Translating Songs in Shakespearean Drama: Adaptation or Appropriation?

Document Type : Original research articles

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English Department, faculty of Arts,South Valley University, Qena, Egypt

Abstract

Modern Translation Studies, supported by the so-called French Theory, suggest that translation can be a form of adaptation. Insofar as it relies on transcoding, translation adapts a literary text from one cultural matrix into another. Whether in prose or poetry, the verbal transcoding will in the end rely on the culture behind the text. However, when a poet translates another poet, the translator’s own lexicon, based on his or her culture, may transform the adaptation into appropriation. Nothing exemplifies this more conspicuously than the translation of Shakespearean songs in his oft-translated dramatic works. There are two ways of rendering these songs into Arabic: either to follow the old, established practice of regarding them as an essential component of the dramatic situation, or to regard them as capable of standing by themselves and, albeit linked to the context of the drama, they can be read as independent lyrics in their own right. The examination of their translated versions into prose is now considered close enough to paraphrase, which is also considered a form of adaptation. However, it is in poetry that one can perceive the change of adaptation into appropriation. Translations by Mutran, Al-Wakeel, Enani and Badawi show that there has been a consistent tendency of adapting the songs to the cultural milieu of the translator, with more appropriation noted in the work of the early 20th century poet, Khalil Mutran, than in more recent translations. Recent translators increasingly think of the songs as part and parcel of the Shakespearean text.

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