CC BY
10Journal of Siberian Federal University. Humanities & Social Sciences 4 (2010 3) 518-525
УДК 81.33
Phonosemantic and Phonostylistic Phenomena in Turkish Literary Text as a Translation Problem
Ekaterina M. Feytelberg*
Siberian Federal University 82a Svobodny, Krasnoyarsk, 660041 Russia 1
Received 5.08.2010, received in revised form 12.08.2010, accepted 19.08.2010
Linguistic iconism, though frequently mentioned by modern linguists, is still unexplored within the framework of translation theory. To work out a strategy that could be applied to iconic units in literary text it should be regardedfrom the point of view of an integrative approach. This article is an attempt to consider phonosemantic and phonostylistic phenomena in Turkish literary text from a point of view of a new approach that would take into consideration not only semantic meaning of the unit, but also the function it performs, its composition and type. The author suggests the definitions of phonosemantics and phonostylistics and analyses the cases of their role in the literary text. The article deals with such phonosemantic and phonostylistic phenomena as onomatopoeia, sound symbolism, sound metaphor, alliteration and assonance. This article represents a base for composing a new strategy of dealing with iconic lexical units.
Keywords: translation, translation problems, equivalence, adequacy, literary text, Turkish language, phonosemantics, phonostylistics, onomatopoeia, sound symbolism, sound metaphor, alliteration, assonance.
Point of view
Translation of any literary text is a very challenging task for a translator. Possessing a unique esthetic value, literary translation requires not only good knowledge of source and target languages, but other competences that are vital for interpretation of the stylistic means used by author. For the literary text translation to be adequate, it has to convey the techniques the author used both intentionally and unintentionally to have an influence upon the reader. Phonosemantic and phonostylistic means are also an integral part of the figurative system of the literary text, therefore they have to be carefully transferred into the target text.
* Corresponding author E-mail address: yekaterina@list.ru
1 © Siberian Federal University. All rights reserved
But, as S.V. Voronin has repeatedly said, for translators «linguistic iconism (onomatopoeia and sound symbolism) has always been something of a stepchild. Translation theory was never aware of it as a problem in its own right» (Voronin, 1990). But, in fact, it should be considered as a problem, because avoiding and omitting phonosemantic and phonostylistic units may result in considerable distortion of its stylistic effect. Voronin and Pago emphasize, that «iconic words are not only words that are felt to possess a phonetically motivated tie between sound and sense - iconic, too, are all those countless words where, in the course of historical development, this tie has become obscured but where it can be uncovered with the
aid of etymological analysis» (Voronin, 1990; Voronin, Pago, 1995). It is worth mentioning that not only etymologically iconic words can have phonosemantic and phonostylistic meaning; in certain literary contexts non-iconic words can become phonosemantically or phonostylistically relevant.
The object of this study is not onomatopoeia or iconic words in Turkish literary text, but phonosemantic and phonostylistic phenomena, i.e. realization of the iconic words within the framework of the figurative system of the literary text. To further this research it is necessary to differentiate the two terms.
Phonosemantics investigates the vast domain of linguistic iconism (as instanced by onomatopoeia and sound symbolism and the sound/sense link in a word. From the point of view of the iconic system's chief property, the aim of phonosemantics would be the study of iconism as the indispensable, essential, recurrent and relatively stable non-arbitrary phonetically (primarily) motivated tie between of the phonemes of the word and the property of the denotatum that serves as the basis for nomination (Voronin, 1990). It is a science on the joint of phonetics, semantics and lexicology, its object is iconic system of the language in pantopochrony. In short, the present research phonosemantic effect or phonosemantic phenomena refers more to semantization of the sounding of the literary text than to its stylistic properties.
Phonostylistics studies expressive properties and stylistic potential of sounding words and word combinations together with rhythmic, syntactic, semantic and lexical realization of the text. It is situated on the joint of stylistics and phonetics. Speaking about phonostylistic phenomena we mean iconic and non-iconic means of language that due to their sounding shape can be relevant for the realization of the esthetic and expressive functions of literary text.
Discriminating phonosemantics and phonostylistics is essential from the point of view of translation theory, because for phonosemantics, a translation unit is a lexical unit (iconic or non-iconic), while for phonostylistics a translation unit is usually a unit of higher level, up to the literary text as a whole.
The next step after defining phonostylistics and phonosemantics is examining the realization of phonostylistic and phonosemantic features in iconic and non-iconic lexical units. As mentioned above, in literary text etymologically non-iconic words can be phonostylistically or phonosemantically relevant; it should be also taken into consideration that sometimes iconic words are not perceived by a modern speaker as such and can be revealed only with the help of ethymological analysis. To overcome these complications, the basic points of the research can be listed as follows:
1) In certain contexts, non-iconic lexical units can be phonosemantically and/or phonostylistically relevant;
2) In most cases etymologically iconic lexical units bare phonosemantic or phonostylistic meaning;
3) Any phonosemantically relevant linguistic unit also refers to phonostylistic meaning of the text;
4) Semantization of phonostylistic figures on the phonosemantic level is not obligatory.
The main conclusion of this article is that for performing adequate literary translation, a translator has to be able to differentiate between phonosemantics and phonostylistics, to identify the function and the message of each phonosemantically or/and phonostylistically relevant linguistic unit in the literary text. The present approach to literary translation enables the translator to transfer the intentional expressive techniques applied by the author into a target text.
Examples
Within the framework of this research, a wide range of Turkish literary texts has been analyzed. Among them there are such pieces of modern Turkish literature as «Istanbullular» by Buket Uzuner, «Masumiyet Muzesi» and «Oteki Renkler» by Orhan Pamuk, and such bright example of classic Turkish literature of the XX century as «Caliku§u» by Re§at Nuri Guntekin and humorous stories by a brilliant Turkish satirist Aziz Nesin.
From the point of view of phonostylistics and phonosemantics, the problems of translation can be caused by the following phenomena:
1. Onomatopoeia. Achieving equivalence on the level of onomatopoetic words is a basic problem a translator usually faces (Voronin, Ermakova, 1991) Vlakhov S. and Florin S. in their book «Непереводимое в переводе» («Untranslatable in Translation») refer to onomatopoetic words as to words with no direct equivalents in other languages (Vlakhov, Florin, 1986). Nevertheless, some linguists have noticed that onomatopes in different languages have much in common. In Turkey the author of formal classification of onomatopes, Hamza Zulfikar, wrote that «People who speak different languages give more or less the same names to the sounds of nature, because the easiest and natural ways to express this or that sound and very alike. The differences between onomatopes in different languages can arise in the process of secondary onomatopes derivation, but it is still possible to find similarities on the primary onomatopes level» (Zulfikar, 1995). In Russia the postulate about the translation of onomatopes belongs to the founder of phonosemantics, S.V. Voronin. S.V. Voronin and N.M. Ermakova have proved that there are no such drastic differences between onomatopes in different languages; applying universal phonosemantic classification by S.V.
Voronin enables us to predict the structure of the onomatope in the target language in 90% of cases (Voronin, Ermakova, 1991). Due to the universal phonosemantic classification this problem of translation can be practically solved. To illustrate this, we can turn to one of the onomatope classes defined by S.V. Voronin. Instants are onomatopes that designate pulses (the pulse is an instant sound like a tap, tick, click or knock) (Voronin, 1982). Ex facte, instants in different languages look diverse, but this diversity is in fact hidden similarity; phonetic analysis shows that their construction is isomorphic and can be represented as follows (PLOS = plosive, AFFR = affricate, VOC = short vowel):
PLOS
——- + VOC + PLOS
AFFR
As emphasized by S.V. Voronin, the sounds of the phonemotype tend to be pulselike themselves; hence plosives (as well as affricates) in onomatopes designating pulses are not purely phonetical, they are «semantically loaded» (Voronin, 1990). So, having defined the phonemotype of the present onomatope, it is possible to predict its equivalent in the target language, so that its phonetic construction corresponds to the phonemotype scheme.
Onomatopes of this phonemotype are present in the following examples:
istanbul matbuati ate§ etmeye hazir bir batarya vaziyetinde, benden kuguk bir i§aret uzerine bam!... bum!... (Guntekin, 2000). Firstly, the words are certainly etymologically and semantically iconic, it is fixed in the onomatopes dictionary by Hamza Zulfikar (Zulfikar, 1995); secondly, their phonemotype totally corresponds to the that of an instant as describedby S.V. Voronin as it consists of the plosive /b/, short vowels /a/ and /u/, and, finally, plosive /m/. The sentence is translated into Russian as: Стамбульская пресса, как артиллерийская батарея, находится в боевой готовности. Стоит мне
подать маленький знак - и бах!... бух!... The phonemotype of the Russian onomatope can ve desctibed just like the Turkish one in the source text, except for the final /kh/ instead of a plosive sound. So, in general the phonemotype of the word in both source and target languages remains isomorphic.
The next example contains an onomatope derived from a primary onomatope, according to to classification by Hamza Zulfikar) (Zulfikar, 1995). Having an iconic origin, this derived word also has to be treated as an onomatope, with a phonemotype of an instant. Bu yay, asabi parmaklarim arasinda birdenbire gatladi, iki parga oldu (Guntekin, 2000). The iconic verb gatla- is derived from the onomatope gat, which means «a sound of a fragile object breaking» (Zulfikar, 1995); its direct Russian equivalent is хруст - хрустеть, which does not only correspond to its lexical meaning, but also to its phonemotype. So, the sentence is translated into Russian as В моих нервных пальцах смычок вдруг хрустнул и разломился надвое.
2. Sound symbolic lexical units that do not correspond with a sounding denotatum. Sound symbolism is always a phonostylistic phenomena; contributing to the semantization of the sounding of the literary text, sound symbolism can often become phonosemantically relevant itself. The translation of sound symbolic elements can cause more problems than onomatopoeia because the phenomenon of sound symbolism is vaguer and less explored than onomatopoeia; in the majority of cases it is almost impossible to apply any certain technique to the translation of sound symbolism. Though there is a way of dealing with it. Firstly, it is necessary to identify the function performed by the sound symbolic unit in the text. The translation technique depends most of all on the function. If it is impossible to find a direct sound symbolic equivalent in target language, then the
sound symbolic effect can be compensated in another part of the sentence, it can be translated descriptively or be substituted by onomatopoeia. Some problems that arise during translation of sound-symbolic elements in literary text are presented in the following examples:
'Boyle bir rezilin giktgi koyu Allah yerle bir eder elbet bigun... deyip mutfaga savu§tu. Emin Hoca'nin dudaklari kipir kipir. lyice yalvardim: 'Emin Hoca emmi... Kurban olayim...' - Конечно, в один прекрасный день Аллах сотрет с лица земли деревню, из которой вышел столь недостойный человек!- сказала она и скрылась на кухне. Губы Эмина-ходжи мелко-мелко задрожали. Я взмолился: «Эмин-ходжа, дядюшка... Ну прошу тебя... » (Nesin, electronic source). In this example finding a sound-symbolic equivalent to the word combination kipir kipir was both possible and relevant from the point of view of the quality of translation. But in some situations it is obligatory to find another way of conveying the meaning of the sound-symbolic unit that does not have a direct equivalent in the target text. For example, in this case the translator managed to take advantage from reduplication. Unlike Turkish language, in which reduplicated lexical units are very frequent and productive, in Russian they occur less often, consequently they are more exressively and stylistically marked than reduplicated lexical units in Turkish language.
The next example is taken from «Masumiyet Muzesi» («Museum of Innocence») by Orhan Pamuk, whose style is famous for a special «oriental» style of narrating, very picturesque and metaphoric. Di§arida, Istanbul'da bahar gunlerine ozgu o piril piril gok vardi (Pamuk, 2008). Epithet piril piril is sound-symbolic, it does not refer to a sounding denotatum, but its phonetic shape feels like a sound effect, an essential element of the phonostylistic and phonosemantic system of the text. In fact, it has a non-iconic and non-symbolic synonym
parlak, and being replaced with it, the epithet could have dramatically change the image of the utterance. So, the sound symbolic effect can be compensated in the translation by means of additional lexical units, like Небо было таким ослепительно сияющим, каким оно бывает только в Стамбуле весной.
3. Sound metaphor, according to the definition by Yu. Lotman, is «any equalization of one sound complex to another, like rhyme and different kinds of sound repetitions. Sound metaphor binds phonetic phenomena in a person's mind by means of association that generates emotional influence, anticipated and directed by the author» (Prokofyeva, 2009). Sound metaphor is widely used in Turkish literary text. Due to the firm principle or Turkish writing, sound metaphor is frequently accompanied by occasional changes and distortions of spelling. Thereby it is possible to claim, that in Turkish literary text sound metaphor is situated on the joint between phonosemantics and phonostylistics. In most cases the function it performs in literary text is figurative function, which means that it enables the reader to «hear» the scene as the author imagines it. This technique can cause serious problems for the translator.
Marti yagmurda, damin ustunde higbir §ey olmami§ gibi duruyor. Sanki yagmur yagmiyor; her zamanki gibi kipirdamadan duruyor. Ya da marti bir buyukfilozof, aldirmiyor. Oyle duruyor. Damin ustunde. Yagmur yagiyor. Oyle duran marti da sanki §oyle du§unuyor: 'Biliyorum, biliyorum, yagiyor; ama yapacak fazla bir §ey yok.' Ya da: 'Evet, yagmur yagiyor, ama bunun ne onemi var' (Pamuk, 1999). In this example not only the words roots themselves, but also grammatic affixes become phonostylistically relevant. The author takes advantage from several factors: firstly, the word yagmur «rain» is usually used together with verb yagmak «to rain»; due to being paronymous and consisting
mostly of vowels, their combination yagmur yagiyor sounds melodious and soft. In the quoted extract the word combination yagmur yagiyor is repeatedly accompanied by verbs in the form of Present tense with the suffix -yor-, which also contributes to the phonostylistic pattern of the text, creating its rhythm and melody. Another reason for the suffix -yor- to possess the phonosemantic meaning is the fact that it is untypical for a Turkish word to have sound /o/ in the end of the word; etymologically this suffix originates from a separate verb that meant «to go», but gradually transformed into the Present Tense suffix. So, frequent repetition of this grammatical form can have a specific phonosemantic sounding in the literary text. Translating this extract into Russian using only ordinary verbs in Present tense is not enough, it requires a special strategy to recreate the meditative mood of the scene. Чайка сидит на крыше под дождем, будто ничего не случилось. Сидит под дождем не шевелясь, как будто дождя нет. Или эта чайка - великий философ, она не придает дождю значения. Так и сидит. На крыше и под дождем. А дождь идет и идет. И кажется, будто чайка думает так: «Знаю, знаю, дождь, но ведь ничего с этим поделать нельзя». Или так: «Да, дождь идет, и чего в этом такого?». Exaggerated repetitiveness of the word дождь «rain», the frequency of hissing sounds and reduplications идет и идет, знаю, знаю help to create the meditative rhythm of the scene and make the whole extract sound close to rustling of raindrops.
Another example of sound metaphor can be seen in a story by Turkish satirist Aziz Nesin. In satiric writing and other types of humorous text such phonosemantic techniques can be quite frequent for not only conveying the emotions of the characters or creating the atmosphere of the situation, but also to contribute some expression and humour into the text. Di§lerimi sika sika,
yumrugumu vura vura, kalemi bastira bastira yazdigim yazilan hatirlayip birden kendimden korkmaya ba§ladim (Nesin, electronic source). In this sentence the sound metaphor is represented by the rhythm of reduplicated word combinations. Reduplication itself is widely used in Turkish expressive speech, mostly in colloquial speech and literary text. In literary text this reduplication has dual nature: on one hand, grammatically it is just another way of deriving adverbial participle, but due to their reduplicated nature they are also expressively marked; on the other hand, reduplication also contributes a special sound effect to the text, creating the sound metaphor. Russian language doesn't have such a mechanism of contributing expression into the utterance by grammatical means. So, in Russian translation we have nothing to do but compensate the lack of grammatical and reduplicative means by lexical ones. Вспомнив, сколько всего я написал, со злостью сжимая зубы, колотя от ярости кулаком по столу, с силой нажимая на ручку, мне стало страшно.
4. Alliteration and assonance, that are repetitions of similar sounds and their combinations, can refer both to phonosemantic and phonostylistic phenomena. Even though occurrence of alliteration and assonance is more typical for poetry than for prose, sometimes writers turn to these techniques to add more expressiveness to the utterance, or to create an unusual stylistic and phonosemantic effect. Contributing to creating the mood and the atmosphere of the piece, they can help the reader imagine the scene better, to «hear» it with their «inner ear», like in the following example: lkiya§li kadin daha birbirini gorur gormez agla^maya ba§ladilar. Aglayip kucakla§tilar, kucakla^ip agla§tilar.<... > Rezzan Hanim'in ilk sozu, 'Ooh, kana kana agladim da ferahladim <... >' demek oldu (Nesin, electronic source). The only iconic
word in the extract is aglamak «to cry»; but it is not always expressively marked because it does not have a non-iconic synonym. In this context, accompanied by other words, also rich in sound /a/, it makes assonance occur. The translator's task is to preserve this phenomenon in the target text or replace it with another expressive technique of equal value. Только увидев друг друга, две старушки разрыдались. Рыдали и обнимались, обнимались и рыдали... После чего Резан-ханым сказала: «Ох, вот я вдоволь наревелась и мне стало легче». This variant of translation is conditioned by several factors: firstly, Russian verb плакать, unlike Turkish aglamak, is not iconic, and unlike Turkish, it has expressively marked synonims рыдать and реветь. Secondly, none of the Russian equivalents of the verb aglamak can accompany the verb обнимать (kucakla§mak, to hug) with the effect of assonance. So, to compensate the expressive markedness of the phrase, the translator turned to another technique and took advantage of the variety of Russian synonyms for the verb to cry.
An interesting example of alliteration is represented in a short story by Aziz Nesin «Ben Bir Copum» («I am a Truncheon»). Ben bir copum! <... > Amerika'dan buraya once demokrasigeldi, sonra cip, arkadan da cop, yani ben geldim. Ciple cop, biz ikimiz demokrasinin agtigi yoldan geldik. - Я джоп, резиновая дубинка! <... > Из Америки к вам пришла сначала демократия, потом джипы, потом я. Мы, джип и джоп, приехали к вас в одной упаковке с демократией (Nesin, 1976). The word cop «truncheon» is not etymologically iconic, it is adopted from Persian (Ni§anyan, electronic source). Nevertheless, its phonetic shape makes it associated with the sound of a truncheon blow and this similarity was taken use of. Due to its alliteration with the word cip «jeep» it stands out in the text and can not be omitted in the process of translation without
distorting the stylistic image of the text. So, preserving the word cop in the target text looks like the best solution as it attracts the readers' attention both with its contrast with other Russian words and its phonetic shape.
Results
The results at this stage of research can be formulated as follows: the specific character of the literary text presupposes a special role for etymologically iconic, or occasionally phonosemantically and phonostylistically loaded linguistic units. Every phonosemantically relevant unit is a part of phonostylistic and stylistic system of the literary text and it requires a careful approach to its translation. An ability to recognize a phonosemantic element, to assess
its value in the text, to identify its function within the framework of the literary text and to convey its meaning into the target text is vital for preserving the stylistic uniqueness of the text, the individual style of its author. The techniques chosen for the translation of this or that phonosemantic or phonostylistic phenomena may vary from direct equivalents to compensation, descriptive translation and functional translation. The aim of the translator in this case is conveying not only the message, but also the image of the text, its mood and atmosphere, its sound and sense.
It means that literary translator has to be competent in phonosemantics and phonostylistics in order to be able to perform phonosemantic analysis of the literary text.
References
1. Guntekin Re§at Nuri. Ak§am Gune§i (istanbul: inkilap, 2000), in Turkish.
2. Guntekin Re§at Nuri. Qaliku§u (istanbul: inkilap, 2000), in Turkish.
3. Nesin Aziz. Stories for you. Translated by L. Dudina (Moscow: Khudozhestvennaya literatur, 1976), in Russian.
4. Nesin Aziz. Vatan Sagolsun [Electronic source]. - www.franklang.ru, in Turkish.
5. Ni§anyan S. Sozlerin Soyagaci [Electronic source]. - http://www.nisanyansozluk.com, in Turkish
6. Pamuk Orhan. Oteki Renkler: Segme Yazilar ve Bir Hikaye. (istanbul: ileti§im Yayincilik A.§., 1999), in Turkish.
7. Pamuk Orhan. Masumiyet Muzesi. (istanbul: ileti§im Yayincilik A.§., 2008), in Turkish.
8. Prokofyeva L.P. Sound-colour associativity in language conscience and in literary text: universal, national and individual aspects, a dissertation submitted for the degree of Doctor Litterarum (Saratov, 2009), in Russian.
9. Vlakhov S., Florin S. Untranslatable in Translation. (Moscow: Vysshaya Shkola, 1986), in Russian.
10. Voronin S.V. Fundamentals of Phonosemantics. (Leningrad:Leningrad University Press, 1982), in Russian.
11. Voronin Stanislav. Phonosemantics and Translation, in Translation and Meaning, Part 2. : Proceedings of the Lodz Session of the 1990 Maastricht-Lodz Duo Colloquium on «Translation and Meaning», Held in Lodz, Poland, 20-22 September 1990. (Lodz, 1990).
12. Voronin S.V., Ermakova N.M. To the problem of equivalence in translation (based on english onomatopoetic words), in Informational-Communicative aspects of translation: interacademic research collection (Nizhniy Novgorod, 1991), in Russian.
13. Voronin S.V., Pago A.D. Equivalence in translation and iconic lexical units (semiotic approach),
in The problems of English language structure in synchrony and diachrony : issue 7, «English Phylology in translational and comparative aspects» (Saint-Petersburg: Saint-Petersburg University Press, 1995), in Russian.
14. Zulfikar Hamza. Turkgede Ses Yansimali Kelimeler. Inceleme-Sozluk. (Ankara, 1995), in Turkish.
Фоносемантические и фоностилистические явления в турецком художественном тексте как переводческая проблема
Е.М. Фейтельберг
Сибирский федеральный университет Россия 660041, Красноярск, пр.Свободный, 82а
Несмотря на то, что многие современные лингвисты говорят о звукоизобразительности в языке, она до сих пор практически не изучена в контексте теории перевода. Для того чтобы выработать переводческую стратегию, которую можно было бы применять в художественном переводе, необходимо рассматривать звукоизобразительность с точки зрения интегративного подхода. Эта статья представляет собой попытку рассмотреть функционирование, состав и тип фоносемантических и фоностилистическихявлений в турецком художественном тексте. Автором предложены определения фоносемантики и фоностилистики, дан анализ их значения в художественном тексте. В статье рассматриваются такие явления, как звукоподражание, звукосимволизм, звуковая метафора, аллитерация и ассонанс.
Ключевыеслова:перевод,проблемыперевода,эквивалентность, адекватность,художественный текст, турецкий язык, фоносемантика, фоностилистика, звукоподражание, звукосимволизм, звуковая метафора, аллитерация, ассонанс.
