Masaryk University Faculty of Arts
Department of English and American Studies
English Language Translation
Bc. Vendula Srničková
Translating Nonsense in Roald Dahl’s Children’s Books
Master‟s Diploma Thesis
Supervisor: Ing. Mgr. Jiří Rambousek
2014
I declare that I have worked on this thesis independently, using only the primary and secondary sources listed in the bibliography.
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Author‟s signature
Acknowledgements I would like to thank my supervisor, Ing. Mgr. Jiří Rambousek, for his patience, guidance and valuable advice throughout the entire writing process. Contents
1. Introduction ...... 7 2. About the Author ...... 9 2.1 Life and Works ...... 9 2.2 Illustrating Roald Dahl ...... 10 2.2.1 Quentin Blake ...... 12 3. Roald Dahl’s Style in Children’s Books ...... 13 3.1 Lexical Innovation ...... 16 3.2 Phonological Innovation ...... 17 3.3 Typographical Innovation ...... 18 3.4 Semantic Innovation ...... 19 3.5 Narrative Voice ...... 19 3.6 Other Characteristics of Roald Dahl‟s Style ...... 20 4. Roald Dahl in the Czech Republic ...... 21 4.1 Czech Translations of Roald Dahl ...... 21 5. Presentation of Analysed Works ...... 23 5.1 James and the Giant Peach ...... 23 5.2 Fantastic Mr. Fox ...... 24 5.3 George‟s Marvellous Medicine ...... 26 5.4 The BFG ...... 27 5.5 The Witches ...... 28 5.6 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory ...... 29 5.7 Matilda ...... 30 5.8 Danny the Champion of the World ...... 32 5.9 The Twits ...... 33 6. Theoretical Background ...... 35 6.1 Nonsense as a Literary Device ...... 35 6.2 Translating Nonsense ...... 41 6.3 Nonsense in Children‟s Literature ...... 48 7. Translation Analysis ...... 55 7.1 Objective and Methodology ...... 55 7.2 Charlie, Danny and James ...... 57 7.3 George, Mr. Fox and Matilda ...... 69 7.4 The BFG ...... 76 7.5 The Witches ...... 85 7.6 The Twits ...... 91
8. Summary and Conclusion ...... 94 9. Bibliography ...... 98 10. Summary ...... 104 11. Resumé ...... 105
“A children's story that can only be enjoyed by children is not a good children's story in the slightest.”
― C.S. Lewis
1. Introduction
Nonsense and Roald Dahl essentially have two things in common. The first is the fact that neither is associated with the other, for despite continuing to be an extremely popular and current children‟s author several decades after his death, no one made the connection between Dahl and nonsense until 2012, when David Rudd pointed out the similarities between the author of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Lewis Carroll in one of his essays. The second parallel that exists revolves around a concept that could perhaps be described as “underratedness”. Just as Dahl is a linguistically underrated children‟s author, nonsense is not given the attention it deserves in translation studies.
The translation of nonsense is one of the most demanding tasks a traslator can be assigned, both in terms of interpretation and transfer into the target language. The translation of nonsense requires a high level of mastery of both the source and target languages, in order to be able to perceive all of the features of nonsense in the text and translate them adequately.
The first part of this thesis will introduce Roald Dahl as both a human being and an author, briefly describing his life and works, while marginally mentioning the importance of illustration in his books for children, and his famous collaboration with illustrator Quentin Blake, spanning several decades and encompassing almost two dozen books. The significance of considering illustrations when translating and publishing children‟s books will also be touched upon.
The subsequent chapter describes Dahl‟s writing style from a linguistic perspective, focusing especially on its most prominent and distinguishing features, such as the author‟s favourite stylistic figures. The word that best characterizes these features is innovation on a lexical, phonological, semantic and typographical level.
7 Chapter 4 will present information regarding the translation of Dahl‟s children‟s books in the Czech Republic in chronological order. Nine of Dahl‟s stories have thus far been translated into Czech by five different authors, and several publishing houses have decided to include Dahl‟s work in their portfolio. The books have yet to be retranslated, however, so there is no possibility of comparing two translations of the same book.
Chapter 5 will provide summaries of the characters and plot of each book that is analysed in the practical part of the thesis. This will be followed by a chapter dealing with some theoretical information regarding nonsense as a literary device (its definition and description), the translation of nonsense (how translators approach this task and what solutions they most often opt for) and, lastly, the role of nonsense in children‟s literature.
The practical part of this Master‟s thesis provides examples of how translators have dealt with various aspects of the author‟s writing style and how they have chosen to translate the features of literary nonsense present in the books into Czech. It is followed by a summary of the analysis, where any trends or tendencies will be described.
This thesis essentially has two aims. The first is to demonstrate that Roald Dahl widely utilizes nonsense in his books for children, despite not being regarded as a nonsense writer. The second objective is to demonstrate how Czech translators dealt with (or failed to deal with, when they were not aware of them) instances of nonsense in their translations. The translation of nonsense must occur on all levels, from phonological to syntactic. The assumption is that the translators, who were not particularly focused on the various literary devices Dahl employs, will have a tendency to analyse the text predominantly on a lexical level.
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2. About the Author
2.1 Life and Works
Roald Dahl was born on September 13th, 1916, in Wales.
When he was just three years old, his older sister died of
appendicitis, and his father‟s death followed shortly
afterwards. His memories of the two British boarding
schools he attended are mostly negative and include savage
beatings, sadistic headmasters and prejudiced teachers. He never excelled academically, but was an avid reader. After graduating, he went to work for the Shell Oil Company in East Africa, and joined the Royal Air Force in 1939 when
World War II began. His first flight was a disaster: he crashed in the Lybian desert and had to undergo a hip replacement and two spinal surgeries. After recovering, he continued to fly for the RAF until 1941, when blinding headaches and other health issues forced him to return to Britain.
Dahl then moved to the United States to help with the British war effort as assistant air attaché. He started writing short stories for literary magazines. In 1953, he published the best-selling story collection Someone Like You and married actress
Patricia Neil. Roald and Patricia were married for thirty years and had five children.
One of them died at the age of eleven from measles encephalitis, and another was severely injured in a car accident at just four months old. The child‟s skull was shattered and he became temporarily blind. In a desperate attempt to help his son, Dahl helped invent a valve that kept spinal fluid from pressing on the brain, and although little Theo
9 recovered before it was ready, it was later used on thousands of other children with similar problems (Anderson).
As if these tragic events weren‟t enough, Dahl‟s wife suffered a series of near- fatal strokes in 1965. Once again Dahl came to the rescue and helped her recover through a cruel rehabilitation regime. After Dahl divorced Neal, he married Felicity
Dahl. He died seven years later, on November 23rd, 1990, in Oxford, England (Bio).
Dahl published the book James and the Giant Peach in 1961. It was his first highly successful children‟s book. In 1964, he released Charlie and the Chocolate
Factory, which went on to become his most popular work. Over his decades-long writing career, Dahl wrote nineteen children‟s books and nine short story collections.
His other successful children‟s books include Fantastic Mr. Fox (1970), The Witches
(1983) and Matilda (1988). All of the aforementioned have also been made into films.
2.2 Illustrating Roald Dahl
Dahl‟s books are the kind that were written to be illustrated. The larger-than-life and ridiculously exaggerated characters and situations often call for a quirky visualization.
In fact, Dahl himself often calls on and incorporates illustrations into his stories. The very first lines of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory clearly demonstrate this technique:
“These two very old people are the father and mother of Mr. Bucket….And these two very old people are the father and mother of Mrs. Bucket…This is Mr. Bucket. This is Mrs. Bucket…This is Charlie.” (CCF 12) Here is another example from Danny the Champion of the World:
“I never had a moment‟s unhappiness or illness and here I am on my fifth birthday.” (D 11)
10 And lastly, an excerpt from The Witches:
“Kindly examine the picture opposite. Which lady is the witch?” (W 10)
Dahl‟s many references to illustrations in his stories are a phenomenon that translators and publishing houses have had to take into consideration, and in cases where they have failed to do so, the result has been, to say the least, slightly awkward.
This becomes evident when the opening of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory in two
Czech editions, both translated by Jaroslav Kořán, which have a schema of illustrations different to the source text, are compared:
1. Mateřídouška, 1971, illustrated by Jaroslav Malák: The first Czech edition of
Karlík a továrna na čokoládu was loyal to the typical Czech format of
illustrating children‟s books: four to five pages of text followed by a half-page
or full-page illustration. In this case, there is an illustration on the page
preceding the first chapter, where all the members of the Bucket family are
depicted. The translator had the sagacity to move away from a literal translation
and instead opt for one where the narrator is simply presenting the characters,
not introducing them to the reader:
„Na samém pokraji jednoho velikého města stál docela malý domek. A přece v tom malém domku žilo tolik lidí. Kolik? Počítejte...Tak to byl dědeček Pepa a babička Pepička, otec a matka pana Bucketa. Potom dědeček Jiří a babička Jiřinka, otec a matka paní Bucketové. Potom ještě pan Bucket a paní Bucketová.“ (KTČ 3) 2. Academia, 2006, no illustrations, (the book cover contains a photo from the
film “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory”, starring Johnny Depp): Despite
this version not containing any illustrations, the opening sentences have not been
altered, and even though the author is prompting us to look at Charlie‟s relatives,
we are unable to do so, because there is nothing to look at. The publishing house
11 should have taken this into consideration before discarding all of the
illustrations.
These examples prove that illustrations are an integral part of Roald Dahl‟s work and should not be overlooked during the translation process. The following section provides some basic information on one of the greatest partnerships in the history of storytelling.
2.2.1 Quentin Blake
Blake is so famous for his illustrations of Roald Dahl‟s
stories that many people do not realize that he himself
wrote over thirty books (as well as illustrating them,
naturally). In total he has illustrated more than three
hundred books by writers such as Joan Aiken, Elizabeth
Bowen, William Steig and Dr. Seuss.
Born in London in 1932, Blake had always made his living as an illustrator and was also a teacher at the Royal College of Art. His illustrations have been published ever since he was sixteen years old. He studied English at Downing College,
Cambridge, and got a postgraduate teaching diploma from the University of London. He has won several awards, such as the Hans Christian Andersen Award for Illustration, which is the highest international recognition given to creators of children's books, in
2002. In 1999 he was appointed the first ever Children's Laureate, a post designed to raise the profile of children's literature, and he was also knighted for his work in 2013.
12 Even though his drawings often look like they were created on the spur of the moment, on his official website Blake reveals that a lot of preparation and planning goes into his illustrations, especially in the case of sequences of drawings. He often uses the light-box technique, which allows him to see where and how his characters need to be positioned on a page (Quentin Blake). Blake knows how to create complex facial expressions, gestures and stances in his characters and this combination of detail and nonchalantness couples perfectly with the characters in Roald Dahl‟s books. Blake has illustrated all of them and his distinctive style has almost become an extension of Dahl himself.
Blake‟s and Dahl‟s collaboration started in the mid 1970s, when the two came together under the same publisher and Blake was recommended as an illustrator for
Dahl‟s picture book The Enormous Crocodile. Very soon the two became professionally inseperable. It is probably for this reason that in recent years the publishing house
Knižní klub has chosen to use Blake‟s illustrations in its Czech translations, rather then commission a Czech illustrator. Some Czech illustrators that have contributed to help
Czech translations of Dahl come alive include legends like Adolf Born, Jaroslav Malák and Jan Brychta.
3. Roald Dahl’s Style in Children’s Books
In Language and Control in Children‟s Literature, Knowles states that no discussion of modern children‟s fiction can ignore Roald Dahl (1996). But what exactly is it that makes Dahl so popular with children? The author himself provided a list of what constitutes a good child author in Writer magazine:
13 “He must like simple tricks and jokes and riddles and other childish things. He must be unconventional and inventive. He must have a really first-class plot. He must know what enthralls children and what bores them...They love suspense. They love action...They love chocolates and toys and money...They love being made to giggle. They love seeing the villain meet a grisly death. They love a hero and they love the hero to be a winner. But they hate descriptive passages and flowery prose...Many of them are sensitive to good writing and can spot a clumsy sentence.”(Dahl 2009)
Dahl also mentioned in the article that children become easily bored, so it is much more difficult to keep the attention of a child than that of an adult. Chambers claims that “what [Dahl] aims to achieve – and does – is a tone of voice which is clear, uncluttered, unobtrusive, not very demanding linguistically, and which sets up a sense of intimate, yet adult-controlled, relationship between his second self and his implied child reader” (Chambers 256). The bottom line is that Dahl understands his readers„ sense of humour, sides with them, and simply knows how to tickle a child‟s funny bone.
Despite his ongoing popularity as a children‟s author, it is surprising how little has actually been written about Dahl‟s writing style. Catherine Butler, Associate
Professor of English at the University of the West of England, draws attention to the fact that little critical attention has been devoted to him since Mark West published a short study two years after Dahl‟s death (2012). Thanks to the position of children‟s literature as a marginal genre and the controversial issues Dahl took pleasure in addressing in his books, it is no surprise that enraged and overprotective parents and other members of the general public, who see the author as an anarchist, spend most of their time condemning his “celebration of vulgarity, racism, sexism, and violence” (2).
Dahl is criticized for his portrayal of family relationships, justice and revenge, as well as many taboo subjects. His most famous work, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory,
“has been loved by children and hated by adults because it is full of fun and virtually immoral” (Carpenter 1). Numerous essays (by David Rees, Eleanor Cameron, and
Michele Landsberg, for example) have repeatedly addressed the topic of whether or not
14 Dahl‟s sadistic and subversive literary style is suitable for children at all, and much has been written about Dahl in connection with child education and morality.
In his essay Roald Dahl and the Commodification of Fantasy, Peter Hunt explains that Dahl has been a trailblazer in the sense that he has broadened the range of acceptable language in children‟s books, as well as changing the way children are looked upon (2012). According to Hunt, Dahl merits credit for the fact that “children are no longer predominantly seen as innocent and vulnerable to influence. On the contrary, they are increasingly regarded as sophisticated, demanding, „media-wise‟ consumers” (179), a trend that continues to this day. In the second half of the twentieth century, Dahl‟s writing empowered children in a way that no other books had ever done before (both inside and outside of his stories). As Hollindale noted, Dahl was “both the conscious inheritor of a tradition and a respectful iconoclast in his dealings with it”
(274) and is best read as a satirist who writes stories on multiple levels that appeal to the child but can also satisfy the adult mind (something that Barbara Wall refers to as
“double address” (1991)). The structure of his stories is strikingly similar to the typical morality tales of the nineteenth century, and his use of the fantistical reflects medieval narratives, where violence abounded, but where everyone was aware that the story is a fantasy and should therefore be looked upon with a certain amount of aloofness.
Therefore, despite being full of violence and primitive sadism, thanks to this approach the “dangerous dynamics” of Dahl‟s work lose their power (Hunt 186).
One of the only essays dealing with the Dahl‟s linguistic style was written by
David Rudd, Professor of Children‟s Literature at the University of Bolton. According to Rudd, for Dahl “the shape, sound and possibilities of language are abiding concerns, often becoming part of the subject matter or plot.” (51) In this regard, Rudd compares
Dahl to Lewis Carroll and his books Alice in Wonderland and Alice Through the
15 Looking Glass, where language becomes central. He claims that Dahl and Carroll share another characteristic as authors: both largely utilize intentional nonsense as a literary device.
Furthermore, Rudd points out that Dahl‟s writing style caters to both tradition and modernity with narrative roots “in orality, reaching back to nursery rhymes, jokes and folk tales,” on one hand, and “a language more appropriate for those reared on cartoons, TV, advertising slogans and the like,” on the other (53-54).
Dahl teaches children not only to love reading but also to enjoy language and not be afraid to get creative with it. Into his children‟s stories he projects the belief that
“ways of representing the world – objects, ideas, beliefs, values, and mores – are, ultimately, arbitrary” (53).
Rudd„s essay “„Don‟t gobbelfunk around with words‟: Roald Dahl and
Language,“ discusses the characteristics of Dahl‟s writing style, essentially categorizing them as four types of innovation: lexical, phonological, typographical, and semantic.
3.1 Lexical Innovation
Dahl‟s writing for children contains a myriad of neologisms, or newly coined words, some of which are simply malapropisms, like “human beans”. Others are compound words (whizzpopper), and in some cases “Dahl collapses two words into one, as did
Carroll with his portmanteau creations like „chortle‟ (to chuckle and snort).” (Rudd 56)
Another one of Dahl‟s techniques is the addition of an incorrect affix (usually a suffix) to an already existing word, such as in the case of “filthing” and “disgusterous”.
16 Very often, Dahl replaces a word with another, already existing one, that retains the phonological or semantic connotation, “thus the BFG talks about „natterboxes‟, where „natter‟ not only rhymes with „chatter‟, but is also its synonym.” (ibid.) The technique is often used in idiomatic phrases, such as “once in a blue baboon”. Here the word replacing the original not only rhymes with it, but it also evokes the blue face of the animal mentioned.
Dahl also uses many spoonerisms. A spoonerism “consists of a transposition between the consonant sounds (especially the initial sounds) of two words.” (Cuddon
651). Even Miss Honey, one of Dahl‟s principal characters in Matilda, shares her creator‟s passion for spoonerisms, and with the help of her imagination “Cosy Nook” becomes “Nosey Cook”. Some of Dahl‟s spoonerims, such as the one just mentioned, as well as, for example, “Dahl‟s Chickens”, are more effective than others because they contain a semantic dimension.
Furthermore, Rudd aims at shedding light on what he considers two misconceptions regarding Roald Dahl‟s vocabulary. Firstly, he argues that it is not true that Dahl‟s lexis is restricted (thus challenging Chambers„ claim that it is not linguistically demanding). Secondly, that his language is outdated. He argues, rather, that Dahl is a fan of slang and colloquial language to the point that it has become part of his distinctive idiolect, his narrative voice.
3.2 Phonological Innovation
Just as Dahl‟s books were meant to be illustrated, they were also created to be read out loud. One of Dahl‟s favourite literary techniques is alliteration – a figure of speech in
17 which consonants, especially at the beginning of words, or stressed syllables, are repeated (Cuddon 27). Rudd points out that Dahl most often alliterates two words
(“Some beastly bird has dropped his dirty droppings on my head!”), less often three
(“foul and filthy fiend!”) and occassionally he even manages a quadruplet (“grousing, grouching, grumbling, griping”).
His alliteration is often accompanied by assonance, the “repetition of similar vowel sounds, usually close together, to achieve a particular effect of euphony”
(Cuddon 60), and he is not afraid of utilizing full rhyme in his prose, in the naming of characters, for example (Oompa-Loompa), or phrases like “sweet to eat”.
3.3 Typographical Innovation
Dahl certainly likes to play with the visual aspect of his texts, frequently using capitalisation (both small and large capital letters), different types of fonts, reordering of text layout, bold lettering, italics, and exclamation marks to emphasize, draw attention and entertain.
The typographical schema of his stories could also be interpreted as a guideline to how to read them out loud, where to raise the voice, where to put emphasis on a word or phrase, where to pause, how to (mis)pronounce a word, where to prolong a vowel or consonant, etc. One of his books, Esio Trot, even compels the reader to read a large part of the text backwards in order to grasp the meaning of the words. It would perhaps be suitable to say that Dahl liked to play with words both figuratively and literally.
18 3.4 Semantic Innovation
Dahl likes to employ figurative language to make semantic shifts. However, “like many other nonsense writers, [he] seems keen not to lose sight of the original meaning” (Rudd
60). Rudd argues that this is one of the reasons he prefers similes and puns to metaphors, because both frames of reference, the original and the transgression, are maintained. A simile “is a figure of speech in which one thing is likened to another in such a way as to clarify and enhance an image” (Cuddon 629). A pun involves play on words. Dahl does, however, makes use of many metaphors when composing his colourful insults (“You ignorant little slug! … You witless weed! You empty-headed hamster! You stupid glob of glue!”)
Rudd also describes a technique Dahl uses largely in his book The BFG called adnominatio, where proper nouns are interpreted either literally or homophonically
(Greece vs. grease, Chile vs. chilly). One can often find motivated names in Dahl‟s writing (The Wormwoods, Miss Honey, Miss Trunchbull, etc.). Some of these motivations may not be fully apparent at first sight, however. Rudd mentions the example of Charlie Bucket, suggesting that Charlie is a empty vessel which Willy
Wonka is free to fill to the brim with advice, knowledge and know-how.
3.5 Narrative Voice
To say that Dahl is a writer with a strong narrative voice would perhaps be an understatement. Rudd points outs in his essay that it is, in fact, so intrusive and opinionated that it always comes through, no matter what the situation, and it is for this reason that many of his characters seem to speak in very much the same style: it is
19 actually Dahl‟s own voice coming through. Just as often, however, Dahl will speak as the narrator, but we will actually here a character‟s thoughts and feelings (this technique is called free indirect discourse). Both situations are once again a reflection of the fact that Dahl draws on techniques more closely associated with the oral tradition (Rudd
2012).
He very often shifts from third person to first person and second person, as if addressing an audience as a speaker, rather than an author. Dahl will sometimes ask the reader‟s opinion, sometimes he will give them advice and often he will prompt them to look at a picture. This helps to create a sense of being “in the moment”, a sense that things are happening right here and right now. His constant utilization of “this” and
“these” further evokes this feeling of immediateness, and whenever his wishes to amplify this sensation even more, he writes in the present tense.
3.6 Other Characteristics of Roald Dahl‟s Style
Rudd does mention syntactic innovation as the fifth category for Dahl‟s writing style, but he then goes on to explain that the possibilities of syntactic innovation are, understandably, rather limited, and in the case of Dahl they are confined to one book only: The BFG. Here Dahl creates a sociolect for the giants, who speak like foreigners that have not yet mastered the rules of English grammar and do not know how to properly conjugate verbs.
Aside from the techniques and figures of speech mentioned above, Dahl„s over- expressive writing style is filled with hyperbole, onomatopoeic words, interjections and repetition, including anaphora (repetition of a word or group of words in successive clauses (Cuddon 40).
20 As mentioned before, Dahl was not afraid to reuse a word, phrase, concept or character he liked, and there seem to be specific words so strongly anchored in his idiolect that they appear repeatedly in almost all of his stories. Words like “filthy”,
“marvellous” and the phrase “shut up” certainly fall into this category.
4. Roald Dahl in the Czech Republic
4.1 Czech Translations of Roald Dahl
The first Roald Dahl book to be translated into Czech was the short story collection Kiss
Kiss in 1969. Dahl‟s Czech children‟s debut came two years later with Karlík a továrna na čokoládu by Jaroslav Kořán and Pavel Šrut with the publishing house Mateřídouška.
The 1980s were a period during which Dahl‟s short stories such as Switch Bitch and
Twenty-nine Kisses from Roald Dahl were translated, but his chidren‟s books seemed to have been forgotten.
The next decade brought along with it the translation of a large part of Dahl‟s primary works, such as James and the Giant Peach, The BFG, The Witches and Danny the Champion of the World. Dahl‟s children‟s books have experienced a boom especially in the last decade, during which the translations of The Twits, Fantastic Mr.
Fox, and George‟s Marvellous Medicine have emerged. From 2007 onward the publishing house Knižní klub has republished almost all of Dahl‟s children‟s book available on the Czech market with original illustrations and covers by Quentin Blake.
None of Roald Dahl‟s children‟s books have been retranslated yet, so it is impossible to compare how different translators approach the same book. All of the
21 editions you see below contain the same translation, except for the first translation of
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. There are slight differences between this version and the subsequent ones, and these will be discussed in more detail in the analysis section of this thesis.
Below is a table showing all of the Czech translations of Roald Dahl children‟s books published in the Czech Republic to this day. These are also the books that will be dealt with in detail in the analysis section. For the purposes of this thesis, the books Boy and its sequel Going Solo are not considered children‟s books, because many sources categorize them as autobiographies. Audio recordings (such as in the case of The Magic
Finger and The Enormous Crocodile) have not been taken into consideration either.
NAME ORIGINAL TRANSLATOR ILLUSTRATOR PUBLISHER YEAR Karlík a Charlie and Jaroslav Kořán Jaroslav Malák Mateřídouška 1971 továrna na the Chocolate and Pavel Šrut čokoládu Factory
Danny, Danny the Jaroslav Kořán Lubomír Anlauf Albatros 1990 mistr světa Champion of the World Karlík a Charlie and Jaroslav Kořán Jan Paul Winston Smith 1992 továrna na the Chocolate and Pavel Šrut čokoládu Factory Čarodějnice The Witches Hana Parkánová Adolf Born Jan 1993 Kanzelsberger Jakub a James and the Jaroslav Kořán Markéta Albatros 1993 obří Giant Peach and Pavel Šrut Prachatická broskev MHO The BFG Jan Jařab Eva Vogelová Hynek 1998 Karlík a Charlie and Jaroslav Kořán Jan Brychta Academia 2002 továrna na the Chocolate and Pavel Šrut čokoládu Factory Jakub a James and the Jaroslav Kořán Jan Brychta Academia 2003 obří Giant Peach and Pavel Šrut broskev Prevítovi The Twits Iva Nováčková Jan Brychta Academia 2004 ObrDobr The BFG Jan Jařab Jan Brychta Academia 2005 Karlík a Charlie and Jaroslav Kořán Academia 2006 továrna na the Chocolate and Pavel Šrut čokoládu Factory Matylda Matilda Jitka Herynková Quentin Blake Knižní klub 2007, 2011 Jirkova George‟s Jitka Herynková Quentin Blake Knižní klub 2007, zázračná Marvellous 2012 medicína Medicine Danny, Danny the Jaroslav Kořán Quentin Blake Knižní klub 2008,
22 mistr světa Champion of 2012 the World Fantastický Fantastic Mr. Jitka Herynková Knižní klub 2009 pan Lišák Fox Jakub a James and the Jaroslav Kořán Quentin Blake Knižní klub 2009 obří Giant Peach and Pavel Šrut broskev Karlík a Charlie and Jaroslav Kořán Quentin Blake Knižní klub 2010, továrna na the Chocolate and Pavel Šrut 2013 čokoládu Factory Prevítovi The Twits Iva Nováčková Quentin Blake Knižní klub 2011 ObrDobr The BFG Jan Jařab Quentin Blake Knižní klub 2012
The table above reveals that the book that has been republished most often is
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (a total of six times). This comes as no surprise, seeing as it is probably Dahl‟s best-known work. This is also the reason why it was
Dahl‟s first chilren‟s book to be published in our country. Many of Dahl‟s children‟s books (The Magic Finger, Esio Trot, Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator, etc.) and all of his picture books (The Giraffe, the Pelly and Me, etc.) have yet to be translated into
Czech, so let‟s hope it will happen soon.
5. Presentation of Analysed Works
5.1 James and the Giant Peach
Four-year-old James Henry Trotter must go and live with his two
horrible aunts after his parents get eaten up by a rhinocerous.
James‟ life is pretty miserable for the next three years as he slaves
away at Aunt Sponge‟s and Aunt Spiker‟s house, lonely, extorted
and abused. One day he meets and man who gives him a bag of strange green insects and promises him that all of his troubles will disappear when he eats them. Unfortunately, James manages to drop the bag under a peach tree in the
23 garden and all of the insects wriggle their way into the soil and disappear. As a result of this incident, a huge peach appears in the garden the next day, and James‟ aunts are determined to earn a fortune by charging anyone who wishes to see this extraordinary fruit a high fee.
James gets inside the peach and meets a cheeky centipede, an old grass-hopper, a kind lady-bird, a fearful spider, a pessimistic earthworm, a shy silkworm and an inconspicuous glow-worm, all of whom have grown human-sized thanks to the magical powers of the mysterious green insects. Together they roll off the hill in their new juicy home, running over and killing James‟ aunts and ending up in the Atlantic Ocean. They escape a hungry school of sharks by harnessing over five hundred seagulls and flying off into the clouds to accidentally upset some aggressive Cloud-Men along the way.
They arrive safely in New York City, landing their peach on the spike of the Empire
State Building. The inhabitants of the city are convinced they must be dangerous aliens, until James introduces his peculiar friends and explains to everyone how harmless and useful they are. The peach gets eaten up by hundreds of children during a procession through the streets of New York. Everyone begins a new life and James lives in the stone of the peach in the middle of Central Park and writes a book about his amazing adventures.
5.2 Fantastic Mr. Fox
Mr. Fox lives in a hole with his wife and four children and spends his
days stealing chickens, ducks and turkeys from three mean farmers
called Boggis, Bunce, and Bean. The farmers grow tired of this
24 mischievous thief and decide to kill him. They wait outside his home and manage to shot his tail off just as he is coming out, and when Mr. Fox succeeds in getting back inside they decide to dig him out along with the rest of his family and kill them all. At first they try digging with shovels, but the foxes dig deeper into the interior of the hill and thus the farmers never manage to reach them. So they bring along heavy machinery to facilitate the work. They dig for three days nonstop, and just when it looks like there is no hope left, Mr. Fox gets the idea to dig an underground tunnel leading right into
Farmer Boggis‟ chicken coop. He sends one of his children to bring back the chickens to Mrs. Fox and tell her to prepare a feast, while he heads off to Farmer Bunce‟s storehouse with his remaining children.
Along the way they meet Badger and his son, and discover that all of the animals that live inside the hill are starving, because the farmers have it surrounded from all sides and no one can get out. Mr. Fox invites Badger and his family and all of the other hungry animals to join them for dinner (Weasel, Rabbit, and Mole). Badger accompanies Mr. Fox to Bunce‟s storehouse, where they help themselves to plucked ducks, hams and bacon. The second little fox is sent home with the loot.
The last stop is Farmer Bean‟s secret cider cellar, where an annoying rat tries to get them to go away and where they are almost discovered by a maid who comes into the cellar to take a couple of jars of cider out to the farmers, who are convinced that the starving foxes are about to leave their hole any minute. All goes well and they return to the feast with several jars of the delicious beverage. Here they decide that they won‟t be having to go outside anymore, because whenever they get hungry they will be able to visit the farms via the underground tunnels and take whatever they desire. All the while, the farmers sit waiting outside the hole in the rain, completely unconscious of everything that has happened.
25
5.3 George‟s Marvellous Medicine
George is a small boy who lives on a farm with a miserable and
evil grandmother to whom he has to give medicine while his
parents are away. He decides to reinvent this medicine in the hope
that it will make his old grandmother more bearable. He searches
every room in the house and puts practically everything he can find into a huge saucepan, and then heats and stirs it. When George‟s grandma receives this concoction the effect is marvellous. Smoke starts coming out of her mouth and she bulges and then begins to stretch and grow, until she is very thin and taller than the house and her head goes through the roof. All her pains have disappeared, but she is just as irritating as before. To prove to her that he invented the potion himself, George gives a dose to one of the hens in the yard, which grows to the size of a horse.
George‟s father is extremely excited about George‟s marvellous medicine. He feeds it to all of the animals on the farm and they all increase significantly in size. His father asks George to recreate the medicine so that they can sell it to other farmers and thus end hunger forever. George tries to remember the recipe but forgets some of the ingredients, so his second attempt is not so successful. A hen that drinks the medicine grows ridiculously long legs, but her body stays unaltered. George and his father change the recipe several more times, but each time the result is close to catastrophic. The next victim, a black cockerel, grows an extremely long neck, and another hen becomes tiny.
In the meantime, the grumpy grandmother is upset that no one is paying any attention to her, and when she sees George with a mug of something brown in his hand, she thinks it is tea he has made for himself instead of bringing it to her. She drinks it all
26 and disappears, because it was actually the newest version of George‟s medicine, the shrinking kind, and she drank over fifty doses of it.
5.4 The BFG
In the middle of the night, a little orphan called Sophie looks out of
her window and happens to see a giant with an enormous blowpipe
looking into the bedrooms of nearby buildings. Unfortunately, the
giant notices her and takes her away to Giant Land, where she discovers that there are nine man-eating giants that go hunting human “beans” every night in almost all of the countries of the world. The Big Friendly Giant (BFG) that kidnapped Sophie is the only giant who doesn‟t eat humans, and instead feeds on disgusting Snozzcumbers (black and white cucumber-shaped vegetables). He spends his time catching and mixing dreams for little girls and boys. He has huge ears that allow him to hear the faint sounds that dreams make. The BFG speaks in a very strange way and it is not always easy to understand him, but he is kind to Sophie and hides her from the other giants so that she doesn‟t get eaten up.
But Sophie doesn‟t just want to save herself, she wants to stop the horrible people-eating giants for good, and so she devises a plan. She tells the BFG to mix a special dream for the Queen of England that will make her realize what is going on, and then they visit her together and Sophie tries explains the whole situation. The Queen invites them both for breakfast in the ballroom of the Buckingham Palace and gives orders to her Head of the Army and Head of the Airforce to follow the BFG to Giant
Land with helicopters, tie up the sleeping giants and bring them back to England.
27 One of the giants, called Fleshlumpeater, wakes up while the Queen‟s soldiers are trying to tie him up and almost eats one of them. Sophie rushes to the rescue and pricks the giant with the Queen‟s brooch, and because the giant is a coward, the BFG tells him that he has been bitten by a snake. The giant holds still while the BFG pretends to take the snake‟s tooth out of his foot, actually tying him up.
The giants are deposited in a huge pit and become a famous tourist attraction. As a punishment they are fed nothing but snozzcumbers, except when someone accidentally falls into the pit. The BFG learns proper English and writes a book about his adventure with Sophie.
5.5 The Witches
The Witches is the story of a small boy who loses his parents in a car
accident and goes to live with his Norwegian grandmother, who tells
him stories about witches and explains how to recognize them. He
learns that they are bald but wear high-quality wigs, have no toes and
always wear gloves to hide clawed fingernails, and have strange pupils and blue spit and slightly larger nostrils than an ordinary person. The boy encounters a witch while playing in a tree one day, but escapes unharmed.
The two plan to go on holiday to Norway, but Grandmother catches pneumonia, so they are forced to go to a hotel in Bournemouth on the South coast of England instead. The boy receives two white mice as a present and is secretly training them to walk on a string behind a folding screen in the hotel ballroom when he accidently witnesses what should have been a meeting of the Royal Society for the Prevention of
28 Cruelty against Children, but is actually an annual meeting of all of the witches in
England, including the Grand High Witch herself.
The Grand High Witch reveals her true appearance and makes a speech about her plan to turn all the children of England into mice. She demonstrates her Formula 86
Delayed Action Mouse-Maker on a boy named Bruno Jenkins, and just when it looks like he will escape unharmed for the second time, our boy is sniffed out and turned into a mouse as well.
With the help of his adventurous grandmother, he steals the special mouse- making potion from the Grand High Witch‟s hotel room, and manages to pour it into the soup that will be served to all the witches during dinner time. Meanwhile, Bruno is returned to his shocked parents. All the witches turn into mice and are killed by the hotel personnel, and the boy and his grandmother decide to get rid of all the witches in the world because they now know the address of the Grand High Witch‟s headquarters.
They talk excitedly about how they will go about destroying witches in every country and how much fun it will be.
5.6 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
Roald Dahl‟s most famous children‟s book is the story of little
Charlie Bucket, who is extremely poor and lives with his four
grandparents and parents near the biggest chocolate factory in the
world. The owner of the factory, Mr. Willy Wonka, has decided to
hide five golden tickets in ordinary chocolate bars around the world, and whoever finds one will be allowed to enter the gates of his factory, which have been
29 closed not only to the public but also to workers for the past ten years. They will also receive a life-time supply of chocolate and sweets after the visit. On the third attempt,
Charlie miraculously finds one of the tickets and takes his grandfather Joe along with him to see the factory.
Inside the chocolate factory the visitors see wonderful things. They meet the ever-singing Oompa-Loompas, go down a chocolate river in a boat made of an enormous boiled sweet, see Wonka‟s top-secret inventing room and travel around the factory in his Great Glass Elevator.
All of the other winners of the golden ticket have horrible personalities.
Augustus Gloop is greedy and fat, Veruca Salt is a spoilt brat, Violet Beauregarde has a nasty habit of chewing gum all day, and Mike Teavee does nothing but watch television. One by one, the children‟s bad traits and habits get them into trouble and they end up having to leave early along with their parents. Augustus is sucked up a chocolate pipe, Veruca gets pushed into the rubbish chute, Violet goes blue and bloated like a blueberry, and Mike turns up miniature inside a television screen. Soon the only child left is Charlie, and Willy Wonka reveals to him that the golden tickets were actually a method of finding someone who could inherit the factory, because Wonka has no children of his own. He invites Charlie and his whole family to come and live with him in the factory and help him run it.
5.7 Matilda
Matilda is a small prodigy. At the age of one and a half she could
speak perfectly and by the time she was three she could read and
30 visited the public library on her own to devour Dickens and other classics. Matilda‟s father, Mr. Wormwood, is a crooked second-hand car dealer, and her mother does nothing but play bingo every afternoon and watch television in the evening. They are both too ignorant and selfish to notice what an incredible child they have, and take much more notice of Matilda‟s older brother Mike, who is rather ordinary. Often they treat her unfairly, but Matilda has no trouble getting back at them. She puts superglue on her father‟s hat, exchanges his hair tonic for peroxide, and hides a talking parrot up the chimney in order to make her terrified parents believe their house is haunted.
Matilda is also great at mathematics, but the only person who seems to appreciate her genius is Matilda‟s form teacher, Miss Honey. She tries to talk to
Matilda‟s parents about it, but to no avail. The school is ruled by the imposing Miss
Trunchbull, a headmistress that hates children and enjoys humiliating and physically punishing them. She throws girls by their pigtails, pulls little boys‟ ears and hair and keeps them standing in the corner on one foot, and when she discovers that a boy named
Bruce Bogtrotter has stolen some of her chocolate cake, she makes him eat an entire chocolate cake in front of the whole school during assembly.
One day, Matilda‟s friend Lavender puts a newt in the headmistress‟s jug of water and when Matilda gets blamed for it, she discovers that she can make objects move with her willpower. She tips over the Trunchbull‟s glass of water and practices her powers at home with her father‟s cigar. She finds out that Miss Honey is actually the
Trunchbull‟s niece and has been mistreated all her life by the horrible woman, so she pretends to be Miss Honey‟s deceased father and makes the chalk write messages to the
Trunchbull on a blackboard. The messages say that she should leave Miss Honey alone and give her back the house that is rightly hers according to the will Dr. Honey left behind. The Trunchbull faints and moves away the following day.
31 Matilda‟s parents move to Spain because the police is after Mr. Wormwood, and
Matilda stays behind and moves in with Miss Honey. She loses her powers because she has been moved up to the highest class and her brain is no longer bored.
5.8 Danny the Champion of the World
Danny‟s mother died when he was just four months old, and he lives
with his father in a caravan next to the filling-station they own. They
are quite poor, but Danny‟s father is a wonderful parent and Danny
has a beautiful and exciting childhood that he wouldn‟t trade for the
world.
One night, Danny wakes up and notices that his father is not in his bed. When he returns Danny discovers that his father has a deep and dark secret: he loves to poach pheasants. The best place to go is Victor Hazell‟s wood, about six miles from Danny‟s home. Danny‟s father says he finds great satisfaction in poaching in Mr. Hazell‟s wood, for he is an arrogant, evil man who deserves to be robbed of some game.
Danny gradually discovers that almost everyone in the village is into poaching, including some of the men he most respects and fears, such as Doctor Spencer, Sergeant
Samways, and even Reverend Clipstone. Danny finds out about some of the cleverest and most exciting methods poachers use, including The Horse-Hair Stopper and The
Sticky Hat.
Danny‟s father doesn‟t return home from his second poaching trip, and nine- year-old Danny takes one of the cars from the filling-station and goes out to find him.
He finds his father lying at the botton of a deep pit that the keepers have dug in the
32 wood to catch poachers. His ankle is broken. With the help of a towing rope that he finds in the car, Danny pulls his father out of the pit and helps him home.
Danny and his father come up with a fantastic plan to poach almost all of Mr.
Hazell‟s pheasants. They want to do this because Hazell‟s annual shooting party is coming up in a couple of days. They fill soaked raisins with powder from the sleeping pills that Danny‟s father has brought home from the hospital and give these to the pheasants the night before the shooting party. The pheasants go up to roost in the trees and fall to the ground once the sleeping pills start to work. Danny and his father gather a total of one hundred and twenty pheasants and ask Mrs. Clipstone to bring them to the filling-station on the following day in her specially-designed pram. As Mrs. Clipstone is arriving, the pheasants begin to wake up and try to fly away, but seeing as they are still under the influence of the sleeping pills, they are unable to get far from the filling- station. Mr. Hazell sees this and becomes furious, but there is nothing he can do, because pheasants are property of whoever‟s land they are on. The effect of the sleeping pills gradually wears off, and the pheasants fly away, not toward Mr. Hazell‟s wood, however, but in the opposite direction.
Doctor Spencer manages to gather six pheasants that have overdosed on the sleeping pills and died, and he divides them between Mrs. Clipstone, Sergeant Samways and Danny‟s father.
5.9 The Twits
Mr. and Mrs. Twit are a repulsive older married couple. Mr. Twit has
a filthy beard he never washes that covers almost his entire face and
33 Mrs. Twit has become as ugly as the ugly thoughts she has been having her whole life.
The couple entertain themselves by playing nasty pranks on each other. Mrs. Twit puts her glass eye in her husband‟s beer to scare him and mixes worms into his spaghetti, and to get back at her Mr. Twit places a frog in his wife‟s bed and makes her believe she is shrinking by gradually elongating the walking stick she uses to beat animals and children as well as the chair she usually sits on. He then pretends to help her by tying her legs to an iron ring in the ground and her hands to a hundred balloons in a fake attempt to stretch her back to her original height. He further decides to cut the strings by which his wife is attached to the ground and let her fly away for good, but Mrs. Twit bites through the balloon strings and comes back down to beat her husband with her elongated walking stick.
The couple are cruel and hunt birds by putting glue on a tree in their garden. The birds that perch on this tree inevitably end up in the Twits‟ weekly bird pie. One day, a group of boys climb up the tree and get stuck there. They manage to escape only by leaving behind their trousers.
Mr. Twit also keeps a family of four monkeys in a cage in the garden and forces them to do tricks upside down. One day a Roly-Poly Bird from Africa visits the monkeys and helps warn the other birds not to sit on the glue-covered tree. Mr. and Mrs.
Twit are furious and decide to go out and buy guns in order to shoot the birds instead.
While they are out, the monkeys escape from the cage and with the help of the birds they decide to take revenge on their evil owners and turn them upside down. They achieve this by gluing every piece of furniture to the ceiling of the house, including the living room carpet. The birds also manage to place a small amount of glue on the Twits‟ heads unnoticed, and when the couple return they are astonished to see their new inverted home. Confused and dizzy, they hope to solve the problem by standing on their
34 heads and get stuck in this position for good. They gradually shrink away and a week later, when a man comes along to read the gas meter, he finds nothing but their clothes lying on the living room floor.
6. Theoretical Background
6.1 Nonsense as a Literary Device
In the previous chapter, an attempt was made to summarize the principal characteristics of Roald Dahl‟s writing style, in order to anticipate the issues translators may have to face during the translation of his works. This summarization revealed that these characteristics correspond closely to those of nonsense, not as a genre but rather as a literary device. This means that while Dahl employs nonsense to make his stories funnier, crazier and generally more appealing to children, his books should not be defined as nonsense literature per se, since, as will be demonstrated throughout this chapter, they do not always fulfil the typical requirements of the genre, especially on a textual level.
So what exactly is nonsense? According to Tigges, literary nonsense:
“...balances a multiplicity of meaning with a simultaneous absence of meaning. This balance is effected by the play with the rules of language, logic, [...] and representation, or combination of these. [...] It must invite the reader to interpretation and avoid the suggestion that there is a deeper meaning (connotations and associations) because these lead to nothing. [...] The greater the distance between what is presented, the expectations that were evoked, and the frustration of these expectations, the more nonsensical the effect will be.” (qtd. in Kratochvilová 5).
35 One of the principal elements of nonsense is therefore paradox. According to
Stewart, it is “an activity by which the world is disorganised and reorganised” (vii).
Nonsense has several characteristic features, the first and most prominent being a playlike character. This means that nonsensical play consists in the manipulation of the context of messages. Other literary works are often alluded to and parodied in nonsense texts. The genre tends to reject metaphors, because it does not function on the basis of symbolism, and as mentioned earlier, Dahl himself uses metaphors almost exclusively for insults, favouring other stylistic figures in his work for children.
Another important feature is the balance and tension between two opposed elements, namely between the reasonable and the absurd. The beauty of nonsensical episodes is that they occur within the framework of an everyday reality. Furthermore, the tension that builds up between these two opposing sides is never released, and the author often fails to give the reader any clues as to exactly how the story should be understood and interpreted.
Nonsense writers do not create fantasy worlds, but rather insert unmotivated events and bizarre characters into familiar and conventional settings, or viceversa. This is essentially what makes nonsense nonsensical, it is a series of glitches in the matrix, an absurdity that unabashedly stands out in a sea of ordinary operations and situations. As
Kratochvilová puts it, “literary nonsense does not appeal to our dreamlike imagination, but to our linguistic imagination” (55). This statement presents another feature of nonsense, and that is predominantly verbal nature. The opposition in nonsense is created between a presence and absence of meaning and between coherence and incoherence, which, according to Lecercle, appears most frequently on the semantic level (31).
One feature of nonsense that may not be immediately apparent is a certain lack of emotional involvement. The nonsensical is exaggerated, shocking and obscene, but
36 does not provoke or offend the reader, who is aware of the fact that these hyperbolical displays are meant to be taken with a pinch of salt and accepted as mere manifestations of the genre. No one should therefore be horrified when a boy in one of Dahl‟s books mixes together every chemical substance he can find around the house only to subsequently spoonfeed it to a grumpy relative. Dahl expects his readers (and their parents) to understand that his books are not calling upon children to give their grandparents potentially lethal concoctions. The entire story is, in fact, so exaggerated that it is not expected to be taken seriously or literally.
Nonsense frustrates the reader‟s expectations: there are no clear boundaries between right and wrong, good and evil, or even normal and peculiar. Dahl as a children‟s writer does not fully respect this criteria of nonsense, because his stories have a fairly classical fairytale structure, with a happy ending and a moral lesson for those who deserve it, although there are cases where the border between what is considered right and wrong is blurred. In Danny the Champion of the World, the main character is shocked to discover that most of the adults he knows poach, even though it is an illegal activity, but because they poach from someone who is a bad person, the evilness of poaching is counterbalanced. Mr. Fox steals from three mean farmers, and claims that their personalities justify the theft. In The Witches, there is no happy ending: the main character remains a mouse for the rest of his life, despite defeating his enemies. There is no return to the normal or original state of things, so common in traditional children‟s stories.
A patchwork structure is also typical for nonsense (the texts lack consistency and are often episodical) as well as a lack of point (events often occur simply for the sake of occurring, without any clear connection to the plot or development of the story).
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is made up of longer chapters closely connected to
37 the development of the story on one hand, and shorter, more random chapters, which contribute little to the plot but the main purpose of which seems to be amusement. The remainder of Dahl‟s books analysed in this thesis, however, do not have a patchwork structure.
Nonsense writers delight in the use of inversions and reversals in several forms.
One of the most common forms is a spoonerism, and this is also one of Dahl‟s favourite stylistic figures, as mentioned earlier. Individual words can also be reversed by play with their spelling: their letters may be reversed (e.g. d instead of b), replaced, omitted or added. Palindromes and mirror writing (Dahl employs this technique abundantly in his book Esio Trot, which unfotunately cannot be subject to analysis in this thesis because it has not yet been translated into Czech) are also frequently used. All of these operations challenge the idea of acceptable and conventional ways of both reading and writing. As for fixed expressions and idioms, these can be inverted by emphasizing the literal meaning either of the utterance as whole, or of its individual elements
(Kratochvilová 19).
Nonsense likes to play with boundaries and infinity, and there is often a surplus of signification (importance is given to information that would normally be considered insignificant) or overloading of the text with information that is irrevelant to a better understanding of the text. The genre also plays with the boundary between what one sees on the page and how this information changes when it is said out loud (words can be strangely spelled to look like a foreign language, but when pronounced they translate into words in the native language). Although Dahl himself does not employ these techniques often, they are a common feature in the texts of other, more traditional nonsense writers.
38 Another popular device is the use of simultaneity through punning, i.e. using a word or two words with the same sound in its/their two possible meanings. (Newmark
217). Simultaneity is also expressed via portmanteaus, already mentioned in the chapter on Dahl‟s writing style. New words, however, are also created through unmotivated neologisms, which often end up looking like regular words because they respect the rules of phonetics and morphology. They are especially common with the names of non-existent flora and fauna. Examples of most of the nonsense literary devices listed above can be found in Dahl‟s work will be presented and commented on in the chapter on translation analysis.
Some of Dahl‟s books reflect not only nonsense as a literary device, but also as a literary genre. One of the most common themes in literary nonsense includes the depiction of eccentricity and madness. Dahl‟s list of peculiar characters is practically endless, ranging from Willy Wonka, the chocolate factory owner, to the feared Miss
Trunchbull, headmistress of Matilda‟s school. James‟s friend the Centipede and
George‟s evil grandmother cannot be considered entirely normal either. Mr. and Mrs.
Twit are completely ridiculous, and Sophie‟s friend the BFG with his distinctive idiolect is far from ordinary, to say the least.
Other frequent motifs are violence, cruelty and punishments. There is an abundance of physical punishments and cruelty in most of Dahl‟s books, such as caning and ear-pulling. Children are bullied, forced to eat an entire chocolate cake, their favourite books are deliberately torn to pieces, they are killed in a myriad of ways using magic, and eaten by giants, to name a few other examples. One thing that most of these acts of violence have in common is that they are almost exclusively committed against children (fortunately, good children always manage to get revenge). As mentioned earlier, these motifs should be viewed with a certain amount of emotional detachment.
39 Literary nonsense is also fascinated by inventions, which are most prominent in
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, where Wonka takes his visitors to the inventing room to show them hair toffee, everlasting gobstoppers and chewing gum that tastes like a three-course meal. Another important, though accidental, invention is the original version of George‟s medicine.
Another theme unique to the genre are parts of the body, or an entire body, that have grown out of proportion. Dahl embraces this theme and chickens in George‟s
Marvellous Medicine grow exaggeratedly long legs and necks, while in Charlie and the
Chocolate Factory, Mike Teavee gets stretched and becomes extremely thin in the process, and Violet Beauregarde closely resembles a blueberry by turning blue and becoming almost completely round. Dahl extends this theme to fruit in James and the
Giant Peach.
Voyages and journeys also play an important role, and this is why James travels across the entire Atlantic Ocean, and Sophie‟s kidnapper takes her to the land of giants.
Themes absent from nonsense texts are God and religion, and Dahl strictly adheres to this rule in his children‟s books.
Some of Dahl‟s stories contain more themes of nonsense literature than others
(they seem to be practically absent from, for example, Danny the Champion of the
World, while Charlie and the Chocolate Factory could almost be considered prototypical of nonsense literature, containing almost all of the themes mentioned above). Dahl seems to have found a healthy balance in his children‟s stories between the traditional folk tale and literally nonsense, both on a linguistic and thematic level.
40 6.2 Translating Nonsense
Not much academic literature deals specifically with the translation of nonsense, which is why the following section is partly based on Eva Kratochvilova‟s Master„s thesis from 2001, as well as on general translation strategies and theories that can also be employed in the process of translating nonsense prose. According to Kratochvilová, “all basic features and operations of the genre can be preserved in the target texts, provided the translator is aware of them“ (43). The analysis of Dahl‟s Czech translations will reveal that this statement is of extreme importance. Nonsense as a literary device must be recognized in the first place. It demands an in-depth analysis of the text and the relationship between its individual components (all the way down to the morphemic level), otherwise its inner logic gets weakened.
Levý divides the translation process into three crucial phases: comprehension of the source text, correct interpretation, and restylization to fit the target text (50). Errors may and do occur on all three of these levels, which can lead to a decrease in the accuracy and quality of the translation. He also distinguishes between two norms in translation. The first one is the reproductive norm, according to which accuracy and faithfulness are the most important factors in translation. The second is the artistic norm, which favours the aesthetical aspect of the translation, and tends to gravitate toward free translation and adaptation (82). A translator must correctly evaluate and determine the importance of both of these norms in the case of each translation and make choices during the translation process accordingly. Because of the nature of nonsense, an emphasis should be placed on the artistic norm during its translation.
Kratochvilová points out that literary nonsense “is undoubtedly a minor literary genre, yet it has enjoyed the attention of translators, who are probably attracted by the
41 challenging work connected to the translation of the playful, self-reflective texts” (45).
It should be added that the translation of nonsense, despite being popular among translators, is also one of the most challenging genres to translate, and is a frequent
“victim” of retranslation, thanks to its suitability to free translation. One need look no further than the most iconic nonsense work Alice‟s Adventures in Wonderland and its various Czech translations for proof of this statement.
Lecercle claims that English “is particularly suited for nonsensical linguistic play because of its analyticity” (167). While it is true that the nonsense tradition is deeply rooted in anglophone cultures, the popularity of the translations of Carroll and
Lear‟s work demonstrates that it is undoubtedly enjoyed in other countries as well. It is necessary to mention that this popularity is predominantly the merit of the respective translators in those countries, proving that English is far from being the only language suited for nonsense.
There are essentially three ways to translate fixed expressions and idioms that are part of nonsensical linguistic play. According to Mona Baker, fixed expressions and idioms are “frozen patterns of language which allow little or no variation of form and, in the case of idioms, often carry meaning that cannot be deduced from their individual components” (63). If a translator is lucky, a more or less corresponding phrase will exist in the target language. Needless to say that this is a not very frequent. When such a situation does arise, however, conversion is relatively straightforward and allows for a faithful translation. Sometimes, fixed expressions or idioms can be misleading because they have both a reasonable literal and idiomatic interpretation. Translators may therefore easily accept the literal interpretation and miss the play on idiom (Baker 66).
The most common situation is the non-existence of a corresponding phrase in the target language, because idioms and fixed expressions are often culture-specific. In
42 such cases different lexical items are used to express the same idea in the target text
(74). However, in a nonsense text both literal and idiomatic meaning has its place and purpose, an it is often very difficult to find a solution that will preserve both of these meanings, if not fully, then at least partially.
In such cases, translators have several options. The standard strategy is to preserve the deeper, idiomatic meaning and logic of the operation and change the individual words, which necessitates alterations in the context reflecting the literal meaning of the fixed expression (Kratochvilová 50). Such a strategy is considered successful because none or little of the pun is lost. However, it is not always possible to come up with a satisfactory substitution, and sometimes the translator chooses to artificially keep both the individual words and the deeper meaning at the cost of producing a slightly unnatural, unidiomatic expression in the target language.
The translator may also choose to preserve the literal meaning and alter the idiomatic one, while ensuring that it still fits the context. Sometimes the translator may even replace a fixed expression with an utterly different one, thus altering both the literal and the idiomatic meanings of the expression. Context is the most important aspect in both of these cases, and if an idiomatic meaning does not fit well into the entire text, it must be sacrificed, or, if possible (which it often isn‟t), changed accordingly.
When it is impossible for the translator to come up with a satisfactory solution in the target language, omission is employed as a last resort, but he or she may attempt to make up for it through compensation, that is, “employing the operation elsewhere, when the target language allows it, even though the source text does not require it at that place” (Kratochvilová 52). The purpose of this strategy is to preserve the style of the
43 source text, and it will therefore be one of the strategies analysed in translations of
Dahl‟s books.
When it comes to dealing with spoonerisms and play with spelling, translators often don‟t make use of a corresponding operation in the target language, despite the fact that it would allow them to do so. Kratochvilová‟s analysis of Czech translations of the “Jabberwocky” confirms this statement, showing that translators most often either omit or substitute the operation with a different one, such as adding or omitting a letter in the case of letter replacement, or punning where the source text omits letters in words.
Onič points out that the “survival of alliterations in the translation process is mostly random” and when it does occur, there is no proof of a clear strategy focusing on this linguistic element (273). Naturally, the nature of the target language will sometimes force the translator to make sacrifices, especially if the lexical items of the alliteration
(or rhyme) are very closely connected to the context. As mentioned before, context is of higher significance than stylistic figures in translation. This is why it is necessary that translators consider the text in its entirety before attempting to translate its parts.
According to the words of Snell-Hornby, text is a “complex, multi-dimensional structure consisting of more than the mere sum of its parts...whereby an analysis of its parts cannot provide an understanding of the whole” (69). Textual analysis therefore needs to be the first step in every translation process.
Repetition is also a significant operation of literary nonsense and it should be treated as such in translations. Despite this, translators are often indifferent to the stylistic significance of repetition and choose to omit it. Another prominent nonsense device is the use of simultaneity, namely punning and neologisms. Lecercle distinguishes between three types of puns: those playing on identity (pun proper), those
44 playing on similarity (interchanging two similar-sounding words), and puns playing with fixed expressions (1994). Puns proper touch the borders of translatability and it is sometimes necessary to employ omission or paraphrase in such cases and translate only part of the meaning. The translator should not, however, ignore the fact that there is a pun in the source text and translate literally. Once again, the coherence of the text must be maintained at all costs.It is up to the translator to decide what should be preserved and what to sacrifice in each particular situation. This decision-making process is used in the translation of the majority of puns (Kratochvilová 63).
In some cases, it may be feasible to preserve both of the meanings that the pun is based on. Despite the fact that it is tempting for a translator to select an option that is more or less equivalent to the source text, he or she must be very careful about the resulting impression of the pun in the target text. An overly earnest attempt at finding a corresponding pun in the target language may cause the entire structure to seem somewhat artificial. In such cases, it is better for the translator to remain slightly restrained and opt for a more “invisible” solution. According to Venuti‟s theory on a translator‟s invisibility, “a translated text...is judged acceptable...when it reads fluently, when the absence of any linguistic or stylistic peculiarities makes it seem transparent, giving the appearance that it reflects the foreign writer‟s personality or intention or the essential meaning of the foreign text – the appearance, in other words, that the translation is not in fact a translation, but the „original„”(1). The translator‟s main objective is therefore to render the translation as fluid and natural as possible, and he or she must attempt to find the right balance between creativity and apparent authenticity.
Where possible, puns can be substituted by a different nonsense operation, or, as in the case of fixed expressions and idioms, compensation may be used elsewhere, if the
45 target texts permits us to do so. Omission, once again, is the least desirable but unfortunately sometimes inevitable option.
Translators must always keep in mind that whatever solution they decide to employ may have effects elsewhere in the text, especially since repetition is a common nonsense literary device and phrases or concepts are often recycled throughout the text.
Solutions that work nicely in one passage may cause the coherence of the text to completely collapse elsewhere, and finding a one-size-fits-all translation is often tricky business.
Kratochvilová points out that translators are under constant pressure to decide which feature of the text has the highest significance and should therefore be preserved and which could possibly be sacrificed (68). Mostly there is no right or wrong decision and each occurrence should be evaluated individually. Very often it is a no-win situation, because part of the beauty and specifics of the nonsense genre is always lost in the process. It is due to the verbal nature of nonsense that translators are forced to make these highly complex decisions.
The second type of punning (on similarity) usually occurs in direct speech and is meant predominantly to amuse the reader. A word is exchanged for another similar- sounding one with a completely different meaning, but it is still possible for the reader to infer the correct word from the context of the phrase. Sometimes these types of puns are not commented on elsewhere in the text, in which case their translation is relatively simple and it is up to the translator to select the suitable lexical items in the target language. Puns playing on similarity that are tightly connected to context are less frequent, but require a more thorough analysis on the translator‟s part.
The translation of neologisms is an area where the translator can really demonstrate his or her creative side, but even here it is necessary to adhere to certain
46 rules. Newmark claims that “it is [the translator„s] duty to re-create any neologism he meets on the basis of the source language neologism,” (149) meaning that the method of neologism creation should be preserved in the target text. At the same time, the translation should preserve the meaning of the word the neologism is based on, or replace it with a close equivalent. There are essentially four types of neologisms: unmotivated, motivated, portmanteaus and false coinages. False coinages are especially tricky to translate, because they give a new meaning to an already existing word, and this meaning is not always suited for the target language. However, it is a strategy that
Roald Dahl seldom uses in his books for children, therefore it will not be subject to analysis in this thesis.
Once again, translators often don‟t employ corresponding operations in the target text, so unmotivated neologisms are sometimes translated as motivated ones or portmanteaus, and viceversa. Compensation is also used, as in the case of puns and idioms. What is essential is that the meaning of the target language neologism corresponds to the source language one, even if it is based on a considerably different word (it must evoke a similar image in the reader‟s mind).
According to Kratochvilová, Czech translators are very apt at naturalising neologisms; most of the time they seem to integrate them successfully into the target language and they usually show great resemblance to ordinary Czech words (83).
Robu claims that “translating nonsense language can be viewed as the translation of another translation,” (52) and in a way she is right. A translator must first decipher the nonsense code, only then is he or she capable of a faithful rendition of the source text in the target language. The entire process should begin with a thorough reading of the text as a whole, a stylistic analysis moving from macro to micro level. According to
Snell-Hornby, the first level is that of syntax (sentence structure and length,
47 arrangement of information, nominal and verbal style), followed by the level of semantics and lexis (word formation, the usage of multiple dimension with metaphor, wordplay and pun). The lowest level concerns elements within words, such as alliteration and assonance (121).
A careful analysis should be carried out to ensure that all of the devices literary nonsense employs have firstly been recognized and then correctly interpreted. Once this is done, the final step is to attempt to recreate as many of the nonsense operations as possible, while maintaining the naturalness and fluency of the target text. In the case of necessity, different operations or compensation may be employed where the target text allows it, and omission should be considered a last resort. All three of these phases are of equal importance to a successful translation and should never be underestimated.
6.3 Nonsense in Children‟s Literature
In order for us to comprehend the role and importance of nonsense in children‟s literature, it is necessary to present a brief history of the development of the genre. Rudd correctly points out that literature for children and the concept of childhood itself was
“constructed differently at different times and for different groups within any particular period.” (2010:12). During the Middle Ages, the difference between adults and children was not recognized at all, and most of what we define as children‟s literature today was passed down from generation to generation in oral form. Children became more literate with the invention of the printing press. However, all of the available literature was purely of a didactical nature. The seventeenth century gave rise to religious texts for children. One hundred years later, John Locke and Jean-Jacque Rousseau presented a new concept of childhood, in which they considered enjoyment and pleasure important
48 aids to learning (Bobulová et al. 20). This was when the first collections of fairy tales and adventure stories appeared. During the Romantic Movement in the ninteenth century, there was a regression to folk tales, and impossible fantasies became acceptable reading material for children. It was also a time when many new translations of children‟s literature appeared (Frimmelová, 16-19).
However, it wasn‟t until the mid-nineteenth century that the real turning point for children‟s literature came, most notably with the publication of Carroll‟s Alice‟s
Adventures in Wonderland. During this period, novelists explored “the limits of social expectation through linguistic experiment” and presented the “idea of nonsense as a force of the imagination, of nonsense as a challenge to the logic of adulthood and the law of civil life” (Lerer 191). Language became a game for them, not merely a static tool. What these writers wanted to demonstrate was the fact that languages are completely arbitrary and conventional systems of signification. They refused to be slaves to language and succumb to the rules human kind had assigned it. Carroll noted in his textbook Symbolic Logic that “no word has a meaning inseparably attached to it; a word means what the speaker intends by it, and what the hearer understands by it, and that is all” (qtd. in Lerer 193). He maintained that any writer of a book is fully authorized to attach any meaning he likes to any word or phrase he intends to use.
The book Alice‟s Adventures in Wonderland was revolutionary in many ways.
According to Hunt it did two startling things: it changed the idea of what children were allowed to think and, as a consequence, changed the tone of voice in children‟s books, introducing liberty of thought, which, at the time, was something unthinkable. He goes on to explain that the book places itself squarely on the side of an intelligent child- reader, one that does not need to be spoon-fed the rules and ways of the world and prescribed universal patterns of linguistic behaviour and creation. The implied child
49 reader is treated as an equal rather than a subordinate. This approach made it possible to explore more complex and “unacceptable” themes, because writers considered the child reading their book capable of handling them (2009).
In the end, as Booth points out, all narratives are didactic, regardless of stylistic devices or genre (1988). The educational aspect of the literature of this brave new world, which suddenly belongs more to the child-reader than the writer for children, is just as present as it had always been in what adults had defined as literature for children.
The main difference, however, was that it was presented in a less imposing way, disguised as humour and satire. The message, however, lived on behind the veil of the nonsensical. For example, according to Rudd, Roald Dahl can be seen as “remarkably didactic in…his disapproval of television…and of badly behaved children in general”
(2010:6) in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Despite the fact that the children get punished for their nasty habits in a very amusing way, there is no doubt about why they are being punished.
The two best-known representatives of the nonsense genre are naturally Lewis
Carroll and Edward Lear. The latter revelled in the sounds of words used in new ways, and in his poems, words that have specific, dictionary meanings fracture into nonsense.
His verses seem to respond to the social experience of childish vision and, in turn, to the ways in which a child‟s life seems to be upside down. It is no wonder, then, that most of the later writers of nonsense prose and poetry wrote primarily for children. Sir Walter
Scott, though not traditionally considered a nonsense writer, also had a significant influence on the genre and opened verbal doors to later novelists by coming up with
“new words, or strange sounds, that for most readers seemed all too close to nonsense”
(Lerer 191).
50 So how do nonsense and children‟s literature fit together? According to Lerer, nonsense “offers more than play or foolishness. It bridges the discourses of adult and children‟s literature, and it crystallizes our social and aesthetic attitudes towards words and their relationship to worldly things, human intention, and the pictorial imagination”
(192). Adults imagine the child as coming into this world as a sort of tabula rasa, ready to absorb and assimilate the information he or she is exposed to. The child is presented with a set of guidelines on how to behave, speak, write, and what to expect from others in various life situations, but to the child these linguistic and behavioural choices are new, and may therefore seem arbitrary. A child‟s liberal mind will question and attempt to bend these rules in order to understand the structure of the world around him or her.
And this process directly reflects the fundamental concept of nonsense literature.
Lerer‟s theory that nonsense literature mirrors a child‟s understanding of the world is undermined in a study by Marlene Dolitsky, in which she aims to show that children‟s understanding of and reaction to nonsense differs substantially from that of adults as well as from what adults imagine it to be. Dolitsky took two groups of nine- year-old children and taped their class discussions of a French translation of Carroll‟s poem “Jabberwocky”. The study revealed that the children‟s first reaction to the neologism-layered text was one of rejection and reluctance. They were aware of the fact that the author had wanted to express something by what he wrote down, and the words certainly evoked feelings and impressions, but the prevailing sentiment was one of uncertainty and inadequacy. The children did not seem to comprehend the playfulness of the “language game” and were predominantly disturbed by Carroll‟s work. However, it is possible that in a scholastic environment the children felt pressured to find a
“correct” answer, one which, in this case, did not exist. It is possible that they might
51 have reacted differently had they been reading the poem, for example, at home with their parents.
Gradually, the teacher managed to generate discussion, and the children began expressing their opinions and describing things such as overt actions, processes and personality, the dynamics of the story (with emphasis on movement), and covert processes. Dolitsky considers the last two topics an indicator of greater linguistic maturity, pointing out that these more mature children also participated more actively in the discussion and were more likely to want to persuade the others of their opinion.
These children mentioned things like the general plot and what the characters in the poem may be thinking, as opposed to the first group, which focused mainly on describing the individual elements and characters of the story.
Not yet understanding the specifics of the nonsense genre, the children in the study seemed reluctant to accept the idea that they themselves are free to assign any meaning they desire to the words. The results of the study suggests that the children did not understand the “rules of the game”. Their approach remained intellectual as they attempted to analyse the poem. Could this mean that the comprehension of nonsense is an acquired skill? One that enlightened parents should practice with their children in order to demonstrate that man is master of words, and not the other way around?
According to Dolitsky, a child‟s reaction to nonsense may also depend on his or her psychological state of mind (the children‟s interpretations of the poem varied significantly, and could have therefore been influenced by their immediate mood) and was influenced less by what the word meant to the child and more by what it associated the word with.
52 Just as in the case of adults, the children assigned word meaning mainly by phonetic or semantic association, metaphoric strategy or strategy of superstructure
(Dolitsky 50). Unlike in the case of adults, children gave very few compound, or portmanteau, interpretations, and they showed a distinctive preference for defining nominal neologisms. Their metalinguistic awareness was made apparent by the maintenance of word classes (55). The interesting thing is that the children often couldn‟t explain how they had arrived at certain interpretations, meaning that it seems to be an automatic process. Dolitsky concludes her study by stating that “it would seem that language-to-thought relations are more fixed and rigid for children than for adults and that the ability to assign meaning consciously and not automatically is a function of maturity and language development” (72).
Dolitsky claims that “the newness of the Jabberwocky words and images it gave rise to encouraged the use of both simile and metaphor” (48), but the children tended to anchor their interpretations into relatively transparent phrases, which suggests that children need the right mix of sense and nonsense to be able to appreciate the genre at all and not feel completely lost. One needs to keep in mind, however, that Jabberwocky is a very demanding example of nonsense literature, which can often take on much more simplistic forms that are less challenging, especially for younger children. Carroll, Lear and other nonsense writers (including Dahl, for the purpose of this thesis, although he is not officially characterized as such) wrote many works where they managed to find what seemed like the perfect balance between the familiar and the borderline, so as not to intimidate the child-reader. However, one tends to question the claim that their literature was meant predominantly for children, for they seemed almost to be writing for a fictitious reader, one that has a child‟s view of the world but an adult‟s
53 comprehension of it. Perhaps they were actually writing for the child every adult has hidden away inside.
A child reading nonsense literature clearly reacts in much the same way as Alice herself did upon hearing the “Jabberwocky” poem for the first time: “Somehow it seems to fill my head with ideas – only I don‟t know exactly what they are!” (Carroll 197). But nonsense is not about meaning, it is more about questioning the very meaning of meaning, and it could therefore possibly be the most stimulating literary genre for children, inciting imagination and forcing the mind to go beyond the conventional and the obvious. Dolitsky‟s study demonstrates, however, that a child must have a certain linguistic maturity in order to be able to appreciate the processes.
As Lerer concludes in his chapter on sense and nonsense in children‟s literature,
“nonsense is more than play, it takes us to the limits of expression” (208). In this sense, the nonsense form is much like visual art: it is characterized by an incongruity between production and consumption. The receptor‟s interpretation of a painting is never equivalent to the artist‟s intention. Every individual is free to draw his or her own conclusions and visual art (especially the abstract kind) is often evaluated more on the basis of the emotion it evokes than on established quantitative and qualitative standards.
Nonsense is the next level in linguistic stimulation of the power to create in one‟s mind.
A suitable comparison here could be made between a child watching television versus a child reading a book. The former is presented with a myriad of audio-visual and spatial information and most of the imagining has been done for him or her. The latter has nothing but words on paper, and it is up to the brain to create the necessary images, sounds and actions. Nonsense takes this process one step further: the child can no longer rely on the meaning of words to guide him through the story, he or she is asked to leave
54 the security of definition and grammar and venture beyond, into an unknown and fascinating world.
7. Translation Analysis
7.1 Objective and Methodology
The purpose of the following thesis is not to provide an exhaustive analysis of the individual translations, but rather to pinpoint examples of the author‟s literary style and look into how the individual translators dealt with them. This thesis is not focused on the poetry in Dahl‟s books for two reasons. Firstly, because only two of the nine books under analysis contain larger segments of poetry worth analysing. Secondly, the poems in these two books were translated by the same person, Pavel Šrut, who worked with
Jaroslav Kořán on Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and James and the Giant Peach.
The stylistic figures discussed here are widely used in poetry, but the process of and motivations for their translation differ largely, because their significance is generally higher in poetry than it is in prose. It is for these reasons that the poems have not been included in the analysis.
The nine English source texts and their Czech translations were compared manually, with emphasis on the aspects of author‟s style mentioned above, namely lexical, semantic, and phonological innovation and their subcategories. Instances of these stylistic figures were collected in Excel tables and each translator‟s choices were critically analysed. Other issues pertaining to children‟s literature, such as foreignization, domestication, and appropriateness, were dealt with marginally where necessary. The sections are divided by author, with an introductory paragraph
55 containing basic information on each translator (where possible – it was not possible to obtain any information regarding the translator Iva Nováčková).
One of the methodological issues of the analysis was what to define as deliberate alliteration. Alliterations occur naturally in language, especially in the case of two-word alliterations. For the purpose of this thesis, deliberate alliterations were selected from descriptive passages (where they were usually located at the end of a sentence) and direct speech (very often insults and exclamations).
In some cases, I have given myself the liberty of humbly offering my personal opinion on the translational choices, occasionally even suggesting solutions that would have been more faithful to the source text style. The aim is not to pass judgement on which of the translators is more apt at translating nonsense, puns and other stylistic figures. Each translator has translated a different Dahl book, and each book has its specific characteristics and translation obstacles. It would therefore be difficult to make an objective comparison in this sense. The goal is simply to draw attention to the fact that there is more to Dahl than just a chocolate factory, a giant peach and a captivating storyline. This is a descriptive thesis, and should be regarded as such.
Typographical innovation was not dealt with in the analysis. The general tendency of the translators is to remain loyal to the author‟s typographical scheme, to the point where sometimes the Czech translation has an unnatural intonation when read out loud (what an English speaker emphasizes through italics in a sentence is not necessarily equivalent to what a Czech speaker would emphasize). Occasionally italics are substituted for bold lettering and vice versa, and sometimes the italics are completely omitted, but this does not have a significant effect on the end result.
56 Furthermore, it would be impossible to determine whether the typographical choices were made by the translator him/herself, or by the publishing house.
Roald Dahl‟s writing style has, until recently, been largely overlooked, because critics have always reacted to aspects related to the content of his sentences rather than their structure. The hypothesis presented in this thesis takes this fact into consideration, and the assumption is that the translators will mostly overlook the stylistic figures present in the text and will focus more on the semantic content, tending either to translate literally or opting for less creative and more common idiomatic choices.
7.2 Charlie, Danny and James
One third of the Czech translations of Dahl‟s children‟s books were done by Jaroslav
Kořán, born in Prague in 1940. Aside from being a professional translator, he is also a scriptwriter, dramaturgist and photographer. He has translated over seventy British and
American novels into Czech by authors such as Kurt Vonnegut, John Wyndham or
Charles Bukowski (Klimecká 39-40). He has also translated many of Dahl‟s works for adults, such as Pig (Prase), Claud‟s Dog (Claudův pes), Twenty Nine Kisses from Roald
Dahl (Jedenadvacet polibků), Someone Like You (Líbej mě, líbej), etc.
For practical purposes, the three translations analysed in this chapter will henceforth be referred to only by the first word of their title and names of their principal characters, i.e. Charlie, Danny and James.
Charlie was, as mentioned earlier, translated in 1971 for the publishing house
Mateřídouška. It is, rather uncommonly for a translational debut, an abridged version totalling 96 pages, where the poetry has been cut down by at least one half and several
57 chapters, such as “Square Sweets That Look Round”, have been completely omitted.
Reading it, however, one gets the sensation that the book was first translated in its entirety and then later abridged. There are some minor differences between this translation and the unabridged version that came later (for example, Mr. Fickelgruber‟s name has not been translated into Czech), but most of the differences are an inevitable consequence of the abridgement. What is peculiar about this first Czech version is the erroneous numbering of chapters. Instead of chapters 19 and 20, chapters 17 and 18 are followed again by chapter 17 and 18. Furthermore, chapter 20 precedes chapter 27, and chapters 21 through 26 are missing completely. However, the chronological order of the text is correct, therefore this is to be considered a mere typographical error and not the consequence of abridgement.
Another interesting fact is that Charlie, being the first Dahl children‟s book to be translated into Czech, is a translation of Dahl‟s original 1964 book, where the Oompa-
Loompas are depicted as “a tribe of 3,000 amiable black pygmies who have been imported by Mr. Willy Wonka from the very deepest and darkest part of the African jungle where no white man had been before.” (Treglown, qtd. in Howard) After years of criticism, Dahl rewrote the passage about the Oompa-Loompas, making their skin rosy- white and giving them long fair hair. The Czech translation, however, was never revised, so the Oompa-Loompas in it still look like they were made out of chocolate, according to a comment made by one of the children.
In his translations, Kořán has been very creative with many of the charactonyms of Dahl‟s characters. A charactonym is a name of a fictional character that suggests a distinctive trait of that character. As Carta points out, names get translated in children‟s literature more often than in literature for adults because there is the assumption that children may experience difficulty in pronouncing and reading foreign names, and also
58 because the names in children‟s stories are often connotative (43). In James, Aunts
Sponge and Spiker become Tetička Bečková and Brčková. Not only does Kořán hold on to the alliteration, but he skilfully selects names that continue to reflect the physical appearance of the two women. In Charlie, Augustus Gloop is August Gdoule, a misspelling of kdoule, which pretty much sums up the boy‟s figure. Violet Beauregarde is Fialka Garderóbová, and even though the the last name is not necessary a charactonym, it reflects the original English one in the sense that it is of French origin.
“Fialka” is a literal translation that fits well into the story when the poor girl experiences the consequences of eating blueberry-pie-flavoured chewing gum:
“Violet, you‟re turning violet, Violet!” „Vždyť ty nám fialovíš, Fialko!“ (KTČ (CCF 124) 96) Veruca Salt becomes Saltini in Czech, perhaps suggesting an Italian background
(not a charactonym, however), and Mike Teavee is none other than Miky Telekuk, a semantically richer choice than the author‟s. With all of these secondary characters„ names translated into Czech, it comes as a surprise that the principal character, Charlie
Bucket, remains a Bucket. Willy Wonka‟s name is transferred without change, but his competitors all receive a beautiful Czech compound-word equivalent: Fickelgruber –
Krutichvost, Prodnose – Prkonos, Slugworth – Zakrejcar. And Kořán is much more convincing than Dahl when it comes to naming Russian characters. Charlotte Russe doesn‟t sound Slavic at all; Karla Karlovna Rusevová is much more realistic. “Cows that give chocolate milk” seemed a bit too long for the translator, so he simply called them “krávy kakaodojky”, gaining some plus points for alliteration in the process, which may have been an act of compensation for alliterations not translated in other places.
59 James Henry Trotter loses his middle name and becomes Jakub Tamtudy, and sometimes Kuba for his new insect friends (the Grasshopper, mainly). His friends lose the capital letter in their names, and their gender is emphasized: Centipede – stonožník,
Earthworm – žížalák, Silkworm – hedvábník, despite the source text referring to the
Silkworm as “she”, etc.)
Roald Dahl may seem like he invents a lot of words in his children‟s stories
(especially when appearing alongside other words that are neologisms), but the reality is that many of the words a reader may consider made-up actually aren‟t, they are simply uncommon, therefore even an adult reader may sometimes have trouble recognizing them. Towards the end of James, the citizens of New York are guessing what kind of creatures the travellers on the peach could be. Here are some of the words used, their definitions, and their Czech translations (only the last four are actually neologisms):
Creature Translation Definition wampus godzila a creature in American folklore, variously described as some kind of fearsome variation on a cougar manticore krokuta a Persian legendary creature similar to the Egyptian sphinx gorgon mrchodlav in Greek mythology, the term commonly refers to any of three sisters who have hair made of living, venomous snakes, as well as a horrifying visage that turns those who beheld her to stone cockatrice bazilišek a mythical beast, essentially a two-legged dragon with a rooster's head whangdoodle tlamouník - snozzwanger vrtičenich - vermicious hnida - knid chlamstavá prock pazřout -
In Danny, Kořán decided not to translate almost any of the names, surnames, nicknames, or places in the book, except for a car called Baby Austin (Bejbinka) and
Soapo, the name of Danny‟s birthday present: a full-size toy car made from soap boxes
60 and bicycle wheels. The translator opted for “bednolet”, inspired no doubt by the Czech word “prskolet”, used to describe a small and not very powerful motorcycle. Kořán is rather inconsistent in his choices of which names to translate and which to simply transfer. In Danny, he translates only the name of a certain Lord Thistlethwaite to Lord
Polyethylen. Admittedly it is a humourous solution, most likely motivated by the fact that Thistlethwaite would be quite a challenge for children, and possibly for parents as well, in terms of pronunciation. He also simplifies the spelling of Hazell to Hazel and
Clipstone to Clipston, although here the motivation behind his decision is less clear, because the spelling of other character surnames is not simplified.
It is interesting to see how Kořán deals with the BFG, who makes a short appearance in Danny at the beginning of the book, as part of a story Danny„s father is telling. Danny was published in 1990, and the BFG is translated here as “Obr kamarád”.
Eight years Jan Jařab renames him Moc Hodný Obr, or MHO, in the Czech translation of the The BFG, only to rename him again seven years later to ObrDobr in 2005. It is likely that the abbreviation did not appeal to Czech readers, possibly because abbreviations are less frequent in their native language.
In terms of domestication and foreignization, the translator has made what can be regarded as the necessary changes in order for children to understand the story better.
These changes mostly involve food and some explicitation regarding Anglosaxon culture. The Empire State Building acquires the definition “nejvyšší newyorská budova” in the translation, and the cruise ship Queen Mary becomes “slavná Queen Mary”.
Yorkshire pudding is described as “zlatohnědé křupavé těstíčko” and raisins are dipped into rum instead of gin. Marshmallows are translated as “ibiškový fondán”. Most Czech children nowadays know what marshmallows are, but at the time of the translation
61 maybe even the translator wasn‟t sure. And for possibly the same reason, zip gun has been translated as “prak”.
In terms of translating repetition Kořán often doesn‟t respect the author‟s repetition, which is sometimes results in a loss of rhythm, as the following example demonstrates:
“Then at last, when he could stand it „Teprve když už to nemohl déle no longer, he would peel back a tiny bit vydržetodloupl z jednoho růžku of paper wrapping at one corner to papírový obal a uždíbl z čokolády expose a tiny bit of chocolate, and then malinký kousíček...“ (KTČ 11) he would take just a tiny nibble...” (CCF 17) Without the repetition of tiny in the Czech translation, the phrase completely loses its cadence and becomes much more banal. But repetition in Roald Dahl‟s work is not sentence or even paragraph-limited, it usually weaves through his entire novel. Dahl deliberately uses the same words and phrases in various places in his books and translators, in an attempt to diversify his vocabulary in the translation, destroy Dahl‟s deliberate storytelling scheme.
The beauty of Dahl‟s characters lies, among other things, in the fact that they are often given very original and entertaining idiolects. In Danny, Dahl presents us with a certain Sergeant Samways, who is described as follows:
“Sergeant Samways had a funny habit of sometimes putting the letter h in front of words that shouldn‟t have an h there at all. And as though to balance things out, he would take away the h from all the words that should have begun with that letter.” (D 199) Kořán opted for a very different description of the sergeant‟s way of speaking in his translation:
„Seržant Samways mluvil, jako když má rýmu, i když ve skutečnosti žádnou rýmu neměl. Prostě tak směšně mluvil.“(D 138)
62 This is one example of how translators employ a nonsense operation in the target text which is different to the source text. Essentially, instead of alternating between adding and omitting a certain letter, the translator replaces at least one consonant in the majority of words with the letter b, to make it look as though the speaker hasn‟t blown his nose. The difference between these two approaches is substantial:
“What, may I hask, is „appenin„ „Bida, bida, bida. Copak se to tady around „ere?” (D 199) děje, sbíb-li se btát?“(D 138)
Kořán‟s translation is not as effective, especially when read out loud (not to mention that this is quite a difficult task). He could have chosen to give the sergeant a foreign accent, which would have allowed for a more structured and logical idiolect
(foreigners tend to repeat similar mistakes in pronunciation and grammar when speaking English).
The translator actively substitutes the imperial system for the metric in all three books, but for some reason his currency of choice in Charlie is American dollars, despite there being no mention anywhere in the source text that the story takes place in the United States:
“A WHOLE fifty pence!” (CCF 60) „Celý dolar!“(KTČ 46) “The coins were all five-penny pieces.” „Byly to samé deseticenty.“(KTČ 48) (CCF 63) One of the most prominent aspects of Dahl‟s style being alliterations, it is vital to look at how Kořán has dealt with them. Below is a list of alliterations that have been successfully transferred into the target language:
Panic and pandemonium Pozdvižení a panika Stopped and stared Zastavovali a zirali Enraptured, enchanted Uchvácen, unešen Twistings and turnings Obrátek a zatáček Misty moonlit Mlhavá měsíční Glints and glimmers Prosvítal a probleskoval
63 Considering that the analysis was one done on three two-hundred-page books, the number of alliterations in the Czech translations by Kořán is very low. For example,
Dahl uses the phrase “panic and pandemonium” a couple of times, but Kořán translates it slightly differently the second time, without using an alliteration (zděšení a panika).
The phrase “obrátek a zatáček” has been highlighted in red because, despite it not being an alliteration, it is still a rhyming assonance and both words have an equal number of syllables, so the effect is very euphonic.
The following is a selection of alliterations that, instead, have not been translated as such: great greedy gulps hltali plnými doušky rude and rambunctious chováš se jako hulvát a pořád jen každého urážíš sighing long and loud hluboce si povzdechla deaf as a doorknob hluchý jak poleno rumble and roar burácel a divoce ryčel sloshing and splashing stříkaly a tryskaly mystic and marvellous čarovná a podivuhodná whizzing whirring svištivý vířivý blowing up like a balloon nafukuješ se jako balón sizzled like a sausage upečou jako sele jiggled and joggled strkají a tlačí sliding and slithering klouzali a smekali se foul and filthy sprostý a hanlivý jumpy as a jack-rabbit nervózní jako opice madder than a mackerel užírá vzteky bloated old blue-faced baboon starý odulý paviáne hovering like a helicopter stál ve vzduchu jak helikoptera smug superior little smile samolibý nadřazený úsměv flabby folds of fat sádelnatými faldy the water came pouring and roaring voda se valila a lila a vířila a prýštila a down upon them, bouncing and kanula, linula se a proudila a chlístala a smashing and sloshing and slashing and kypěla a zurčela a šplíchala a crčela a hučela swashing and swirling and surging and a romonila cáchala whirling and gurgling and gushing and rushing
A closer look at the table on the preceding page reveals that the left column consists mainly of adjectives and similes, and that two-word alliterations prevail.
64 Sometimes, as in the case of “rude and rambunctious”, words are translated as entire phrases and therefore it is impossible to stick to the alliteration. Sometimes the translated phrase rhymes, but not enough to significantly stand out in the text. Similes are most often converted to idioms that are commonly used in the target language, rather than experimenting and trying to evoke a new image for the sake of alliteration.
For example, the simile “hluchý jako had” would not have the same effect as “hluchý jako poleno”, a common comparison in the Czech language, despite the fact that snakes don‟t have ears either. The English phrase “madder than a mackerel” is completely nonsensical, because a fish does not experience such a negative emotion, yet the concept of excessive anger is still transmitted well and the phrase serves its purpose while at the same time pleasing the ear. Kořán has opted for an unmarked utterance for the sake of naturalness, had he chosen a more original, and therefore marked solution, the phrase might have sounded too artificial. Invisibility over alliteration, in this case.
However, some of the phrases in the table above could definitely have been adapted for alliteration, for example, “hrubý a hanlivý” or “visel ve vzduchu jako vrtulník.” Also, the words in the last, long phrase could have been swapped around in order to have those beginning with the same letter next to each other. Since their order is random, it would have been a feasible solution.
Occasionally, however, the translation alliterates better than the original text, or the translator makes up for the lack of alliterations by placing one where the author did not (compensation). In such cases, “My father‟s deep dark secret” becomes “Tátovo temnotemné tajemství” and “...they were dumbfounded. They were bewildered and dazzled” becomes “...zaraženi. Zmateni a zmámeni.” The former example is one of those rare instances in which it is possible to use corresponding lexical items in the
65 target language that begin with the same letter. It is more a question of coincidence than deliberate choice.
Kořán does a great job with some of Dahl‟s neologisms. “Swudge” is Willy
Wonka‟s name for a sweet, minty, edible grass. Kořán has called it “mentolín”, emphasizing the mintiness. “Sugar power”, which is what Wonka‟s Great Glass
Elevator runs on, becomes “cukrolina”, which evokes the word “elektřina”.
“Splendiferous” is actually translated as the portmanteau „báchořečný“ in
Czech, despite being an existing, archaic word in the source language. Butterscotch and buttergin become rumola a slivokola.
There are several instances where the Kořán is forced to deal with punning. He does quite well with Violet‟s “By gum, it‟s gum” by opting for the more complex “U všech bublinovejch žvejkaček, to je žvejda!”. Other similar exclamations include “u sta hadic a žebříků”, which seems like an even more suitable exclamation for a fireman than “Snakes and Ladders”, despite it being a popular board game, and “u sta injekčních jehel” is surely a more original thing for a doctor to say than simply “Great Scott”.
Kořán‟s best translation of play on words is probably the following:
Storeroom number 77 – all the Skladiště číslo 77 – všechny beans, cocoa beans, coffee beans, jelly boby – kakaové boby, kávové boby, beans and has beans. závodní boby a nabobi. “Has beans?” cried Violet „Nabobi?“ vypískla Fialka Beauregarde. Garderóbová. “You‟re one yourself!” said Mr. „Právě takoví, jako jseš ty!“ řekl Wonka. (CCF 112) pan Wonka. (KTČ 86-87)
The pun in this case was a tricky one to translate, because Kořán had to find a word in which some kind of “bob” would be contained, and this word needed to be relevant to Willy Wonka‟s answer. The reason that Wonka replies “You‟re one
66 yourself!” is because Violet will soon be unvoluntarily leaving the factory. “Nabob”, which describes a wealthy, influential or powerful person, was a suitable choice here because it satisfies both criteria. It would have been even more effective (and less nonsensical) had the translator substituted Violet for Veruca, because she is the rich girl, spoilt girl of the group, therefore Wonka‟s answer would have suited her much better.
There is another pun in the same chapter that involves the act of whipping whipped cream with whips, which were translated into Czech as “pomlázky a metly”, and the act of whipping is “šlehání pomlázkou”. This doesn‟t work quite as well as the original, unfortunately. Immediately afterwards, Mr. Wonka explains that a poached egg isn‟t a poached egg unless someone has poached it, and Kořán translates this segment using “sázená vejce”, adding that they „nestojí za nic, když je nezasadíš a nepočkáš, až vyrostou.“
It is inevitable that some play on words used by Roald Dahl will be untranslatable from English to Czech. Here are some examples of puns that got lost along the way:
“It seems that almost everyone around „Tak mi připadá, že jste tady všichni here is loved!” said James. “How nice k pomilovaní!“ řekl Jakub. „To se mi this is!” líbí!“ “Not me!” cried Centipede happily. “I „Já ne,“ vyhrkl šťastně Stonožník. „Já am a pest and I‟m proud of it! Oh, I jsem škůdce a jsem na to hrdý! Ach, am such a shocking dreadful pest!” jaký já jsem odporný škůdce!“(JOB 85) (JGP 101) The pun here revolves around the word pest, which has two meanings in
English: that of an insect that destroys garden plants, and that of an annoying person. It is this second definition of pest that could not be transferred into the target text, because in Czech the word has only the former meaning. The Centipede‟s final exclamation reminds the reader of the phrase “Stop being such a pest!” which adults sometimes use with naughty children.
67 “She‟ll come to a sticky end one day, „Uvidíte, že se jí to věčné přežvykování chewing all that gum, you see if she jednou nevyplatí.“(KTČ 37) doesn‟t.” (CCF 49) Here Charlie‟s Grandma Georgina is talking about the chewing-gum addict
Violet Beauregarde, and she has chosen her words well, since chewing gum is adhesive, and will in fact cause Violet some serious problems. There is no equivalent phrase in
Czech.
“Whatever it is,” my father said, “I „Ať je to co je to,“ řekl táta, „byl bych wish to heavens she‟d stop running. rád, kdyby už přestala utíkat. Ještě It‟ll give the game away.” (D 190) všechno zpacká.“(D 135) Danny‟s father expresses his preoccupation about Mrs. Clipstone “giving the game away”, which of course means to reveal a plan or strategy, but in this case there is another semantic level involved, because Mrs. Clipstone is hiding a large number of pheasants in her pram, and pheasants are game.
There is also a scene in Charlie where Wonka is trying to explain that he has square-shaped sweets that look around with their eyes, except he uses the word “round” instead of “around” and so the children think he is trying to tell them that the square sweets in fact look spherical. There is a discussion between Wonka and the children, during which the words “look round” and “are round” are played upon. Round was translated into Czech as “vykulené”, but this is not the same as “kulaté”, so the passage loses much of its brilliance.
Kořán also has a tendency for omission. In some cases, he decides to omit a passage because there is simply no need for it in Czech and it would be untranslatable:
“Although actually you are quite right. She isn‟t really a worm at all. Glow-worms are never worms. They are simply lady fireflies without wings.” (JGP 50) Since glow-worm in Czech is larva světlušky, there is no need to talk about worms. Other times the translator omits because he considers the phrase redundant:
68 “The creatures, some sitting on chairs, others reclining on a sofa, were all watching him intently…So what would you call it if you saw a grass-hopper as „Stvoření, některá rozložená v křeslech, large as a dog? As large as a large dog. jiná pohodlně natažená na pohovce, ho You could hardly call that an insect, pozorně sledovala…Ale jak byste could you? There was an Old-Green- nazvali kobylku velkou jako pes? Velkou Grasshopper as large as a large dog jako veliký pes…A vedle konipasa si sitting directly across the room from hovel obrovský pavouk…“ (JOB 34) James now…And next to the Old- Green-Grasshopper, there was an enormous spider.” (JGP 39)
“This is Charlie. How d‟you do? And „A tohle je Karlík.“(KTČ 8) how d‟you do? And how d‟you do again? He is pleased to meet you.” (CCF 13)
7.3 George, Mr. Fox and Matilda
Jitka Herynková, translator of Fantastic Mr. Fox, George‟s Marvellous Medicine and
Matilda, was born in 1946 in Olomouc, where she studied English and Spanish at the
Palacký University. For many years she worked as a librarian here and in 1990 she was appointed head of the Foreign Relations Office. She has translated novels by several authors into Czech, including Ezra Pound, Jeanne Birdsall, Syrie James and Helen
Lawson (Obec překladatelů).
Below is a list of alliterations and their Czech equivalents in in Matilda,
Fantasic Mr. Fox and George‟s Marvellous Medicine:
scrunching and scraping vrzání a škrábání dead as a dumpling nadobro mrtvou dead as a dingbat nepověsíme jako nějakýho toulavýho psa miserable midget mizernej skrčku, trpaslíku watching and waiting hlídání a čekání stopped and sighed and sadly shook odmlčel, povzdechl si a smutně zavrtěl his head hlavou furry frump chlupatý bubáku
69 her boilers going to burst už to nevydrží huge horny hand velikánskou rohovitou ruku frisky as a ferret čilá jako fretka, zase jako čiperka goggled and gaped vyjeveně zírala s otevřenou pusou bugs and bogles štěnice a strašidla dotty as a doughnut úplně praštěná gasped and gurgled oddechovala a chrčela fried to a frizzle, boiled like a beetroot Usmažím se jak brambůrek, uvařím se jako vajíčko mad and marvellous bláznivé i báječné smoking blue and bubbling and modře kouří a bublá a šumí a pění frothing and foaming pork prickles, tender trotters, bristle Svědění, slabé nohy, sněť štětin a blight and swine sickness prasečí nemoc Helga‟s hairset úžasný účes always complaining, grousing, stěžují, bručí, brblá, vrčí, remcá grouching, grumbling, griping particularly poisonous obzvlášť otravné sting me into saying vyprovokovat k vyjádření boasting and bullying chvástání a sekýrování poisonous parent zlého rodiče sensible and solemn rozumně a vážně pale and pleasant přijemný bledý deep and dangerous hluboký hrozivý formidable female hrůzu nahánějící žena flushed and flustered zardělá a rozechvělá stank like a sewer smrdělo to tu jako v kanále barmy as a bedbug je protivná jako štěnice plain plump person nehezkou obtloustlou osobu sneaked like a serpent proplížil jako had bursting blister prasklej puchejři fleabitten fungus mizerná houbo clotted carbuncle malá nádhero
As you can see, the number of alliterations in the Czech translation is minimal, even though it would have easily been possible to alliterate more. Clotted carbuncle, for example, could have been “ucpaný uhr”, miserable midget could have become
“mizernej mrňousi”, and “her boiler‟s going to burst” might have been translated as
“brzy bouchne”, etc. Herynková, however, did not consider it a priority to retain what
Rudd considers one of the most prominent aspects of Roald Dahl‟s style in the Czech version of the books. Obviously, the translators are not expected to be able to transfer
70 all of the stylistic figures into the target language, and admittedly, in some cases it would be difficult, if not impossible, and may lower the overall quality of the translation, making it sound unnatural. However, had Dahl been alive and fluent in
Czech, he might have been disappointed to discover how little the translators of his children‟s books are playing with language and sounds.
Herynková also chooses not to translate similes like “dead as a dumpling/dingbat” and “dotty as a doughnut” as such, because death and madness and other abstract concepts are not usually used in similes in the Czech language. She merely emphasizes the extent to which one is dotty or dead (“nadobro mrtvý”, “úplně praštěný”). Her choices regarding the translation of insults are somewhat inconsistent, because sometimes she translates them literally (bursting blister - prasklej puchejři) and other times she opts for a more practical and general solution (clotted carbuncle - mála nádhero). Especially in Matilda, the theme of the insults is often some unalluring physical condition (scab, blister, fungus, wart), but this becomes much less prominent in the Czech translation.
As for domestication, Parkánová explains that “Bovril and Ovaltine” are
“instantní polévka a instantní káva bez kofeinu”, and a “soap-opera” is “americký doják na pokračování”. However, Golden Syrup remains “zlatý syrup”, despite the fact that this is a relatively unknown ingredient in Czech cuisine.
When it comes to translating names, in Matilda, Herynková transfers all of the first names of the characters into Czech (Matilda – Matylda, Michael – Michal,
Lavender - Levandule) and gives the important adults charactonyms that reflect their personalities: Wormwoods - Kazisvětovi, Miss Trunchbull – Slečna Kruťáková, Miss
Honey – Slečna Dobrotová. Matilda‟s classmates‟ last names also get translated.
71 Herynková creates most of the Czech versions of their surnames by translating one part of the English last name and adding a suffix to it:
Rupert Entwistle Rupert Zamotal Amanda Thripp Amanda Mašlatá Bruce Bogtrotter Bruce Bahnil Eric Ink Erik Inkoust Julius Rottwinkle Julius Hnilík Ollie Bogwhistle Ollie Bonzík
Another ingenious name translation is Crunchem Hall, Matilda‟s school, translated as “Drtičova škola”.
In Fantastic Mr. Fox, the only character names are those of the three farmers:
Boggis, Bunce and Bean, “one fat, one short, one lean”. Their Czech names also reflect their physical appearance: Soudek, Suk a Stýblo. All the other characters in the story are animals without special names, and in George‟s Marvellous Medicine, the only person whose name is revealed to the reader is that of Killy Kranky, George‟s father, and this
Herynková translated as Kazimír Chorý. The motivation of both the author and the translator for these choices is baffling; George‟s father is neither easily irritated nor ill.
There are some great examples of play on words in Matilda. During a scene where Matilda‟s class are taught by the Trunchbull, the headmistress gives one of the students a multiplication problem, managing to insult him at the same time:
“I have eight coconuts, eight monkey- „Mám osm kokosových ořechů, osm nuts and eight nutty little idiots like burských oříšků a osm natvrdlých idiotů you. How many nuts do I have jako jsi ty. Kolik mám těch tvrdých altogether?” (M 218) kousků dohromady?“ (M 220) Here the author plays upon two different meanings of the word nut: the fruit and the crazy person. This is a very tricky pun to translate, and Herynková attempts to make up for the lack of homonyms by using the word “natvrdlý” to describe the student and
“tvrdý” to describe the different types of nuts. The translator made a decent attempt, but
72 the Czech version is far less witty than the original. For the sake of puns this could be labelled quite a translation “oříšek”.
On another occasion, Trunchbull asks a different student to spell a word for her: “Now then, spell write.” „Tak tedy, hláskůj slovo oběd.“ “Which one?” Nigel asked. “The thing „Které?“ zeptal se Nigel. „To, co se jí v you do with a pen or the one that poledne, nebo myslíte objet autem?“(M means the opposite of wrong?” (M 146) 144-145) This translation was good choice, because the translator managed to find an equivalent pair of words in the target language. “Oběd” and “objet” are homophones that are pronounced in the same way but have a different spelling, much like “write” and “right”. The situation becomes a little trickier when yet another student is asked to spell the word „what‟:
“Spell what, you idiot! Spell the word „Hláskůj když, tupče! Hláskůj slovo „what‟!” „když‟!“ “W…O…T,” Eric said, answering too „G…Y…Š,“ odpověděl Erik příliš quickly. rychle. “Ah yes, I know,” Eric said. “It‟s got „No jo, už vím,“ opravil se Erik. „Je an H in it. W…H…O…T. It‟s easy.” tam D. G...D...Y...Š. To je lehké.“ …“It must be W…H…O…T…T.” (M …„Musí to být G…D…I…Š.“ (M 154) 152)
The problem here is that the mistakes the child is making in Czech are not very credible. A child would not be very likely to not hear the letter D in the word “když”, as in the case of Eric‟s first attempt. He would have been more likely not to hear the K.
The mistakes the child is making in English are much more believable, because he is attempting to spell the word “what” phonetically.
When the Trunchbull forces Bruce Bogtrotter to eat an enormous chocolate cake in front of the whole school, she is inspired by the English idiomatic proverb “you can‟t have your cake and eat it”:
73 “And now you‟ve got cake. What‟s „A teď máš dort. Co chceš víc, budeš ho more, you‟re going to eat it.” (M 127) jíst!“ (M 129) Not only does the Czech translation completely ignore this reference (which is understandable, because the equivalent does not exist in Czech) but the translation of
“what‟s more” is incorrect (it should something more like “a navíc, a ještě k tomu”). In order to translate it correctly, however, the translator would have had to understand the relationship between the verbs in the first and second sentence, which she evidently didn‟t.
Mrs. Wormwood explains to Miss Honey that the secret to a happy life lies in setting the right priorities for oneself:
“Looks is more important than books.” „Výzor je důležitější než názor.“ (M 98) (M 97) The archaic Slovakian word “výzor” is very awkward in this phrase. It is possible that most younger children would not know what this word means. It might have been more effective to opt for a solution like “líčeni je důležitější než učení”.
Homophones once again play a role in George‟s Marvellous Medicine, when
George goes looking into the garden shed for animal pills to add to his magic mixture:
“For horses with hoarse throats” „Pro koně při chrapotu.“ (JZM 32) (GMM 35) Once again, this is a difficult phrase to translate into Czech. However, the phrase would not necessary have to contain a homonymy to be entertaining and interesting.
One could utilize the name of an animal and disease that have a similar sound. An example could be “pro psy s psotníkem”. The fact that psotník is a disease dogs don‟t suffer from, because it afflicts only small children, does not matter, because a horse suffering from a hoarse throat is just as, if not more, ridiculous. Furthermore, “psotník” can be used in a figurative sense, where the phrase “Já z toho dostanu psotník” suggests
74 that one has gotten a big fright. This phrase could be played upon in the translation:
“Pro psy, co dostali psotník.”
Miss Honey‟s spoonerism COSY NOOK/NOSEY COOK is translated as the phrases “útulný kout” and “koukej se zout”. Unfortunately, the Czech translation is not a spoonerism, it merely rhymes. The translator could have tried to be more creative and chosen any name for the house that would allow for the switching of the first letters of both words to create a new, hopefully funny meaning.
One last thing worth noting is that in Fantastic Mr. Fox, Herynková tactfully omits a belching scene:
“This delicious meal…” he began, and „To výtečné jídlo…“ začal a pak se then stopped. In the silence that odmlčel. „…mě úplně odrovnalo,“ followed, he let fly a tremendous belch. dodal. “And I hope you have enjoyed it as „A doufám, že si to užíváte tak pěkně much as I have.” He let fly another jako já.“ colossal belch. „Vůbec o tom nepochybuj,“ řekl “Better out than in,” said Badger. Jezevec. (FPL 70-71) (FMF 77) This is the only instance in all of the Czech translations of Dahl‟s children‟s books where a translator has decided to omit undesirable conduct (despite the fact that the books are full of inappropriate behaviour, often worse than a bit of belching). It would be interesting to find out the motivation behind this choice, and whether it was
Herynková or the publishing house who considered this passage inappropriate for children.
75 7.4 The BFG
Born in 1965, translator Jan Jařab is both an author and translator of children‟s books
(W.P. Du Bois, Maurice Sendak). He has also published translations of modern
American fiction (Charles Bukowski, Richard Brautigan, Thomas Berger), essays by
Susan Sontag and nonfiction. His original profession is medicine, however, he has dedicated his time to human rights since 1999 – first in the Czech government, later in the European Commission, and today he works for the European Office of the UN in
Brussels (Meander).
As mentioned earlier, The BFG is a unique book because in it, Dahl has created a character with a very peculiar way of speaking. The language that the BFG uses reflects Dahl‟s writing style, and should therefore be considered his most representative work and the most important book in this analysis. It is layered to the brim with puns, alliterations, spoonerisms, neologisms and nonsense. Much of the story revolves around the dialogue between little Sophie and the Big Friendly Giant, so most of the text consists of direct speech. The other giants in the story speak in much the same manner as the BFG, which is why Rudd defined it as a sociolect.
The BFG explains to Sophie that he talks in a strange way because he never had the chance to learn proper English. His speech is therefore not unlike that of a foreigner.
Occasionally, however, in short sentences, he does manage to use the correct verb tense.
There is also a chapter in the book which reveals how the BFG writes. His writing is full of misspellings, lacks proper punctuation, and reflects his idiolect:
Today I is sitting in class and I discover that if I is staring very hard at my teecher in a spheshal way… …go and fetch you hat and cote…
76 …and then I is hearing my mummy‟s voice saying wake up your brekfust is reddy. (103) The following list compares the main characteristics of the BFG‟s speech in
English and Czech. Jařab‟s task was to create a similar idiolect in Czech for the giant:
Overuse and misuse of the present continuous tense
Examples: “I is needing to listen only to silence when I is mixing up such a knotty plexicated dream as this.” and “They is allowing me to hear absolutely every single twiddly little thing.” Since the Czech language doesn‟t have continuous tenses, the translator decided to express the BFG‟s errors through the overuse of personal pronouns. In Czech the use of personal pronouns in sentences is redundant, and could be one of the common mistakes a foreigner learning Czech and coming from an
English-speaking country, where personal pronouns are obligatory in sentences, may make:
“Tell me what you is seeing.” „Řekni mi, co ty vidíš.“ (30) (34) Failure to conjugate the verb be
Example: “Meanings is not important.” “Is” is the verbal form the BFG uses most often, even when talking about himself or in the plural. Jařab does not really make a distinction between this characteristic and the former one, but he chooses to have the
BFG incorrectly use prefixes to only slightly change the meaning of words, so that the intended meaning is still evident:
“I is trusting you.” (100) „To ti důvěřím.“ (97)
“I is remembering.” (63) „Už si připomínám.“ (60)
In the first sentence above, the translator incorrectly and deliberately added the prefix dů-, creating a word halfway between “důvěřovat” and “věřit”, which have slightly
77 different meanings. In the second sentence, the word “připomínám” is grammatically correct, but the prefix should be vz- instead of při-. Jařab could have used the same strategy as Dahl and made the Czech Giant speak something like this: “Já tobě věřit.” It would have been a rather banal and uncreative solution, however. Children reading this book will have to think about what they are reading and exercise their knowledge of word formation. Furthermore, Jařab inserted the personal pronoun “to” in the first sentence, making it even more grammatically incorrect.
Neologisms: nouns, adjectives and verbs scrumdiddlyumptious laskominkový mintick vteřiňátko uckyslush fujtajbl jiggyraffe žižrafa gobblefunk chmatlánkovat cattypiddler houslenka hipswitch natotáta whiffsquiddler blešťucha hippodumpling hrochodoch quogwinkle xafourek crocadowndilly krokodák trogglehumper krutihrb ucky-mucky škaredný phizzwizzard čarokrásník bellypoppers brtulníky frobscottle šumlenka grobsquiffler skrčkulík redunculous nezamysl flushbunking pleskotný whizzpopping vízřáchání snozzcumber fňokůrka swinebuggler sviňbulík disgusterous odpůrný crumpscoddle břinkoklouz
The table contains some of the compound words Dahl invented for the BFG.
Many of them are animals, such as crumpscoddle and whiffquiddler, and some are food and drink, like frobscottle and snozzcumber. The words used most often from this list are trogglehumper (a nightmare) and phizzwizard (a good dream). Gobblefunk, the only verb in the table, means to play with words. Jařab doesn‟t always translate these words into Czech as compound ones, often he will simply add or change a letter (odporný x odpůrný, žirafa x žižrafa). Nor does he transfer portmanteaus as such (see disgusterous and redunculous from the list). When dealing with animal names, however, he does usually manage to make up a compound word equivalent (sviňbulík, břinkoklouz, etc.)
78 Occasional mispronunciation of words
Examples: “langwitch” instead of “language”, “poisnowse” instead of
“poisonous”.
Jařab traslates these misspellings and mispronunciations by doing the same in
Czech: poisnowse becomes “jedovitý” and langwitch becomes “jazylka”. The second time langwitch appears in the text, Jařab translates it as “řeč”, but does not decline the word correctly: “Tak úplně nevyrozumím jeho řeč.”
Frequent use (and misuse) of idiomatic phrases and sayings
Examples: “I is beginning to see where you is driving to” instead of “I see where you‟re headed/going” and “we had better get crackling” instead of “cracking”.
Dahl Jařab Original Expression disappearing in thick air prostě opařit disappear into thin air you is not twiddling my nevěšíš mi bublíky na are you pulling my leg leg nos one right is not making nečiň ty druhému, co two wrongs do not make two lefts třetí čtvrtému a right save our solos, deliver us zachraň se kdo musíš, save our souls, deliver us from weasels, the devil is budiž nám nebe from evil, the devil is dancing on my dibbler milostivo, toho jsme dancing on my shoulder byli čertovi dlužni out of the window úplně vyloučené out of the question barking up the wrong dog pláčeš na nesprávném barking up the wrong stromě tree we must go pell-mell for musíme teď jít rovnou to go hell for leather leather now po věci bug as a snug in a rug sedět jako bavlnce na snug as a bug in a rug jehlách curiousity is killing the rat kdo je zvědavý, bude curiosity killed the cat brzo plešatý once in a blue baboon jednou za turecký rok once in blue moon skin and groans kost a růže skin and bones shoot away posluhuj si fire away
79 As you can see, Dahl‟s technique is usually to substitute a word in the expression either with a word that rhymes with it, or change the position of the words in the phrase. Jařab has managed to copy this technique in a couple of cases, once even retaining the semantic connotation (starý x plešatý). Strangely enough, there are two instances where the substitute word is semantically bound to the original English phrase
(hrobě x stromě and turecký x moon). Some of the translations are simply gramatically incorrect (posluhuj si x posluž si, jít rovnou po věci x jít rovnou na věc) or the collocation is wrong (úplně vyloučené x naprosto vyloučené).
Spoonerisms
The spoonerisms that the BFG uses are both intra and extralexical, meaning that not only the first letters of different words, but also consonants and vowels within the same word are swapped. Here are some examples of spoonerisms in The BFG:
Dahl Jařab Original Word porteedo portédo torpedo prossefors prosefory professors Dahl‟s Chickens Dahl‟s Chicken Charles Dickens gun and flames Palba propukne Fun and games curdbloodling Ztuhne žíla v krvi bloodcurdling crook and nanny Od dola shorů Nook and cranny catasterous disastrophe Katastrální strofa Disastrous catastrophe rommytot prupindy tommyrot
The first two examples were simply transferred into the target language without having to be translated. And Jařab doesn‟t make any attempt to translate “Dahl‟s
Chickens” into Czech either, so the readers will miss the semantic dimension of the spoonerism and might not even make the connection with the writer Dickens.
“Průpindy” is most likely a portmanteau of “průpovídky” and “pindy”. “Curdbloodling” has been translated as an entire phrase in which the words “krev” and “žíla” have
80 swapped places. “Palba propukne” is probably a variation on “válka vypukne”. The only real spoonerism in the Czech translation is “od dola shorů”, but “katastrální strofa” is also an interesting solution; it almost seems like the division of a portmanteau, had katastrofa been one.
Unconventional similes and a strong inclination towards alliteration
This characteristic is valid for all the giants. Some of the similes used include
“dotty as a dogswoggler” (trhlý jako taprapír), “deader than duck soup” (mrtvější než kachní polívka), “fast as a fizzlecrump”, (rychle jako šipkoun), “helpless as horsefeathers” (bezmocní jako berančí peří), “rotten old rotrasper” (ohrtavnice ohavná) and “jumpsy as a joghopper” (juklavý jako plašenka). The translator is not afraid to invent neologisms if the situation calls for it (for example, ohrtavnice), and since most of these phrases are nonsensical, he can let his imagination roam free. These examples are great opportunities to transfer the stylistic figure of alliteration, because the words are not semantically bound to each other. However, Jařab only alliterates in half of the cases.
As for alliteration that is not part of a simile, it mostly occurs in insults:
serious and snitching vážná a svižná filthy old fizzwiggler hnatemnice hnusná venomsome vindscreen viper jedovitá hadice karburátorová flushbunking flurry hromobleskový spěch mince my maggots u všech všudybuchů, swipe my swoggles u sto hromocvoků ruddy little runt skrčku smrštěný troggy little twit mrňavulo molousavá shrivelly little shrimp tintěro třtinová mucky little midget kvičalo kviklavá squaggy little squib šintouchu šimravý squinky little squiddler šinťavý šimrouch, pibbling little pitsqueak pinoživý pískva
81 Once again, seeing as there is no semantic or idiomatic link between most of the individual elements of the alliteration, Jařab has no problem alliterating almost every phrase in Czech. In the first phrase, although he was not able to alliterate, he at least rhymed. “Venomsome vindscreen viper” is a pun used in a situation where a giant confuses a snake (viper) with the object that is used to clean windscreens (wiper). This is why the translator chose to retain the automobilistic element (hadice karburátorová) in the translation.
As a translator, Jařáb is forced to deal with a lot of puns throughout the book.
Some of them were tackled better than others, and below are some examples that fall into both of these categories.
All throughout the story the giants use the malapropism human bean (instead of being), which Jařab blended into “čoklidi”, because he needed to be able to utilize the term appropriately in the following passage:
“The human bean is not a vegetable.” “Oh, but the bean is a vegetable,” Sophie said. (28)
„Máš rád sladkosti?“ zeptala se Sofie v naději, že odvede konverzaci směrem k nějakého méně nebezbečnému druhu jídla. “Do you like vegetables?” Sophie asked, hoping to steer the conversation „Čoklověk nepatří mezi sladkosti.“ towards a slightly less dangerous king „Ale čokoláda ano,“ řekla Sofie. (25) of food.” The end result doesn‟t quite have the same effect, and “čoklověk” sounds more like a portmanteau of “čokl” and “člověk” than of “čokoláda” and “člověk”.
In one of the most famous scenes in the book, the BFG explains to Sophie that humans from each country taste differently. Dahl plays with the literal meaning of country names, and Jařab was therefore forced to adapt the nationalities in order to not
82 lose the pun. The BFG tells his little friend that Turks taste like turkey (turecký med),
Greeks from Greece taste greasy (Řekové mají pachuť říčního bahna), the Welsh from
Wales have a fishy taste (Skot chutná po hovězím – po skotu), people from Jersey have a wooly taste (Srbové mají kovovou příchuť jako srp), etc. At one point things start to get a little confusing:
“Danes from Denmark is „Čoklidi z ostrova Capri, ti tasting ever so much of dogs,” the chutnají co nejvíc po rybách,“ Giant went on. “Of course,” Sophie pokračoval Obr. „Samozřejmě,“ said. “They taste of great danes.” přikývla Sofie. „Chutnají po kaprech.“ “Wrong!” cried the Giant, „Špatně!“ zvolal Obr a plácl se slapping his thigh. “Danes from do stehen. „Čoklidi z ostrova Capri ti Denmark is tasting doggy because they chutnají po rybách, poněvadž chutnají is tasting of labradors!” po sardinkách!“ “Then what do the people of „A jak tedy chutnají lidé ze Labrador taste of?” Sophie asked. Sardínie?“ zeptala se Sofie. „Po “Danes,” the Giant cried, kaprech,“ odpověděl Obr vítězoslavně. triumphantly. “Great danes!” (28-29) „Přece po kaprech, ne?“(26) This adnominatio continues further on in the book, where the BFG talks about people from Wellington tasting of boots (Jařab converts this to Línec in Rakousko, and explains that the people there taste like “rákosky”. Perhaps a simpler option would have been to say that people from Línec taste like linecké). Yankee Doodles become Holí
Anďané, and Hottentots (a derogatory term for a tribe in Southwest Africa) are translated as Ohniváci. Swedes are popular among giants for their Sweden sour taste
(read „sweet and sour‟), but in Czech they become Španělé, “pro tu chuť španělských
špačků.” In the English text, Chileans are chilly, but Jařab makes them people from
“Zimabwe”, suggesting that the misspelling gives them a cold quality, while completely ignoring the geographical position of the country. The translator makes use of misspelling again later on:
“I is off to Baghdad and I is one of their ten children as well!” going to Baghdad and mum and every (174)
83 „Utíkám do Paktátu, schlamstnu (163) mámu, pak tátu a deset dětí k tomu!“ When the BFG decides to give one of the other giants a nightmare, the giant dreams about a certain Jack with a beanstalk. This is an allusion to the English fairy tale
“Jack and the Beanstalk”, in which a young boy kills a giant. The fairy tale is not very well-known in the Czech Republic, so Jařab domesticated this passage by replacing
Jack with David, from the biblical story of David and Goliath, where David‟s weapon is a sling instead of a beanstalk.
Occasionally, the BFG gets carried away with his words, as in the following example:
“Oh, Queen! Oh Monacher! Oh, „Ó, královno! Ó, monarchyně! Ó, zlatá Golden Sovereign! Oh, Ruler! Oh, panovnice! Ó, vládkyně! Ó, vládkyně Ruler of Straight Lines!” (159) všeho vlání!“ (147)
Earlier in the book, the BFG makes another reference to the Queen of England:
“They is at least two times my wideness „Jsou tuplem mojí širokosti a and double my royal highness!”(36) dvojnásobkem mé královské výsosti!“(32) Jařab was unable to find the corresponding homonyms in Czech, but he managed to approximate the monarchical puns by first using a pair of words that sound as though they have the same root, even though they don‟t (vlání x vládkyně) and then by using two words that do have the same root, but a completely different meaning (výsost x výška).
When Sophie looks at some of the labels on the jars containing dreams in the
BFG‟s cave, she reads about a dream in which a boy makes himself a pair of suction boots and is walking along the ceiling when his sister comes into the room and asks him what on earth he is doing. This is the boy‟s answer:
84 “I told you you was driving me up the „Povídal sem ti přece že máš v hlavě wall and now you has done it.” (105) všecko zhůru nohama a teď to jasně vidíš že sem měl pravdu.“ (95) There is no corresponding phrase in Czech, so the translator opted for “máš v hlavě všecko vzhůru nohama”, which doesn‟t work near as well and sounds a little clumsy.
One of the giants tells the BFG that he is off to see Mrs. Sippi and Miss Souri.
This pun is especially effective when read out loud. Jařab translates it as “starou
čukotkou a mladou kamčatkou”, two Russian peninsulas. It was very well, because both of names are feminine and the terms old and young are often used in Czech when talking about women or men.
7.5 The Witches
Hana Parkánová-Whitton was born in 1950 in Prague. She studied Czech and English at
Charles University, and then worked for twenty-five years in publishing, most recently as editor of Knižní klub. In addition to publishing activities she devoted herself to translation (over 50 books) and her own literary creation. She is the author of Jak si vypěstovat na anglické zahrádce českého trpaslíka and Jak se po anglicku vytratit v
Anglii. She has also written the acclaimed historic novel Zimní královna. In 2001 she married an Englishman and now lives mainly in the UK. She has founded a literary agency, continues to translate and collaborates with Český rozhlas on programs about
Great Britain (Databáze knih).
Parkánová has chosen not to translate any of the character or place names in the novel, but she does have fun with the names of the different creatures the witches must catch in order to make the Delayed Action Mouse-Maker:
85 gruntle poletucha čunivá crabcruncher krabák drtivý babblesnitch frňák ukecaný grobblesquirt chrlič nenechavý catspringer skočkodan kočkovitý
Her translations are based on the binominal nomenclature used to classify living organisms in biology, which makes the animals seem more realistic. In “skočkodan” she cleverly combines the Czech word for cat with the word “skoč”, meaning to jump or spring.
The Witches contains yet another example of a character‟s distinctive idiolect.
The English version presents us with a Grand High Witch who has what could be defined as a German or Germanic accent. She pronounces w as v, and has a tendency to roll her r. In the Czech translation, Nováčková, instead, gives her a lisp and makes her roll only her ř:
“You may rrreemoof you vigs!” (69) „Můžete fi fundat paruky“ (51)
Considering that this is supposed to be the most dreaded and dreadful witch on the planet, one questions whether giving her this sort of a speech defect in Czech was a wise decision.
Being a foreigner, the Grand High Witch gets her idiomatic phrases confused sometimes:
“Vee will vipe them all avay! Vee will „Fmeteme je z povrchu zemfkého. scrub them off the face of the earth! Odfraníme je z tváře země! Utopíme je Vee vill flush them down the drain!” na lžíci vody!“ (Č 55) (W 77) The correct phrases are, of course, “to wipe something off the face of the earth” and “to flush something down the toilet”.
86 There are several mistranslations in the book worth mentioning. The most awkward one involves a cook complaining that a mouse has gotten into his underwear:
“It„s running around in my flaming „Pobíhá mi dokola v červených knickers!” (171) trenýrkách!“ (116) The translation of the entire phrase is somewhat clumsy, but what is completely mistranslated is the word “flaming”, which, in this case, is used as an interjection. It is certainly not meant to be describing the colour of the man‟s boxers.
Here is a list of a few more mistranslations in The Witches:
“I expect there„s rats scuttling all over „Jsem přesvědčená, že vám krysy the kitchen floor and stealing the food off prohryzaly podlahu v kuchyni skrz naskrz, the shelfves...” (53) chodí tam na potraviny...“ (41) …the summer holiday guests in this …proudil hovor hostů, kteří v tomto rather grand hotel were babbling away poněkud rozlehlém hotelu trávili letní and tucking into their suppers. (177) dovolenou a teď se šťourali v jídle. (119) „It‟s been terrific,“ I said. „Absolutely „Bylo to příšerné,“ řekl jsem. „Naprosto terrific.“ (190) příšerné.“ (129)
Most of the examples above have one common denominator: the translator mistranslated the underlined words because she incorrectly interpreted Dahl‟s own idiolect and distinctive narrative voice. “Flaming” is a euphemism for a very vulgar swear word in British English, “grand” can be large, but it in this case it means impressive, and “terrific” is a synonym of fantastic in British English, not terrible. As for scuttling, it is the act of moving hastily with small, short steps, a synonym of scamper and scurry. The translator erroneously translated the definition of the transitive verb scuttle, which means “to cut a hole through the bottom, deck, or side of (a ship), or specifically to sink or attempt to sink by making holes through the bottom“. This definition, however, makes little sense in the context of the story. Frankly, mice are not very often seen eating through a floor, and their intention was hardly to attempt to sink the kitchen. Last but not least, “tucking in” means starting to eat something eagerly,
87 which is practically the opposite of the word the translator used. It is possible that she confused it with the phrasal verb “poke at”.
The table on the following page contains some examples of alliteration: bald as a boiled egg hlavu má plešatou jako koleno frizzled like a fritter spálit na škvarek frighful and frightening nejhrůznější a nejděsivější shrunken and shrivelled seschlá a samá vráska squashed, squirted, squittered and frittered rozdrceno, rozcupováno, rozmetáno, rozřřřezáno foul and filthy ušmudlané a smradlavé ghoulish grins ďábelsky se křenily wipe them all out like weasels skoncuju s nimi jako s lasičkami swipe, swizzle rozmetáme, roztrháme stinks like a sewer smrdí to jako stoka brainless bogwomper nemyslící náno blue as a bilberry modré jako borůvky stiff and silent ztuhla a ztichla silly slob pitomo fit and frisky v kondici, abych byl mrštný swift and silent mrštně a tiše searing scorching feeling sžíhající a sžírající pocit suck and sniff nasavat a cenichat squish and squallop and squiggle rozdrtíme, smeteme z povrchu zemskeho a zašantročíme proof of the pudding zkouška praxí swish them and swollop them vysmrkáme je a vypudíme squish and squiggle them zašantroč je, šup s nimi pryč
Dahl‟s favourite consonant in this book seems to be S, for he uses it abundantly in his alliterations. The real beauty of Dahl‟s lexicon lies in the fact that even though he uses a myriad of words that the average 8-11 year-old cannot possibly know, the sound of the words often hints at its meaning. Thanks to this technique in conjunction with context, the child reader is able, in most cases, to deduce or infer the meaning of the language, and it becomes obvious that swipe and swizzle, for example, are a violent means of destroying someone.
88 In the phrase “frightful and frightening”, the words not only alliterate, but they also contain the same root (fright). It would have been effective if the translator had attempted to find a similar example in Czech (a couple of possibilities that come to mind are “nejhroznější a nejhrozivější” and “nejstrašnější a nejstrašlivější”)
Neologisms in The Witches include the portmanteaus giganticus, frumptious and fantabulous, which were translated as gigantikózní, srandózní and baba-báječná, respectively. The first is a simple transfer, the second involves the collapsing of the words “srandovní” and “famózní” into one, and the third most likely alludes to the Baba
Yaga of Slavic folklore. Only the second word copies Dahl‟s technique. Other neologisms include bogwomper (an unspecified insult) and boshwolloping (an adjective that could mean almost anything, but is in any case highly expressive). The first has been translated as “náno” as part of the alliteration in the table above, and boshwolloping was defined as “děsuplně praštěný”, which, quite frankly, doesn‟t have the same ring to it.
Parkánová manages to alliterate several times by using the prefix roz- in Czech, mostly in the direct speech of the Grand High Witch. Other instances of alliteration in
Czech seem to be more frequent than in the case of Kořán and Herynková.
Another one of Dahl‟s techniques includes stacking adjectives and verbs one after the other. The translator, however, prefers to divide this “list” into several sentences, thus changing the rhythm:
“…plotting and scheming and vražednými, krvelačnými myšlenkami, churning and burning and whizzing bude jimi rovněž hýřit a v hlavě ji budou and phizzing” (7) vřít.“ (7) „…kutí piklů a bude vřít vymýšlením pletich. Bude kypět a hořet
89 There are not many puns present in this Dahl novel, but here are at least two examples, one of which was completely lost in the process of translation:
“Children are smelling of dogs‟ „Děti smrdí jako pfí hovínka!“ hřímala drrroppings!” screeched the Grand Hlavní nejyšší čarodějnice. „Fůůůj!“ High Witch. “Pooooooo!” cried the řvalo hlediště. „Fůůůj! Fůůůj! Fůůůj!“ audience. “Poooooo! Poooooo! (55) Poooooo!” (77) In this passage, Dahl plays with the word boo, used by a crowd to express disapproval and discontent, and the word poo, a synonym for dogs‟ droppings. The translator most likely did not notice this pun, because in Czech it would have satisfactory to substitute the word fůj with hnůj, and the end result would have been similar.
In this next example, Grandma is explaining to her son why the Grand High
Witch kills at least one witch at every Annual Meeting:
“She does it in order to keep the rest of “Děla to, aby ty ostatní udržela hezky v them on their toes.” pozoru se scvaknutými patami a spičkami.” “But they don‟t have any toes, Grandmamma.” (130) “Babi, ony ale žádné špičky na nohou nemají.” (90)
The solution opted for by the translator does not work as well as the original, but it could be considered a satisfactory attempt. Another option could have been to go along the lines of “Ostatní kolem ní raději chodí po špičkách,” meaning that they want to be noticed as little as possible in order not to get into trouble.
When Grandmother goes to dinner alone and the waiter asks her where her grandson is, she replies that “he‟s not feeling very well.” The ordinary phrase was converted into a pun by Parkánová when she translated it as “necítí se nějak ve své kůži”. This phrase has a double meaning, because not only is Grandmother pretending
90 that her darling is ill, she is also alluding to the fact that he has been turned into a mouse and is no longer a little boy.
7.6 The Twits
The Twits were translated by Iva Nováčková. She ingeniously chose the name
“Prevítovi” for the married couple who are the main characters of this book, despite the fact that the word twit has a slightly different meaning in English. Her choice was motivated by the actions of the characters, who are mischievous and plotting and disliked by everyone around. Other translations of names include “slizotřas obrovský”
(Giant Skillywiggler), “Hulahop” (Muggle-Wump) and “Ptáček Baculáček” (Roly-Poly
Bird), who retains his rhyming assonance. Hugtight sticky glue was translated as
“Pevnědrželovo lepidlo” and Squiggly Spaghetti became “špagety kroutivky”, losing the alliteration.
Nováčková is the only translator who decided to not switch from the imperial to the metric system for measurements. Her motivation may have been that the subject is only dealt with once in the book and isn‟t significant to the main storyline.
The following table contains Nováčková‟s translations of alliteration:
Whiskery old warthog starý štětinatý vepři Fatty folds of his flabby neck v tučných záhybech jeho ochablého krku Frumptious freaks příšerné obludy Dropped his dirty droppings upustil svůj nechutný ptačinec Filthy freaks odporná monstra Grand and glorious living room velkolepý a úžasný obývák Pulling and puffing tahali a funěli Ghastly garden příšerné zahradě Bundle of balloons balík balonků Terrible twits strašné prevíty Watch you like a wombat sleduju tě jako ostříž
91 Giving her another grizzly grin se na ni mrzutě zašklebil Ghoulish grin ďábelským úsměvem you grizzly old grunion, you rotten old ty starý mrzutý medvěde, ty starý turnip, you filthy old frumpet prohnilý tuříne, ty starý špinavý obejdo He gaped, he gasped, he gurgled vyvalil oči, zalapal po dechu, zachrčel I‟ll swash you to a swizzle, I‟ll gnash sešlehám tě do šlehance, sešvihám tě do you to a gnozzle, I‟ll gnosh you to a švihance, seřežu tě do řezance gnazzle Filthy feathery frumps hnusní opeření zmetci wriggled and squirmed, and squiggled se vrtěl a kroutil a vlnil a svíjel a and wormed, and he twisted and turned, překrucoval a otáčel a kolébal a motal and he choggled and churned
Because the Twits is a relatively short novel, the table above contains all the instances of what is assumed to be deliberate alliteration. Dahl‟s favourite letters here are evidently F and G, and he recycles words like “freaks” and “grizzly” throughout the story. Situations where the translator has transferred the alliteration are highlighted in red, but mostly it seems that Nováčková paid little attention to this stylistic figure and didn‟t consider it important. She does, however, choose to alliterate one Czech sentence that is not alliterated in English, and does so by repeatedly using the prefix “při-”:
“They were pinned down, cemented, „Byli přichyceni, připevněni, přilepeni k glued, fixed to the floorboards.” (88) podlaze.“ (77) Czech is a language where prefixes are widely utilized to create new meaning and to express completion and change of state. The real question, however, is whether the translator chose this option because it was the first thing that came to mind, or whether she went out of her way to seek an alliteration for the sake of euphony and author‟s style. This question, of course, is valid for all the translators mentioned here.
Several of the alliterations contain the word “old”, which Nováčková literally translates as “starý”, perhaps not realizing that Dahl uses this word more as an interjection than an adjective. It is to be regarded more as a stylistic tool than an actual semantic unit. Jařab, in fact, understood this and almost never translated instances of
92 “old” and “little” in alliterations in The BFG (see page 80). Dahl merely inserts this word between two adjectives to render the phrase more rhythmically appealing:
“You grizzly old grunion, you rotten „Ty starý mrzutý medvěde, ty starý old turnip, you filthy old frumpet!” prohnilý tuříne, ty starý špinavý (41) obejdo!“ (30) Being a two-syllable word in Czech, “starý” doesn‟t have the same cadence as does “old” in English. Its position as the first word in the sequence further diminishes the melodiousness of the phrase. Lastly, “old” is used much less frequently as an insult in our language. Its use and repetition therefore doesn‟t have an equivalent effect, and the Czech translation would have seemed much more fluid had Nováčková completely discarded the word.
The Twits is a very short book and contains only one example of a play on words:
“Poor muggles has gone off his wump „Nebohý hulahop přece jen přišel o at last.” (75) rozum.“ (65) The original phrase “he has gone off his rocker” has been altered here and the word “rocker” has been substituted by the second part of the monkey‟s name. In order to be able to translate it into Czech, Nováčková would have had to select Muggle-
Wump‟s name more carefully, and with this pun in mind, but admittedly it is not easy to capture the essense of this sentence in the target language.
Dahl repeatedly uses the word “trick” in this book, and Nováčková opts for several different translations of the word. We can encounter the word as “fígl”,
“vylomenina” and “lest”, and this increases the overall type/token ratio of the translation. The other translators also had the tendency to do this. For example, the word
“marvellous” was translated in Danny as podivuhodný, senzační, skvělý, výborný and fantastický. Translations of the same word in the other books most often included
93 báječný, úžasný, bezva and parádní. The same counts for “beast/beastly”, which were translated as anything from hnusný, zlý, nelidský, odporný, protivný, šeredný and ohavný to nezvedenec, štěně, ničema, syčák, bestie, lenoch and neřád.
8. Summary and Conclusion
The analysis has revealed several tendencies regarding the translators„ approaches to the translation on nonsense. One of the most prominent patterns that emerged in the preceding chapter is a certain lack of consistency, suggesting that the translators do not not approach the translation of nonsense with a clear strategy. The choice to translate operations (for example, a portmanteau as such, or a reversal as a reversal, etc.) seems to be random. None of the translators demonstrate a focus on presenting nonsense operations equivalently every time, or even non-equivalently every time, for that matter.
When, for example, they come across a portmanteau in the source text, they will occasionally merely transfer the word, if it sounds acceptable in the target language.
Sometimes they manage to create a portmanteau in Czech, and sometimes they will translate it as a conventional, existing word, or a completely different strategy will be employed. Even Jařab‟s translation of the BFG‟s idiolect reveals this tendency; although the translation strategy is clearer in this case (it is evident which operation in the source text corresponds to which operation in the target text), there are many instances where the source text contains this operation and the target text doesn‟t (this tendency, however, is not bidirectional, meaning that Jařab does not utilize the BFG‟s idiolect if the author has not already done so in the ST). The most disappointing is the translation of spoonerisms, where a different operation is employed in the majority of cases. This may suggest that spoonerisms are very difficult for translators to adequately
94 render in the target language. One of the ways of translating nonsensical style more faithfully might therefore be to pay more attention to the operations at work within the text and focus on traslating them equivalently and consistently (where the target language permits one to do so).
The assumption is that this lack of consistency is due to a focus on making the target text as natural and fluid as possible, choosing not to focus too much on the eccentricities of nonsense in order not to risk making the translation sound artificial.
The translation of idiolects (other than that of the BFG) through letter substitution can only be labelled as unfortunate. It is not merely a question of whether the target language choice is corresponding in terms of the nonsense operation (which it isn‟t). The main problem is that the solution evokes a completely different image for the reader, and the translation thus becomes a lot less accurate.
As for the author‟s narrative voice, its distinctiveness and originality has been toned down substantially in the translations and a version conforming more to ordinary style and language has been presented.
There is a distinctive tendency to pay little attention to the translation of alliteration, which is understandable, because alliteration is a stylistic figure that is not utilised abundantly in the Czech language. It does not have the same tradition as in the
English language, and unless very distinctive, the reader is unlikely to notice it.
Alliteration is not perceived as a specific stylistic figure in Czech, but rather a mere instrument of euphony, which is probably the reason why most translators themselves have treated it so superficially. If dealt with at all, it was sometimes translated as rhyming, which, on the other hand, is a very prominent stylistic figure in the target language prose, more common than in English. Had the translators wanted to transfer
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Dahl‟s style into Czech more accurately, they could have chosen rhyming as a substitute to alliteration and used it more often. Rare instances where alliteration was translated as such should be regarded as coincidence: the target language provided translators with corresponding words that begin with the same letter. Unmotivated alliteration occurred mostly due to the use of prefixes in the target language.
Compensation does occur, however, the number of untranslated nonsense devices is distinctly higher than the number compensations in all of the analysed texts.
It would be an unjustified simplification to attempt to summarize the individual approaches of the translators to nonsense in Roald Dahl‟s children‟s books on the basis of the analysis in the previous chapter. Despite the temptation to make statements that suggest that Kořán has a higher tendency for omission and Parkánová seems to have made the most mistranslations, while at the same time alliterating more than the others,
Herynková has failed to accurately comprehend the author‟s narrative voice and Jařab is the most creative of all the translators, both the methodology and choice of texts do not permit these claims to be made. As already mentioned in the methodological section of this thesis, every analysed book has its specific characteristics and differs substantially in the number and types of occurrences of literary nonsense devices. The BFG contains more neologisms than all of the other books combined, while Fantastic Mr. Fox contains almost no instances of any nonsensical device. Had Herynková translated the former instead of the latter, she would have had to employ a completely different strategy. This is the beauty and, at the same time, curse of nonsense literature. The BFG is the only book in which nonsense is a central feature, and not merely a stylistic tool, so it is natural that Jařab‟s approach to the translation needed to reflect this fact.
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Another general tendency is one to disregard the author‟s deliberate use of repetition, not only on the level of sentences but also on a textual level. Equivalent words and phrases within the same text are often translated differently, suggesting that the translators probably failed to recognize repetition as one of Dahl„s deliberate stylistic figures. Consequently, the entire rhythm and cadence of the stories changes.
Nor do the translators notice that Dahl has a tendency to prefer and repeat certain consonants and themes in his books. Evidently, much analysis goes on at the lexical level during the translation process, and not so much on a textual and phonological levels.
When it comes to the translation of idiomatic expressions and puns where simultaneity cannot be maintained in the target language, the prevailing tendency is to keep the literal meaning where possible and sacrifice the deeper one. A pleasant revelation is one that omission is employed very little with play on words; most of the time translators did their best to come up with at least a partial solution to the translation problem. Omission occurs mostly in cases where the translator obviously hasn‟t recognized the pun at all.
The analysis of nine Roald Dahl children‟s books has provided insight into the approaches of translators to the translation of nonsense, as well as demonstrating that because so little attention is paid to the linguistic aspect of Dahl‟s work, the focus of the translators was centered more on content than form, with a tendency to translate literally where possible, and opt for conventional solutions in the target language.
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9. Bibliography
Primary Sources
Source Texts
Dahl, Roald. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. London: Puffin Books, 1999.
Dahl, Roald. Danny the Champion of the World. London: Puffin Books, 1994.
Dahl, Roald. Fantastic Mr. Fox. London: Puffin Books, 1996.
Dahl, Roald. George‟s Marvellous Medicine. London: Puffin Books, 1982.
Dahl, Roald. James and the Giant Peach. London: Puffin Books, 1995.
Dahl, Roald. Matilda. London: Puffin Books, 1989.
Dahl, Roald. The BFG. London: Puffin Books, 1984.
Dahl, Roald. The Twits. London: Puffin Books, 1982.
Dahl, Roald. The Witches. London: Puffin Books, 1985.
Translations
Dahl, Roald. Čarodějnice. Trans: Hana Parkánová. Praha: Jan Kanzelberger, 1993.
Dahl, Roald. Danny, mistr světa. Trans: Jaroslav Kořán. Praha: Albatros, 1990.
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Dahl, Roald. Fantastický pan Lišák. Trans: Jitka Herynková. Praha: Knižní klub, 2009.
Dahl, Roald. Jakub a obří broskev. Trans: Jaroslav Kořán, Pavel Šrut. Praha: Albatros,
1993.
Dahl, Roald. Jirkova zázračná medicína. Trans: Jitka Herynková. Praha: Knižní klub,
2007.
Dahl, Roald. Karlík a továrna na čokoládu. Trans: Jaroslav Kořán a Pavel Šrut. Praha:
Mateřídouška, 1971.
Dahl, Roald. Karlík a továrna na čokoládu. Trans: Jaroslav Kořán a Pavel Šrut. Praha:
Winston Smith, 1992.
Dahl, Roald. Karlík a továrna na čokoládu. Trans: Jaroslav Kořán a Pavel Šrut. Praha:
Academia, 2002.
Dahl, Roald. Karlík a továrna na čokoládu. Trans: Jaroslav Kořán. Praha: Academia,
2006.
Dahl, Roald. Matylda. Trans: Jitka Herynková. Praha: Knižní klub, 2011.
Dahl, Roald. Moc hodný obr. Trans: Jan Jařab. Praha: Hynek, 1998.
Dahl, Roald. obrDobr. Trans: Jan Jařab. Praha: Academia, 2005.
Dahl, Roald. Prevítovi. Trans: Iva Nováčková. Praha: Academia, 2004.
Secondary Sources
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Alston, A. And Butler, C. (eds.). New Casebooks: Roald Dahl. New York: Palgrave
Macmillan, 2012.
Anderson, Sam. “Big Sometimes Friendly Giant: Roald Dahl – the storyteller as a
benevolent sadist”. New York Magazine. 5 Sep. 2010. Web. 30 July 2014.
Baker, Mona. In Other Words: A Coursebook on Translation. London and New York:
Routledge, 1994.
“Biography” Quentin Blake (2013): n. p. Web. 6 Aug. 2014.
Bobulová, Ivana et al. 2003. Children's and Juvenile Literature: (Written in English).
Nitra: Pedagogická fakulta UKF v Nitre, 2003.
Booth, Wayne C. The Company We Keep: An Ethics of Fiction. Berkeley, CA:
University of California Press, 1988.
Carpenter, H. Secret Gardens: A Study of the Golden Age of Children‟s Literature.
London: George Allen & Unwin, 1985.
Carroll, Lewis. Alice 's Adventures in Wonderland. London, New York: Penguin Books,
Penguin Popular Classics, 1994.
Carta, Giorgia. Theory and Practice of Translation: The Case of Children‟s Literature.
In Parker, R. H., Garcia, K. G. (eds.). Thinking Translation: Perspectives from
Within and Without. Florida: BrownWalker Press, 2008.
Chambers, A. „The Reader in the Book‟, in N.Chambers (ed.), The Signal Approach to
Children‟s Books, London: Kestrel, 1980.
Cuddon, J. A. A Dictionary of Literary Terms. London: Penguin Books, 1979.
Dahl, Roald. Writing children's books: An author of classics reflects on what it takes to
succeed in this genre: giving young, readers what they want. Writer (Kalmbach
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Dolitsky, Marlene. Under The Tumtum Tree: From Nonsense To Sense, A Study In
Non-Automatic Comprehension. Amsterdam/Philadephia: John Benjamins
Publishing Company, 1984.
Frimmelová, Kateřina. Translating Children‟s Literature: diplomová práce. Brno:
Masarykova univerzita, Fakulta pedagogická, Katedra anglického jazyka a
literatury, 2010. Vedoucí diplomové práce PhDr. Pavel Doležel, CSs.
“Hana Parkánová-Whitton”. Databáze knih (2014): n. p. Web. 1 Sep. 2014.
“Herynková Jitka.” Obec překladatelů (2006): n. p. Web. 8 Aug. 2014.
Hollindale, Peter. “And Children Swarmed to Him Like Settlers. He Became a Land.”
The Outrageous Success of Roald Dahl‟, in Julia Briggs, Dennis Butts and M. O.
Grenby (eds), Popular Children‟s Literature in Britain. Aldershot: Ashgate,
2008.
Howard, Kristine. “My Dahl Biography”. Roald Dahl Fans 2014 Web. 17 July.
2014.
Howard, Kristine. “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory Politically Correct Oompa–
Loompa Evolution.” Roald Dahl Fans. 2014. Web. 12 Oct. 2014.
Hunt, Peter. Roald Dahl and the Commodification of Fantasy. In Alston, A. and
Butler, C. (eds.). New Casebooks: Roald Dahl. New York: Palgrave Macmillan,
2012.
Hunt, Peter. The Same but Different: Conservatism and Revolution in Children‟s
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Fiction. In Maybin, J. and Watson, Nicola J. (eds.). Children‟s Literature:
Approaches and Territories. Milton Keynes: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009.
“Jařab Jan.” Meander (2014). Web. August 17 2014.
Klimecká, Zuzana. The Individual Style of a Literary Translator Jaroslav Kořán and
His Translations of A Confederacy of Dunces, Charlie and the Chocolate
Factory and The Sirens of Titan: diplomová práce. Brno: Masarykova
univerzita, Filozofická fakulta, 2009. Vedoucí diplomové práce Mgr. Simona
Javůrková.
Knowles, M., Malmkjær, K.. Language and Control in Children‟s Literature. London;
New York: Routledge, 1996.
Kratochvilová, Eva. Literary Nonsense and its Translation: diplomová práce. Brno:
Masarykova univerzita, Filozofická fakulta, 2001. Vedoucí diplomové práce Ing.
Mgr. Jiří Rambousek.
Lecercle, Jean-Jacques. Philosophy of Nonsense: The Intuitions of Victorian Nonsense
Literature. London and New York: Routledge, 1994.
Lerer, Seth. Children‟s Literature: A Reader‟s History from Aesop to Harry Potter.
Chicago and London: The Univ. of Chicago Press, 2008.
Levý, Jiří. Umění překladu. Praha: Miroslav Pošta – Apostrof, 2012.
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Baltimore and London: The John Hopkins Univ. Press, 1979.
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10. Summary
The topic of this thesis is the translation of nonsense in children‟s literature, namely children‟s books by British short story and iconic children‟s writer, Roald Dahl. The thesis provides information on the author‟s life and works, as well as mentioning the importance of illustration in Dahl‟s books and his famous collaboration with acclaimed illustrator Quentin Blake. The significance of considering illustrations when translating and publishing children‟s books is also briefly discussed.
Dahl‟s writing style is described from a linguistic perspective, revealing that many of the literary devices he employs with regularity are common to all nonsense writers and include, for example, stylistic figures like puns and similes, neologisms
(especially portmanteaus and spoonerisms) and alliteration. These features are the focus of the practical part of the thesis.
Information regarding the translation of Dahl‟s children‟s books in the Czech
Republic is presented in chronological order. All nine of the books translated into Czech by five different translators and released by various publishing houses are subject to analysis. First, the characters and plot of each analysed book are described. This is followed by a section dealing with some theoretical information regarding the definition of nonsense as a literary device, how translators approach its translation, and the role of nonsense in children‟s literature.
Lastly, the practical part of this Master‟s thesis provides examples of how translators have dealt with various aspects of the author‟s writing style and how they have chosen to translate the features of literary nonsense present in Dahl‟s books. The research is then summarized and the prominent trends or tendencies are described.
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11. Resumé
Hlavním tématem této práce je překlad nonsensu v dětské literatuře, a to konkrétně v knihách britského povídkáře a kultovního spisovatele pro děti, Roalda Dahla. Práce poskytuje základní informace o autorově životě a díle, a v rámci významu ilustrací v jeho knihách zmiňuje také slavnou spolupráci s uznávaným ilustrátorem Quentinem
Blakem. Také je stručně nastíněna důležitost dostatečného vnímání ilustrací při překladu a vydávání knih pro děti.
Druhá část popisuje Dahlův literární styl z lingvistického hlediska a poukazuje na to, že mnohé z literárních prostředků, které autor pravidelně používá, jsou běžnými jevy nonsensové literatury. Tyto prostředky zahrnují například stylistické figury jako hru se slovy a přirovnání, neologismy (zejména portmanteau a spoonerismy) a aliterace.
Na ně se podrobně zaměřuje praktická část diplomové práce.
Informace o překladu Dahlových dětských knih v České republice jsou uvedeny v chronologickém pořadí. Předmětem analýzy je všech devět knih přeložených pěti různými překladateli a vydaných několika různými nakladatelstvími. Nejprve jsou popsány postavy a děj jednotlivých příběhů. Poté následuje teoretická část práce, zabývající se definicí nonsensu jako literárního prostředku, informacemi o tom jak překladatelé přistupují k jeho překladu a rolí nonsensu v dětské literatuře.
Praktická části diplomové práce uvádí příklady toho, jak se jednotliví překladatelé vypořádali s různými aspekty autorova stylu a jak se rozhodli překládat jevy literárního nonsensu přítomné v knihách Roalda Dahla. Práce poté shrnuje výsledky analýzy a popisuje významné trendy nebo tendence v této oblasti.
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