More than seventy years after the publication of Nineteen Eighty-Four, a wave of new translations of the classic work of English literature captures the Italian publishing market. As a consequence of the copyright protection coming to an end in 2021, refreshed versions of what can be referred to as the ultimate dystopian fantasy testify to the fact that the contemporary relevance of the novel justifies making more up-to-date reinterpretations of Orwell’s book. The goal of the study is to investigate the phenomenon of retranslation, that is the act of translating a work that has previously been translated into the same language, in an attempt to establish the extent to which alternative renditions subsequent to extant translations reflect linguistic and cultural changes occurring in the receiving system. For this purpose, a comparison of three different Italian translations of the English classic, published in 1950, 2000 and 2021, is conducted. The analysis takes into account some of the most influential theoretical writings regarding the activity of retranslation, focusing on the different strategies implemented in order to adapt the lexical, syntactic and stylistic characteristics of the original to the ever-changing translation norms of the Italian literary system. According to the present study, literary retranslation is to be understood as capable of influencing the process of re-standardization taking place in the target language. Tellingly, innovations introduced in the Italian language of translations are one of the many reasons behind the production of alternative translations of George Orwell’s literary masterpiece, thus contributing to challenging the prevailing view of retranslation as an exclusively restorative phenomenon.
A più di settant’anni dalla pubblicazione di 1984, il classico della letteratura inglese torna protagonista nelle librerie italiane con una serie di nuove traduzioni. Complice la scadenza nel 2021 dei termini di copyright, versioni aggiornate di quella che può definirsi come la fantasia distopica per eccellenza testimoniano come il romanzo orwelliano conservi un’attualità tale da legittimare una sua rivisitazione in chiave moderna. L’obiettivo di questo studio è quello di indagare il fenomeno della ritraduzione, ovvero la realizzazione di una nuova traduzione di un testo nella stessa lingua di arrivo in cui era stato già precedentemente tradotto, nel tentativo di stabilire in che misura interpretazioni successive a traduzioni esistenti riflettono i cambiamenti nel frattempo manifestatisi nel sistema linguistico e culturale di destinazione. A tal fine, è compresa nello studio una comparazione di tre diverse traduzioni italiane del classico inglese, pubblicate rispettivamente nel 1950, 2000 e 2021. L’analisi è condotta in relazione ad alcune delle più influenti riflessioni teoriche riguardanti la pratica (ri)traduttiva, con uno sguardo alle strategie adottate per riprodurre le caratteristiche lessicali, sintattiche e stilistiche dell’originale in base alle sempre mutevoli norme del sistema letterario italiano. I risultati di tale analisi indicano che la ritraduzione letteraria è da intendersi capace di favorire il processo di ri-standardizzazione in corso nella lingua di arrivo. Tuttavia, l’introduzione di eventuali cambiamenti di tipo linguistico e culturale nell’italiano delle traduzioni rappresenta una delle tante ragioni dietro alla proposta di traduzioni alternative del capolavoro di George Orwell, contribuendo così a contrastare la visione tuttora prevalente della ritraduzione come un fenomeno esclusivamente correttivo.
Retranslating 1984: the effects of linguistic and cultural changes on three Italian translations of the English literary classic
LINGUANOTTO, PAOLA
2021/2022
Abstract
More than seventy years after the publication of Nineteen Eighty-Four, a wave of new translations of the classic work of English literature captures the Italian publishing market. As a consequence of the copyright protection coming to an end in 2021, refreshed versions of what can be referred to as the ultimate dystopian fantasy testify to the fact that the contemporary relevance of the novel justifies making more up-to-date reinterpretations of Orwell’s book. The goal of the study is to investigate the phenomenon of retranslation, that is the act of translating a work that has previously been translated into the same language, in an attempt to establish the extent to which alternative renditions subsequent to extant translations reflect linguistic and cultural changes occurring in the receiving system. For this purpose, a comparison of three different Italian translations of the English classic, published in 1950, 2000 and 2021, is conducted. The analysis takes into account some of the most influential theoretical writings regarding the activity of retranslation, focusing on the different strategies implemented in order to adapt the lexical, syntactic and stylistic characteristics of the original to the ever-changing translation norms of the Italian literary system. According to the present study, literary retranslation is to be understood as capable of influencing the process of re-standardization taking place in the target language. Tellingly, innovations introduced in the Italian language of translations are one of the many reasons behind the production of alternative translations of George Orwell’s literary masterpiece, thus contributing to challenging the prevailing view of retranslation as an exclusively restorative phenomenon.File | Dimensione | Formato | |
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https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12608/11644