1 Style and Historicity in Fiction -Translating George Gissing’s New Grub Street- Annemijn van Bruchem 3147606 Master thesis Theory and Practice of Translation Supervisor: Dr. Cees Koster Second reader: Dr. Ton Naaijkens Annotated Translation of George Gissing’s New Grub Street 2 September 2010 2 List of Contents Part one 1. Introduction .......................................................................................................................... 5 Research Question .............................................................................................................................. 6 Layout .................................................................................................................................................. 7 Part two Theoretical framework ...................................................................................................................... 10 2. George Gissing and New Grub Street .............................................................................. 11 Biography........................................................................................................................................... 11 New Grub Street ................................................................................................................................ 12 A critical note .................................................................................................................................... 13 Genre ................................................................................................................................................. 14 Themes .............................................................................................................................................. 15 3. Theory ................................................................................................................................. 16 Intercultural Communication and thick-translation .......................................................................... 16 Christiane Nord and her pragmatic, functionalist circular model ..................................................... 21 Translation problems: a categorisation ............................................................................................. 22 Intended audience and communicative function of the target text ................................................. 23 The position of a translator ............................................................................................................... 26 Part three Annotation ......................................................................................................................................... 27 4. Style in New Grub Street .................................................................................................. 28 4.1. A brief overview ......................................................................................................................... 28 4.2. Authorial tone ............................................................................................................................ 29 4.3. Irony and black humour ............................................................................................................. 30 4.4. Allusions ..................................................................................................................................... 31 4.4.1. Indirect allusions to the Bible .............................................................................................. 32 3 4.4.2. Indirect allusions to contemporary work ............................................................................ 33 4.4.3. Direct allusion ...................................................................................................................... 34 4.5. Descriptive focus ........................................................................................................................ 36 4.6. Speech and thought representation .......................................................................................... 38 4.7. Poetic and prosaic language: register and style among characters ........................................... 40 5. Style as a translation problem ......................................................................................... 43 5.1. Translating complex sentences .................................................................................................. 43 5.2. The implied reader ..................................................................................................................... 45 5.3. Tautologies and pleonasms ........................................................................................................ 46 5.4. Translating allusions ................................................................................................................... 47 5.5. Connotations .............................................................................................................................. 50 5.6. Translating humour, wordplay and proverbs ............................................................................. 51 5.7. Register ....................................................................................................................................... 53 5.8. Outdated exclamations .............................................................................................................. 55 5.9. Conclusion .................................................................................................................................. 56 6. Culture and historicity in New Grub Street .................................................................. 57 The form of the novel ........................................................................................................................ 58 Markers of poverty ............................................................................................................................ 59 6.3.1. Tutorage .............................................................................................................................. 59 6.3.2. Pawning one’s possessions ................................................................................................. 60 6.3.3. Garrets ................................................................................................................................. 60 Literary magazines ............................................................................................................................. 61 6.4.1. General ................................................................................................................................ 61 6.4.2. Tit-Bits ................................................................................................................................. 62 6.4.3. Monthlies and weeklies ....................................................................................................... 62 6.4.4. Papers versus magazines ..................................................................................................... 63 6.4.5. Women’s magazines............................................................................................................ 63 “Sell like hot cakes” ........................................................................................................................... 64 Board schools .................................................................................................................................... 64 7. Culture-specific items and other translation problems in New Grub Street .............. 66 Form of the novel .............................................................................................................................. 66 4 Units of measurement ....................................................................................................................... 68 Literary magazines ............................................................................................................................. 68 7.3.1. Tit-Bits and Chit-Chat .......................................................................................................... 70 7.3.2. Papers versus magazines ..................................................................................................... 71 7.3.3. Stationers ............................................................................................................................ 72 “Sell like hot cakes” ........................................................................................................................... 72 Education ........................................................................................................................................... 74 Conclusion ......................................................................................................................................... 75 8. Final Conclusion ................................................................................................................ 76 Part four Translation and notes ........................................................................................................................ 79 9. Translation .......................................................................................................................... 80 10. Source text .....................................................................................................................