All in all, the omission does not change the meaning of the sentence, so the translator becomes invisible by omitting a small feature characteristic of Roy. She creates a beautiful, readable and understandable text at the expense of weakening the authors intentions. The second example of alliteration comes from the description of the railway station as seen by Estha, sitting on the train and holding Ammus hand through the window. He is being sent to his father, and his mother and sister came to say good bye. The readers can see the setting through his eyes. It is a dirty place full of desperate people. The despair and 39

helplessness of people at the station is emphasized by Esthas own despair. We can see homeless and sick people, poor children, and various vendors. The description of the railway station reflects Esthas feelings and state of mind. He is sad, afraid and desperate that he has to leave his family, yet he is helpless to do anything about it. Roy used alliteration to introduce the sad atmosphere of the station and to emphasize that the atmosphere of this place is similar to Esthas feelings: everything is dark and filthy, and everyone is helpless, desperate and in a difficult situation. Hollow people. Homeless. Hungry (Roy 300). Lid bez ceny. Bez domova. Bez jdla (Roy CZ 72). Przdni udia. Bezdomovci. Vychudnut (Roy SK 59). These phrases, if translated, do not contain the same sounds. That is why small changes needed to be made during the process of translation. Once again, the Czech translator tried to transfer the form and the meaning, too. In the first sentence we can see a shift of the repeated sound from the beginning to the middle of the phrase, although in the following sentences it returns to the first syllables. Another shift we can notice is the character of the words containing similar sounds. As we have explained before, these words normally would not alliterate, so they needed adjustment. The translator has decided to use the same preposition to include the same sound into the phrases, creating alliteration by the repetition of the same preposition. This technique is slightly different from that in the original, yet it is very creative and original conveying form and message at the same time. The sentence sounds good, and the alliteration is visible. The translator succeeded even in creating a similar mood as in the original. The description shows sorrow, problems, pain

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and despair in both languages. The Czech repetition of the preposition highlights the mood at the railway station and in Esthas mind. The Slovak translation in this example represents one of Redererovs strategies of normalization. The meaning is transferred, but the form is normalized. The translator paraphrased the alliteration, i.e. the meaning is explained, but the alliteration is omitted. The sentence is only a word-for-word translation of the original without any poetic device or anything special or unusual in the text. The readers of the Slovak translation will not feel the correspondence between the overall mood at the station and Esthas feelings. By omitting the repetition the readers will not see the emphasis put on these features further deepening Esthas sorrow. This target text also involves explicitation: it presents the third category as thin not as hungry. By this choice the translator shifts the readers attention from their needs to their exterior. She talks about how they look, while Estha is more concerned with their interior and their needs. The source text is talking about the difficult situation of these people. In comparison, the Slovak translator starts with the interior of the people (hollow), followed by an implication of their homelessness (probably visible) and ends with an explicit statement about their exterior features. On the other hand, the Slovak text is perfectly understandable, readable and natural according to the domestic tradition. But at the same time it blurs Roys characteristic style and the devices she uses to achieve a particular effect. In Venutis terms, the translator is invisible, but the truth is that the author of the original is becoming more and more invisible as well. In both examples, sound plays an important role constituting a part of the overall meaning. Its main function is the transfer of implicit concepts and meanings. They are used to prepare the reader for the things that will come, to imply that things are not what they 41

seem at first glance and to highlight the despair and difficult situations of the people. In the first example we saw that sounds worked similarly in both languages, even if they referred to slightly different concepts, they had a similar effect on the readers. The most important feature that enabled such a creative translation was that the image on which it was based is understood in both cultures. Rain and wind with their sounds are known in India as well as in the Czech Republic, even though we do not have monsoons. The creativity in the second example was based mainly on the small changes introduced by the translator, i.e. introducing the preposition.

3.3. Metaphor
The transfer of metaphors is an extremely difficult task, because metaphors are culture-specific, and cultures organize reality differently: the relationship between language and culture is that the structure of a language determines the way in which speakers of that language view the world (Wardhaugh 218). The primary difficulty lies in the image itself, since it may not be understood in two different cultures in the same way, or it may have different connotations. The first question that arises during translation is the question of: Can the metaphor be transferred by the same image? If not, what are the similar metaphors available in the target language? Some metaphors are shared by more cultures, but most of them involve slight shifts. There are a lot of theories connected to metaphors, their classification and the strategies for their translation. The most important theorists working with metaphors include: Raymond Van den Broeck, M. B. Dagut and Peter Newmark. We have decided to work with the already introduced translation strategies proposed by Newmark. In this 42

chapter we will take a closer look at two examples of metaphor translation and try to analyze how much the solutions correspond to Newmarks strategies. The first example describes the meeting of Rahel and Estha after several years from the point of view of the third-person narrator. The twins have not seen each other for a long time and completely lost touch with each other, even though as children they were very close and mentally connected. The meeting was not a happy event. The twins realized that they do not know each other and do not have too much to say, so they only enjoyed the others presence. The atmosphere was full of expectation, hope, love as well as disappointment and sorrow. It is described from the narrators perspective seeing the twins from the outside talking about their feelings only later, towards the end of the book. They have not seen each other for twenty-three years, and by then they were thirty-one, the age when their mother died. Roy described the first impressions the twins had by explaining that they are considerably older than the last time they saw each other using a metaphor. This metaphor refers to the dark circles under their eyes, which are normal, but at the same time, they are the first visible sign of people growing older. Roy has decided to draw attention to the circles by a metaphor, thus emphasizing the time they have not seen each other. It is natural, that if someone sees a person after a long time the first thing s/he notices are the changes on the persons exterior. After introducing the setting of the scene let us now look how the translators cope with the translation of this metaphor: Gentle half-moons have gathered under their eyes and they are as old as Ammu was when she died (Roy 2). Pod oima jim narostly nn plmsce a te je jim tolik let jako Ammu, kdy zemela (Roy CZ 15). 43

Pod oami maj dnes jemn tmav kruhy a vek ako Ammu, ke zomrela (Roy SK 11). Once again, the Czech translator took an approach that is creative in the Leechian sense and transferred the metaphor. In accordance with Newmarks strategies this example would belong to the first category: reproduction of the same image as in the TL (88). The creativity lies in the image of the moon, which looks the same all over the world. So if a speaker says half-moons, the addressee can easily understand what form s/he is referring to. The use of metaphor in the original has a further effect of weakening or only implying the fact that they are ageing, not telling it the way it is. It is not so important for the story, because everyone knows that they are thirty-one years old, and everyone can imagine how a person of that age can look like. The intention of the author probably was to mention that they are no longer children, but at the same time she did not wish to emphasize their exterior features. The Czech translation succeeded in transferring the metaphor and its meaning, while keeping the wrinkles implied. The fact that they have wrinkles is further softened by the use of gentle, which is also transferred to the Czech translation. The Slovak translator, in contrast, employed a different strategy which would belong to Newmarks fifth category, i.e. converting metaphor to sense (90). This translation also involves explicitation, because it explicitly says that the twins had circles under their eyes. It not only omitted the metaphor, but it used the conventional phrase referring to circles under the eyes. The message of the sentence is transferred, but the form is different. The results of this omission are manifold. Firstly, the translator is deleting the characteristic features of the author even if this metaphor does not collide with the Slovak literary traditions and there is no apparent reason for doing so. The second consequence is that the 44

target text explicitates what was only implied in the source text. Now we come to the domain of translation universals, which proved useful in identifying the translation strategies employed. The Slovak translation explicitly states that the twins were ageing and that they had circles under their eyes. This explicitation does not influence the message of the sentence or the book as a whole. The biggest difficulty with this translation arises if we take a look at the book as a whole. Then we can see that it starts with the present, the meeting of the twins, continues in the past, their lives, then returns back to the present again, giving further details of the meeting, and, finally, ends with the reference to the forbidden love of their mother Ammu and Velutha. This means that if the translator starts to give details of their meeting at the beginning of the book, she disturbs the sequencing. If she shows or explains something that the readers would not yet be sure of, she disturbs the flow of events in the book by explicitly saying more about the twins than necessary. Fortunately, this is only a small detail and does not influence the readers or the text considerably, yet it does introduce a slight shift of attention. The second example comes from the description of Ayemenem mentioned above. The metaphor is based on the metaphorical use of the adjective usually referring to people, but in this novel it refers to the intensity of the colour. This metaphor perfectly fits into Roger Fowlers definition of metaphor as the representation of one idea in a perspective normally associated with another (213). It is original, because it casts new light on the meaning of the word immodest by enlarging its meaning to collocate with an inanimate subject, such as a colour. The colour green is a metonymical representation of the trees in the countryside referring to the banana trees and jackfruits described earlier in the text (see below). The metaphor is used to stress that the monsoon brings life to the country, with the 45

rain supporting vegetation and via it animals as well. The trees are full of life, leaves and vitality and their colour is visible from a distance. The main question for the translators probably was: can the colour be referred to as immodest in the target language as well? The countryside turns an immodest green (Roy 1). Krajina pekypuje zelen (Roy CZ 13). Krajina sa necudne zazelen (Roy SK 9). The answer, according to the Slovak translator, is: Yes, it can. Her translation is interesting and at the same time creative. If we try to categorize this solution in terms of the strategies proposed by Newmark, this translation would be an example of the first category: reproduction of the same image (88). The translator used the possibilities given by the language to produce a metaphor that is simple and powerful at the same time. The Slovak equivalent for the English word immodest is fairly close to the meaning of the original, sharing its reference to peoples pride and also its sexual undertone. This metaphor was not difficult to translate since the word immodest as well as its translation share common meanings and connotations, so an almost word for word translation proved creative. The only minor change was the transfer of the noun green into a verb zazelen. The translator introduced personification into this sentence when she created a verb and ascribed an active role to an inanimate subject. This shift of roles involves explicitation as well, because an active subject draws more attention than a passive one. Nevertheless, the form and the message of the text were transferred, the translation is fluent and natural, and so it might be judged as creative. Please note that we call creative only this example, not the whole translation. Even though this translation is successful and the only available

46

translation in Slovak so far, there are many reasons (introduced in the first chapter) that may give rise to some doubt about the success of this translation. As we have seen in the examples already analysed, one of the translations usually employs normalization strategies while the other is creative. This pattern corresponds to the general tendencies occurring in these two translations of The God of Small Things. As mentioned above, it is usually the Slovak translator who resolves to employ normalization, but the examples are organized to show the creativity of both translators where possible. In consequence, most phenomena presented in this analysis present a creative and a normalizing approach from each translator. If we return to the Czech translation and to Newmarks categories, this instance might be classified as an example of the second strategy, i.e. replacement of the source text image with a conventional image from the target language (89). The inclusion of the translation into this category is based on the view that pekypuje zelen is a dead metaphor, which Leech describes as generally accepted as being no longer recognizable as such (Semantics 228). This means that this phrase was once a metaphor, but as the language evolved it became part of the lexis and is no longer thought of as a metaphor. This strategy of using a dead metaphor involves normalization, because the readers will not think of the phrase as innovative or interesting, it is only a conventional way to express a concept. The Czech translation also misses the sexual undertone of the original. Normalization in this case involves loss of creativity and of the allusion to sexual behaviour. The sentence is understandable, fluent and conforms to the domestic traditions, but it misses the previously mentioned small details which make the sentence stand out.

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As far as metaphors are concerned, in the examples above, they constituted an important part of the message of the original, thus it was not possible to delete them. However, it was possible to normalize them, losing some minor connotations and allusions of the original. The translation of metaphors may involve the use of other techniques, such as personification or explicitation. The normalization strategies in the examples analyzed above involve only slight changes of meaning, usually only minor features are omitted, but if normalization is used consistently, it can affect the meaning and especially the characteristic style of the whole book. As the examples prove, the translation of metaphors is a difficult task, because there are no ultimate rules to their use and sometimes they are difficult to understand even for the translator, not to mention that they must be understood by the target language readers as well.

3.4. Compounds
This sub-chapter was created solely on the basis of Arundhati Roys style. The God of Small Things contains many instances of a creative use of language, and one of the most common phenomena is the creation of compounds. The author uses two main strategies to create these expressions: connecting words with a hyphen and joining words together. These compounds are neologisms created by using the available linguistic material to produce new words. By this description they exemplify the first sense of the term creativity as defined by Geoffrey Leech (A Linguistic Guide to English Poetry 24). English has different conventions for word-formation than Czech and Slovak, and the translation of these expressions must have been a complicated task. First of all, the Czech and Slovak language usually do not coin new words by connecting existing ones with hyphens, but the 48

second strategy is used also in these languages. The second difficulty is connected to the creative linguistic talent of the translators. They have to be very creative and innovative to be able to coin new words. Once again, the Czech translation contains more compounds, which can be explained partly by the creative abilities of the translator, and partly by the fact that she decided to use a foreignizing strategy, i.e. not adapting the text to the domestic traditions. This foreignizing strategy enabled her to coin new words by the same strategies as those of the source text. The Slovak translation contains very few instances of these strategies and most compounds are translated by common words. We will take a closer look at one of the few examples of creative translation of compounds to see if it works and how it works in Slovak. One of the main reasons for the small number of neologisms in the Slovak translation is the domesticating strategy employed in the text. The Slovak translator decided to modify the text to conform to the domestic traditions, and if she had used too many compounds it would have disturbed the domesticating strategy and looked strange in the text. We have not found any rules or specific reasons for creating compounds. The only plausible explanation is that they are a part of Roys creative approach to language and a typical part of poetic devices of literatures in English. The first sentence comes from the description of the river in Ayemenem. It presents a dark and sad image full of despair. Once it was a grand, powerful river, but since that time there has not been enough water in its channel, what water was left was toxic and smelly. It was no longer appropriate for drinking or cooking and its smell could be felt all over Ayemenem. The compounds in this example refer to facts that would normally be expressed by adjectives. Even though we found no reason for their creation, we can certainly say a few words on the effects they have. The first compound is placed in the 49

initial position to catch the attention of the readers. It must be clear from the first moment that there is something special in the sentence. The next consequence is that the new words cast new light on the birds described, and they show them in a little more active role. Finally, they draw attention to their appearance, which fits into the overall colour scheme of the river and its surroundings. Bronze-winged lily-trotters walked across it. Splay-footed, cautious (Roy 124). Pes hladinu se prochzely bruslaky s bronzovmi kdly. Obezele, s doiroka rozkroenma nohama (Roy CZ 128). Po hladine si vykraovali bronzovokrdle jakany. Plochonoho, opatrne (Roy SK 108). The Slovak translator created new words using the same technique as Roy, even though in this sentence the author used the other technique. The new expressions were created by joining the words together. If we stop to think of the possible reasons for this choice we will see that creating new expressions by joining words disturbs the Slovak text considerably less than using hyphens. They would disturb the text typographically and they do not conform to the domestic tradition. Once again, creativity is achieved by an almost word-for-word translation of separate words, only with small changes. The neologisms were created by joining two words together with the addition of a vowel for easier pronunciation a common practice in Slovak word formation as well as in other languages. By these slight adjustments the translator succeeded in transferring both the message and the form. She created new compounds with one of the techniques used by the author of the original while adding a component of Slovak word formation. At the same time, she managed to transfer creativity and adhere to the Slovak traditions. As we have mentioned 50

before, most of these neologisms are not transferred into the Slovak translation. Nevertheless, at least a few of them are translated, probably because the translator felt that this technique is so dominant in the text that it cannot be normalized all the time and the reader of the target language text must get at least a small illustration of one of the major techniques used by Roy. The Czech translation, in contrast, is not creative: it uses circumscription and explicitation to transfer the meaning of the source text. It must be said that there are many more instances of compounds in the source text that are translated creatively by the Czech translator. We have chosen this example to show the creativity of the Slovak translator, but unfortunately there are not too many sentences where both translations are creative. This translation explicitly describes what splay-footed means and how it is realized. In addition, it paraphrased the second compound making it sound natural and fluent, but it has no special meaning or importance. The sentence simply says that they have wings of bronze colour. It does not sound as important and poetic as the original. This translation involves explicitation and the normalization of the FSP ascribing no special importance to the words highlighted in the source text. The next example is from the part of the book which describes the beginning of Estahs journey to his father. After the death of their cousin Sophie Mol, the family had decided that Ammu had to leave the old house in Ayemenem because the twins brought misfortune to the family. Twins in general were considered evil in India, but after they caused, even if indirectly, the death of their cousin, they had to be separated. So Estha was sent to his father, Ammu moved into town to look for a job and Rahel stayed in Ayemenem. Estha was accompanied by a friend who happened to travel in the same 51

direction, but his seat was in the next coup. The readers can explore the train through the eyes of Estha sitting in a coup with strangers. He explores the coup and the train with its sounds. The compounds in this sentence refer to the sounds the train makes during the journey. Roy created this word by joining together two words. This strategy proved successful in the Slovak translation of the previous example, but this time it is not enough to translate the words on their own, something very special must be added: Trainrumbles under their feet (Roy 323). Vlakohluk pod nohama (Roy CZ 308). Pod nohami sa im ozvalo zarachotenie vlaku (Roy SK 270). The Czech translator succeeded in adding something special and creating a compound. She translated rumbles with a more general word. The one-word expression is perfectly comprehensible while at the same time it is creative and interesting. By this time the readers of the original would probably realize that Esthas use of English is very peculiar. He makes a lot of mistakes when he writes; his style is informal and original. However, not only his language, but also his mind the mind of a child, the way he sees the people and the world around him is very creative. The Czech translator also added a vowel to the compound for easier pronunciation. This translation shows how a child with vivid imagination sees the world around him. The word vlakohluk creates a feeling in the readers of the target text that they explore the train together with Estha, through his eyes. The word sounds as if created by a child, so the translation fulfils Levs requirement that it should have a similar effect on the reader. In comparison, the Slovak translation employs circumscription. The sentence sounds natural and conventional, but it does not contain a word which reminds the readers that they 52

see reality through the eyes of a child. The translation simply explains the sound as an adult would do. With this circumscription the translator omits an important aspect of the original, i.e. Esthas attitude to the English language and the world. The reader of this translation cannot see that Estha had a vivid imagination and that he modified the rules of the language as he liked. This example of normalization also includes explicitation. It explicitly says that Estha heard the sound of the train, whereas the original says only that there were trainrumbles. Compounds are a distinctive feature of The God of Small Things. They help to remind the readers that they can see the world through the eyes of a child, they can draw attention to the facts the author wishes to emphasize, while in other cases they are used to indicate pronunciation. This phenomenon has a considerable effect on the overall message of the book, and if omitted it affects the text considerably. We think it is fundamental to remind the readers that they see the thoughts of a child, and it is also important to draw attention to the features that are fundamental in the source text. On the other hand, it is much more important to transfer the meaning of the sentence. It depends on the translator to decide how to deal with these difficulties, but even if the translator is not able to transfer message and form, she should certainly find some way to express these underlying aspects of the text.

3.5. Creative translation

Here we will analyze some examples of the creative use of language which do not fit into the previous groups. Usually they do not use an identifiable or classifiable device or

53

technique or they are not creative in the original, but present a problem for the translators in some way. The first example is a part of the description of Sophie Mol. This is the first time she meets the twins who do not like her, even though she is judged by all the adults as adorable. She is beautiful and, most of all, white. Her being white counted as something very special for the family, and her father was very proud that he has a white daughter and that he once had a white wife. The importance of Sophie Mol being white is underlined by a detailed description of the colours associated with her, e.g. her eyes were bluegreyblue, her skin was the colour of sand, etc. In the example, we can see a part of the sequence devoted to the colours present on Sophie Mol, where the difficulty lies in the description of her hair. Her hair is referred to as being hatted, a fairly common way in English to say that she had a hat, although it is a real nut for the translators: But her hatted hair was beautiful, deep red-brown (Roy 141). Ale jej okloboukovan vlasy byly pekrsn, syt zrzavohnd (Roy CZ 145). No vlasy pod klobikom mala ndhern, sto ervenohned (Roy SK 124). The word okloboukovan is a beautiful and original solution. The Czech translator coined a new word by creating an adjective from a noun with the addition of affixes. The compound looks interesting, while presenting itself as an original Czech word created according to the domestic traditions. The author certainly had good reasons to refer to the hat on the girls head this way. She might just as easily say that Sophie Mol had a hat, but she did not. By talking of a hatted hair she ascribed an additional emphasis to her hair showing that it was something special. In a way it was special, because it was the hair of Chackos half white daughter who was beautiful. The next reason for drawing the readers 54

attention to the hair was the change of focus. So far, the narrator was describing the different colours of Sophie Mol, e.g. skin and eyes almost neutrally, but now she says that her hair was beautiful. This change implies approval, so the interesting phrase shows a change of attitude towards the exterior features of Sophie Mol. From white and bright her features now change to dark, common in the country and probably more favoured. The Slovak translation draws the readers attention to her hair, but it does not show that it, as everything else on Sophie Mol, was special. This translation only tells the reader that she had a hat, and it does not indicate anything interesting or special. The translator has normalized a creative passage deleting the small hints of the original that direct the readers attention and shape the story. The readers of the Slovak text would not feel that Sophie Mol was seen by the family as such a beautiful child and that everything on her was lovely, but the dark hair was her most beautiful feature. The main message is transferred yet again; the readers would miss the connotative meaning of the sentence. The second example comes from the same chapter of the book, but from an earlier passage. The whole family is at the airport waiting for the arrival of Sophie Mol and her mother. The book describes how much they were preparing for the visit and how much they wanted to make a good impression on the visitors. Ammu warned the twins to behave properly and to be polite to their cousin. All of them were wearing their best clothes, albeit Rahels airport frock was rather strange and she probably looked funny in it. The sentence in our example emphasizes that even Rahels knickers were clean and still crisp. There is nothing creative in the English sentence; it simply says that the knickers were clean and smelled good. However, if we try to translate it into a language where crisp has

55

different connotations and different use; we will see that it is more complicated than it would seem at first sight. At Cochin Airport, Rahels new knickers were polka-dotted and still crisp (Roy 136). Na knskm letiti byly Rheliny puntkovan spodn kalhotky jet voav (Roy CZ 139). Na Cochinsk letisko si Rahel brala bodkovan nohaviky, nakroben a praskajce novotou (Roy SK 118). The Slovak equivalent of the English crisp is used mainly in connection with food to mean fresh and crunchy, so it was clear that something new has to be created. The Slovak translation sounds good and uses conventional domestic images, while being original. This solution involves explicitation: it explicitly defines what crisp means in English. What is more, the translator added new information not present in the source text that they were new, since crisp does not necessarily mean new. The readers of the source text will learn only a few lines further that they were not only clean but also new. Despite the above mentioned disadvantages, the translator showed her good command of the target language by creating the metaphor of the knickers cracking with newness. Dagut claims that the main function of metaphor is to shock its readers by creating an aesthetic impact (qtd. in Schaffner 1256). He explains that when people read, they read the words and do not stop to think about them, so they will stop only if they see something strange and shocking that catches their eye. This metaphor will certainly force the readers to stop and think about what they have read. They will feel that it is important that even Rahels knickers are clean

56

and fresh and that they should bear this information in mind for a certain time. They will need it shortly, when Ammu will explain to Rahel the difference between clean and dirty. It is interesting that while the Slovak translator uses explicitation, the Czech one decided to take a different approach: namely implicitation. She decided to emphasize the fact that they had a pleasant smell. This information of course implies that they were clean, but it does not say how they felt. It is very unfortunate that she only implied the information of their being clean, since later in the book the readers will need this information again. It is one of the common strategies used by Roy to introduce a notion and later elaborate on it. In some cases this information becomes a recurrent motif. The emphasizer jet adds a certain power to the implicitation that it was recently washed and ironed, yet it is still not enough, because the author will come back to this topic later on, presupposing that the readers know that the knickers were clean. We have seen two examples where the source language was not creative, but where the translators needed a good portion of creativity to include all the underlying messages present in the original. They were not always able to create something new and unexpected that would convey the message as well. They employed different strategies of creativity as well as of normalization, but they have always transferred the main message of the text. Nevertheless, it is sometimes not enough to translate the basic message and omit the hints and directions woven into the original.

3.6. Repetition
The God of Small Things contains three types of repetition. The first type is the repetition of short sequences throughout the book which become recurrent motifs in the 57

story. One of them is Ammus dream with the man without hands. The second type includes information or notions which the author introduces in one sentence and then she returns to them a few lines or pages below, such as Rahels crisp knickers. The third type of repetition is the repetition of words or sounds in one sentence. We concentrate on this last type, i.e. repetition within a sentence. The first sentence we look at talks about the arrival of Sophie Mol. The whole family was standing at the Cochin Airport waiting for the arrival of Sophie Mol and her mother. Everyone was excited and the children were impatient, because they had to wait for such a long time. This sentences main function in the text is gradation. Everything was prepared at home for the arrival of the visitors, they brought a bottle of boiled water for them to drink, they were wearing their best clothes and the children were instructed to behave properly, not to embarrass the family. Rahel was so excited that she pinched Estha. This is one of the two sentences that gradate the tension of the situation explaining how important it was for the family to look good. It stresses that everything was prepared with good care and that it took a certain period of time. Everything was prepared and agreed on and now they were ready for the visitors to come. The rehearsals had been rehearsed (Roy 136). Vystoupen nacvien (Roy CZ 139). Vetko skanie bolo doskan (Roy SK 118). The sounds are not so important in this sentence. They are repeated simply because the sentence contains two words from the same root. However, the repetition of these words is important. The Slovak translation is an almost word-for-word translation using a noun and a verb from the same root. Thus the target text uses the same means to achieve a 58

similar effect on the readers. The form and the message were transferred. It is interesting to see that in the examples we have analyzed so far, the Slovak translator employs creative strategies most often at places where she was able to use the same or at least similar means and very close translation. This tendency is prevailing in the whole translation. On the other hand, in the cases where creativity can be achieved by a close translation the Czech translator employs normalizing strategies, while at much more difficult instances she creates unusual phrases or new words. To return to the Slovak translation, the gradation of tension is present as well as in the original with the additional help of explicitation. The translation explicitates that all the rehearsals are over, everything is ready and should go according to plan by adding vetko to the sentence. This word further emphasizes that an event has come to its climax. The Czech translation omitted the repetition, thereby weakening the information that the climax is near. This sentence does not create or highlight tension and does not show the excitement of the characters. It simply says that everything is prepared, so the visitors can come. The translator has also shifted the meaning from rehearsal to vystoupen, further weakening the importance of the situation. By referring to the performance, not to the rehearsals, the emphasis shifted from the long and careful preparation to the performance proper. There is no emphasis on the duration and hard work connected to the preparations. In conclusion, normalization in this sentence has weakened the tension, the duration of the preparations and the importance of the situation. The second sentence comes from the place where Estha has to leave the cinema, because he was disturbing the audience with his singing. It is an unpleasant and embarrassing situation for everyone, but Estha could not stop singing, so he leaves the 59

auditorium to sing in the hall where he met the Orangedrink Lemondrink Man. The audience become even angrier when he started to sing again. When Estha wants to leave they even have to move their legs to let him out which created another wave of dislike in the audience. We can observe the situation from Esthas perspective. He describes the various noises in the cinema, how people started to turn around and started to shout. When Estha is leaving the dark auditorium, he is led only by the red light. Roy repeats the colour of the light to help the readers imagine the situation and to remind them that they see the events through the eyes of a seven years old boy. The red sign over the door said EXIT in a red light (Roy 100). erven npis nad dvemi ervenm svtlem hlsal VCHOD (Roy CZ 106). erven npis VCHOD svietil nad dverami (Roy SK 89). This time it is the Czech translation that transferred repetition. In this case it creativity and a good command of the Czech language was needed to be able to compress all information into a single sentence. The target text describes the situation seen from the perspective of a child. All those angry people, angry Ammu, leaving the auditorium in the dark, pushing through others led only by a red light. The readers could easily imagine the situation. By repeating the colour of the light it receives an additional emphasis (also present in the original) explaining that the light was his only guide. Here the form and the message are transferred. If we compare it to what we have seen previously, we can see another example of the strategy already employed. As we have proposed earlier, the Slovak translation is creative at places where the creativity is supported by a possibility of a close translation, whereas the Czech one works the other way round. This example probably does not wholly work according to this rule: it was possible to make a close translation of the 60

source language sentence, but it required a bit more skill to compress the repetition into one sentence. The translator needed a good knowledge of her mother tongue and a strong sense for the language to transfer the repetition into the target text. The other translation omits repetition, creating a traditional, natural and neutral Slovak sentence. The readers cannot identify with the perspective, because there are too few hints of it. They do not have such a strong impression that they see the situation through Esthas eyes. By omitting these small hints the translator deleted some important guidelines and implied the explicit information of the source text. The readers of the Slovak translation cannot identify with Estha pushing through the audience in the dark only led by a red light. The use of normalization in this sentence may be caused by the fact that the translator cannot work with the language as good as Roy does. As we have mentioned before, her previous translations were mainly texts which do not employ such a complicated and creative language. We can clearly see that the Slovak translation does not use all the devices and techniques available to transfer as much of the original as possible. We have analyzed two examples of repetition seeing that it can be put to different uses. There are more uses of repetition in the book, but the main objective of this work is to provide a summary of the different techniques employed by the translators, so we cannot dwell too much on this one issue. In the examples above, we have seen that repetition was used to create and highlight tension and to guide the readers in interpreting what they read. The translators used different strategies to make a creative translation where possible, but they were not able to translate repetition in all cases. We can also think about the omission of repetition in terms of loss and gain. What the readers will certainly gain is new

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knowledge from the story, but they might lose the hints present in the original. In all cases, it depends on the translator to decide what approach she takes and why.

3.7. Compensation
Compensation as described by Baker means that one may either omit or play down a feature such as idiomaticity at the point where it occurs in the source text and introduce it elsewhere in the target text (78). In the first, narrower, sense it involves introducing features within the same sentence. This means that compensation would be close to the instance of normalization. A question arises: is it possible to transfer a normalized feature of a text by means of compensation? Probably in some cases yes, but most of the normalizations in the translations of The God of Small Things are lost forever and cannot be recovered. In the wider sense, compensation means introducing new features somewhere else in the text. This enables the translator to make up for a loss at a completely different place of the text, thereby increasing the possibility of compensation. If a translator normalizes a feature of the original, it is more probable that s/he will find a place somewhere in the text where s/he can add this feature, than to find such a place in the same sentence. The two translations analyzed in this section will show an example of both kinds of compensation. We can argue whether compensation is a creative strategy or not, but it is at least an attempt to return a creative feature to the text. The thick-lipped man referred to in the first example is the friend who accompanies Estha on the journey to his father. He is described as a nice and kind person who understands the difficult situation of the family. This sentence includes an example of Roys special liking for compounds, which is unfortunately normalized in both translations. 62

This is the first sentence in which the readers hear about this man. Roy decided to characterize him by his exterior features, while his internal qualities are seen only through his acts. A thick-lipped man with rings, cool in white, bought Scissors cigarettes from a platform vendor (Roy 301). Oprstenovan mu s odulmi rty, sebejist v blm obleku, si od prodavae na nstupiti koupil cigarety znaky Scissors (Roy CZ 289). Chlap s hrubmi perami a mnostvom prsteov, slun a ahostajn, si v stnku na nstupiti kupoval cigarety Scissors (Roy SK 252). If we take a closer look at the Czech translation we can see what is compensated and how. The compound thick-lipped is paraphrased, but the second attribute of the man with rings is translated by a creative compound. The translator compensated for the loss of the compound by creating a new one. Here we can see her effort not to omit the features which are characteristic of the original. Naturally, there are some instances when it was not possible to compensate for normalization, but this time she came up with an original solution. She created a new word with the help of affixes a very productive strategy. By creating a compound referring to the rings, the translator shifts the attention from the mans lips to his rings. The initial position of the compound still characterizes the man according to his exterior, but it is no longer represented by his thick lips, but by his rings. The basic concept remained the same; the man is presented in terms of his exterior features while his character can be seen only through his acts. Both expressions are in an initial position to catch the readers attention and show them that this man is important. This information is crucial because there are many descriptions of different people at the railway station. Roy 63

needed to show the readers that they should take a closer look at this man, because he is important, unlike the people described previously. In the Slovak translation the first feature of the man is circumscribed and the second one is translated with additional explicitation. Once again, the readers would miss the hint or guideline to examine the man more closely, because he is important, unlike all the others described before. The Slovak readers would read on and they would not stop to think and see the importance of this man. This translation further weakens the fact that this man will be of some importance by putting him in the initial position. Thus he looks like everyone else described before and there is nothing to guide the readers attention. The text seems to go on with the description of the railway station and the people, not indicating that change is coming and it is the time that something will happen. The readers of this translation will only later realize that they should devote more attention to this man. However, the overall message was transferred, but the form was omitted depriving the readers of guidelines and hints. This second sentence is also from the description of the events at Cochin Harbour Terminus, it only concentrates on Estha. He was sitting in the train holding his mothers hand through the train window, an Elvis puff on his head, his holdall under his seat and the Eagle vacuum flask on the small table in front of him. He was being sent to his father. He would not see his mother again, and he would meet Rahel only twenty-three years later. His heart was breaking, his stomach hurt, but his puff was perfect (until the lady sitting next to him spoiled it). The narrator calls Estha a millstone using repetition. Chacko called Ammu and the twins millstones on their way to the airport. The source language sentence is short, imaginative and looks simple. 64

A millstone with a puff (Roy 323). Mlnsk kmen s nadchnutm esem (Roy CZ 308). Mlynsk kame s elvisovskou vlnou na hlavike-makovike (Roy SK 270). The compensation strategy employed in this sentence is the addition of a phrase. We cannot say what the translator compensates for or why. She simply added this phrase to the sentence to make it stand out. She probably felt that she had omitted or suppressed so many characteristics of Roys style that she had to add something somewhere in the text to show that the original uses the language creatively. There are relatively few cases of compensation in the book, compared to the large amount of other phenomena, yet it can be seen that the addition of certain phrases is one of the main strategies of compensation used by the Slovak translator. We have described these phrases as certain phrases on purpose because the translator uses mainly fixed phrases to complement the sentences. The reasons for this strategy are not clear, since Roy uses fixed expressions only rarely. In addition, it is not clear what the function of the fixed phrase is. It explicitates that Estha had a puff on his head (which is clear from the context) and draws attention to Esthas small head. This shift of attention to his head is not very lucky, because it guides the readers to a dead-end where nothing new or interesting happens. The source text, in contrast, directs the readers attention to Estha spreading small hints that they explore the train from his perspective. The Czech translation explicitates what a puff is and how it looks like. The source text used the image of the puff to make it clear for the readers who the millstone was. It was the third sentence that talked about Estha sitting on the train thereby emphasizing that they will explore the train from his perspective. The advantage of this translation is that it

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does not explicitate that it was Estha, it only explains the word puff. About which we must admit that it would be extremely hard to translate without explicitation. Compensation usually stems from the effort of the translators to return something to the text that was lost. These may be poetic devices, information lost in the process of translation, and many more. If the translator feels that the readers of the target text will miss the omitted information, technique or device s/he tries to introduce the distinctive feature elsewhere in the text trying to show the readers at least at some places what the original looks like, how it works with the language and how it communicates with its readers. These attempts are not always successful and it is extremely hard to find a place where compensation might be introduced, but the most important function of the text is to convey the message and every other device and technique must be subordinated to this objective.

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Conclusion
This work provided an analysis of creative and normalizing strategies employed in the Czech and Slovak translation of Arundhati Roys The God of Small Things. We have seen that the texts and the strategies employed by these translators differed to a great extent. The translators took a different approach to translation: the Czech one tried to stay as close to the original as possible, while the Slovak one took a much freer approach. Their attitudes to translating the peculiarities of the original were different as well: the Czech translator tried to convey the message and the style of the original by transferring most of the metaphors, rhymes, unusual phrases, sound and word plays, while the Slovak one translated most of the similes, only a part of the metaphors and alliterations and only few instances of other sound and verbal games. In the first chapter, we saw the drawbacks of these translations. These features are presented only in the first chapter because they do not involve creativity and because they usually do not occur in both translations and, consequently, are not comparable. The only exception is the phenomenon called omitting information, nevertheless even this feature is employed in different situations by the two translators. The most serious shortcomings of the Czech translation include staying too close to the original, creating strange-sounding sentences, and problems with cultural reference that are sometimes translated clumsily and at other times mistranslated. As far as the Slovak translation is concerned, it frequently omitted information or sentences that were difficult to translate. The most serious drawbacks of the Slovak translation include omitting the creative devices of the author,

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adding emphasis, introducing new information irretrievable from the context and overexplaining the text, making it simpler and easier to understand. The analysis was divided into seven sub-chapters, each presenting one phenomenon and the translators solutions of the problem they represented. The first category was Names. Here we saw examples of Roys creativity in naming people and objects. She used these creative names to draw the attention of the readers to the important facts and objects in the text. The Czech translator employed a creative strategy, coming up with an original name, trying to retain the creativity of the original, while using explicitation and losing some of the connotations of the source text. The Slovak strategy for creating original names is similar to the Czech one: translating the main message and meaning of the text, while introducing change of meaning and loss of connotative meaning to the text. The normalizing strategy of the Czech translator involved circumscription, shift of readers attention and loss of connotation, while the Slovak included domesticating strategies and reduction of importance. The second phenomenon was the creative use of sounds. They were mainly used to create a particular mood, they contained a lot of connotations, added emphasis and in most cases and they constituted an important part of the meaning. As far as creativity in the Czech translation is concerned, we have seen transfer of sounds with slight shifts of the image presented to the readers. Unfortunately, in our analysis, we have not seen creative Slovak translations of sentences involving sounds. This may be a consequence of the much lower number of creative solutions of this phenomenon in this translation. The normalizing strategies of the Slovak translation involved omitting alliteration, losing connotations, and emphasis. 68

The third category studied in this work concentrated on metaphors. Metaphors were employed in the source text to emphasize certain facts, while only implying others. The creative strategies of the Czech translation included the transfer of metaphor with all its allusions. Similarly, the Slovak translation transferred the metaphor by slight adjustments. Normalization in the Czech translation was based on using a conventional Czech metaphor and loss of connotations, while the Slovak translator employed explicitation, and paraphrasing the metaphor. The fourth sub-chapter was devoted to compounds by which Roy adds emphasis, directs the attention of readers, and draws it to the narrator. The creativity of the Czech translation rested on the translators ability to coin new words, whereas the Slovak translator managed to coined new words using the same strategy as the author of the source text. Normalization in both translations of compounds contained circumscription, reduction of importance and shift of attention. The fifth category talked about the examples of creative translation including sentences of the source text that are not original, yet bring certain difficulties. The Czech translator coined a new word using affixes, while the Slovak translator employed explicitation. The normalizing strategy employed by the Czech translator was implicitation, while the Slovak one used circumscription. Repetition is the title of the sixth sub-chapter, which talked about repetition of words employed to gradate tension, duration, emphasizing an aspect of a particular situation and drawing attention to the narrator. The creativity of the Czech translation was based mainly on the translators good command of her mother tongue, and the Slovak repeated two words from the same root. The normalized Czech translation introduced weakening of 69

tension, but the Slovak translation involved such strategies as omitting repetition and weakening emphasis. The last part of the analysis dealt with compensation. The Czech translator coined a new word, thus compensating for the loss of the previous compound, in contrast, the Slovak translator compensated for the losses in the text by adding a fixed phrase to the sentence. The degree to which the creative and normalizing strategies influenced the text was of major importance to us. We have seen that not only normalization, but also creative translation can change or at least considerably influence the meaning of the source text. The degree of their influence depends on the degree of the change they have introduced to the text and on the importance of the phenomena to the meaning of the sentence and the text. For example, compounds do not constitute such an important part of the meaning, whereas the sounds and metaphors form a substantial part of the message of the text. By omitting or normalizing a compound, the translation usually reduces or omits emphasis, or the hints guiding the attention of the reader, but by omitting or normalizing metaphors and sounds the readers would miss a considerable part of the meaning, and some of the allusions to previously mentioned events and facts. As we have seen, the strategies employed by the two translators differ considerably. Probably the most important tendencies are that the Slovak translator employs creativity at places where it can be based partly on a word-for-word translation. Redererov only rarely coined new words when the word-for-word translation of the phrase or word was not similar to that of the original. The next recurring tendency in the Slovak translation was the use of fixed phrases for compensation. By this means the translator introduced new features

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to the sentence where the source text was not particularly creative, even though we can argue how much creative this strategy was. The Czech translation worked almost in the opposite way: it is interesting that it did not include creative translations at places where creativity might have been partly based on a word-for-word translation, but coined new words and translated unusual structures at places where there was no similarity between the two languages. This analysis did not talk about Roys use of italics and capital letters in the text in a greater detail. Similarly, it did not analyze the representation of the caste system, the political and religious background of this novel, whereas they play an important part in the novel. Further study may be devoted to Roys narrative strategies and her use of a child narrator as well. All these issues would be important to look at; nevertheless they do not fit into the objective of this analysis, but would provide a good basis for further research.

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. Semantics. The Study of Meaning. London: Penguin Books, 1981. Lev, Ji. Umn pekladu. Praha: Panorama, 1983. Mikul, Roman. kolsk slovnk spisovnej sloveniny. Bratislava: Prroda, 2009. Newmark, Peter. Approaches to Translation. New York: Prentice-Hall, 1988. Nishant, Shulin. "Arundhati Roy's The God of Small Things." 4 June 2001. Postcolonial and Postimperial Literature: An Overview. Indian Institute of Technology. 21 December 2008 <http://www.postcolonialweb.org/india/roy/nishant1.html>. Pisarska, Alicja. Creativity of Translators: The Translation of Metaphorical Expresions in Non-literary Texts. Pozna: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Uniwersytetu im. Adama Mickiewicza, 1989. Reddy, K. Ganapathi. "Arundhati Roy." 9 April 2002. The Hindu. 12 December 2008 <http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/op/2002/04/09/stories/2002040900050100.htm>. Roy, Arundhati. Boh malikost. Bratislava: Slovart, 1998. . Bh malikost. Praha: Mlad fronta, 2001. . The God of Small Things. London: Harper Collins Publishers, 1997. Tikkanen, Amy. "Roy, Arundhati." 26 April 2009. Encyclopdia Britannica Online. 22 December 2008 <http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/511182/ArundhatiRoy>. Truax, Alice. "A Silver Thimble in Her Fist." 25 May 1997. The New York Times on the Web. 20 June 2007 <http://www.nytimes.com/books/97/05/25/reviews/970525.25truaxt.html>. Venuti, Lawrence. The Translators Invisibility: A History of Translation. Translation Studies. London: Routledge, 1995. Wardhaugh, Ronald. An Introduction to Sociolinguistics. Oxford: Blackwell, 1992.