Every language continues to live thanks to literary works such as poems, stories, novels etc. Literary works of any country inlude its culture, tradition, history and aspects of the society too. When the reader appreciates those works in the specific country, it becomes popular all over the world through readers and it requires to be translated to other countries.
At this point, literary translators take a responsibility by translating global literary works for the readers. The only aim of literary translators is to make them beautiful as much as possible. Because translation is an art of combination of two languages. This is the combination of structures, words, meanings and cultures between them. That is why it is so important to give the reader the feeling of reading this foreign work in his or her own language. Sometimes we lose ourselves in a successful book.
Translated work should create the same impact in the reader too.Without any fear and hesitancy, we should think about which translating might be better.Just be brave and let the translation flow away! after all these key points, there are basically three steps to be a successful literary translator. After all these key points, there are basically three steps to be a successful literary translator. Master at your mother language, keep reading and learning and familiarizing with socio-cultural aspects at target language.
First of all, a literary translator must be a master at his or her native language with all the details. If translators do not professional at their native language, they can not proffessional at another one too. Because translating is not only translating words but also it is very important to translate without corrupting the meaning and preserving the integrity of the sentence.To be able to translate the literary works, it is necessary to dominate both languages. This means that translators have to undergo serious language training. The structures of language are different in each language and elements of sentence such as subject and verb in each language are used in the different parts of the sentence. For example in Turkish, sentence structure almost always ends with the verb whereas in English we always put the verb in the middle of the sentence.
On the other hand, basic concepts such as adjective, pronoun, verbs and complement exist in every language. Firstly, it is essential to have basic knowledge of these concepts. Then, it is necessary to master at the equivalents of these concepts in the target language. Thanks to the first step, a literary translator transmits word to the reader by using the right word in the right place. Being a master at native and target language totally, literary translator lays the base of successful translating.
No matter how professional a literary translator is, he or she should never stop reading.Because just like people, languages are also in a continuous development process.The development of the era causes the language to differ. As a result of this, new words are constantly derived in every language by people. A good literary translator must follow closely language developments.
While a word gets become a popular, a word sometimes becomes old-fashioned and loses its value.Read with purpose! A literary translator must read any work like news, poems, novels etc. everyday and every translator should keep an eye on the terminology used.They should have a comprehensive terminological knowledge in the native language and the target language. Each literary translator should evaluate whether he / she has proficiency in the subject of the translation and accept the translation accordingly.
For example, every literary translator has to know different terms in the field of medicine or drama. A translator who is unfamiliar with those subjects, can not translate the words in the text literally. This situation causes the translation to be unhealthy.When you start to set up yourself as a successful literary translator, it is very important to stay updated yourself. It is also important not to stop reading and learning. Because many proffesional literary translators continue their education no matter how old they are. Continuing your education allows you to either become specialize or varied yourself.
Lastly, literary translator should not only know his or her own culture, but also they should dominate the culture of the target language. When literary translators familiar with socio-cultural and etymological -linguistic correlations between the two languages, they can improve the quality of the translations in their literary works. Sometimes it may not be enough to find the equivalent of a word to be translated from dictionary.
If you give the feeling that is felt in its original language with your own language, a successful work appears. Do not make your translation by dividing the sentence, just protect the original integrity, give the intimate feeling and keep in touch with readers. When you pay attention to these criterions, a sincere and understandable work can be done successfully in your own language. Finally,when you transmit the original feelings and experiences to the reader, the work continues to live in another language without being damaged.
In a nutshell, when these three main features are considered by literary translators, they can create an original work in a new language. First read the work as it is, start translating with those steps and translate the title of the work lastly. By establishing a bridge between these two different languages, cultures and society, literary translators transmit them successfully from generation to generation. It should not be forgotten that every translation may be correct yet every translation may not beautiful.