Masaryk University Faculty of Arts
Department of English and American Studies
English-language Translation
Michaela Macková
Specifics of Comics Translation Master’s Diploma Thesis
Supervisor: Ing. Mgr. Jiří Rambousek
2012
I declare that I have worked on this thesis independently, using only the primary and secondary sources listed in the bibliography.
…………………………………………….. Author’s signature
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Acknowledgement I would like to thank to my supervisor Ing. Mgr. Jiří Rambousek for his valuable advice and kind support and to Martin Buchal and Jiří Pavlovský for their insights into the processes of comics publication and translation.
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Table of Contents
Table of Contents ...... 1
1. Introduction ...... 6
2. Comics ...... 9
2.1 Defining Comics ...... 9
2.2 Types of Comics ...... 11
2.3 Short History of Comics ...... 15
2.4 Comics and Comics Translation in the Czech Republic ...... 18
3. Comics Translation ...... 23
3.1 The Publication Process ...... 23
3.2 The Translation Process ...... 30
4. Specifics of Comics Translation ...... 35
4.1 Foreignizing, Domestication and Localization ...... 35
4.2 Translation Constrained by Pictures ...... 37
4.3 Translation Constrained by Balloons and Caption Boxes ...... 41
4.4 Special Signs ...... 45
4.5 Onomatopoeic Words ...... 48
4.6 Proper Names, Nicknames and Neologisms ...... 49
4.7 Intertextuality ...... 51
5. Translation Analysis ...... 53
5.1 Calvin and Hobbes ...... 53
5.3 The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen ...... 82
6. Conclusion ...... 93
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7. Works Cited and Consulted ...... 97
7.1 Primary Sources ...... 97
7.2 Secondary sources ...... 97
7.3 Framing Sources ...... 100
8. Czech Resumé ...... 101
9. English Resumé ...... 102
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1. Introduction
Comics is a literary and artistic form which is based on the interaction of two semiotic systems – pictures and writings. Thanks to its history and tradition it is a very culture-specific form as well. Both of these facts influence the process of translation and give it certain specifics of which a translator intending to translate comics should be aware.
Comics translation can be seen as an easy task and both the specifics of comics translation and the unique traits of comics are often neglected when possible difficulties of comics translation are considered. ―A number of studies […] use comics mostly as a source of examples to discuss the translation of puns, proper names, onomatopoeias, citations, allusions and other features of language which are often found in comics but are not specific to them‖ (Zanettin, ―Comics in Translation Studies‖ 3).
Even though the necessity to deal with translations of onomatopoeic words, proper names etc. does not arise exclusively in comics translation, there are some specific usages of these forms which can be found only in comics and together with other various specifics of comics translation they deserve a special attention.
For a translator it is useful not only to be aware of the specifics of comics translation, but also to understand comics. In that way s/he can make sure, that the quality of translation will not suffer. As Heiskenen says: ―It would be useful to improve translators‘ understanding of comics through a more systematic and analytical study of their specifics and elements, and most importantly of the interplay of word and image‖ (in Koponen 1). Therefore this thesis offers the list and the discussion of the specific aspects of comics translation, and the analysis of three
Czech comics translations. In addition, because the translation of comics can be seen as
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―a localization process, in which the translation of the verbal components of translated comics is only the part of the adaptation of the product to the target locale‖ (Zanettin,
―The Translation of Comics‖ 200), this thesis describes the processes of both the translation and the publication of comics.
Chapter two of the thesis explains what comics is, focuses on its history and describes different types of comics. The historical summary here is not very extensive, as it is offered only as the basic framework for the reader to be able to classify comics properly and to better understand the complexity of comics as an artistic and literary form. Considering the fact that the main interest of this thesis lies in English-Czech translation, the history is focused on the Czech Republic and the production of translated comics in this country.
Chapter three of the thesis introduces the process of translation and the process of publication as it happens in the Czech Republic. This part of the thesis explains and is intended to prove that some editorial and publisher‘s decisions can influence the translator and his/her translation of comics. It is based on the personal experience in the field of comics translation and on the interviews with Czech publishers, mainly
Martin Buchal who works in BB art publishing house, Jiří Pavlovský who works in
Crew publishing house, and Václav Dort who works in Comics Centrum publishing house.
Chapter four of the thesis describes the specifics of the comics translation and chapter five shows them on the concrete examples. The list of specifics has been constructed based on theoretical works on comics translation (mainly on works published in Federico Zanettin‘s collection of essays Comics in Translation), on the interviews with the Czech translators Richard Podaný and Viktor Janiš, and again on the personal experience in the field of comics translation. Chapter five consists 7
of three analyses of three comics translated into Czech: Calvin and Hobbes (in Czech
Calvin and Hobbes) translated by Richard Podaný, Batman: Hush (in Czech Batman:
Ticho) translated by Jiří Pavlovský and The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen
(in Czech Liga výjimečných gentlemanů) translated by Viktor Janiš. The analyses focus mainly on the said specifics of comics translation.
Chapters four and five combined are intended to show whether the pictorial content of comics and balloons really are constraint for the translator, whether and how the target culture‘s expectations and the translators‘ awareness of the specifics of comics translation influence the analysed translations and whether the specifics of comics translation differ for various types of comics. The findings are summarized in chapter six which contains the conclusion of the whole thesis.
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2. Comics
The discussion of the process of comics translation and its specifics cannot proceed without explaining what comics is, where its roots are and what are its unique traits. Information of this kind helps to understand comics better and translate it better.
The following subchapters discuss various definitions of the term ―comics‖, show the variety of types of comics, and present its short history focused on comics translations in the Czech Republic.
2.1 Defining Comics
For some people comics is a funny collection of cartoons aimed at children, for others it is a colourful magazine presenting superheroes aimed at adolescents and for another group of people it can be a profound art with a deep meaning aimed at adults. The opinions and definitions differ and the examples of comics analysed in chapter five show that comics can be all of that. The question is, and this chapter tries to find an answer to it, whether any universal definition exists.
In Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary published in 2005 ―comics‖ is defined as ―the section of a newspaper that contains COMIC STRIPS‖; however, throughout the years comics developed from comic strips into a very variable art form. ―Depending on the theoretical framework adopted and on the context in which the term is used, comics have been variously termed a ‗genre‘, ‗medium‘, ‗language‘, ‗semiotic system‘ etc.‖ (Zanettin, ―Comics in Translation‖ 5); yet we can talk about many different genres of comics rather than of comics as a genre (ibid). The dictionary definition offered here is a too narrow definition to encompass all the range of works considered as comics. On the other hand, Zanettin‘s attempt at illuminating how comics can be termed is too 9
broad and context dependent. A good definition of the term ―comics‖ is hard to find, because ―[t]he world of comics is a huge and varied one [and a] definition must encompass all these types while not being so broad as to include anything which is clearly not comics‖ (McCloud 4).
William Eisner considers comics a form of ―a sequential art‖ which he sees as ―means of creative expression, a distinct discipline, an art and literary form that deal with the arrangement of pictures or images and words to narrate a story or dramatic idea‖ (5). In his work Comics and Sequential Art he discusses, together with periodical comics or graphic novels, instructional manuals and storyboards. His definition of comics encompasses works which are not considered as comics, for example animations.
Scott McCloud in his work Understanding Comics starts his attempt at defining comics with Eisner‘s definition and tries to narrow it down. He defines comics as ―juxtaposed pictorial and other images in deliberate sequence intended to convey information and/or to produce an aesthetic response in the viewer‖ (McCloud 9). Both
Eisner‘s and McCloud‘s definitions have in common one major flaw – they exclude works which are generally considered to be works of comics – single panelled cartoons.
R. C. Harvey offers the following definition: ―comics consist of pictorial narratives or expositions in which words (often lettered into the picture area within speech balloons) usually contribute to the meaning of the pictures and vice versa‖
(qtd. in Danner). Harvey‘s definition takes into consideration single panelled cartoons, but cannot be applied to comics which do not contain any words.
Eisner‘s, McCloud‘s and Harvey‘s definitions are focused on the physical structure of comics (Danner), but a different approach is also possible. A good example of such approach is Neil Cohn‘s definition: 10
Truly, single panel comics, text-dominated comics, and text absent comics are
all comics—because their inclusion has nothing to do with their structural
makeup… In this light, categorically, comics can only be understood as
a sociological, literary, and cultural artifact, independent of the internal
structures comprising them. (qtd. in Danner)
There is no definition of comics with which would everyone agree. Some theoreticians, like Douglas Wolk, even think, that the ideal definition is impossible to find: ―If you try to draw a boundary that includes everything that counts as comics and excludes everything that doesn‘t, two things happen: first, the medium always wriggles across that boundary, and second, whatever politics are implicit in the definition always boomerang on the definer‖ (17). That is the reason why a new attempt at defining comics is not made here. Besides that, all definitions above combined offer a good understanding of what ―comics‖ is.
2.2 Types of Comics
Almost every art form can be further sorted out according to various criteria.
Comics is no exception to that. As the art form consisting of both pictorial and verbal components, comics can be subdivided according to artistic features used in it, according to its function and theme, and according to format in which it is published1.
1 Comics can be also subdivided according to area or country it comes from i.e. American and
British comics, European comics, East Asian comics etc. because ―[d]ifferent cultures
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As far as the artistic features are concerned, comics can be divided into many categories. Every artist has his/her own distinct style of drawing, but two basic broader art styles in which comics are drawn can be distinguished: iconic (or cartoony) style and realistic style (McCloud 54, 192). The iconic or cartoony style uses the wide variety of lines and characters have usually a simplified anatomy. On the other hand, the realistic style tries to get as close to the reality as possible and characters are depicted very closely. Yet, the art is based on the freedom of inspiration, so the styles can be variously combined and one can find for example, comics with iconic characters and realistic backgrounds (McCloud 54).
Another distinct artistic feature according to which comics can be divided is the tools and artistic techniques used to create comics. The basic layout and sketches are generally done by pencils and the inking is done by various ink pens or brushes, but as far as the colouring is concerned, artists can use the wide variety of tools and techniques based on the tools they use: watercolours, acrylics, poster colours, pastels, crayons etc. However, the old fashioned painting techniques are not the only option available to the artists nowadays – they can use a computer and create digital illustrations. The whole comics then can be computer-generated.
To various painting techniques the use of colour is connected – comics can be black-and-white, shaded, or coloured either in flat colours or in expressive colours
(McCloud 192). The division of comics based on colour is, however, rather close to
inroduce different kinds of comics‖ (Rota 81). However in this subdivision all the aspects mentioned are combined, thus this thesis sticks to the division based strictly on them .
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the division according to format, because colour can be considered as aspect of format2, because it can be changed not only by the artist himself, but by the publisher as well.
The artistic features mentioned here are only the basic ones. Extensive works could be written on the artistic features of comics. Nevertheless, because the division according to these criteria is not used very often in connection with comics, only these examples are mentioned to give the reader an idea about the artistic possibilities comics may offer. The more frequently used criteria for division of comics are discussed in the following paragraphs.
Comics can be read for various reasons – for example to be entertained or to be instructed (Zanettin, ―Comics in Translation‖ 5). These are two basic functional divisions, yet the further thematic division can be applied. Entertainment comics can be, similarly as other media, divided into genres based on their theme. The main (super-) genres are: comedy, tragedy and epics (Zanettin, ―Comics in Translation‖ 6). Comedy genres can range from a gag humour to a political satire (ibid). Tragedy comics appeared only recently (ibid) and thus their sub-genres are not much profiled yet. Epics is thematically the most varied (super-) genre. One can read detective comics, sci-fi comics, horror comics, romance comics, adventure comics, history comics etc. (ibid).
Instruction comics can be further divided into technical instruction comics and attitudinal instruction comics (Eisner 142, 145). Technical instruction comics teach the reader how to do something, show them processes they can perform following the instruction offered (Eisner 142-4). Attitudinal instruction comics show the reader
2 The term ―format‖ of comics in this thesis refers to properties of comics such as the size of the comics, the type of its binding, the number of pages, the size of its page etc.
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certain attitude and try to make him assume the role or the attitude presented (Eisner
144-5).
The most widely used division of comics is based on the format in which comics is published. The original format which gave comics its name is a comic strip – a short set of panels3 published in newspapers or magazines. People traditionally linked comic strips to humour and satire. In the Untied Stated of America these daily strips were originally collected in comic books (Rota 81). This format developed further and nowadays it usually contains ―a short episode (22-24 pages) of a longer, ongoing story, usually to be continued in the following issue‖ (ibid). Comic books are soft-covered, periodically issued books of 32 to 80 pages (ibid). In this format superhero stories appear and therefore people mostly associate this format with superhero comics. Comic books are also collected. In Europe, these collections are called comic albums. They are non-periodical, hard-covered books (ibid). In the United States of America they are referred to as graphic novels or trade paperbacks and they do not have to be hard- covered – just card-covered. There is a discrepancy in using the term ―graphic novel‖ – it is used both for collections of comic books and for originally published larger works created as one consistent work. Therefore sometimes the term original graphic novel is used for those larger self-contained original stories.
There are also several formats specific only for countries of their origin i.e. bonelliano from Italy and tankōbon from Japan. Bonelliano is a soft-covered, square-bound, black-and-white, periodical book of 96 to 160 pages (ibid). Originally this Italian format also collected newspaper strips, but evolved into books containing longer self-contained stories usually centred on one main character (Dylan Dog, Tex
3 ―A box which contains a given scene‖ (Eisner 163)
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etc.). Japanese tankōbon collects episodes from Japanese manga magazines – it has from 200 to 400 pages, is printed in black and white, it is soft-covered, square-bound and non-periodical.
This list of comics types may not be exhaustive. Comics is a form of art which develops in time and develops in different places differently according to various culture-specifics. There may be other, less known divisions of comics and other specific types of comics not listed here, but the most frequently used divisions were covered.
2.3 Short History of Comics
As the beginning of comics era the end of the 19th century is traditionally considered (Zanettin, ―Comics in Translation‖ 1). However, the first examples of comics stories are much older than that. They can be found among the creations of the ancient cultures like Egyptians, Chinese or Greek. The Egyptian paintings of everyday life or the French Bayeux Tapestry depicting the Norman Conquest are basically sequential images with written comments and they can be considered to be the predecessors of comics (McCloud 10-15).
Both for comics and the written text the important milestone in history is the invention of the printing press (McCloud 15). Thanks to the printing press, literature could spread to wide masses. The printing press made comics possible. But comics had to wait for its first modern creator, Rodolphe Töpffer, till the beginning of the 19th century. Töpffer was the first one who combined words and pictures, and used cartooning and panel borders (McCloud 17). At this time caricature cartoons and magazines were widely popular and this form of art started to thrive (McCloud 17-8).
The appearance of another comics pioneer is therefore no surprise. A German artist
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Wilhelm Busch ―quickly established himself as the first fully professional and truly popular comic strip artist‖ (―comic strip‖). He revived the realistic social satire in his famous Max und Moritz picture story (ibid).
The most important year in comics history is considered to be 1894, the year when R. F. Outcault‘s character Yellow Kid appeared in New York newspapers
(Zanettin, ―Comics in Translation‖ 1). It was one of the first comics printed in full colour, containing dialogues in balloons and profitably merchandised (ibid). Comic strips were becoming more and more popular and as soon as in 1920‘s ―most of the major categories of American comics were established‖ (―comic strip‖). In 1930‘s
―the United States witnessed an explosion of comics strip‖ (Zanettin, ―Comics in Translation‖ 2) and American comics spread throughout the world. Other countries, however, did not fall behind – Hergé‘s legendary Tintin appeared in 1920‘s and René
Goscinny‘s and Alberto Uderzo‘s Astérix was published in 1960‘s (―comic strip‖).
More realistic continuous adventure strips of many forms were published in 1930‘s and such characters as Dick Tracy raised demand for this kind of stories
(ibid). Short stories and strips started to be collected and published in comic books
(Zanettin, ―Comics in Translation‖ 2), which very soon specialized. Detective Comics and Action Comics4 were established (―comic strip‖). With upcoming WWII the superheroes stories became immensely popular, because in them, readers could see for example Superman or Captain America fighting Hitler or Japanese soldiers and winning the war. This era of American comics is called the ―Golden Age‖ of comics.
4 In Detective Comics Bob Kane‘s and Bill Finger‘s Batman appeared for the first time and in
Action Comics Joe Shuster‘s and Jerry Siegel‘s Superman appeared for the first time.
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After WWII people turned to stories of crime, exotic adventures and horror
(Zanettin, ―Comics in Translation‖ 2) and the vicious nature of comics started to be criticized by moralists. In 1954 a psychiatrist Frederick Wertham published his famous work Seduction of the Innocent in which he blamed comics for rising delinquency.
―The industry responded by instituting systems of self-censorship‖ (―comic strip‖).
American publishers created so called Comics Code Authority (Zanettin, ―Comics in Translation‖ 2), the set of rules about what content can and cannot appear in comics
(i.e. nudity, violence etc.). What is more, prior to its publication, every comics had to be assessed by a special committee. This had a devastating effect on some comics genres in the United States of America and the number of published comics significantly lowered (ibid). On the other hand, the diminishing production of American comics boosted the production of comics in some European countries (ibid).
In 1960‘s superhero comics regained its popularity starting with the revival of one of pre-war superheroes Flash. Besides DC Comics‘ superheroes like Batman and
Superman, whose stories were still published, but their quality was significantly lower than that of the pre-war stories, new superheroes like Spider-Man or Iron Man emerged
(Zanettin, ―Comics in Translation‖ 3). The so called ―Silver Age‖ of comics in the United States of America began. Another big publishing house, Marvel Comics, which targeted not only on children, but also on a more adult readership, started to thrive. New superheroes appeared, new stories of the pre-war ones were published, and superhero comics were enriched by superhero teams like Fantastic Four or X-Men.
In 1960‘s and 1970‘s educated adults could read a new type of comics meant for them (ibid). In the United States of America it was the underground comics which offered the readers adult themes (ibid). Slowly the topics covered in comics, especially in some superhero comics, were becoming more serious. First superheroes failed to save 17
the day and in their stories they dealt with drugs, alcohol and psychical problems.
The harsh reality clashed with fantastic worlds and comics artists finally proved that comics do not have to be for children and teenagers only, but that they are for adults as well. This age of American comics is known as the ―Bronze Age‖.
The ―Modern Age‖ of American comics began approximately with the emergence of original graphic novels (see 2.2): in 1986 Frank Miller‘s
Batman: The Dark Knight Returns was published, Alan Moore‘s Watchmen closely followed and Maus by Art Spiegelman won a Pulitzer Prize (―graphic novel‖). These novels deal with much serious content such as various social issues, political issues, common threats etc. By these novels the publication of comics has not ended. Since
1980‘s various notable works of comics were published both in Europe and the United
States of America. The great influence of American comics still lasts. Not only because
American comics are world-widely translated, but because American comics introduced many genres and styles which are nowadays ―incorporated and developed within other national traditions‖ (Zanettin, ―Comics in Translation‖ 4).
2.4 Comics and Comics Translation in the Czech Republic
The same way as in other countries in the former Czechoslovakia and in the later
Czech Republic comics was firstly seen as the form created only for children and teenagers. There is nothing strange about it considering the fact that first comics presented in Czechoslovakia were cartoons drawn by Josef Lada and Ondřej Sekora.
These were aimed at children and in 1920‘s they were published in children magazines like Malý čtenář or in children‘s section of newspaper Lidové noviny. One of Lada‘s notable creations is the cartoony story Švejkovy osudy and Sekora is best known for
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the creation of the character named Ferda Mravenec, whom he firstly presented in 1935 in Lidové noviny. He admitted to be inspired by Walt Disney and Wilhelm Busch.
Comics slowly gained on popularity and even some translations of works like American
Felix the Cat or British Bonzo the Dog were published.
The best known Czech comics, generally considered to be one of the first true comics in Czechoslovakia and the Czech Republic, is Rychlé šípy written by Jaroslav
Foglar and drawn by a caricaturist Jan Fischer. In 1930‘s it was published in Mladý hlasatel magazine and it was so popular that it survived not only World War II, but also the socialist era. It influenced several generations of readers. Throughout the years it was published in magazines Mladý hlasatel, Vpřed and Skaut – Junák. In 1970‘s it appeared as a stand-alone magazine (which can be considered as a kind of comic book) and many years later, after the Velvet Revolution it was published as the voluminous hard-covered collection. After Jan Fischer it was drawn by Václav
Junek, Bohumír Čermák and Marko Čermák.
After the World War II comics slowly regained its position only to lose it with the beginning of Soviet Occupation of Czechoslovakia. Comics was marked as the product of western ideology, but it survived in children‘s magazines such as ABC mladých techniků a přírodovědců, Ohníček, Pionýr, Mateřídouška etc. From 1950‘s to 1980‘s the situation remained mostly the same. Only the number of children‘s magazines grew slightly and as comics gained on popularity again, it started to be published even in other magazines and newspapers like Mladý svět, Svobodné slovo,
Mladá fronta. Mostly the original stories were published (i.e. Vzpoura mozků), but there were also adaptations of well known literary (i.e. Dobrodružství Johna Cartera) and occasionally translations of French, Polish and Yugoslavian works (i.e. French Pif).
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In 1969 Čtyřlístek the first comics-only magazine, for the greater part drawn by
Jaroslav Němeček, started to be published and it is published since. Together with
Rychlé šípy it is one of the most popular Czech comics. Another notable artist of the time was Kája Saudek, who published his first work Agent Nr. 00 – WC in 1966.
He worked for magazines Mladý svět and Student. Three years after his first work had been published, he published one part of his next work Múriel a andělé, but he was forbidden to continue with it. The whole work Múriel a andělé was published as late as in 1991. Kája Saudek‘s works are notable for the unique style and irony, which were unfortunately unacceptable for the communist regime. For some time Kája Saudek could publish only semi-legally, but it did not stop him. Later he cooperated with
Jaroslav Foglar on Modrá rokle, Ztracený kamarád and Jeskyně Saturn.
After 1989 Czech original comics was still published in magazines such as
Kometa or Aréna. Kometa played an important role on the Czech market in the first years after the Velvet Revolution, mainly thanks to the works of Kája Saudek and
Marko Čermák which attracted the readers. Besides these two, many other promising young artists started publishing in this magazine. Besides Kometa and Aréna, Čtyřlístek was still published and Rychlé šípy and Kája Saudek‘s works reprinted. However, there seemed to be no interest in comics among the Czech people at the beginning of 1990‘s.
Readers‘ interest in comics was renewed as late as in 1997 by the specialized comics magazine CREW. This magazine focused on translations of foreign comics.
The Czech authors could and still can publish in Aargh! magazine, Komiksfest! magazine, Zkrat etc. Independent works also started to be published i.e. Alois Nebel by
Jaromír 99 etc.
The two most important publishing houses which issued comics for some time regularly after 1989 were Semic-Slovart and Egmont ČSFR. As soon as in 1990 20
Egmont published Mickey Mouse comic books followed by Duck Tales5 and in the years
1991-1994 Semic-Slovart published such series as Spider-Man, Barbar Conan, Pink
Panther, G. I. Joe, Transformers or Garfield and even the film adaptations like
Terminator 2: The Judgement Day. Unfortunately these Semic-Slovart comic books were of disputable quality. The continuity was disrupted – the stories which were originally narrated in several issues often ended abruptly without being finished in their
Czech version; or they were illogically divided into several issues which did not follow one another. Besides that pages of stories were often missing. It is interesting though that these comics were published in two language mutations – both in Czech and Slovak
(even before the separation of both countries in 1993).
Besides these two main well known publishing houses there were naturally other ones, which often ceased to exist after publishing one or two comics titles. Such an example is AG Comics, which published only one Star Wars comics. The main player on the field of translated comics publication was Crew. As it has been mentioned above, it firstly introduced foreign comics in its CREW magazine and then it became a major publishing house publishing comic books and graphic novels. Its first place on the market is nowadays threatened by other publishing houses which are: BB Art,
Comics centrum, Talpress (publishing manga) and Egmont (publishing mainly children comic books distributed at newspapers stands).
These publishing houses nowadays publish the vast amount of foreign comics starting with Garfield, Astérix, The Simpsons (Simpsonovi) and ending with paper-back collections of comic books like 100 bullets (100 nábojů), Transmetropolitan and special hard-covered ―Omnibuses‖ of Captain America, Daredevil, Star Wars etc. Besides them
5 Egmont, nowadays Egmont ČR, still continues to publish Disney licensed comic books .
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some newspapers still publish comic strips: Reflex publishes Zelený Raoul (the original
Czech comics), MF Dnes publishes translated Dilbert etc.
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3. Comics Translation
―When comics are translated a change of genre, readership, publication format
(or a combination of the three) may be involved which will then govern primary translation choices […]‖ (Zanettin, ―Comics in Translation‖ 8). Therefore this chapter not only describes the process of comics translation itself, but also the whole publishing process as it happens in the Czech Republic starting with obtaining the publishing rights and finishing with the printing of the final product. In the course of this description this chapter deals with two kinds of translations: firstly it deals with the translation of comics format – with the adaptation of comics to ―the publishing conventions of target culture‖ (Rota 79), and secondly it deals with the translation per se – with the translation of verbal parts of the comics.
3.1 The Publication Process
The first step which needs to be done before any comics can be translated into a different language in a different country is the obtaining of rights to translate and publish it. The choice of rights to be bought is governed by several factors: the taste of the publisher, the saleability of the product, the availability of the rights and the financial budget available (Kormosi).
Even though publishers Václav Dort from Comics centrum and Jiří Pavlovský from Crew claim that they primarily publish comics they like, they naturally cannot be guided just by that – in fact, the taste of the publisher and the saleability of the product are indirectly influenced by the intended readership (Pavlovský, ―Beseda‖).
Every publisher wants to publish comics which will be read and which will earn him/her the invested money back, so s/he needs to know the readership‘s preferences: 23
Will the superhero comics sell well? Will the witty collection of cartoons sell better?
From the interview with Václav Dort it is obvious, that the publisher also considers the format which is more suitable for him/her to publish and the additional changes of graphic elements which will be needed. S/he considers these facts with respect to his/her financial budget and with respect to what the readership is used to and what the readership will be willing to pay for the final product: Will the 32 paged ―one-shot6‖ be good? Will the collection of several comic books with a compact finished story be better? Will the fully coloured version of comics be the right choice? Will the black and white version of comics be acceptable for the readers? Will the cover and the size of comics need a change?
The readership preferences can be learned in several ways: they can be estimated based on sales numbers of similar types of products or on sales numbers and popularity of the product in different countries or they can be learned directly through the contact with the readership. In case of the sales numbers and popularity, the publisher can do the research or order the survey. However, to remain in contact with the readership may be a more demanding task. Luckily, in the Czech Republic, the community of comics readers/fans tends to stick together, meets at conventions, posts in web forums and actively evaluates the published products both from the point of view of original quality as well as from the point of view of work done by the translators, letterers7 and publishers. The Czech publishers are well aware of this readership and they visit or
6 One-shot is a comic book containing only one short story which is not continuous and can stand alone independently.
7 ―the person responsible for writing the translated text in the balloons and caption boxes‖
(Zanettin, ―The translation of Comics‖ 202)
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organize the meetings of fans, answer their questions, watch closely their reviews and try to listen to their pleads and demands8.
As far as the possibilities of learning readership preferences are concerned, the relatively small comics market of the Czech Republic is an advantage – it is not so difficult for the Czech publishers to stay in contact with their readers. Unfortunately, as far as the availability of the rights is concerned, it is not so easy. Big foreign
(especially American) publishers and licence holders are profit-driven and have license policies more suitable for bigger markets or bigger publishing companies (Buchal). For small publishers publishing at such small markets as the comics market in the Czech
Republic is, it can be difficult to financially reach some publishing rights and even to get the right contact to ask for them – there are rights owners who literally ―live in a log cabin somewhere in the middle of the prairie‖ (―Č. K. D.‖).
According to Martin Buchal‘s talk, the further financial problems for the Czech publishers may arise from financially unfeasible practices held by some of the foreign rights owners. The first practise is that comics rights may be sold in packages – several rights for several different comics are sold at once as a so called package. The Czech publisher is often interested only in some of comics included in such a package, because other comics included would not sell. Yet, s/he does not have much of the choice – either s/he pays for all of them, or s/he gets nothing. The second practise is that the ownership of the rights is limited to a certain number of years (usually two years).
During this time the publisher has to publish the comics and distribute all the published
8 See, for example, Crew webpages www.crew.cz, especially discussions in ―Auditorium‖ section, promotions of various fan projects in ―Doporučujeme‖ and links to the convention organized by Crew publishing house in ―Links‖ section.
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pieces. There should not be any piece left in his/her warehouses, otherwise s/he needs to prolong the ownership of the rights (Buchal). The third practice is probably the most feasible for the Czech market: the publishing house pays for the rights, pays the irreversible advanced payment and regularly reports sales of the product9 (Litoš).
Additional payment for the rights is needed only if the sales are higher than the irreversible advanced payment, which happens only occasionally (ibid).
In the past, to overcome some of the financial difficulties and communication problems, the two Czech publishers Crew and BB Art found their own solution – they were buying the rights together and were publishing comics together. It was financially more feasible to them and they could share the valuable contacts (Pavlovský,
―Beseda‖). Nowadays, with the readership and the demand for comics growing, the publishers seem to be established better in their branch of business. They have established better contacts with the rights owners by visiting the big comics conventions in the United States of America and by negotiating personally with the top agents of the big publishing companies such as DC Comics, Marvel or Dark Horse (Buchal).
And they also can publish comics which they would not dare to dream of publishing few years ago as the readership nowadays is ready for them and demands them.
If the negotiation and communication with the distributor of the rights goes well the contract is signed, the advance payment is paid, and the publisher can find the translator (Kormosi). The publisher needs two kinds of source materials: the printed original comics (or its scanned version) for the translator to translate and graphic materials for the graphic processing of the product. The second ones can take some time
9 To see details about how the payment for the rights and the irreversible advanced payment is calculated see Litoš.
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to get according to Crew‘s pages, because the big publishing companies may have problems to find older materials (Pavlovský, ―Beseda‖). It apparently happens that some pages are not received at all, as can be seen in Calvin and Hobbes: Pomsta hlídaných
(in English The Revenge of the Baby-Sat: A Calvin and Hobbes Collection), where one can read the apology for the lower quality of the publication due to missing graphic materials.
The graphic adaptation of comics starts as soon as the publishing house receives the graphic materials – it is done either by the letterer or the graphic(s) and the letterer.
According to Valerio Rota, the options the publishing house has in translating format are three: the adaptation to a local format, the retention of the original format or the adoption of a third format (84). ―The current tendency of European publishing houses is to manipulate and alter comics to be translated as little as possible, for economic, as well as cultural reasons‖ and two strategies applied in this process may be foreignizing strategy and domesticating strategy10 (Rota 84). The foreignizing strategy ―is mainly adopted in countries […] where the reading public has developed an awareness of the artistic importance of comics and where, consequently, drastic alterations of original works (a domesticating strategy) would not be viewed in a favourable light‖ (ibid). Typical signs of this strategy are the preservation of the original format of the comics and the scarceness of the adaptation of graphically rendered textual elements i.e. onomatopoeic expressions or titles (Rota 85-6).
The Czech Republic can be seen as the country where the foreignizing strategy prevails.
Nevertheless, some domesticating strategies such as the change of format from the smaller paperback to the bigger bound product were applied on Star Wars Omibus:
10 ―Domestication‖ and ―foreignization‖ are terms coined by Lawrence Venuti. See Venuti.
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Stíny Impéria (in English Star Wars Omnibus: Shadows of the Empire) and the change of colours from the coloured print to the black and white print was applied on Batman:
Deset nocí Kgbeasta (in English Batman: Ten Nights of the Beast). Still, such practices as the re-arrangements of pages and panels, or the censorship are only rarely applied by the Czech publishers.
The major amount of the graphical adaptations of verbal content of comics can be done only after the translation is received by the publisher and checked by the editor and the corrector. The editor checks the correctness of the facts, the naturalness and cohesion of the text and the corrector checks its grammatical correctness. The changes proposed by the editor are discussed with the translator, sometimes they are discussed by the whole editor‘s office (if the terminology affecting several subsequent publications of comics or the extensive graphical changes is concerned). The changes are then incorporated into the translated text.
The textual elements of comics are then modified by the letterer – the translated text is put into balloons and the translated titles and the onomatopoeic expressions located outside the balloons are graphically changed. The letterer has to deal with several aspects influencing the reading of the comics: special signs (the placement of asterisks, breath signs, note signs etc.; see subchapters 4.2 and 4.3), the choice of font
(which should be as close to the original one as possible), the visual disproportion of various language sign systems (the Czech language has, for example, signs which overlap into the space between lines), the disproportion of the text length of various languages, graphical renderings of the textual content (Mičátek). Not only the letterer, but also the translator should pay the attention to these aspects when translating, because his translation choices, as far as these aspects are concerned,
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can make the letterer‘s job easier or more difficult and subsequently they may improve or worsen the overall impression of comics.
After the letterer finishes his work, the whole comics should be fully graphically adapted. It is printed out and sent to the translator and the editor for the final revision.
All aspects are checked now – facts, grammar, graphics. The corrections are implemented into the comics by the letterer. If a high number of textual changes are needed, the grammar revision is preformed again. When everything is ready, the comics is converted into the needed format and sent to the printing press. The remaining step is the distribution of comics to the readers – to newspaper stands or, in the Czech Republic more commonly, to the book shops.
The same way comics is a product of several authors and artists (a penciler11, an inker12, a letterer etc.), a final translation is a product of a translator, an editor, a letterer, a graphic and a corrector (Zanettin, ―The Translation of Comics‖ 202).
The cooperation and communication among these people is important and quite specific aspect of the work. What they achieve together, ―[t]he publication of a foreign comics[,] can also be seen as an instance of localization in that it involves not only linguistic translation but also the adaptation of visual/cultural information, as well as technical constraints‖ (Zanettin, ―The Translation of Comics‖ 201). From that it seems that the translation of comics certainly is not only a matter of translation per se, done by the hired translator, but it is heavily influenced by the publisher‘s and editorial decisions
11 A penciler is the first one who renders the story of comics in the visual form. S/he outlines the layout of every page and sketches every part of the plot. S/he works in pencil.
12 An inker is responsible for refined outlines in black ink which s/he draws over a penciler‘s lines.
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and it depends on the work of the group of people cooperating and working on different aspects of translation/adaptation of comics.
3.2 The Translation Process
Once the translator is hired by the publisher and receives source materials
(a comic book or its scanned version) to translate, the process of translation per se begins. ―No translator can afford to overlook the role of contexts in translating because they are crucial for so many decisions […]‖ (Nida 79), so as soon as the translator gets the source materials, s/he, at least partially, analyses them in order to determine the intention of the text, to see how it is written and to detect possible problematic aspects of it (Newmark, A Textbook 11). In case of comics this assessment means to mainly focus on the specifics of comics translation – to assess the amount of wordplays, onomatopoeic words, proper names, newly coined expressions and to asses possible difficulties which may arise from the complementarity of pictorial and verbal content of comics. Throughout the whole process of translation the translator needs to consider that his/her translating solutions will require graphical adjustments.
S/he also should, at least partially, assess the extensiveness of graphical adjustments his/her solutions will require.
Basically, s/he has to decide on the degree to which s/he intends to adapt the comics to the target culture expectations (i.e. to what extent s/he will apply foreignizing or domesticating strategies). Of course this needs to be discussed with the publisher or the editor. This is the matter not only of the terminology, culture- specific terms and series- or issue-specific expressions, but also a matter of onomatopoeic expressions appearing outside balloons (see 4.5), of titles (see 4.6) and
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of linguistic paratexts (see 4.6). What gets translated is not solely the translator‘s decision in these cases. The publisher and/or the editor play major role here too.
The genre of comics, the intended readership and the financial budget available influence these decisions – as has been already mentioned in the previous subchapter.
The translator‘s translation of a certain term may be denied by the publisher or the editor because it was not translated in the previous series or because it has some significant role in another series of comics which the publisher plans to publish.
Similarly, the extensive translations of onomatopoeic expressions implemented in pictures may be denied because of an extra work and additional expenses which the graphical adjustments of such expressions represent.
As soon as the matter of what is redundant for the translator to translate is settled, and the question of the degree of adaptation resolved, the translator proceeds with the translation. Peter Newmark in his Paragraphs on Translation lists ―golden rules for translating comics strips‖ (152) coined by Anthea and Derek Hockridge:
1. Keep the feel of the original. [Stylistic register?]13
2. Don‘t try to translate puns literally. Make a different joke to fit the spirit of
the French one. [What if Romance and English puns coincide?]
3. Make sure the English fits the drawings [and diagrams in technical texts],
particularly facial expressions [and in children‘s stories].
4. Have roughly the same number of jokes – knockout and literary – even if
they aren‘t quite in the same places as in the original strip. [Compensation,
as in translations of light comedy of farce.] (Newmark, Paragraphs 152)
13 Texts in square brackets are commentaries from Peter Newmark.
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The translator can get some guidance from these rules. However, they are very specifically oriented at translating comics strips and thus interested mainly in preserving jokes. What is more, the point number four often cannot be adhered to, because of the complementarity of pictorial and verbal parts of comics – if the translation of the joke cannot be placed at the same place as it is placed in the original, the following text containers hardly ever afford enough space to compensate for the previous joke (see 4.2).
Comics is of various genres and uses various narrative techniques. Texts in comics usually appear in balloons, in caption boxes, as titles and as linguistic paratexts
(Celotti 38-9). All these forms may seem as limiting and separating text into smaller independent units. The translator, however, should not treat this verbal content of comics as a set of separate independent texts but s/he should treat it as the complex unit. Therefore, comics translation may generally follow the same guides as the literary translation – guides such as those, for example, proposed by Jiří Levý, who claims that translator decides between sets of following contradicting statements when translating:
1. A translation must give the words of the original.
2. A translation must give the ideas of the original.
3. A translation should read like an original work.
4. A translation should read like a translation.
5. A translation should reflect the style of the original.
6. A translation should possess the style of the translator.
7. A translation should read as a contemporary of the original.
8. A translation should read as a contemporary of the translator. 32
9. A translation may add to or omit from the original.
10. A translation may never add to or omit from the original.
11. A translation of verse should be in prose.
12. A translation of verse should be in verse. (Levý 14-5)
However, ―[c]omics are a narrative space where both pictures and words convey meaning and jointly create the story, with the translator ‗reading‘ the meaning of the pictorial elements and their different relationship with the verbal messages‖
(Celotti 33) and from that some specifics of comics translation arise. When following general translation guides, the awareness of these specifics is still needed.
The specifics of comics translation are dealt with separately in a greater detail in the following chapter. Based on Celotti‘s approaches to the translation of linguistic paratexts (see 4.2) and on the practical experiences with comics translation five general strategies used in comics translation can be foreshadowed:
1) content can be translated
2) content can be left untranslated
3) content can be culturally adapted
4) content can be deleted
5) the source material can be adjusted (i.e. footnote addition, balloon
enlargement)
They can be applied both on translation of the verbal content of comics and the pictorial content of comics.
The translator of comics usually enters his/her translation into a text document in which s/he has to visibly mark the page number of the translated page and visibly differentiate translations of individual balloons and caption boxes (for information 33
on balloons and caption boxes see 4.3). The information provided in this way has to be understandable to the letterer, who is to work with the text further. The translator should also very thoroughly transcribe bolds and italics – in this way an emphasis is added to certain words and messages, which should be kept. There are also aspects of the original comics the translator should leave out i.e. advertisements. In addition to his/her translating job, the translator may be as well asked to add some material to the target product i.e. foreword, afterword, new text for flaps or new text for back cover.
The translator‘s work of course does not end when s/he hands in the translation to the publisher. As it has been mentioned in the previous subchapter, the translation is checked by the editor. In the next instance the editor discusses possible changes with the translator and only after these changes are worked into the translation, the translation goes to the letterer and/or graphic(s). The translator checks his work for the last time after his translation is inserted into balloons, caption boxes and reworked into graphic titles and inscriptions.
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4. Specifics of Comics Translation
The list of specifics of comics translation presented in this chapter is based on the opinions of Richard Podaný, Jiří Pavlovský a Viktor Janiš, three comics translators whose translations are analysed later in this thesis, and on the discussions of various theoreticians such as Celotti, Garcés and Zanettin. All these people mentioned and discussed some of the following specifics and considered them the important aspects of comics translation.
Some of them are solely aspects of comics translation, some of them are aspects which come up also in literary translation, or technical translation, but which call for a different and a specific approach if they are to be translated in comics. The translator should be aware of them and should take them into consideration when translating, because ―[t]exts in comics are not mere transcription of the characters‘ speeches: they are graphic representation of them. Before being something to be read (i.e. texts), they are something to be seen: pictures themselves, which contribute to the visual equilibrium of the page‖ (Rota 80).
4.1 Foreignizing, Domestication and Localization
The conclusion of subchapter 3.1 indicates that, considering format changes, graphic changes and translation of various graphically rendered texts, comics translation can be considered as the instance of localization. The process of localization is described as ―taking a product and making it linguistically, technically, and culturally appropriate to the target locale where it will be used and sold‖ (qtd. in Zanettin,
―The Translation of Comics‖ 200). The strategies of foreignizing and domestication are part of this process. In case of foreignizing ―[t]he comics keeps, as far as possible, its 35
original cultural and editorial characteristics‖ (Rota 85). Domestication, on the other hand, ―involves the publication of a foreign comic in the local format, notwithstanding the characteristics of a foreign publication‖ and may be ―accompanied by many alterations of the original comic‖ (Rota 86).
The processes of foreignization and domestication have already been discussed in chapter three. They were mentioned in the context of format adjustments of comics and in the context of translator‘s need to decide on the degree of domesticating and/or foreignizing strategies s/he intends to use.
As far as format is concerned, when a domesticating strategy is adopted, the type of publication may be changed (i.e. from a paperback to a hard cover), pages and panels may be shrunken or magnified, re-arranged, or even omitted, and colouring may be changed from black and white to fully coloured and vice versa (Rota 86-9). Also various minor changes may be applied – some pages of comics can be redrawn or updated when it is re-published, covers and pictures can be changed or retouched
(Zanettin, ―The Translation of Comics‖ 205). On the other hand, when the foreignizing strategy is applied, ―the format is preserved, thus clearly revealing the foreign origin of the comic‖ (Rota 85) and only necessary changes are made.
The domesticating strategy applied to verbal parts of the comics may include mutilation of texts (Rota 87) – the translator or the letterer can shorten or in another way modify the texts (Zanettin, ―The Translation of Comics‖ 204) – graphical adjustments of onomatopoeic expressions and titles, and application of cultural or political censorship (i.e. name changes due to unsuitable connotations). The foreignization process usually means that the onomatopoeic expression outside the balloons, titles and other ―graphically rendered textual elements‖ are kept unchanged (Rota 85). Even culture-specific expressions, names and terms can be treated the same way. 36
It is specific to comics that both verbal and visual content is adjusted to the target culture‘s expectations (Zanettin, ―The Translation of Comics‖ 200). Even though the foreignizing and domesticating strategies can be applied in all kinds of texts translations, in comics translation the uniqueness of these strategies‘ application lies in the fact that they are applied both to the verbal and the pictorial part of comics and frequently used to ―update‖ the original product when it is re-published or translated into another language.
4.2 Translation Constrained by Pictures
Comics is unique in its combination of pictorial and verbal content. Text in comics is incorporated in and surrounded by the pictorial content, it intertwines with it, reacts with it, adds to it, it is supported by it and so forth. ―Comics require the reader to blend the print and the graphics to comprehend the intended communication‖
(McVicker 85). Not only the reader, but also the translator have to focus both on the verbal and the pictorial content and consider their mutual interaction while translating. It is one of the most important specifics of comics translation – verbal parts of comics are extensively influenced by pictorial parts of comics.
In one of the interviews Richard Podaný states that ―one of the worst
[differences in translating the fiction and the comics] is that because of how images and text are intertwined, the translator is often deprived of the possibility to use some alternative escapist solution which he can use when translating fiction14‖ (Klíčník).
The lengthy escapist solutions or the additional explanations of terms or situations are
14 ―Jedním z nejhorších je, že vinou provázanosti na obraz je často překladatel zbaven možnosti provést nějaký úhybný manévr jako v beletrii.‖
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often not applicable in comics. There is usually no extra space in balloons where the explanation could fit. Scarcely footnotes are used, but generally they are seen as the violation of the original page composition requiring additional graphic adjustments.
What is more, sometimes the page composition even may not allow such graphic adjustments.
From this it seems that the picture is a constraint for the translator. ―A specific concept has even been created within Translation Studies for the translation of multimedia text, i.e. ‗constrained translation‘‖ and some theoreticians like Shuttleworth or Cowie classify comics as a multimedia text type (Celotti 34). However, in the same interview from which the previous statement is quoted, Podaný admits that
―[…] the comics is one of synthetic art mediums which join together literary and visual components […]15‖ and that he ―[…] had to learn how this fact influences the text
[…]16‖ (Klíčník), which not only shows that he is aware of this basic specific of comics translation and understands the mutual interdependence of texts and images, but also that comics translation does not have to be inevitably seen as a constrained translation.
If this notion of comics as a synthetic art medium is elaborated on a little further, comics can be seen as ―the form of sequential art, in which the simultaneity of the visual and the verbal languages generates the diegesis‖ (Celotti 34). The translator can thus approach the comics translation in a different way, as Celotti suggests – as ―a semiotic investigator faced with the multimodal text with two meaning-making resources rather that with a text constrained by the pictures‖ (47).
15 ―[…] komiks patří mezi syntetická umělecká média, která spojují slovesnou složku s vizuální […]‖
16 ―[…] se musím naučit, jak tenhle fakt ovlivňuje text […]‖
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The interdependence of the visual and the textual content of comics can be best seen on examples of puns and idioms which are often represented both graphically and literary. Due to the cultural differences, however, some idioms and puns cannot be translated word for word as they would not be understood by the target readership which is not familiar with them. The translator thus has to substitute the original idiom or pun with the local idiom or pun, which has the same meaning and is understood by the target readership. This can be problematic, if the graphic representation of the pun or the idiom in target language does not match the representation depicted in the original. The solution is to change the graphic representation, but that is usually quite expensive and complicated: the creator(s) of the original would have to agree with the change and the artist capable of performing such a change would have to be found.
The compensation somewhere else is similarly complicated as substitution, because of the complementarity of pictures and writings and because of the continuity of the story.
The translator thus has to come up with his/her own, most probably descriptive translation and try not to spoil cleverness, naturalness and smoothness of the pun or the idiom very much.
Similarly as the choice of a suitable idiom or pun, also the choice of individual words and simple phrases may depend on the visual content of comics. Visually established mood of the scene or a tempo of narrative set by frames can influence the choice of a suitable expression. Such a choice can be based on what the translator sees on the picture. Pictures often help to choose a suitable register, a style of speech, or just the most suitable synonym. This all helps to transfer a mood, style and other non- linguistic aspects of the original work properly.
Verbal content of comics does not appear only in balloons and caption boxes.
Some of it can be rendered graphically and thus become an integral part of the graphic 39
composition. These are onomatopoeic expressions appearing outside the balloons, linguistic paratexts and story titles. Because the onomatopoeia can also appear inside the balloons, it is treated separately in subchapter 4.5, but both linguistic paratexts and story titles are described here as verbal content of comics heavily interconnected with and influenced by the pictorial content.
A linguistic paratext is a term suggested by Maria Grazia Margarito following
Gérard Genette (Celotti 39) and stands for signs, placards, graffiti, epigraphs, newspaper articles etc. which specify the place, the time and the circumstances of events happening in the comics or they expand its story. They show cultural, geographic, social and other contexts (Celotti 39). Because of them long descriptions and specifications of whereabouts are not needed in comics. Depending on paratexts‘ importance and connection to the pictures or the story of the comics, and on the degree and the kind of localization the translator or the publisher decided to apply throughout the comics, paratexts can be or do not have to be translated, culturally adapted or left- out (ibid). In case the paratext is vital to the story, it is translated; in case it specifies the place and the overall domesticating strategy is applied throughout the comics, it is culturally adapted; in case it is just a graffiti text supporting the atmosphere of the story‘s setting, it may be left unchanged.
The last example of the verbal content of comics influenced widely by the visual content, or more likely influenced by the whole story depicted visually, are the titles of comics. The same as the book titles, the comics titles should be attractive, suggestive and should reflect the content of the work (Celotti 38). They also can have various puns and allusions hidden in them. Therefore, to leave the title of the story untranslated is in most cases hardly an option for the comics translator. S/he either needs to change the whole title – change it from the allusive one to the descriptive one (Newmark, 40
A Textbook 56) – or very rarely the title can be translated in a footnote. So far the comics titles do not differ from the book titles. However, contrary to the book titles, the comics titles are often graphically rendered in such way that they allude to the content of the story graphically. This is the way in which the pictorial content of comics once again influences the verbal content of comics and makes the translation of comics titles specific.
4.3 Translation Constrained by Balloons and Caption Boxes
In the previous subchapter some of the examples presented touched upon the second specific of comics translation, balloons. Federico Zanettin considers them one of the ―grammatical devices‖ (Zanettin, ―Comics in Translation‖ 18) of comics.
Viktor Janiš talks about them as about the first specific of comics translation which comes to everybody‘s mind as possible constraint of comics translation (Pavlovský,
―Janiš‖). Even though balloons are nowadays inherently associated with comics form, originally they were absent in comics and ―began to appear only later in the twentieth century outside the United States‖ (Zanettin, ―Comics in Translation‖ 2). Balloons ―can thus be considered a distinguishing feature of comics as an American form of visual narrative‖ (ibid).
Janiš states that the limited space of balloon comes to people‘s minds as a constraint almost immediately, especially when the translation from English into
Czech is considered – the Czech sentences tend to be longer than their English counterparts (Pavlovský, ―Janiš‖). However, he explains that ―[i]t is not as tragic as in case of subtitles […]‖, because in the comics, the size of font, the space between lines or the whole balloon can be adjusted (ibid.).
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Balloons, together with caption17 boxes, contain the majority of written text which is translated in comics. As has been mentioned above, a translation is partially influenced by the place available in a balloon or in a caption box (Pavlovský, "Janiš").
The translator should watch the length of his sentences, which should not differ from the length of the source text extensively. In addition, as it has been already mentioned in subchapter 3.2, the translator should not treat the content of the balloon as the separate unit, but as the part of the complex whole – s/he should think about logical continuity, cohession and coherence of the text.
The translator should presuppose which adjustments may be needed if his translation is lengthier than the original, and s/he should assess whether these adjustments are possible – even though s/he is not the one performing these adjustments. If the length of text differs, there are basically four solutions, all applied by the letterer: the size of font can be reduced or enlarged, the space between lines can be similarly adjusted, the balloon can be reduced or enlarged as well, and sometimes even deleted or added (Mičátek). The size of balloon is not the only aspect which needs to be considered – the surrounding of balloon, the overall layout of panel, or the layout of page can be also of interest to the translator and the letterer. For such an adjustment as the enlargement/reduction and the deletion/addition of balloon the pictorial content of balloon‘s surrounding needs to be suitable.
Not only balloons were mentioned in the previous paragraph, but captions as well. The existence of this differentiation shows that there are various kinds of text
17 ―The ‘sacred‘ text […], usually in the third person, grants the narration a literary dimension‖ (qtd. in Celotti 38). ―It usually marks changes in time and space, but it can also include commentaries connected with the pictures‖ (Celotti 38).
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containers and types of balloons (see fig. 1). These various containers have different functions. They differentiate the direct speech from narrating voice and thoughts, and they mark different styles of speeches.
Fig. 1: Types of Balloons (Piekos)
An ordinary balloon containing speech of character is rounded, drawn by a clear straight line. A connection to the "speaker" uttering its content is marked by a balloon tail aiming at the character‘s mouth. The same shape as the ordinary balloon has a whispering balloon, the only difference is that it is grayed-out or painted with a dashed line (Piekos). The so called burst balloon is used when someone is screaming
– its line is irregular, more chaotic than the line of a radio balloon (or electric balloon), which is used ―whenever the speech is transmitted through a radio, TV, telephone, or any type of speaker‖. It is drawn by a spiky line and it has an italicized content (ibid).
There is also a special balloon for situations when someone is talking from off-camera
(i.e. from behind the door), emanating speech balloon, which looks like an ordinary balloon, but at the end of its tail it has a multi-pointed burst (ibid). Last three types of balloons are those with the wavy lines: so called wavy balloon, which represents 43
a distressed speech and whose line and tail are shaky; a thought balloon, which is bordered by the regularly waved line and instead of balloon tail it has little bubbles painted towards the head of the character; and a telepathic balloon, which ―look[s] like a thought balloon except [it has] breath marks on opposing corners‖ (see subchapter 4.3 for breath marks) (ibid). Here it should be emphasized, that balloons can be joined and connected (ibid), which may be important as far as the cohesion of translation is concerned.
Thought balloons are nowadays used less often and are replaced with so called narrative captions (ibid). Captions are usually inserted in coloured rectangular boxes without tails, placed near and aligned to the top or the side of the panel. There are four types of captions in comics: Location & Time, Internal Monologue, Spoken, and
Narrative (ibid). All of these captions are italicized except for the spoken caption which represents ―the vocalized speech of a character that is off camera‖ and is placed within the quotation marks (ibid).
The letterer working on the original text adds into comics caption boxes and/or balloons. S/he chooses the type of balloon corresponding to the style of the text s/he is expected to insert. The translator translates this text with both these aspects – the style of the source text and the type of balloon – on his/her mind. In addition, the text in the balloon usually simulates the spoken mode and this, together with field of discourse and tenor of discourse, influence the register used; which the translator should maintain.
The sentence structure, syntax and even lexical choice can be influenced by the type of the balloon or by the arrangement into the caption box. There are likely to be short exclamatory or imperative sentences in the screaming balloon both in the source text and the translation. The narrative caption, on the contrary, will probably contain long complex and declarative sentences. However, some cultural differences or grammatical 44
conventions may demand usage of a different sentence structure or a sentence with a different syntax compared to the original. In such cases the translator still has to reflect the type of balloon and nature of caption. S/he has to avoid an undesired ambiguity and therefore has to be aware of meanings of different types of balloons and captions; the translator needs to be aware of characteristics which different types of balloons impose on the text.
4.4 Special Signs
Comics translation is not specific only because of the pictorial content or because of presence of balloons and captions. Comics also contain a high number of special signs. This thesis distinguishes two types of signs in comics: the signs which are inserted into the verbal content of comics (excluding punctuation marks) and the signs appearing in pictorial parts of comics (―visual metaphors‖ or ―pictograms‖18, as Federico Zanettin calls them in his ―Comics in Translation: An Overview‖).
The ―visual metaphors‖ are usually of no interest to the translator. They add more to the pictorial content – for example they specify the feelings of character and do not influence the verbal content of comics. This type of signs may be of more interest to the letterer and/or graphic(s) and mostly only if they are so culture-specific that they need to be redrawn or retouched. The signs inserted into the verbal content of comics are on the contrary very important for the translator and are another specific s/he can
18 ―i.e. conventional stylized representations which are intertextually recognized, such as saw to represent sleep or stars to represent pain in humorous comics‖ (Zanettin, ―Comics in
Translation‖ 18)
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encounter when translating comics. These signs, similarly as the pictorial content and balloons influence verbal parts of comics – they add additional qualities to the text.
The special signs used in comics are (see fig. 2): an asterisk, a breath mark, a foreign languages sign (the less than and the greater than symbols), a music note sign, a lower case (Piekos) and special characters such as &#@. An asterisk refers to
―the narrative caption somewhere else in the panel or on the page‖ (ibid) – it usually stands for the editor‘s note about where the reader can find some additional information, or in which of the previous issues the event, which is mentioned, happened. It is a footnote used in comics. Breath marks, or cat whiskers, fireflies or crow feet
(in Czech called ―kočičí fousky‖ i.e. cat whiskers) come usually before and after a cough or a breath (ibid) expressed by an onomatopoeic word. Without the word in between, these signs form an asterisk indicating the unconsciousness or the death of the character (ibid). The words uttered in foreign languages are bordered by a ―lesser than‖ and a ―greater than‖ signs. The first appearance is usually accompanied with an asterisk referring to the narrative caption informing about the language from which the utterance is being translated from (ibid). A music note simply shows that the text is not said, but singed. A lowercase use is ―reserved for non-verbal vocalizations like
‗Uh‘, ‗Heh‘, ‗Umm‘, etc.‖ which can be characterized rather as noises than words
(ibid). Special signs &#@ are used as the indistinguishable swearing or speech.
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Fig. 2: Special Signs (Piekos)
The music note alerts the translator to the fact there is song sang in the comics.
The translator then looks up the song and decides whether to retain the original, substitute and accommodate the song to the target culture, or whether s/he produces a new translation respecting the fact that it is the song to be sung. The onomatopoeic sounds in between of breath marks are often quite challenging, because a proper equivalent sometimes may not exist in the target language. And asterisks and footnotes sometimes may be left out in the adaptation, because the comics issue to which they refer has not been published in the target culture yet. As can be seen, these signs not only add new qualities to the text, but they draw the translator‘s attention to the words in their closeness which could be difficult to translate or which could be overlooked.
They offer a new helpful context.
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4.5 Onomatopoeic Words
Onomatopoeia is ―the formation of a word from a sound associated with the thing or action being named; the formation of words imitative of sounds‖ (OED).
Onomatopoeic words can be found in various kinds of texts and mediums, but in comics they are used very extensively and very specifically. Either they are used inside the balloons or outside them.
Inside the balloons onomatopoeic words appear in combination with breath marks. Outside the balloons they are integral part of the pictorial content of comics.
They do not have ―a clear and conventional graphic representation‖ and their expressive effect is traditionally enforced by different typographical and graphical signs
(Garcés 237). Onomatopoeic words can be generally known and used expressions, or newly invented words (ibid).
Even though onomatopoeic words represent sounds, they need to be translated as any other word, because written representations of sounds differ across languages i.e. a dog‘s bark in English is represented as ―woof-woof‖ and in Czech it is ―haf haf‖.
Translating onomatopoeia in comics is mainly about decision making. Newly invented onomatopoeic expressions require newly invented translations. The translator needs to decide whether to leave the original or whether to translate it. The biggest problem with onomatopoeia in comics is that graphically they are usually heavily interconnected with drawings. The change of such onomatopoeia means additional expenses for the publisher and additional work for the letterer or the graphic(s) (Garcés 240). Another aspect influencing the translation of onomatopoeia is the use of colour – coloured drawings are more difficult and expensive to adapt then black and white drawings
(ibid). The decision to translate or not to translate an onomatopoeic word in such cases
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is not the translator‘s decision, but the publisher‘s decision depending on publisher‘s willingness to invest more money into the graphical adaptation of comics.
To translate and graphically adjust onomatopoeia is not always necessary – this may depend on the publishing tradition of respective publishers and countries and on the readership‘s expectations. In countries where foreignizing strategies in translation prevail, onomatopoeia is not translated and readers accept and expect that (Garcés 239).
In Spanish comics, for example, a mixed approach is common. The replacement of onomatopoeia by respective Spanish equivalents depends on the type of sound which it represents – representations of sounds made by animals, humans and sounds of feelings are replaced by their Spanish equivalents and representations of mechanical sounds are retained in their original form (Garcés 241). In some countries, the original form of onomatopoeia may also be retained because the words are understandable in a given context, or their original form is similar to the target language equivalent and that makes them recognizable and understandable for the target readership.
4.6 Proper Names, Nicknames and Neologisms
Peter Newmark in his notes states that ―[p]roper names are translation difficulty in any text. In literature it has to be determined whether the name is real or invented.
In non-literary texts, translators have to ask themselves what if any additional explanatory of classificatory information has to be supplied for the TL readership‖
(Paragaphs 15). ―People‘s first and surnames are transferred‖, there are only some exceptions such as names of some monarchs and prominent figures which are often naturalized (Newmark, A Textbook 214). In some literary genres, for example in comedies, fairytales etc., connotations of the respective names have to be taken into
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consideration and the needs to be translated according to that (ibid). The exact, generally applicable rules on translating, transferring and naturalization of names do not exist and the choice on this matter is usually the translator‘s choice.
In comics the issue of names translation is more pressing and more frequent, because, especially in superhero comics, names are often not proper names per se, but aliases or nicknames. In comics names, aliases and nicknames have to be checked for double meanings, connotations and intertextuality. The translator needs to search for the target language equivalent of the name, s/he needs to verify, whether it is culture- specific and s/he has to assess the name‘s importance for the story and series. Some names have different functions in comics – comical effect, characterizing function, referential function, metaphoric function etc. Some names appear only in short, one- shot stories, and some re-appear throughout one or more long-running series.
Depending on these factors the translator chooses the suitable approach to translation of names: s/he translates them all, s/he transfers them (and treats them according to the Czech grammatical rules; sometimes s/he needs to adjust their spelling according to the Czech typographical conventions), or s/he translates only some of them and the rest leaves untranslated.
Comics is an imaginative form and as such it is not only full of strange names, but it is rich in neologisms as well. ―Neologisms can be defined as newly coined units or existing lexical units that acquire a new sense‖ (Newmark, A Textbook 140). Newly invented fantastic words are full of characters using and encountering newly invented things and surroundings. For old words with new senses a descriptive equivalent often can be found, derived words can be similarly derived with the target language equivalent and new coinages of words are mostly derived from various morphemes, are phonoaesthetic or synaesthetic and as such they can be recreated in translations 50
(Newmark, A Textbook 142). The context plays an important role here. Translator‘s choices in translating neologisms are the same his/her choices in translating names – the target language equivalents need to be searched for (even the equivalents of parts of the words) and every original words needs to be checked for double meanings, connotations, intertextualities and cultural specificities which should be preserved in the translation.
4.7 Intertextuality
―‘Intertextuality‘ is used in some literary criticism to describe the variety of ways that texts interact with other texts, and in particular to focus on the interdependence between texts rather than their discreteness or uniqueness‖
(Montgomery et al. 162). It can be recognized in various types of texts and ―in most cultural and artistic forms‖ (Montgomery et al. 159). Comics is not an exception. Parts of comics can be intertextually related to other texts and genres. Usually they parody them, but the most frequently used form of intertextuality appearing in comics is an allusion. Comics can allude to other texts ―through a verbal reference to another text
[…], through epigraphs […], through names of characters […]‖ and ―[…] through choice of titles […]‖ (Montgomery et al. 158).
The majority of verbal content of comics is intertwined with the graphical content of comics and thus the allusions and other intertextual references are intertwined with it as well. In comics newspaper articles, letters and documents can be represented graphically as linguistic paratext (see 4.6) and their textual content may allude or directly refer to the existing documents either of the similar kind or to the actually existing ones. The translator should be aware of this possibility in order to be
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capable of searching such documents out. Another specific of comics in general is that it draws on the long tradition of comics – allusions thus often allude not only to other literary texts and other mediums such as film, but they also frequently allude to various comics and comic series. The translator often needs to trace these allusions to their source, which can be a demanding job. In addition, the translator may often encounter allusions to works which were not translated in his/her target language and then s/he is confronted with a decision whether to translate such allusion (and how), substitute it with a different allusion, explain the original allusion somehow or leave it out.
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5. Translation Analysis
In this chapter translations of three different comics of three different translators are analysed. The analyses mainly focus on the specifics of comics translation introduced in the previous chapter. Works analysed here are of various types of comics
– they differ in their artistic style, they differ thematically, and they differ also in their format. Calvin and Hobbes is a collection of black-and-white comic strips, Batman:
Hush is a coloured collection of super-hero comic books and The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen is a coloured collection of a comic book fiction from the Victorian Era. This choice was made in order to assess different publication strategies, see whether specific aspects of comics translation will differ for various types of comics and to show the wide range of comics varieties this form offers.
5.1 Calvin and Hobbes
Calvin and Hobbes is a collection of comic strips written and drawn by Bill
Watterson. They depict various comical adventures of a little boy named Calvin and his best friend – a stuffed tiger (whom only he sees as a living one) Hobbes. These strips were regularly published in newspapers by Universal Press Syndicate from 1985 until
1995 (―The Complete Calvin and Hobbes‖). In the Czech Republic it was published by
BB Art in 2009 and translated by Richard Podaný.
The publication format of both the original and the translation is a paperback; in the Czech version both the size and the number of pages remain the same as in the original. The cover picture has been changed. The strips were originally published in black and white with the exception of Sunday special stories, which were printed in colour. These stories, when re-published in this actual collection, were printed 53
in black and white, their panels were re-arranged and the titles in their heads were deleted (see fig. 3). The re-arrangement was performed to adjust the sequencing of strips on pages – a regular Calvin and Hobbes strip consists of one row of (usually) four panels, the Sunday strips consist of two rows of panels, on one page three rows of panels can be placed; in order to distinguish the longer Sunday stories from the shorter regular ones, panels with the Sunday strips were re-arranged to fill in one full page.
The Czech version also sticks to the black and white colouring and to the same arrangement of stories and panels.
Fig. 3: Calvin and Hobbes – Page Re-arrangement
Considering the colouring of comics and its size the translator‘s and the publisher‘s choice was to translate the onomatopoeic expressions placed outside the balloons – their adjustments were not graphically difficult or expensive, because only black and white colours were used. The stories presented – short, humorous, sometimes satirizing, strips about a little boy playing with his tiger and glossing the world around him, are expected to attract mostly adults who are not regular comics readers.
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Even though the onomatopoeic expressions were translated, the names of the main characters remained untranslated and culturally unadapted. Calvin and Hobbes strips are well known from newspapers and the internet despite the fact they had not been published in the Czech Republic before 2009. If the main characters‘ names remain unchanged, the comics is more recognizable. As far as the names and the nicknames of Calvin and others are concerned, the list of their translations follows:
Waterson Podaný
Calvin Calvin
Hobbes Hobbes
Mom, mommy addressed mamí
Pop, dad addressed tatí
Spaceman Spiff Kosmonaut Sekáč
Captain Napalm Kapitán Napalm
Miss Wormwood Pančelka
Mr. Spittle Pan Spittle
Susie Derkins Susie Derkinsová
Rosalyn Rosalyn
Tommy Cashtann Tommy Cashtann
Moe Moe
There is quite a low number of characters appearing in Calvin and Hobbes – the main emphasis is put on the two main protagonists. The stories are depicted through
Calvin‘s thoughts, speeches and interactions so the reader learns other characters‘
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names from Calvin, who interacts with them and thus needs to address them somehow.
Characters whose names are mentioned frequently (some are called by specific names, others by general ones i.e. mom, pop), or Calvin‘s alter egos like Captain Spiff or
Captain Napalm are translated by the translator in the style which reflects Calvin‘s informal register of speech.
The strips are situational and as such they are mostly based on ―dialogues‖ and
Calvin‘s comments. The majority of texts are thus renderings of spoken words appearing in three types of balloons: ordinary balloons, emanating speech balloons and burst balloons. Captions are used only scarcely, when Calvin is fantasizing, to introduce a new situation. His voice in such cases changes into a narrator‘s voice:
We join our hero megazorks above planet Gloob... (Watterson)
Náš hrdina letí mnoho megazorků nad planetou Glub... (Podaný 18)
The rest of the narration of Calvin‘s fantasies is again included in balloons. Calvin often narrates such stories when playing in a sandpit or on a playground, so he is basically commenting his game.
The plural form of the pronoun ―I‖ and its plural possessive is used to further emphasize the change of situation and to reach out to the reader. In his fantasies Calvin also talks about himself in the third person singular: as about Captain Spiff (or any other hero or creature). The example of the caption above shows the typical use of ―we‖ and
―our‖ in these instances. The translation basically sticks to the same narrative technique and retains ―the reaching out‖ nature of the addressing (―náš hrdina‖). In the example above an acting participant is changed in the translation to construct more natural Czech sentence. 56
The amount of information conveyed by the dialogues and Calvin‘s comments is large. Therefore some balloons seem to be filled with the text too much (see fig. 4).
The space limitation of balloons certainly was an issue, however, not for the translator, but rather for the author himself. In the following example, the translator has actually chosen a quite lengthy solution of a compound sentence instead of the original‘s simple sentences:
Taste it. You‘ll love it. (Waterson)
Ochutnej, uvidíš, že to je moc dobré. (Podaný 7)
There are more instances of translations which are lengthier than the original, so in
Calvin and Hobbes balloons were not a constraint for the translator.
Fig. 4: Calvin and Hobbes Strip – Balloon Filled with Text
The complementarity of the pictorial content and the verbal content of Calvin and Hobbes extensively influenced the translator. One of the strips depicts Calvin lying in his bed announcing his mum that he thinks he will not go to school. In subsequent panels she is preparing his clothes and he is still arguing that he will not go to school
(see fig. 5). The last panel depicts Calvin standing at the bus stop, sulkily uttering
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―Rats‖. Without the pictorial context of the previous panels, and without the picture of
Calvin‘s frowning face, the translator could be at loss which meaning of the word ―rats‖ the author had on his mind. There is no additional textual context. The needed context and the climax of the joke is provided by the pictures.
There are many cases like this in Calvin and Hobbes. It is given by the nature of the strips – the strips are situational and comical – that the writings often comment on, add to and finish pictorial jokes.
Fig. 5: Calvin and Hobbes Strip – ―Rats‖
In the following example, Calvin and Hobbes are dressed like pirates and are floating on a wooden plank saying (Calvin starts):
– Prepare the plank!
– Our ship is a plank.
– And you're going to walk it, wise guy! (Watterson)
– Připravte prkno!
– Celá naše loď je prkno.
– Abys z něj neletěl, ty chytrej! (Podaný 102)
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This example shows how problematic an idiomatic phrase can be if it is connected to the picture. In the Czech language there is no equivalent to ―walk the plank‖ phrase which would be similarly idiomatic and suitable to this context. The translator could closely follow the original and use ―projdeš se po prkně‖, however this expression is not as idiomatic for the Czech speakers as the original idiom for the English speaking people. The translator rather drew on the unpleased spiky tone of the title ―wise guy‖ and extended it on the expression substituting ―walk the plank‖. He used the expression
―letět‖ (―to dart‖) in a negative sentence. In this way he successfully translated the threatening undertone originally implicated by the idiom. With this solution, the translator manages to retain the point and the joke of the strip, even though there was no suitable equivalent to the idiomatic phrase.
As it has been mentioned at the beginning of this subchapter the onomatopoeic expressions represented graphically are translated in Calvin and Hobbes – here are some examples:
Waterson Podaný
Munch Chřoust
Sheesh Pšššt
Honk Túút
Gurgle Blub Gllg žbrrrk
Ha ha Ha ha
Wheee Huííí
Gronk Grrrng
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Slam! Prásk!
thwping vžžžbch
beep boop pííp pííp
dig dig kop kop
pat pat plác plác
Yecchh! Bléééé!
scrape škráb
smack mlask
Wap plesk
chunk žuch
Bink, bonk, bang boing Bink, bonk, bang boing
klunk lupp
smash třísk
Words representing sounds made by people: ―munch‖ or ―smack‖, words representing sounds uttered by people: ―yecchh‖ and ―sheesh‖, words representing noises of things:
―smash‖ and ―beep, boop‖, words representing noises of people‘s doings: ―pat pat‖ and
―dig dig‖ etc., these all were translated or transcribed into the sound system more natural for the Czech language. Only ―Bink, bonk, bang, boing‖ remained untranslated, because every word of this inscription was of different size and all of them were arranged into a wavy line sophisticatedly intertwined with the image. Some of the onomatopoeic expressions probably were translated only after the translator thoroughly considered the context because there were some newly coined expressions. The
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translator‘s capability of transcribing the sounds emitted probably helped with such expressions too.
There were no titles to be translated or adjusted in Calvin and Hobbes – the original titles ―Calvin and Hobbes‖ appearing on the Sunday special strips were deleted. Besides onomatopoeic expressions placed outside the balloons some exclamations like ―Ááááá‖ or ―Pomoc!‖ etc. were translated and graphically changed.
Also several instances of linguistic paratexts appeared, such as the sign on the door with the inscription ―teachers lounge‖ (―sborovna‖) or the inscription on Calvin‘s box
―insurance 50 ¢‖ (―pojištění 50 ¢―).
The translation of the box inscription gives away that the translator had to deal with several culture-specific terms. There were some instances of time references:
[…] devour anyone who brings me in before 9 P.M. (Watterson)
[…] sežrat každýho, kdo mě tam dovede dřív než v devět večer! (Podaný 16)
and of some measurements:
He is now over 300 feet tall! (Watterson)
A už je vysoký přes sto metrů! (Podaný 115)
which the translator converted. The currency references, a reference to the Hoover dam
(―Hooverova přehrada‖), a reference to a Valentine card (―valentýnka‖), a reference to
Christmas stocking for Santa (―punčocha‖), all of them were retained, because not only they are all well known, but because the pictorial content referring to them did not allow to substitute them by the suitable target culture equivalents. 61
In Calvin and Hobbes neologisms and intertextualities are connected mostly with Calvin‘s fantasies. In them he refers to various sci-fi films and stories, to fairytales, or to superheroes: he is pretending to be the Godzilla (―Godzilla‖), a giant fly (―obří moucha‖), Calvin the mighty giant (―mocný obr Calvin‖), or the Spaceman Spiff
(―Kosmonaut Sekáč‖). Calvin is not only interested in funny plays, but sometimes he also philosophizes. Therefore there are several instances of direct quotations:
It says here that ―religion is the opiate of the masses.‖ (Watterson)
Tady se píše, že „náboženství je opium lidu―. (Podaný 33)
Intertextual references of this kind usually refer to well known works. They did not seem to cause any problems to the translator. Furthermore, as far as the neologisms are concerned, in his fantasies Calvin fights graknils (―graknil‖) on various planets such as
Gloob (―Glub‖) or Zorg (―Zorg‖) and is using blaster (―blaster‖), frap ray
(―frapopaprsek‖) or atomic napalm neutralizer (―atomový napalmový neutralizátor‖).
As can be seen, if any neologism consists of the words or parts of the words which are recognizable and meaningful, the translator translates it. He pays attention even to such things as alliteration. Even though he is not able to transfer an alliteration of the original
(as in case of Spaceman Spiff), he retains at least the assonance: ―Kosmonaut Sekáč.
Where no part of the word is recognizable and the word seems to be truly a new term, he transfers it. If needed, he also transcribes or naturalizes words to enable their better usage in the Czech inflective system.
The last specific which can be encountered when translating Calvin and Hobbes is the presence of special signs. They affect the translation of verbal content of Calvin and Hobbes only minimally. The mostly used signs are visual metaphors. A picture of a 62
bee and the ―zzzz‖ signs are used to signify a deep sleep. A black cloud is very frequently used to represent anger. In the text the breath marks can be seen with onomatopoeic words like ―sniff‖ (―fňuk‖) in between. The music note sign is also used, but only separately – to signify that Calvin is singing or whistling to himself.
The most notable aspect of Calvin and Hobbes is its narrative style. All texts are written so as to simulate a spoken language. Even though Calvin is only six years old boy, he is an exceptionally clever boy and the register he uses reflects that. Calvin and all people around him speak in a colloquial language:
– Calvin! What‘s all this noise! You‘re supposed to be asleep!
– Monsters under the bad, dad! I was whacking one with my baseball bat!
(Watterson)
– Calvine! Co je to za randál?! Proč nespíš?
– Vobludy pod postelí, tatí! Jednu jsem zrovna tlouk pálkou! (Podaný 19)
Sometimes when he is patronizing someone, he uses more elaborate language full of specialized terms. By juxtaposing a colloquial language and a formal, highly specialized language a humorous effect is created:
– Are your maladjusted antisocial tendencies the product of your berserk
pituitary gland?
– What?
– Isn‘t he great, folks? Let‘s give him a big hand! (Watterson)
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– Nejsou tvoje neadaptibilní antisociální tendence výsledkem dysfunkce
hypofýzy?
– Co to?
– Není skvělý lidičky? Všichni mu nahlas zatleskáme!
(Podaný 39)
The translator renders these different registers very well. He not only uses similarly colloquial words as are used in the original (―whacking‖ – ―tloukl‖), but he also adds element typical of the Common Czech: the addition of prothetic v- to words starting with o- (―vobludy‖), the leaving out syllabic ending -l of masculine past participles (tlouk), the usage of unified plural ending of adjectives -ý, the usage of unified plural ending -ma, or the replacement of -é by -í/-ý and -ý by -ej. This step very well compensates the impossibility to render the contracted forms of verbs (which are used in the original to mark the spoken colloquial language) into the Czech translation.
In this comics the translator also makes a good use of diminutives when rendering the Common Czech: ―Susie posílá psaníčka!‖ (―Susie‘s passing notes!‖). He also very well avoids an overt word for word translation. In the example with monsters under the bed the translator changed a viewpoint, turned the declarative sentence into the question and rendered the phrase into a variant which is typically used in the Common Czech: ―Proč nespíš?‖ (―You‘re supposed to be sleeping‖).
To conclude the analysis of specifics of comics translation encountered by the translator when translating Calvin and Hobbes, the last example of the strip is presented
(see fig. 6):
– Want to go spelunking with me? 64
– Spelunking? There aren't any caves around here!
– You don't need a cave. All you need is a rock.
[onomatopoeic graphic] Spelunk! (Watterson)
– Už vím, co budeme dělat. Cáchy!
– Ty chceš jet do Cách? Ale to je hrozně daleko, až někde v Německu ne?
– Ale ne, stačí když si najdeme pár šutrů.
[onomatopoeic graphic] Cáchy! (Podaný 123)
The text presents the wordplay connected to the pictorial content of the strip. It also shows the colloquial language used in the comics. The translator, again, dealt with the problems very well. He translates freely and creates a new lexical ambiguity which can be the source of the wordplay in the Czech translation. He draws on the phonetic similarity and the polysemy of the Czech name for Aachen, ―Cáchy‖, and an expression representing the splashing sound ―cák‖. This similarity is of the same kind as the original words ―spelunking‖ and ―spelunk‖ in English. He then changes the activity of spelunking to travelling to city of Aachen and draws on the situation depicted on the picture – Calvin and Hobbes deciding what to do. The translator is careful to adhere to the question-answer rhythm of the conversation (and of the strip), sustaining the anticipation. This free adaptation of the wordplay allows him to retain the same colloquial style as the original. He adds unnecessary colloquial expression ―hrozně‖ and the question tag ―ne?‖ which mark the spoken language. Most importantly, by transposition of the singular ―stone‖ to the plural ―stones‖, he allows himself to use the collocation ―pár šutrů‖ which would probably be used by a child in the same situation. 65
Fig. 6: Calvin and Hobbes Strip – ―Spelunk‖
When translating Calvin and Hobbes the translator did not need to deal with all the specifics of comics translation – the titles were absent, some types of balloons were absent, the special signs did not influence the verbal content much, but still there were plenty of examples which showed the specificity of certain parts of comics translation.
There were the idiomatic expressions presented by both the verbal and the pictorial content of comics; many onomatopoeic words appeared, some of which were newly coined; neologisms and intertextual references had to be dealt with etc. Calvin and
Hobbes are strips based on humour and besides the specifics of comics translation
Richard Podaný also had to pay attention to the numerous humour creating devices like the irony, the juxtaposition of different registers, wordplays, various ambiguities etc.
And he managed that extremely well.
5.2 Batman: Hush
Batman: Hush, Vol. 1 is a collection of five comic books from the story spanning over twelve comic books in a regular Batman monthly series published by DC
Comics. It describes Batman‘s fight with his various adversaries, who are unexpectedly trying new strategies suggested to them and orchestrated by, as Batman later finds out, 66
a mysterious Hush. The series was published in the years 2002 and 2003 and the collection Batman: Hush, Vol. 1 was published in 2003 (Loeb 2). It is a fully coloured story drawn by Jim Lee, inked by Scott Williams, lettered by Richard
Starkings and written by Jeph Loeb. In the Czech Republic it was translated by Jiří
Pavlovský and published by Crew and BB Art in 2004.
In the United States of America the collection was published both in a paperback and in a hardcover. Its content was the same, including introductions and biographies of authors; only the covers differed. The Czech version is a hardcover book based on the US hardcover – the size, the number of pages and the covers are the same, introductions and biographies are also present and the book is also fully coloured.
As the story originally published in a regular monthly series it is aimed at experienced comic books readers recognizing the characters and the events which are being referred to. In the Czech Republic, however, the whole series was not published.
The translation maintains signs of comics which aimed at regular comic readers familiar with the form i.e. the comics is foreignized to a great extent. However, the Czech readership, even though familiar with superhero comics, would not accept fully foreignized comics. Therefore some localizing adjustments were made and some domesticating strategies applied.
The way in which the onomatopoeic expressions were treated, can be seen as one of the foreignizing instances. Most of the onomatopoeic expressions outside the balloons remained untranslated:
Loeb Pavlovský
Whumph (mouth covered by hand) whumph
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Chk chk chk (batarangs hit the target) phtoom
Wharoom (doors explode) wharoom
Phtoom (a hook is shot from the pistol) phtoom
Slashh (the beast swings its paw) slashh
sssrrc (a little hook is shot) sssrrc
Slam (a body hits a metal object) slam
vzip (a rope is being unrolled) vzip
Krash (fall into a wooden trash) krash
Vroom (a motorbike) vroom
Skreeechh (skreeching wheels) skreeechh
tap tap tap (a morse code tapped) tap tap tap tap
Boom (a man bumps the door) boom
ha ha ha ha (laughter of several people) ha ha ha ha
slikt (a knife cutting the newspapers) slikt
krakathoom (a thunder) krakathoom
wap (a slap) wap
Bing bong (a house bell) Bing bong
wham wham wham (a helicopter) wham wham wham
buda buda buda (a machine gun) buda buda buda
As can be seen from the list above, even the sounds which are traditionally expressed in a completely different way in Czech, like the sound of a machine gun: ―buda buda buda‖ (ra ta ta ta), were not translated. The reason for this is a high number of such onomatopoeic expressions located outside the balloons. Very complex and expensive
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graphic adjustments to the pictures would be needed in order to change all these onomatopoeic words. The publisher and the translator did not found these changes necessary, because the reader of this comics is supposed to be aware of the fact that s/he is reading comics originally published in the United States of America. What is more,
Batman is quite famous for its use of huge graphic onomatopoeic words like ―Bang!‖,
―Boom!‖ and ―Pow!‖ which were extensively used even in the original Batman television series.
The names and the nicknames were dealt with similarly:
Loeb Pavlovský
Alfred Pennyworth Alfred Pennyworth
Thomas and Martha Wayne Thomas a Martha Wayneovi
The Batman Batman
Nails Nathan Nathan zvaný Skoba
Tommy Harper Tommy Harper
Carlos Valdez Carlos Valdez
Spider Hancock Pavouk Hancock
Bruce Wayne Bruce Wayne
Edward Lamont IV Edward Lamont IV
Killer Croc Killer Croc
Catwoman Catwoman
Selina Kyle Selina Kyleová
Oracle Oracle
Huntress Huntress
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Dick Grayson Dick Grayson
Shondra Kinsolving Shondra Kinsolvingová
Thomas Elliot Thomas Elliot
Amanda Waller Amanda Wallerová
Lex Luthor Lex Luthor
Poison Ivy Poison Ivy
Lois Lane Lois Laneová
Green Lantern Green Lantern
Clark Kent (Smallville) Clark Kent (Smallville)
Perry White Perry White
John Gordon John Gordon
Talia Head Talia Head
Ra's Al Ghul Ra's Al Ghul
Icicle Icicle
Maggie Sawyer Maggie Sawyerová
Most of the names and the nicknames are left untranslated and in the text they are declined as the Czech names. The only exception is Talia Head, who, from no apparent reason, lacks a common suffix -ová applied to women‘s surnames in the Czech environment. Other women‘s names have this suffix, as its absence would probably be one of the aspects which the target readership would not accept.
The majority of proper names in this comics do not have any characterizing or poetic function, so the translator could afford not to translate/adapt them. Some nicknames of supporting characters, which have a characterizing function, like ―Nails
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Nathan‖ or ―Spider Hancock‖ are translated, others (mainly superheroes nicknames which may appear in other comics and play a vital role there), like ―Icicle‖ or
―Huntress‖, are translated only in footnotes. The nicknames of the key characters such as ―Batman‖, ―Catwoman‖ or ―Poison Ivy‖ are not translated. These characters should be known to the target readership19, they are chronically known to the readers of the
Batman comics and their visual appearance and behaviour clearly gives away the origin of their nicknames.
As far as the names of places, companies, parts of the cities etc. are concerned, either they are left untranslated – from the context it is obvious what they are – or a descriptive equivalent combined with the original name concerned, usually coined only for the fictional world of this comics, is used:
Loeb Pavlovský
Gotham City Gotham City
LexCorp LexCorp
Crime Alley Crime Alley (footnote used to
explain)
Gotham Tower Apartments byty v Gothamské věži
Wayne Tech Wayne Tech
Arkham Asylum arkhamský blázinec
Daily Planet Daily Planet
19 All of these characters appeared in well known Batman films successfully screened in the
Czech Republic.
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LexCorp Towers věže Lexcorpu
Metropolis Metropolis
Metropolis S.C.U. metropoliský speciální útvar
G.C.P.D. (Gotham City Police G.C.P.D. (footnote used to
Department) explain)
The same translating approach has been chosen in case of the newly coined terms like
―batrope‖ (referred to by Batman as ―mé lano‖), or ―green‘K‘‖ (―zelené káčko‖; it is explained in a footnote as a green kryptonite).
Batman: Hush, Vol. 1 is an action based comics where the position of panels and their sequentionality plays an important role. Characters‘ movements are often phased into several panels to give the story the feeling of action and of the quicker pace. In the same way the speech in such panels is phased. This is the way in which the pictorial content of this comics frequently influences its verbal content. For example, in fourth part of the story Catwoman fights Poison Ivy. On every panel Catwoman gives Posion
Ivy a punch and throughout this fight she tells her not to mess with her again. This sentence is divided into four balloons, and every single one is placed into one panel (see fig. 7):
Loeb Pavlovský
That To
was bylo
the last time naposledy
you will ever lay a hand on me! (94) kdys na mě vztáhla ruku! (94)
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The translator needed to construct a sentence starting with short sharp words echoing the punches depicted on the pictures. In the same time these words had to fit into rather small balloons. In addition, a word order of this sentence had to allow such a division.
This sentence should also read naturally and be coherent. Jiří Pavlovský managed that very well not only in the example presented here, but also in other similar instances.
Fig. 7: Batman: Hush – Catwoman vs. Poison Ivy
Another example of the textual content influenced by the pictorial content is linguistic paratext. The linguistic paratexts in Batman: Hush, Vol. 1 were translated and graphically adjusted whenever possible, because they usually add to the story and move it forward. At the beginning of the story, events are depicted from Batman‘s point of view – literary. Various written information about Batman‘s enemies is an integral part of pictures. The pictures depict how Batman sees them through his high-tech mask.
The information and graphs depicted are so deeply embedded into the pictures that it would be very difficult to change them. Besides that, the most vital information about
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Batman‘s enemies is also mentioned in the captions. So these paratexts are not of a vital importance to the story and thus remained unchanged.
On the other hand, the instant messenger‘s window where Batman‘s conversation with Oracle is depicted, or the newspaper articles informing about Bruce
Wayne being out of danger: ―Wayne out of danger‖ (see fig. 8), are fully translated and conform to the style of the medium they should represent. They are translated and adjusted because they supply information vital to the story.
Fig. 8: Batman: Hush – Linguistic Paratext Adjusted
Batman: Hush, Vol. 1 is a collection of several comic book issues and every single one of them has its title. The story is thus divided into five parts. The title pages of a kind ensure this division. The titles of these issues characterize the events in the given part of the story, so the translator‘s and the publisher‘s decision was to translate the titles:
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Loeb Pavlovský
Chapter One, The Ransom Kapitola první, Výkupné
Chapter Two, The Friend Kapitola druhá, Přítel
Chapter Three, The Biest Kapitola třetí, Bestie
Chapter Four, The City Kapitola čtvrtá, Město
Chapter Five, The Battle Kapitola pátá, Bitva
All these subtitles, as well as the main title of the story/collection ―Hush‖ (―Ticho‖), follow the predispositions of the original titles i.e. they are short and have the same number of words as the original. This is because of the necessity to graphically adjust them as closely as possible to the original (see fig. 9). In case of the collection title translation, the length of the title, its mysteriousness, the simplicity of letters it consists of and the fact that it is the nickname of a main villain, were the important aspects observed. The Czech solution ―tiše‖ could not work because of the graphical representation of the title where the use of hedge is not possible. ―Tajit‖, on the other hand, looses the sharpness of the title, is longish and what is more, as well as the previous suggestion ―tiše‖, it cannot work as the nickname of the main villain. ―Pst‖ could possibly work, but its shortness makes it unsuitable for the same graphic style used for the original title.
Fig. 9: Batman: Hush – The Title Adjusted
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The greater part of the textual content of Batman: Hush, Vol. 1 appears in caption boxes. In the introductory short story about Batman‘s origin the captions are narrations of Batman‘s loyal butler Alfred Pennyworth, but then, throughout the whole
Hush story, the captions represent exclusively Batman‘s thoughts and commentaries.
The register does not differ much from the one in balloons. Batman/Bruce uses slightly informal English – he uses contracted forms of verbs and sometimes colloquial expressions. The similar register is also used by other characters. Except for the beggars and thieves in the lower Gotham, who speak highly informally:
Didja see that? Didja see that? He didn‘t even touch him? (Loeb 32)
Viděli ste to? Viděli ste to? Ani se ho nedotk! (Pavlovský 32)
As can be seen the translator reflects that and uses traits of Common Czech – he leaves out ―j‖ in ―jsem, jste‖ where it is not usually voiced, he leaves out a syllabic ending -l of masculine past participles: ―nedotk‖, elsewhere in the comics he uses contractions of verbs with ―be‖ i.e. he changes ―přišel jsem‖ to ―přišels‖, or he uses other elements of Common Czech (see 5.1). The rendering of Common Czech as the equivalent of the colloquial English is another domesticating strategy which is largely accepted and expected by the Czech target readership.
There are not only narrative captions in this comics, but also location and time captions: ―Lexcorp Towers‖ (―Věže Lexcorpu‖). As far as balloons are concerned, in
Batman: Hush, Vol. 1 the ordinary balloons prevail, but also the radio balloons (when
Oracle or reporters are speaking), the whispering balloons, the burst balloons, and the wavy balloons (when Killer Croc is speaking in his distorted voice) can be found. 76
Balloons are very often joined or/and connected in this comics. This not only influences the continuity and cohesion of the text, but it also influences the translator. Joined balloons mark two utterances of the same character with a short pause between them.
Connected balloons mark utterances of the same character as well, but the pause between them is a longer one. To add to that, these connected balloons are accompanied by the utterances/balloons of other characters in the vicinity. The balloons arranged in such way usually mark a dialogic exchange (Tommy Elliot starts and Bruce Wayne answers):
– You still have those antique war game pieces?
– I do actually.
– And I have mine. Up for a game?
– You‘re on.
– And I want you to actually show up for an appointment with me to check on
how you‘re doing. (Loeb 84)
– Máš pořád ty starožitné herní figurky?
– Pořád.
– A já mám své. Co takhle partičku?
– Beru.
– A chtěl bych, aby opravdu přišel ke mně na vyšetření, abych viděl, jak se to
hojí. (Pavlovský 84)
And again the translator has to reflect that. He has to be more attentive and read the balloons in a proper order in order to render these exchanges successfully. 77
In Batman: Hush, Vol. 1, as well as in Calvin and Hobbes, the captions and the balloons are not a constraint for the translator – some longer translating solutions can be found:
Given the situation it‘s at best a distraction... (Loeb 102)
Když uvážím situaci, tak přinejlepším nám to dá nějaký čas k dobru...
(Pavlovský 102)
and some shorter one as well.
On this comics it is exceptional, that the publisher decided to use additional footnotes referring to the parts of the texts in balloons marked by the asterisk.
The footnotes here are usually used to introduce characters, places and terms from previous comics of the series or to explain the relationships and things appearing in different comic series not published in the Czech Republic (see fig. 10). In this way the publisher localized this comics – he supposed that the target readership does not have this information.
Fig. 10: Batman: Hush – A Footnote
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The footnotes explaining references to other characters and parts of other comics prove, that a great number of intertextualities are present in this comics. However,
Batman: Hush, Vol. 1 does not refer only to other comics, but also to Aristotle (the bandaged villain of the story quotes solely him):
All men by nature seek knowledge. (Loeb 72)
Všichni lidé od přírody touží po vědění. (Pavlovský 72)
This information is only revealed in the second volume of the collection. This shows how important it is to prepare for the process of translation thoroughly and read the whole story in advance. Or be able to recognize such references and search.
There are not many wordplays in Batman: Hush, Vol. 1. It is given by the genre
– Batman: Hush, Vol. 1 is an action/detective comics. However, the superheroes and the villains sometimes use showy and catchy phrases, clichés and even proverbs:
And curiosity killed you-know-what. (Loeb 95)
A kdo je zvědavý, bude brzy mrtvý. (Pavlovský 95)
In this example a well known proverb was adjusted and used. The translator thus had to do the same. Fortunately, in this case, there is an equivalent in the Czech language which allowed the translator to make adjustments and include the notion of killing/death into the translation by exchanging ―starý‖ (old) for ―mrtvý‖ (dead). With this problem the translator dealt well, but there are some other examples of some interesting parts of
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the original text which he did not manage to translate so well. For example the rhyme in the following example:
Loeb Pavlovský
Well. No ne.
Well. No ne.
Well. No ne.
Look what fell into hell. (27) Koukni co spadlo rovnou do pekla. (27)
The translator translates the comment quite literally even though a free translation could make it possible to maintain the phrase‘s rhyme (at least partially), or to substitute the phrase with a similarly catchy phrase of slightly different meaning. For example:
―Hele hele hele, copak nám to spadlo z nebe?‖ The original phrase is only a comment of
Batman‘s fall uttered by one of the thugs in the lower Gotham. So it does not offer any information vital to the story and it does not influence the plot substantially either.
However, it presents a nicely sounding wordplay which disappeared in the translation.
Unfortunately, this is not the only flaw the translation of this comics has.
The translator often uses figurative language in his translations where there is none in the original:
Loeb Pavlovský
Metropolis. Metropolis.
It is very different from Gotham To město se liší od Gotham City
City and for that alone… jako noc a den. Už jen proto...
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…I try to avoid coming here. (75) ...ho nerad navštěvuji. (75)
The translator adds simile ―jako noc a den‖, which is not included in the original text.
Sometimes such solutions seem strange to the reader who is then surprised by the sudden poetism of the harsh and cold Batman. Such a strategy could be seen as a compensation strategy – a complicated strategy to be used in comics translation, but not impossible. Yet, the translator explicitates a lot in general and that does not go well with the idea of compensation:
Angry, I told her I had no friends at school. (Loeb 46)
Vztekle jsem jí odpálil, že nemám žádné kamarády. (Pavlovský 46)
From no apparent reason he also sometimes alters meanings:
Croc has been on the move all night. (Loeb 65)
Croc je na pochodu už dost dlouho. (Pavlovský 65)
According to these two last examples it seems that the translator translates rather freely, and tries to keep and support (maybe too much) author‘s style which emphasizes
Batman‘s rough nature. However, the example of figurative language usage contradicts such an effort, because the author certainly did not present Batman as the poetic person.
At the first sight the approaches to translating adopted by the translator and the publisher of this comics seems to be inconsistent, but from the reasoning above it is obvious that there is a system in it after all. Batman: Hush, Vol. 1 shows yet another approach to the translating/not translating the onomatopoeic expressions. 81
The complemetarity of the pictorial and the verbal part of the comics is also of different kind – it is more based on the sequentionality of the pictures, and on the extensive use of footnotes (which are not traditionally used in the Czech translations). Batman: Hush,
Vol. 1 is the action/detective comics whose story is driven by the sequential pictures and by the texts implemented into the extensively used captions.
Compared to Calvin and Hobbes this comics is very different kind of comics demanding completely different translating approaches. The translator Jiří Pavlovský dealt with the translation quite well and despite some minor distortions of meanings he produced a good translation in which he extremely well managed to render the author‘s style.
5.3 The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen
The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Vol.1 is a collection of six issues of a comic books series published by America‘s Best Comics of DC Comics.
The collection tells the story about a group of individuals with extraordinary powers who are recruited to protect Victorian England against its enemies. The first issue of
The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen was published in 1999 and a hardcover collection The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Vol. 1, on which the Czech translation of this comics is based, was published in 2000. The story is written by Alan
Moore and drawn by Kevin O‘Neil. In the Czech Republic it was published in 2002 by
BB Art and Crew.
The Czech edition of this collection has the same look and the same format as the US hardcover edition published in 2000. All verbal content, except for the titles of front covers in a gallery of covers, is translated and graphically changed to look
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the same way as the original. Besides the six issues of comics the collection includes a gallery of covers, a short story about one of the main characters, Allan Quatermain, and several pages with riddles and games. The whole content is stylized as a collection of old magazines/picture periodicals – the graphics, the fonts, the bonus materials, the language etc. are stylized to look like a magazine from the Victorian Era.
To preserve this stylization and the unique background constructed for the story, the publication is completely translated into the Czech language.
There are no onomatopoeic expressions outside the balloons present in The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Vol. 1. This specific of comics translation is missing. There are only the onomatopoeic expressions located inside the balloons:
Moore Janiš
Urrhh... (a man is suffocating) Chrrrr...
Hhuch (a man is hit by a crowbar) džum
Nnk (man is forced to drink water) nnk
Gnnk (man is forced to drink water) gnnk
Pfahh! (the sound of spitting) Pfa!
Pfugghh! (the sound of spitting) Pfuf!
Nnnk (a man is hit by a bucket) dzumm
Hhumpf (a man has a knife on his neck) hhumpf
These are mostly unarticulated sounds emitted by people so there is usually no need to translate them and the translator only adjusted them to the Czech phonetic system, if needed. Some of these expressions are sounds emitted by objects – these are replaced
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by their Czech equivalents. All of these onomatopoeic expressions are placed in between breath marks. A similar translating strategy is also adopted with the exclamations inside the balloons. These are translated or transcribed into a set of signs more natural for the Czech language: ―AAA― is translated to ―ÁÁÁ‖, ―pffuh‖ to ―pfúú!, ―...uh...‖ to ―...ehm...‖, ―owwhh‖ to ―auuuuu‖ etc.
The pictorial content of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Vol. 1 influences the textual content in the usual way – the translator‘s choice of particular expressions and the choice of the whole register are influenced by the pictorial content.
The pictures complement the text and vice versa, but there are not many puns or idioms expressed both by the pictures and the text. This comics is quite story- and atmosphere- driven and there are not many wordplays to be found, except for the intertextual plays with the names:
Moore Janiš
Wilhelmina Murray Wilhelmina Murrayová
Campione Bond Campione Bond
Mycroft Holmes Mycroft Holmes
Allan Quatermain Allan Quatermain
Auguste Dupin Auguste Dupin
Captain Nemo Kapitán Nemo
L‘Espanay L‘Espanayová
Anna Coupeau (Nana) Anna Coupeauová (Nana)
Henry Jekkyl Henry Jekkyl
Edward Hyde Edward Hyde
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Donovan Donovan
Plantagenet Palliser Plantagenet Palliser
Lavelle Lavelle
Miss Rosa Belinda Coote Slečna Rosa Belinda Cootová
Hawley Griffin Hawley Griffin
Miss Flaybum Slečna Flaybumová
Olive Chancellor Olive Chancellorová
Miss Carr Slečna Carrová
Miss Becky Randall Slečna Becky Randallová
Polly Whittier Polly Whittierová
Selwyn Cavor Selwyn Cavor
Mors Mors
Invisible Man Neviditelný
Devil Doctor Ďábelský doktor
Quong Lee Čchiung Li
Ho Ling Che Ling
Shen Yan Šen Jen
Sherlock Holmes Sherlock Holmes
Robur Robur
Moran Moran
Harker Harker
James Moriarty James Moriarty
Dodger Dodger
Mitchell Mitchell
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Watts Watts
Ferguson Ferguson
In this extensive list of all names mentioned in the The League of Extraordinary
Gentlemen Vol. 1 many literary characters can be found, starting with the main characters: Wilhelmina Murray from Bram Stoker‘s Dracula, Allan Quatermain from
H. R. Haggard‘s King Solomon’s Mines, Captain Nemo with his Nautilus from Jules
Verne‘s novels, H. G. Wells‘s Henry Griffin alias the Invisible Man, and R. L.
Stevenson‘s Jekkyl and Hyde. Even the minor characters are named after the literary heroes like Auguste Dupin from Edgar Alan Poe‘s Rue Morgue, Mycroft Holmes from
A. C. Doyle‘s Sherlock Holmes stories, Anna Coupeau from Émile Zola‘s Nana or Miss
Coote, a famous stock character of Victorian erotic stories.
There are also references to the actual stories of the famous books: Allan
Quattermain is said to be dreaming about diamond mines, there is a several page long recapitulation of the scene at Reichenbach waterfalls depicted exactly as described in
A. C. Doyle‘s Sherlock Holmes story, various newspaper titles refer to events of
H. G. Wells‘s War of the Worlds etc. The author is an expert on 19th century fictional writers and he refers to their works throughout the whole comics series. He supports the story‘s atmosphere by that and entertains the readers20. The translator thus needs to pay a close attention to every name and event mentioned in order not to leave out some funny, interesting or important fact. As far as the translation is concerned, whenever possible, the names are taken over from the Czech translations of the said works and/or
20 For the extensive notes on the references and allusions see Jess Nevin‘s annotations at www. enjolrasworld.com.
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adapted according to the Czech conventions: the suffix -ová is added to women‘s names, the Chinese names are correctly transcribed etc.
The linguistic paratext in The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Vol. 1 expands the background of the story and helps to establish the world of Victorian
England as it is constructed for this comics/story. This world is based on the real world of the time, but differs in many aspects which are carefully thought through by the author. Therefore the linguistic paratext is fully translated and extensively graphically adjusted (see fig. 11). For example, at the beginning of the story there is an unfinished bridge across La Manche. A plaque with the explanation why it is unfinished glorifying the Queen is attached to it. In another picture of the story a distribution box with the sign ―Edison/Teslaton‖ can be seen explaining why the technology of this fictional world is more advanced. And also the intertextual references such as the inscription on the tag in the museum: ―Adult male Yahoo Homo
Gulliverus‖ (―Lebka dospělého Jahua: Homo Gulliverus―) are part of the background.
Fig. 11: The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen – Linguistic Paratext
Another important aspect of the comics adding to its uniqueness and atmosphere is the language. The story is set into the Victorian Era so the language spoken by
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the characters is little archaic. Collocations like ―heathen coward‖ (―zbabělý pohane‖),
―it would be expedient for us‖ (―by bylo na místě‖), ―deplorable specimens‖ (výlupky nectnosti) are used. Question tags and pleasantries are part of the speech and the characters are addressing each other by titles: sir, miss (in England), monsieur, mademoiselle, madame (in France) and even the address ―memsahib‖ is used by
Captain Nemo. All this is of course carefully rendered in the translation:
Moore Janiš
Oh please, Miss Murray, do call me Slečno Murrayová, udělejte mi
Campion... and perhaps in return, I prosím tu radost a říkejte mi
might refer to you as ―Wilhelmina‖? Campione... A mohl bych vás zase
na oplátku oslovovat „Wilhelmino‖?
Simply remarkable, the view here, Nevšední výhled, nemyslíte? (Janiš)
isn‘t it? (Moore)
This example shows how the translator retained the addressing with a title, the polite tone of the speech and the question tag. In the same time one can also notice that the differing length of the translated text again was not a problem in this comics.
The first two sentences show a lengthier text, which was fit into the balloon where originally a shorter text was placed. The third sentence shows the opposite – a shorter text centred in the balloon where a longer text was originally placed.
The majority of characters speak formal British English, but there are exceptions when the formality of language changes. For example Dr. Hyde is not very friendly and well behaved creature and thus he uses an informal and offensive language:
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Why, you self important little turd! Unfasten these confounded straps. I‘ll snap
your neck in two! (Moore)
Ty nafoukanej hovňousku! Rozvaž mi ty zatracený pouta a já ti přerazím krk
vejpůl! (Janiš)
The translator preserve very well the same level of offensiveness by using suitable equivalents of the offensive expressions: ―hovňousku‖ for ―little turd‖, ―zatracený‖ for
―confounded‖. He combines these with the elements of Common Czech: he uses the unified plural ending -ý instead -á in ―zatracený pouta‖, he replaces -ý by -ej in
―nafoukanej hovňousku‖ and use the slang expression ―vejpůl‖.
The same techniques are used when the main characters Mina and Allan pretend to be a poor and simple couple speaking in the colloquial language:
Moore Janiš
Oh! Blimey! You‘ve caught me and Teda! Safraporte! Vy jste nás tu
the missus at it! přistihla!
It‘s just a goodnight kiss. Be a sport Je to jen pusa na dobrou noc.
and don‘t let on. Buďte tak hodná a přivřete nad
náma vočko.
Here not only the colloquial expression ―safraporte‖ is used, but also the prothetic v- is added to the word starting with o-: ―vočko‖, and the unified plural ending -ma is used instead of -mi: ―náma‖.
The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Vol. 1 is rich not only in the different varieties of the English/Czech language, but also in other languages. Some 89
speeches/sentences in French, Arabic and Chinese can be found in the comics. In order to evoke the authentic feeling of foreignness, they are neither transcribed nor translated neither in the original, nor in the Czech translation (see fig. 12). As far as the French is concerned, there is a whole French dialogue in the story, which is intentionally left untranslated, but there are also many English/Czech sentences in which only a few
French words are used:
Certainment. You are the catspaws of monsieur Bond, non? (Moore)
Certainment. Vy jste oba prodloužená ruka monsieura Bonda, non? (Janiš)
The Chinese and Arabic texts add to the comics the unusual foreign signs. However, the names, if needed and used, are transcribed: ―Quong Lee‖ and ―Čchiung Li‖.
Naturally the translator does not forget to transcribe the name according to the Czech phonetic rules, which differ from the English ones.
Fig. 12: The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen – Foreign Signs
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With such an emphasis on the preservation of cultural diversity of the original, the translation cannot do otherwise. Therefore the translator deals with many cultural aspects and terms like the Indian addressing by the title ―memsahib‖ (―memsáhib‖) or the foreign expressions like ―djinn‖ (―džin‖) – such expressions appearing in
The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Vol. 1 already have their transcriptions established both in the English and in the Czech language.
The majority of the text of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Vol. 1 one can find within the ordinary balloons. Dr. Hyde‘s speeches, because he is a unique character speaking with a distorted voice, are placed within the wavy balloons which help to further distinguish his speech. Also the whispering balloons and the burst balloons are used to further differentiate various types of speeches. Captions are used scarcely and appear mostly to define time and place:
The Birtish Museum, Bloomsbury, London, July 5th, 1898. (Moore)
Britské museum, Bloomsbury, Londýn, 5. Července 1898. (Janiš)
The narrative captions appear only towards the end of every issue and include the narrator‘s commentaries about the next part of the story. There are also fragments of
Mina‘s letters placed within special captions. These captions help to signalize the change of mode from the spoken one to the written one. However, considering the quite high formality of Mina‘s speech in general, there is no big stylistic difference to be seen either in the original or the translation.
The main specifics of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Vol. 1 are the intertextual references and the extensive use of linguistic paratexts to support the atmosphere and help to create little jokes. Actually the whole comics is based on its 91
unique atmosphere of the unique world which was constructed solely for this story (and later other stories). This world is supposed to be believable, rich and entertaining environment where the stories can take place. Therefore the translator Viktor Janiš did not need to be concerned with various newly coined onomatopoeic expressions, with neologisms and the translations of superhero nicknames, but he had to deal with a more difficult task of translating every linguistic paratext, of looking up every name, and of the careful rendering proper registers and cultural terms. He not only managed to preserve the author‘s style, but he also retained the majority of intertextual references and allusions, which is a great achievement.
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6. Conclusion
The aims of this thesis were to describe the processes of comics translation and publication and to introduce the specifics of comics translation. The information presented should increase the awareness of the specifics of comics translation and improve translators‘ understanding of comics. The processes described and the analyses presented here should also answer the additional questions related to the specifics of comics translation. Whether this aims were achieved and the questions answered is summarized in the following paragraphs.
The processes of comics translation and publication described in this thesis confirmed that some editorial and publisher‘s decisions influence the translator and his/her work. Prior to publication of comics, every publisher has to decide whether to preserve the original format in which the comics was published. These decisions are based on the expectations of the intended readership and depend on the financial possibilities of the publisher. The readership accustomed to a certain format will not accept the product in a different format. Therefore the publisher conforms to the readership‘s expectations as much as possible.
Further on, the reader could see that matters of format, such as the type of binding or the size of publication influence the size of panels, the size of balloons, the preference of colour and the graphic techniques used. And these all are very important elements for the translator: as the analyses of comics translations presented in this thesis showed, even though, for example, the size of balloons does not represent any major technical constraint for the translator, the translator simply cannot ignore the balloons, because they are the substantial part of the artistic complexity of comics. Also several other examples of wordplays appearing in the analysed comics showed that the pictorial
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and the verbal parts of comics are often so intertwined that the translator needs to perceive these parts as the whole in order to fully grasp and render all the meanings they present.
The choice of colour also proved to be of a vital importance for the translator because it greatly influences which parts of comics s/he is supposed to translate.
The onomatopoeic expressions placed outside the balloons were translated in the black and white collection of Calvin and Hobbes, yet in Batman: Hush the translation of such expressions was not necessary. The complexity of pictorial parts of Batman: Hush did not allow the letterer to carry out the extensive graphical adjustments needed for the rewriting of the onomatopoeic expressions. The intended readership, however, accepted both these comics, despite these different approaches.
The key factor here is the readership‘s expectations. The readership on which
Batman: Hush is aimed is the readership which is interested in superhero comics, the readership which is aware of the fact that comics are translated from foreign languages and taken over from foreign cultures. This readership thus expects to encounter some foreign aspects in comics. On the other hand Calvin and Hobbes ore even The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen is intended for a broader readership of people who may not be familiar with narrative and graphical conventions specific to comics. Therefore the strategy applied in both Calvin and Hobbes and The League of
Extraordinary Gentlemen was to adapt the comics as much as possible in order to make them more acceptable for a diverse readership.
Even though the approaches to translations of the analysed comics differ according to various readerships‘ expectations, there are some basic publishing and translating conventions, which are followed in all three examined comics. All three comics are collections which stick to the original format. All three translations follow 94
the same rules when translating and adapting women‘s names, for example, or when rendering Common Czech. These approaches are expected by the target culture and as such they are followed in all three analysed comics. The translators and the publishers do not domesticate comics fully and allow some culture-specific and foreign aspects to remain in the translations, yet only to a certain extent and to a certain degree.
Finally, the analyses of comics translations presented here show that the specifics of comics translation do not differ substantially for various types of comics. The variety of the specifics exemplified in the analyses actually shows that the translator can encounter any specific introduced here in any kind of comics.
Yet, the translator can encounter some specifics more often in certain types of comics.
For example, if all three analysed comics are compared from the point of view of pictures being constraints for the translator, this comparison reveals that pictures are more often a limiting constraint for the translator of comics strips (i.e. Calvin and
Hobbes) than for the translator of regular fantastic comic book stories. The comics strips are shorter and thus all the jokes, events and points have to be expressed on a relatively small space and thus are more condensed. As the result, the pictorial and the verbal parts of comics are more densely intertwined in comic strips than in comic book stories.
The specifics of comics translations were successfully described in this thesis theoretically and then exemplified in the actual translations. The three translators whose translations were analysed here, Richard Podaný, Viktor Janiš and Jiří Pavlovský, were certainly aware of these specifics as they talked about them in their interviews.
The translations of Richard Podaný and Viktor Janiš were of a very good quality and their translating solutions were extremely thorough especially in cases of more difficult specifics of comics translation. Jiří Pavlovský‘s translation, on the other hand, has some 95
minor flaws and does not seem to be as thorough as the other two translations.
Yet, the flaws were not specifically connected to specifics of comics translation.
The overall good quality of the analysed translations and the fact that all of the translators dealt with the specifics very well and paid attention to them may suggest that the awareness of the specifics of comics translation can help the translator.
However, such suggestion is still inconclusive, because other factors, such as the translating experience or the formal education in the field of translation could influence the analysed translations. Therefore, all the aims of this thesis were achieved and the questions answered, except for this last question which cannot be answered for sure without additional research of translators‘ backgrounds and the analyses of their other translations.
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7. Works Cited and Consulted
7.1 Primary Sources
Loeb, Jeph. Batman: Hush, Vol. 1. New York: DC Comics, 2004. Print.
---. Batman: Ticho 1. Trans. Jiří Pavlovský. Praha: BB Art a Crew, 2004. Print.
Moore, Alan. The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Vol.1. New York: America‘s
Best Comics, 2000. Print.
---. Liga Výjimečných I. Trans. Viktor Janiš. Praha: BB Art a Crew, 2002. Print.
Watterson, Bill. Calvin and Hobbes. Kansas City: Andrews McNeel Publishing, 1987.
Print.
---. Calvin a Hobbes. Trans. Richard Podaný. Praha: BB Art, 2009. Print.
7.2 Secondary sources
Buchal, Martin. Personal interview. 2010.
Celotti, Nadine. ―The Translator of Comics as a Semiotic Investigator.‖ In Comics in
Translation. Manchester: St. Jerome Publishing, 2008.
―comic strip‖. Encyclopedia Britannica. Encyclopedia Britannica Online. Encyclopedia
Britannica Inc., 2012. Web. 28 Mar. 2012.
―Č. K. D.‖. Crew. Web. 28 Mar. 2012.
Danner, Alexander. ―Definitions of Comics‖. The Elements of Comics. Web. 28 Mar.
2012.
Eisner, Will. Comics and Sequential Art. Tamarac: Poorhouse Press, 2000. Print.
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Garcés, Carmen Valero. ―Onomatopoeia and Unarticulated Language in the Translation
of Comic Books. The Case of Comics in Spanish.‖ In Comics in Translation.
Manchester: St. Jerome Publishing, 2008.
―graphic novel‖. Encyclopedia Britannica. Encyclopedia Britannica Online.
Encyclopedia Britannica Inc., 2012. Web. 28 Mar. 2012.
Hornby, A. S. Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary. 7th ed. Oxford: Oxford UP,
2005. Print.
Klíčník, Richard. ―Podaný, Richard. S Richardem Podaným za evropským komiksem.‖
iLiteratura.cz. Sdružení pro iliteraturu. 16.2.2004. Web. 28 Mar. 2012.
Koponen, Maarit. Wordplay in Donald Duck comics and Their Finnish Translations.
Pro Gradu Thesis. U of Helsinki, 2004. Web. 10 Nov. 2011.
Kormosi, Patrik. ―Rozhovor s Václavem Dortem‖. Kocogel. 21 Jan. 2011. Web. 28
Mar. 2012.
Levý, Jiří. The Art of Translation. Trans. Patrick Corness. Amsterdam/Philadelphia:
John Benjamins Publishing Company, 2011. Print.
Litoš, Petr. ―Kolik stojí vyrobit komiks?‖ Crew. Web. 28 Mar. 2012.
McCloud, Scott. Understanding Comics. New York: Harper Paperback, 1994. Print.
McVicker, Claudia J. ―Comic Strips As A Text Structure For Learning To
Read.‖ Reading Teacher 61.1 (2007): 85-88. Academic Search Complete. Web.
28 Mar. 2012.
Mičátek, Miloš. ―Relettering - chlieb náš každodenný‖. Kocogel. 19 Sept. 2009. Web.
28 Mar. 2012.
Montgomery, Martin, et al. Ways of Reading: Advanced Reading Skills for Students of
English Literature. London: Routledge, 1992. Print.
Newmark, Peter. A Textbook of Translation. London: Prentice-Hall, 1988. Print. 98
--. Paragraphs on Translation. Clavendon: Multilignual Matters, 1993. Print.
Nida, Eugene Albert. ―The Role of Contexts in Translating.‖ Word, Text, Translation:
Liber Amicorum for Peter Newmark. Eds. Gunilla Anderman and Margaret
Rogers. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters, 1999. Print.
Pavlovský, Jiří. ―Beseda s Jiřím Pavlovským‖. Festival fantazie 2010. Chotěboř. 10 July
2010. Panel discussion.
Piekos, Nate. ―Comic Book Grammar and Tradition.‖ Blambot Comic Fonts &
Lettering. Web. 28 Mar. 2012.
Rota, Valerio. ―Aspects of Adaptation. The Translation of Comics Formats.‖ In Comics
in Translation. Manchester: St. Jerome Publishing, 2008.
―The Complete Calvin and Hobbes.‖ Andrews McMeel Publishing. Andrews McMeel
Publishing, 2011. Web.
Venuti, Lawrence. The Translator’s Invisibility: A History of Translation. 2nd ed.
London: Routledge, 2002. Print.
Wolk, Douglas. Reading Comics. Philadelphia: Da Capo Press, 2007
Zanettin, Federico. ―Comics in Translation Studies. An Overview and Suggestions for
Research.‖ In Traduction et Interculturalisme. VIIe Seminaire de Traduction
Scientifique et Technique en Langue Portugaise, Lisbonne, 15 novembre 2004,
93 – 98. Web.
---. ―Comics in Translation: An Overview.‖ In Comics in Translation. Manchester: St.
Jerome Publishing, 2008.
---. ―The Translation of Comics as Localization. On Three Italian Translations of La
piste des Navajos.‖ In Comics in Translation. Manchester: St. Jerome
Publishing, 2008.
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7.3 Framing Sources
Betlachová, Nikola. Comics Between Two Cultural Environments: Analysis of the
Genre and Options for Translation. Brno: Filozofická fakulta Masarykovy
univerzity, 2007. Print.
ComicsDB. Web. 28 Mar. 2012.
Gillár, Martin. Teorie komiksu: současné přístupy a jejich kritické revize. Brno:
Filozofická fakulta Masarykovy univerzity, 2009. Print.
Tomášek, Ondřej. Translating Comics. Brno: Filozofická fakulta Masarykovy
univerzity, 2009. Print.
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8. Czech Resumé
Komiks je literární a umělecká forma, v níž je unikátním způsobem kombinována kresba s textem. Doplňují se, prolínají a vzájemně se ovlivňují. Krom tohoto je komiks také zvláštní svou kulturní specifičností – podoba některých jeho aspektů se mění stát od státu, území od území. Obojí samozřejmě ovlivňuje snahu o překlad komiksu do jiného, než zdrojového jazyka. Překlad komiksu pak má jistá specifika, jichž by si měl být překladatel vědom a kterým v překladatelské teorii není věnováno mnoho pozornosti.
Tato diplomová práce se tedy zabývá specifiky komiksového překladu, popisem procesu komiksového překladu jako takového a popisem procesu publikace komiksu.
Krátce shrnuje základní definice pojmu komiks, představí různá rozdělení komiksů podle typů a seznámí se stručnou historií této umělecké a literární formy jak ve světě, tak v České republice. Její součástí je i analýza tří českých překladů různých druhů komiksů, na nichž jsou specifika komiksového překladu prezentována v praktických příkladech.
Cílem práce je rozšířit povědomí o specificích komiksového překladu, umožnit tak překladatelům lepší pochopení komiksu a usnadnit a osvětlit proces komiksového překladu a publikace komiksu.
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9. English Resumé
Comics is a literary and artistic form which uniquely combines pictures and writings. The pictorial and the verbal content of comics complement each other, influence each other and are intertwined in a complex way. Thanks to its history and tradition, comics is a very culture-specific form as well – it differs in every culture and every state. Both of these facts influence the process of translation and give it certain specifics of which a translator intending to translate comics should be aware and which are not much discussed in translation theory.
This thesis is thus deals with the specifics of comics translation and describes the processes of comics translation and publication. It briefly summarizes the basic definitions of the term ―comics‖, describes different types of comics and introduces a short history of comics both in the world and in the Czech Republic. In this thesis the analyses of three translations of three different types of comics are presented.
The specifics of comics translation are exemplified in them.
The aims of this thesis are to increase the awareness of the specifics of comics translation, to improve translators‘ understanding of comics and to enlighten the processes of comics translation and publication.
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