A Case Study George Orwell’s 1984

UNIVERSITATEA DIN PITEȘTI

FACULTATEA DE LITERE

departamentuL LIMBĂ ȘI LITERATURĂ

SPECIALIZAREA MASTER TRADUCTOLOGIE LIMBA ENGLEZĂ

LUCRARE DE DISERTAȚIE

Coordonator științific,

Lect. Univ. Dr. Cristina MIRON

Absolventă,

BĂNCUȚĂ (Necșoiu) Elena Cristina

PITEȘTI

Anul 2016

UNIVERSITATEA DIN PITEȘTI

FACULTATEA DE LITERE

departamentuL LIMBĂ ȘI LITERATURĂ

SPECIALIZAREA MASTER TRADUCTOLOGIE LIMBA ENGLEZĂ

A CASE STUDY: GEORGE ORWELL’S 1984

Coordonator științific,

Lect. Univ. Dr. Cristina MIRON

Absolventă,

BĂNCUȚĂ (Necșoiu) Elena Cristina

PITEȘTI

2016

DECLARAȚIE PRIVIND ORIGINALITATEA LUCRĂRII DE LICENȚĂ

UNIVERSITATEA DIN PITEȘTI FACULTATEA DE LITERE

PROGRAMUL DE STUDII ……………………………………………………………………………………….

NUMELE ȘI PRENUMELE……………………………………………………………………………………..

PROMOȚIA……………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

SESIUNEA DE LICENȚĂ …………………………………………………………………………………………

DENUMIREA LUCRĂRII …………………………………………………………………………………………

Declar pe propria răspundere că lucrarea de față este rezultatul muncii proprii, pe baza cercetărilor mele și pe baza informațiilor obținute din surse care au fost citate și indicate conform normelor etice, în textul lucrării, în note și în bibliografie.

Declar că nu s-a folosit în mod tacit sau ilegal munca altora și că nicio parte din teză nu încalcă drepturile de proprietate intelectuală ale altcuiva, persoană fizică sau juridică.

Declar că lucrarea nu a mai fost prezentat(ă) sub această formă vreunei instituții de învățământ superior în vederea obținerii unui grad sau titlu științific ori didactic.

În cazul constatării ulterioare a unor declarații false, voi suporta rigorile legii.

Data:

Numele, prenumele și semnătura absolventului

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION…………………………………………………………………….

THEORY OF TRANSLATION……………………………………………

1.1.Translation Studies; Concept…………………………………………..

1.2.What kind of theory do we need for a translation?……………………

1.3.Translation Strategy …………………………………………………

1.2.Interpretation; Translator’s stages

GEORGE ORWELL BEYOND 'ORWELLIAN' UNDERSTANDING

2.1. Introducing Eric Blair. The Age of extremes………………….

2.2. Orwellian concept…………………………………

3.3. Why should we still read George Orwell on politics?…………………..

1984’S TRANSLATION ANALYSIS

3.1. Translating slogans

3.2. Translating verses

3.3. Translating expressions of a political nature

3.4. Translating proper nouns of a cultural or a colloquial nature CONCLUSIONS…………………………………………………..

BIBLIOGRAPHY…………………………………………………….

INTRODUCTION

I.THEORY OF TRANSLATION

1.1. Translation Studies; Concept

As it to be expected, many definitions of the word translation have been offered, starting with the dictionary ones (e.g. the activity of changing something spoken or especially written into another language- Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary, 1996: 1270), and finishing with the more complete definitions given by the specialists in translation studies.

Thus, according to Susan Bassnett, translation involves “the rendering of a SL text into a TL so as to ensure that the surface meaning of the two will be approximately similar and the structure of the SL will be preserved as closely as possible, but not so closely that the TL structures will be seriously distorted” (1988:2).

Leon Levitchi states that “to translate means to paraphrase, to say in other words, from a source language into a target language” (1975:6), while after Eugene Nida and Charles Taber, translating consists of reproducing, in the target language, the nearest equivalent to the message in the source language, in the first place in the semantic aspect and, in the second place, in the stylistic aspect (1974).

As we can notice, the definition in the Oxford Dictionary is rather simplistic and incomplete, making no reference to either the meaning of the form of the message to be translated, while Bassnett’s definition refers to both, stating that we should preserve both the surface meaning and the syntactic structures a closely as it is possible by observing the target language rules. Levitchi stresses the need to paraphrase, to rephrase the message in a translation, Nida’s definition is considered by some translation theorists to be the best.

So translation involves a transfer of meaning from a language, usually referred to as source language (SL) into another, referred to as target language (TL). Therefore, a first problem that should be discussed is weather a total transfer of meaning I possible, or, in other words, if we can speak about a total equivalence between a text and its translation.

Since the early 1960’s significant changes have taken place in the field of Translation Studies, with the acceptance of the study of linguistics and stylistics within literary criticism, and with the rediscovery of the work of the Russian Formalist Circle. The disciples of the Russian Formalist Circle and of the Prague Linguistic Circle have shown that translation is not accessible to anyone with a minimal knowledge of another language, but one of the most difficult tasks that a writer can take upon himself.

Modern translation theory has moved away from purely linguistic perspective toward the methodology of incorporating non-linguistic disciplines, most notably semiotics (the systematic study of signs, sign systems or structures, sign processes, and sign functions), to supplement existing theories.

Throughout history, written and spoken translations have played a crucial role in interhuman communication, not least in providing access to important texts for scholarship and religious purposes. Yet the study of translation as an academic subject has only really begun in the past fifty years. In this English speaking world, this discipline is now generally known as translation studies, thanks to the Dutch-based US scholar James S. Holmes. In his key defining paper delivered in 1972, but not widely available until 1988, Holmes describes the then nascent discipline as being concerned with the “complex of problems clustered round the phenomenon of translating and translations” (Holmes 1988/2000:173).

By 1988, Mary Snell- Homby, in the first edition of her Translation Studies: An Integrated Approach, was writing that “the demand that translation studies should be viewed as an independent discipline….has come from several quarters in recent years”. (Snell-Hornby 1988)

Mona Baker, in her introduction to The Routledge Encyclopedia of Translation (1997), talks effusively of the richness of the “exciting new discipline, perhaps the discipline of the 1990s’, bringing together scholars from a wide variety of often more traditional disciplines.”

Cristina Ungureanu, in her An Introductory Course in the Theory and Practice of Translation, mentions that now, at the beginning of the twenty-first century, the discipline of translation studies continues to develop from strength to strength across the globe.

1.2. What kind of theory do we need for a translation?

David B. Frank asks a very important question A theory can be explained as a lens with which we can view something. It is a way of viewing what seems to be a coherent field of data calling for explanation. But because of our limited human perspective, our theories, like a lens, are only able to focus on certain parts of the object of study, and leave other parts out of focus. A theory might help one see some things clearly, and see other things fuzzily or not at all. As Albert Einstein has suggested, “Whether you can observe a thing or not, depends on the theory which you use. It is the theory which decides what can be observed.”

David mentions the theoretical model for translation, and thus he will assume that the starting point of a translation is a source text. The source text is an instance of communication between an original speaker and author in a certain social context to a certain audience. The audience may be very broad or very narrow and specific, but the text or other speech act is communicated through the medium of a certain language in a certain time and cultural context.

The speaker or writer expresses something that he or she wants the audience to understand and appreciate, and this is done through the conventions of a particular language, which makes communication of this sort possible. For a translation sociolinguistic situation, David mentions that the purpose of the original author in communication is a significant factor, but the purposes of the original recipients of the original text are out of focus. The important thing is what the original author intended to communicate.

After the original author, a second major participant in a translation sociolinguistic situation is the translator. The translator has read the original text, and through the ordinary conventions of language has gained an understanding of it, and now wants to construct a new text based on the original, extending the translator’s understanding of the original author’s text to a new audience. The translator may or may not have been a member of the original audience for this text, but must at least be capable of reading the source text well enough to gain an understanding of it. “We would normally think of this newly-constructed text as being in a different language from that of the original text, or else we would not call it a translation.” Otherwise it might be called some other kind of speech act, like a performance (of a play), or an oral reading (of a written text), etc. This is a simple, common-sensical explanation of what takes place in translation, which does not involve encoding and decoding, meanings detached from forms, implicature and explicature, and so forth. A more abstract and complicated explanation of translation is not needed for a sociologically-oriented model. An explanation of how someone is able to use the conventions of language and hear or read a text and gain an understanding of it, and then communicate that understanding through the creation of a new text – these are the things that a theory of linguistics helps to explain. Note, importantly, though, that in the model of translation being presented here, there are no meanings that exist apart from people. That is, meanings are not “in” words and texts. Words and texts are conventions that people use to express themselves to, and try to influence, each other. They are not “containers” of meaning, the strength and prevalence of the conduit metaphor notwithstanding (Reddy 1979). The work of translation is done with both a purpose and an audience in mind. In fact, purpose and audience are two of the most crucial components of a translation speech act. Without a purpose, one would not expect the translation to take place. The purpose that the translator has for the translation is a necessary component in shaping it.

Any speech act – any instance of verbal communication – involves at least two participants, and the audience of a translation is one of the major participants in that type of interaction. This should be clear enough. Successful communication through language entails two or more people who accept that they both are familiar with the conventions of a particular language and they use that language as a medium. None of this is controversial, but what I want to emphasize is that the audience of a translation, if this audience is cooperating with the translator, has a purpose for the speech act as well. In translation, the translator’s purpose in providing a translation interacts with the purposes of the audience and other participants in this sociolinguistic situation.

1.3. Translation Strategy

A. B. As-Safi in his Translation Theories, Strategies and Basic Theoretical Issues, chapter four- Translation and Interpreting Strategies mentions that, “a translation strategy is a procedure for solving a problem encountered in translating a text or a segment of it” (Baker, 2005:188). Given the distinction between micro-level and macro-level problems, strategies can be divided between local ones which deal with text segments and global strategies which deal with the whole texts. Both local and global strategies interact with relevant elements of the translator’s background knowledge: critical awareness of the style and content of similar texts, of linguistic conventions, register and intuitions about what constitutes the target language (ibid).

Translation strategies can be categorized into general and specific strategies:

1. General strategies: they deal with different text types

2. Specific strategies: they tackle a certain text type, readership and skopos, i.e. the function or purpose of translation. These strategies are of five sub-categories:

– Domestication strategy, also called normalization or naturalization strategy, is employed to bridge cultural gaps and achieve intelligibility in line with the hermeneutic approach which focuses on interpretation and grants the translator the right to manipulate the text so as to make it natural, comprehensible and readable (for naturalness in translation, see As-Safi, 1997) , an approach in which the original text undergoes adaptation so as to be re-created to comply with the target linguistic and cultural conventions and to fulfill the function or purpose of translation, i.e. skopos.

– Compensation strategy. Compensation is, according to Sandor Hervey and Ian Higgins (1992:248), the technique of making up for the translation loss of significant features of the source text (henceforth ST) approximating their effects in the target text (henceforth TT) through means other than those used in the ST, that is making up for ST effects achieved by one means through using another means in the TL. In translating most of the jurisprudential maxims, loss is apparently inevitable; hence this strategy has been maximally utilized. This strategy can be categorized into four sub-strategies (ibid) to which we add a fifth one.

– Compensation in kind. Compensating for a particular type of a textual effect deemed to be untranslatable into the TT by using a textual effect of a different type in the TT.

– Compensation in place. Compensating for the loss of a particular textual effect occurring at a given place in the ST, by creating a corresponding effect at a different place in the TT. An instance for this compensatory strategy is employed to make up for an inevitable loss such as figures of speech pertaining to schemes or tropes, as in compensating for the loss of alliteration by employing assonance or vice versa .

– Compensation by merging. Condensing the features carried over a relatively longer stretch of the ST into a relatively shorter stretch of TT.

– Compensation by splitting. Distributing the features carried in a relatively shorter stretch of the source text over a relatively longer stretch of the target text.

– Compensation by Addition, thus to compensate for the inevitable loss in the translation.

Susan Bassenett in her Translation Studies, talks about translating prose. For a number of years she has used an exercise designed to discover how the translation of a novel is approached. Students were asked to translate the opening paragraph(s) of any novel and the translations were then examined in group discussion. What has emerged from this exercise, time and again, was that students frequently started to translate a text that they had not previously read or that they had read only once some time earlier. In short, they simply opened the SL text and begun at the beginning, without considering how that opening section relates to the structure of the work as a whole. Yet it would be quite unacceptable to approach the translation of a poem in this way. This is significant because it shows that a different concept of the imaginary distinction between form and content prevails when the text to be considered is a novel. It seems to be easier for the (careless) prose translator to consider content as separable from form.

Hilaire Belloc laid down six general rules for the translator of prose texts:

(1) The translator should not ‘plod on’, word by word or sentence by sentence, but should ‘always “block out” his work’. By ‘block out’, Belloc means that the translator should consider the work as an integral unit and translate in sections, asking himself ‘before each what the whole sense is he has to render’.

(2) The translator should render idiom by idiom ‘and idioms of their nature demand translation into another form from that of the original. Belloc cites the case of the Greek exclamation ‘By the Dog!’, which, if rendered literally, becomes merely comic in English, and suggests that the phrase ‘By God!’ is a much closer translation. Likewise, he points out that the French historic present must be translated into the English narrative tense, which is past, and the French system of defining a proposition by putting it into the form of a rhetorical question cannot be transposed into English where the same system does not apply.

(3) The translator must render ‘intention by intention’, bearing in mind that ‘the intention of a phrase in one language may be less emphatic than the form of the phrase, or it may be more emphatic’. By ‘intention’, Belloc seems to be talking about the weight a given expression may have in a particular context in the SL that would be disproportionate if translated literally into the TL. He quotes several examples where the weighting of the phrase in the SL is clearly much stronger or much weaker than the literal TL translation, and points out that in the translation of ‘intention’, it is often necessary to add words not in the original ‘to conform to the idiom of one’s own tongue’.

(4) Belloc warns against les faux amis, those words or structures that may appear to correspond in both SL and TL but actually do not, e.g. demander—to ask translated wrongly as to demand.

(5) The translator is advised to ‘transmute boldly’ and Belloc suggests that the essence of translating is ‘the resurrection of an alien thing in a native body’.

(6) The translator should never embellish. Belloc’s six rules cover both points of technique and points of principle. His order of priorities is a little curious, but nevertheless he does stress the need for the translator to consider the prose text as a structured whole whilst bearing in mind the stylistic and syntactical exigencies of the TL. He accepts that there is a moral responsibility to the original, but feels that the translator has the right to significantly alter the text in the translation process in order to provide the TL reader with a text that conforms to TL stylistic and idiomatic norms

1.4. Interpretation; Translator’s stages

George Steiner in After Babel: Aspects of Language and Translation (3rd edition, Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1998), states that “‘interpretation’ as that which gives language life beyond the moment and place of immediate utterance or transcription, is what I am concerned with. The French word interpre`te concentrates all the relevant values. An actor is interpre`te of Racine; a pianist gives une interpre´tation of a Beethoven sonata. Through engagement of his own identity, a critic becomes un interpre`te—a life-giving performer—of Montaigne or Mallarme´. As it does not include the world of the actor, and includes that of the musician only by analogy, the English term interpreter is less strong. But it is congruent with French when reaching out in another crucial direction. Interpre`te/interpreter are commonly used to mean translator. This, I believe, is the vital starting point.” (p. 28)

Polysemy, the capacity of the same word to mean different things, such difference ranging from nuance to antithesis, characterizes the language of ideology. Machiavelli noted that meaning could be dislocated in common speech so as to produce political confusion. Competing ideologies rarely create new terminologies. As Kenneth Burke and George Orwell have shown in regard to the vocabulary of Nazism and Stalinism, they pilfer and decompose the vulgate. In the idiom of fascism and communism, ‘peace’, ‘freedom’, ‘progress’, ‘popular will’ are as prominent as in the language of representative democracy.

But they have their fiercely disparate meanings. The words of the adversary are appropriated and hurled against him. When antithetical meanings are forced upon the same word (Orwell’s Newspeak), when the conceptual reach and valuation of a word can be altered by political decree, language loses credibility. Translation in the ordinary sense becomes impossible. To translate a Stalinist text on peace or on freedom under proletarian dictatorship into a non-Stalinist idiom, using the same time-honored words, is to produce a polemic gloss, a counter-statement of values. At the moment, the speech of politics, of social dissent, of journalism is full of loud ghost-words, being shouted back and forth, signifying contraries or nothing. It is only in the underground of political humour that these shibboleths regain significance.

According to Leon Levitchi, quoted by Amalia Marasescu in Basic Issues in Translation Studies, any translator should go through the following stages:

Find as much information as possible about the writer whose text s/he has to translate;

Read the text carefully, paying attention to its content, purpose, modality, style, stressed words, connotations, etc.;

Find synonyms in the target language for the words that require special attention;

Make the rough translation;

Make the final translation, in accordance to the norms of the target language. (1975: 250-251).

Petre Newmark (1988:144) also states that there are three basic stage in the translation process:

The interpretation and analysis of the SL text;

The application of the various translation procedures (choosing equivalents for words and sentences in the TL);

The reformulation of the text according to the writer’s intentions, the reader’s expectations, the appropriate norms of the TL, etc.

Then in Newmark’s opinion, quoted by Amalia Marasescu, “an important translation of any kind should be reviewed by a second translator whose language of habitual use is the target language.” He also suggests that it is important to have a parallel reading of the translation and the original, “not only to ensure that no word – sentence – paragraph in the original has been overlooked or forgotten (as usually happens) but to ensure that every punctuation mark (…), figure or word in the original has been accounted for (not necessarily translated) in the translation.” (1993:106)

So, a first stage would be comprehending and interpreting texts, considering the textual, referential cohesion and naturalness levels. This includes reading comprehension and message interpretation (encoding and decoding). Translators should be aware of the fact that incorrect comprehension of a text considerably decreases the quality of the translation. We must, therefore, use reading comprehension strategies for translation (underlining words, detecting translation difficulties, contextualizing lexical items, adapting, analyzing, and o on.) A good translator should define some essential starting-points for the translation, such as the author of the text to be translated, the aim of the text, the readership, and the standard to be used.

Peter Newmark recommends that during this first stage the translator of a text should read the text carefully, get the intention of the text, consult with the client, identify the text type used, establish the readership in both SL and in the TL, establish the scale of linguistic formality, generality, of emotional tone, assess the clarity of the text, establish connotative and denotative meanings and perform a last check of the source text.

When a translator does not understand something regarding the text, s/he should ask for clarifications.

Cay Dollerup in Basics of Translation Studies mentions about The superior source text and the perfect translation.

The notion of the perfect translation presupposes a free flow between source and target texts as well as an omniscient translator who towers above and is in full control of all communicational links in the translational communication.

The idea of the “supremacy of the original” as the only authoritative source which cannot be questioned automatically relegates all translations, proactively as well as retrospectively, to an ancillary and inferior position. The two ideas are incompatible, but they mar much thinking and discussion of translation activity. We have to be aware of the existence of these underlying notions, since they are realized in many phrases that are used in assessment of translation, not only by laymen but also by professionals. It should be kept in mind that the idea that the translation is subject to the “original” connects with religious thinking and canonical literary texts.

In everyday life, the actual users of the translation do not have the possibility of comparing it to the original. They use it because the only representation of the original that they have at their disposal. Therefore, the translation is an autonomous entity to the recipient. Thus, we deal with two or more different texts, which may be discussed either in relation to one another (translation criticism) or on their own terms and without reference to one another (textual analysis of the original, linguistic and syntactic criticism of the translation).

II. GEORGE ORWELL BEYOND 'ORWELLIAN' UNDERSTANDING

2.1. Introducing Eric Blair. The Age of extremes

George Orwell is widely known as a writer of political novels and essays. It is less known that he was born with another name and chose “George Orwell” as his pen name when his first book was published. Orwell is the name of a river in the UK countryside, and George is considered the most English of all names (St. George is the patron saint of England). He was born Eric Arthur Blair in Bengal, India, in 1903. At that time India was part of the British Empire and a military government ruled its people. Eric was five months old when his mother brought him back to England. The family settled near London.

At the beginning of the 1900’s, Great Britain was the world’s largest power, ruling some 500 million people around the globe. They seized the wealth of the countries they colonized, and ruled their populations. At the time of Orwell’s birth, the British Empire contained around a quarter of the world’s population and territory- 39 million square kilometers. George Orwell’s childhood took place in the shadow of major events. World War I began in 1914, when he was eleven. In 1917 in Russia, widespread poverty and the harsh rule of Tsar Nicholas II led to protests on the streets and the start of a rebellion. This turned into a full-scale revolution when troops, sent out to crush the rebels, changed sides. The Tsar was overthrown and in his place a new government seized control. Russian communists, led by Vladimir Ilich Lenin and Leon Trotsky, renamed their nation the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR).

The emergence of a powerful nation committed to communist principles, which it was determined to spread worldwide, threatened the ruling powers in Europe and the United States.

George began his career as a military policeman for the British Empire in Burma. His account of his experiences in Asia was published as a novel called “Burmese Days” in 1934. Many of the Burmese-British were offended by the novel. It included a stinging attack on the British Empire. Thus, because he “could not go on any longer serving imperialism”, he resigned his job and came back to England in 1927. The England he came back to was in serious crisis. England was a divided nation and arguments over the possible ways forward-socialism, capitalism, communism, or fascism- filled the newspapers and magazines. His political thoughts were influenced by the times. So he felt that he had been part of an oppressive regime for the last five years and this left him with a bad conscience.

"I was conscious of an immense weight of guilt that I had got to expiate. I felt that I had got to escape not merely from imperialism but from every form of man's dominion over man. I wanted to submerge myself, to get right down among the oppressed, to be one of them and on their side against their tyrants."

At that time he still did not have any defined ideas concerning socialism or any other economic theory. But during this time he developed his skills as a writer. In 1933, his first book, Down and Out in Paris and London, an account of his time living in poverty, was published. After several rejections, the left-wing publishing house Victor Gollancz picked up this book because of its "social importance". This was the beginning of a fruitful relationship for Orwell that was to last 12 years.

George Orwell, explaining in an essay in 1946 why he became a writer, stated that when he was about sixteen he "…suddenly discovered the joy of mere words." Orwell was passionate about the usage of the words of the English language and its ability to communicate the world as it really was. His love of prose and the concrete world of objective truth reinforced this love.

"So long as I remain alive and well I shall continue to feel strongly about prose style, to love the surface of the earth, and to take pleasure in solid objects."

His belief in the use of words and language to communicate the tactile world led him to despise those who would use language to try to falsify reality and conceal the truth. He treated the language of orthodox politicians and political parties with contempt.

"Political language – and with variations this is true of all political parties, from Conservatives to Anarchists – is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind."

He recognized that language should be an instrument for expressing and not concealing thought. The stale political speakers who loved the use of pre-fabricated terms in their speeches were in his eyes less than human, almost brain-dead.

"When one watches some tired hack on the platform mechanically repeating the familiar phrases – bestial atrocities, iron heel, blood-stained tyranny, free peoples of the world, stand shoulder to shoulder – one often has a curious feeling that one is not watching a live human being but some kind of dummy … the appropriate noises are coming out of his larynx, but his brain is not involved as it would be if he were choosing his words for himself."

His unique political allegory, Animal Farm, was published in 1945, and in 1995 it received the W.H. Smith and Penguin Books Great Reads of the Century award. This novel, together with Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949), brought Orwell world-wide fame. The story of Animal Farm moves from idealism towards disillusionment and tragedy. There will be no fairy-tale ending, but throughout the story, the majority of the animals remain innocent and generous. While Napoleon, Squealer, and their attack dogs become increasingly sinister and vicious in words and actions, the other creatures continue to throw their hearts into the dream of Animal Farm. Students all around the world embrace the “Orwellian” literature as a great way to study history and political issues from a critical perspective.

2.2. Orwellian concept

To describe something as "Orwellian" is to say that it brings to mind the fictional totalitarian society of Oceania described in Nineteen Eighty-Four. And the best way to understand what does and does not constitute Orwellian policy is to read Nineteen Eighty-Four itself and to make up your own critical response.

Orwell’s book is where we get the term Big Brother from, such as when people say “Big Brother is watching you.” The only answer you will probably get from a student nowadays is that Big Brother is an entertaining reality- show, when in fact it’s referring to the omniscient surveillance system that continuously watched and listened to people-as it is described in the novel—even in their own homes. When we call something Orwellian to describe the invasiveness of certain technology or government policies, we are also referring to Orwell’s nightmarish vision described in his novel. There are several other terms that Orwell himself coined in Nineteen Eighty-Four, such as doublethink, thought crime, and memory hole, which have also become part of our vernacular.

If you have read the book or seen the film, you are familiar with the issues that make up the storyline, such as the high-tech surveillance system watching and listening to everyone in order to keep them in line with the government (called the Party in the novel). You are also familiar with the concept of a small elite ruling class (what Orwell calls the Inner Party) living in luxury and wielding unimaginable power over lower level citizens. In the novel, people have lost their freedom, their critical thinking skills, and even the ability to love due to the cultural depths society has sunk to as a result of Big Brother’s control. The reason Nineteen Eighty-Four remained so popular, and the reason society has adopted vocabulary from the book, is because it serves as more than merely a fictional novel for the reader’s entertainment. The novel served (and continues to serve) as a stark warning of what the future may hold.

Big Brother: The Orwellian Nightmare Come True looks at technology that now exists or is under development and will exist in the near future, that threatens to make our world just as horrific as, or even worse than the world George Orwell described. This book will provide information from mainstream news sources, industry experts, and even patent numbers of the most invasive and sinister Orwellian devices anyone could dream of. We will also look at actual government programs and policies that seem as if they came right out of Orwell’s dark imagination, such as the government secretly paying mainstream media reporters to act as gate-keepers and propagandists for the establishment, and the Police illegally spying on and smearing peaceful political activists who were seen as problematic.

Are we not a part of an Orwellian world? Do students nowadays have any knowledge of how the world was like 40 years ago? Orwell’s vision about the future serves as a warning for what is already here, and what is soon to come. It is scary because it holds so much truth, and yet amazing because we proved to be our own enemies. We are being turned into numbers and statistics, and mathematical formulas are used by employers to determine whether an employee is being efficient enough. Social networking sites such as Facebook have turned everyone into their own favorite celebrity and supplement actual friendships and interactions. People don’t need to get together for a dinner party to catch up on each other’s lives anymore; we just monitor their newsfeed on Facebook, from the comfort of our own home.

Today Orwell's words are read differently. We live in a society that seems the opposite of that portrayed by him perfectly. But then, just 4 years after the end of World War II, Orwell wrote in a world that was prepared for the 3rd World War. A world which found out of Nazi crimes and (probably at least partially) from those of Stalinism. Then, the nearly 60 million deaths were not just a statistic. Were parents, children or friends of those who would read 1984. Then, in a dark world but full of expectations, hopes and fears, 1984 was a probable future. Now we call it with a trace of vanity: dystopia.

What made compelling the reading of 1984, was that it is essentially a story about a man and most importantly for the existence of each of us – about hope. Winston Smith lives in a world in which this word is to be executed and removed from the dictionary. With all his realism, Smith can afford to get high with hope and (peak of nerve) with a little love. I understand perfectly and I admired him. Although I felt from the very beginning how this adventure will end, I liked every page and moved with fear to the next paragraph knowing his approaching inevitable. I got the impression that those moments of freedom, hope and love are worth the price paid later.

It is very hard to "advertise" a book like 1984 for the 2016th students. I do not really believe in the perfect book. I was captured by the fact that 1984 has absolutely everything you want from a book. It is truly imperative reading. But at the same time I remain convinced that in order to understand and appreciate the true 1984's value, we need a foundation consisting of tens and hundreds of other books. And still, living in a country like Romania, I really think it helps you understand the book very well.

After reading 1984, we found out that Big Brother can be any modern dictator of the 20th century, and its name has become synonymous with violation of the individual privacy by any totalitarian power. To control the all, dictatorship has to know the most intimate thoughts, and no corner of the human mind can remain unknown to the cold eye of Big Brother.

Before 1989, in Romania, in the communist totalitarian system, the party was the one defining both what was allowed and what was forbidden. To resume a formula of George Orwell, the totalitarian universe, everything that was not forbidden was compulsory; including the duty of the people to be happy, despite the bad conditions which condemned the system. At the end of the communist regime in Romania, in November 1989, that congress of shame and despair, The Communist Party had almost 4 million members. It was therefore one of the largest communist party in the world (proportionally speaking). In fact, it was a giant devoid of any internal life.

The School of Rebellion is a challenge to the capitalist school, where education is an instrument "to facilitate integration of the younger generation into the logic of the present system and bring about conformity". The School of Rebellion is inspired by the "the practice of freedom, the means by which men and women deal critically and creatively with reality and discover how to participate in the transformation of their world”.

The capitalist school sees the student as wage-slave, client and consumer. The School of Rebellion sees students as agents of social transformation and liberation. The capitalist school aims to produce a work-ready, disciplined and commodity thirsty citizen. The School of Rebellion aims to encourage constructive, collective and organized rebellion.

By coming to understand the world and recognizing the need to change it, children and young people can challenge a ‘career’ centered education and become agents of change. Such agency opens a magical door to knowledge. This is what the School of Rebellion hopes for.

2.3. Why should we still read George Orwell on politics? (Cited from-The Guardian)

Until 1989, the answer was plain. He was the writer who captured the essence of totalitarianism. All over communist-ruled Europe, people would show me their dog-eared, samizdat copies of Animal Farm or Nineteen Eighty-Four and ask: "How did he know?"

Yet the world of Nineteen Eighty-Four ended in 1989. Orwellian regimes persisted in a few remote countries, such as North Korea, and communism survived in an attenuated form in China. But the three dragons against which Orwell fought his good fight – European and especially British imperialism; fascism, whether Italian, German or Spanish; and communism, not to be confused with the democratic socialism in which Orwell himself believed – were all either dead or mortally weakened. Forty years after his own painful and early death, Orwell had won.

What need, then, of Orwell? One answer is that we should read him because of his historical impact. For Orwell was the most influential political writer of the 20th century. This is a bold claim, but who else would compete? Among novelists, perhaps Alexander Solzhenitsyn or Albert Camus; among playwrights, Bertolt Brecht. Or the novelist, playwright and philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre, whom Orwell privately called "a bag of wind"? Take them one by one, and you will find that each made an impact more limited in duration or geographical scope than did this short-lived, old-fashioned English man of letters.

Worldwide familiarity with the word "Orwellian" is proof of that influence. "Orwellian" is used as a pejorative adjective, to evoke totalitarian terror, the falsification of history by state-organized lying and, more loosely, any unpleasant example of repression or manipulation. It is used as a noun, to describe an admirer and conscious follower of his work. Occasionally, it is deployed as a complimentary adjective, to mean something like "displaying outspoken intellectual honesty, like Orwell". Very few other writers have garnered this double tribute of becoming both adjective and noun.

Everywhere that people lived under totalitarian dictatorships, they felt he was one of them. The Russian poet Natalya Gorbanyevskaya once said that Orwell was an east European. In fact, he was a very English writer who never went anywhere near eastern Europe. His knowledge of the communist world was largely derived from reading.

In short, he was more memorably and influentially right than anyone, and sooner, about the single greatest political menace of the second half of the 20th century, as well as seeing off the two largest horrors of the first half. But those monsters are dead, or on their last legs. To say "read him because he mattered a lot in the past" will hardly attract new readers to Orwell.

Fortunately, there is a more compelling reason why we should read Orwell in the 21st century. This is that he remains an exemplar of political writing. Both meanings of "exemplar" are required. He is a model of how to do it well, but he is also an example – a deliberate, self-conscious and self-critical instance – of how difficult it is.

Orwell the moralist is fascinated by the pursuit not merely of truth, but of the most complicated and difficult truths. It starts already with the early essay Shooting an Elephant, where he confidently asserts that the British empire is dying but immediately adds that it is "a great deal better than the younger empires that are going to supplant it". At times, he seems to take an almost masochistic delight in confronting uncomfortable truths.

Not that his own political judgment was always good. His vivacious and perceptive wife Eileen wrote that he retained "an extraordinary political simplicity". There are striking misjudgments in his work. It's startling to find him, early on, repeating the communist line that "fascism and capitalism are at bottom the same thing".

As VS Pritchett observed, in reviewing The Lion and the Unicorn, he "is capable of exaggerating with the simplicity and innocence of a savage". But that is what satirists do. So this weakness of his non-fiction is one of the great strengths of his fiction.

Both his life and his work are case studies in the demands of political engagement. In Writers and Leviathan he describes the political writer's dilemma: "seeing the need of engaging in politics while also seeing what a dirty, degrading business it is". After briefly being a member of the Independent Labour party, he concludes that "a writer can only remain honest if he keeps free of party labels".

Finally, of course, Orwell's list, and Orwell’s life, is much less important than the work. It matters, to be sure, that there is no flagrant contradiction between the work and the life – as there often is with political intellectuals. The Orwellian voice, placing honesty and single standards above everything, would be diminished. But what endures is the work.

If I had to name a single quality that makes Orwell still essential reading in the 21st century, it would be his insight into the use and abuse of language. If you have time to read only one essay, read Politics and the English Language. This brilliantly sums up the central Orwellian argument that the corruption of language is an essential part of oppressive or exploitative politics. "The defense of the indefensible" is sustained by a battery of euphemisms, verbal false limbs, prefabricated phrases, and all the other paraphernalia of deceit that he pinpoints and parodies.

The extreme, totalitarian version that he satirized as Newspeak is less often encountered these days, except in countries such as Burma or North Korea. But the obsession of democratically elected governments, especially in Britain and America, with media management and "spin" is today one of the main obstacles to understanding what is being done in our name. There are also distortions that come from within the press, radio and television themselves, partly because of hidden ideological bias but increasingly because of fierce commercial competition and the relentless need to "entertain".

Read Orwell, and you will know that something nasty must be hidden behind the euphemistic, Latinate phrase used by NATO spokesmen during the Kosovo war: "collateral damage". (It means innocent civilians killed.) Read Orwell, and you will smell a rat whenever you find a newspaper boy or politician once again churning out a prefabricated phrase such as "Brussels' inexorable march to a European super state".

He does not just equip us to detect this semantic abuse. He also suggests how writers can fight back. After all, the abusers of power are using our weapons: words. In Politics and the English Language he even gives some simple stylistic rules for honest and effective political writing. He compares good English prose to a clean window pane. Through these windows, citizens can see what their rulers are really up to. So, political writers should be the window cleaners of freedom.

Orwell both tells and shows us how to do it. That is why we need him still, because Orwell's work is never done.

III. TRANSLATION ANALYSIS

"Translation is not a matter of words only: it is a matter of making intelligible a whole culture."

Anthony Burgess

Introduction

The main role of a language translator is to author a piece of writing. This may seem like an odd notion at first glance since the translator is not usually the original writer of the text being translated, but a good translation should read as though it were originally written in the target language. A large amount of concentration and expertise goes into making a translated text flow as smoothly as the original text, similar to authoring a piece of writing from scratch.

Another role of a language translator is to multitask like you’ve never imagined multitasking before. Here is a list of things a translator must do or take into account while working on a translation: seize the intended meaning of the source language; gauge the word choice for the target language; match the formatting of the source language; know or research the best terminology for the subject matter; assess cultural differences in case it impacts phrasing or grammar; convert proper names into a new alphabet if applicable; ensure overall clarity and accuracy of finished translation.

This is quite a lot to consider for one professional working on one text, not to mention that several of these things must be done simultaneously.

Translation is as much an art as a science. A lone machine cannot be depended upon to effectively complete all these tasks. It’s unlikely that the same application can be trusted to process both grammatical nuances and cultural nuances in one fell swoop.

Human translation is still very much a necessity and should certainly be the preference for translating your carefully worded material. Like many machines, humans do errors but that’s why any reputable agency should have a thorough quality assurance process in place.

The novel in discussion for this paper has been translated only once in Romania, by Mihnea Gafița and it has been published three times with the same translation. Mihnea Gafița is a Romanian translator, an essayist, editor, book editor (currently at Curtea Veche Publishing House). Being used with the communist regime, Mihnea was very familiar with all the concepts.

Being a futuristic novel, sci-fi, utopia or dystopia, 1984 brings us quite a number of specific expressions, concepts and ways of thinking which are either new or outstanding, but it also brings a lot of totalitarian concepts. There is no surprise that Orwell’s language, content and creativity are extraordinary. Orwell was a well-read student of English literature and keen on writing parodies and poems at school. Therefore his love for words and language brought the best in his work. In this chapter, instances of four types will be examined: the first two are the infamous slogans and the verses of the novel, and how their translations were made to attract readers’ attention.

The novel itself has its own language called Newspeak. Orwell connected the decline of a language to the political and economic clash. He knew that there will be consequences. Without proof he believed that languages from the communist countries, under dictatorship, such as Soviet Union or Germany had deteriorated. In his essay Politics and the English language, Orwell wrote “When the general atmosphere is bad, language must suffer. If thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought”. Behind this concept is the invention of Newspeak, created by Orwell as the official language of Oceania. In this world there is no concept of freedom therefore there cannot be the word freedom. In 1984’s Appendix, Orwell explains the etymology of the Newspeak and the syntactical arrangements made in order to make her a dead language. Unlike English language, one which has the capability of diverse expression, has the tendency to gain words, Newspeak loses words by removing those that represent opposing concepts.

In the following pages we will study how the expressions of political nature were translated into Romanian language and the way the substance was kept in order to manipulate people’s mind and their knowledge of their surroundings; fourth, colloquial expressions denoting cultural difference. We will pay particular attention to expressions that convey manifest political messages or contain interesting cultural or literary values in the following sub-chapters: translating slogans; translating verses; translating expressions of a political nature; translating expressions of a cultural or colloquial nature.

Verses are chosen because of their special value to Orwell as a student and young writer. As stated earlier, Orwell was well-read in English literature and keen on writing poems and parodies at school. This early influence finds its place in later works and Nineteen Eighty-four is no exception. The song ‘Under the spreading chestnut tree’ is in fact an adaptation of an earlier poem. Orwell’s unrelenting reverie of the good old world (Bolton 1984, Davison 1996) is projected onto Winston: the man is always trying to make sense of his present existence out of his past that is wearing out day by day due to the retelling of history by the Party, and he is anxious to know the complete ‘Oranges and Lemons’ verse that describes a lost world he now vaguely remembers. That said, readers who are aware of how the literary heritage of the English language leaves its mark on Orwell may find these instances appealing. It will also be inspiring to see how items of strong domestic flavour of the environment in the original text are rendered in the Romanian translation.

In addition to his strength in expressing fondness of his country in his writings, Orwell was equally skillful in playing with words to state his concerns about the influence of politics on language. He had always seen it as a threat to people’s ability to speak up and think. He detested the most the falsification of facts and beautifying the undesirable because in so doing people are deprived of the chance to know the truth.

W. F. Bolton, in his The language of 1984: Orwell's English and ours. Oxford Blackwell, indicates Orwell’s preoccupation with euphemism and jargon grew more intense after the War’. In chapter seven of his volume, Bolton (1984) talks extensively of the jargon of the Ministries, common fixed phrases, and ‘dead metaphors’. Special reference to the term ‘Reclamation Centers’ (for ‘colonies for homeless children’) is also made.

Moreover, in chapter two of Bolton’s same volume where word formation is discussed; a long list of examples of compounds (such as ‘prolefeed’) and acronyms (such as ‘Ingsoc’ translated into Romanian as SOCENG- (English socialism) and Minilove- Miniiub’) is provided to demonstrate not only Orwell’s linguistic skills but also how they may mislead readers by their new forms. The significance of compounds lies in their nature that ‘ambiguity is inherent in compounds; few are self-explanatory’, whereas that of acronyms in the fact that ‘the English vocabulary also grows by the adoption of proper names’ and, as Orwell is reported to have observed, many of these names are formed by acronyms. The use of acronyms and initials may serve political interests since they provide an empty frame into which any new meaning can be put, thought may be shaped to the satisfaction of the authority.

3.1.Translating slogans

Origin and Etymology of the word slogan: alteration of earlier slogorn, from Scottish Gaelic -sluagh-ghairm, from sluagh army, host + gairm cry.

The Merriam Webster Dictionary gives a simple definition to the word slogan: Simple Definition of slogan: a word or phrase that is easy to remember and is used by a group or business to attract attention but it also gives a full definition related to the Scottish origin:

-a : a war cry especially of a Scottish clan;

b : a word or phrase used to express a characteristic position or stand or a goal to be achieved;

-a brief attention-getting phrase used in advertising or promotion.

The Romanian Dictionary (DEX) gives the following definition for the slogan: formula obvious, conclusive expresses in concise form, political goals, economic groups, organizations or a topical issue. In our case the slogan is related to politics and especially to the totalitarian system, the communist regime.

Since 1991, this novel has been published with the same translation over and over again. As there cannot be made a comparison between Romanian versions of the novel, we will study the only version there is.

The slogan ‘BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU’, translated by Mihnea Gafița “FRATELE MARE STĂ CU OCHII PE TINE”, is still widely used in the media, and it seems Orwell’s nightmare has been lingering in our minds (if not haunting us) for more than five decades. Because it has such a powerful impact upon readers it surely deserves its own analysis. When I had the chance to ask several colleagues of mine about the meaning of BIG BROTHER, I was not surprised to find out that they thought it was a TV show. A well-read student though, knows that the slogan “FRATELE MARE STĂ CU OCHII PE TINE” and the short expression “FRATELE CEL MARE” encompass nearly all one wants to say about a totalitarian regime. Or it might not necessarily be politics only: we also find it suitable for pure technology, especially developments in telecommunication and monitoring systems. Moreover, we do still find it in printed or electronic materials (advertisements, newspapers, journals, magazines, etc.) around us.

The Romanian translation for ‘Big Brother’ by Mihnea G. is: FRATELE CEL MARE. This is a simple and literal translation. What Mihnea did with the translation, was to write the slogans with capital letters in order to make the reader focus on it. In our country totalitarian regime or communism was something familiar. China and USSR were considered by our regime “The Big Brothers”. Many years we had adopted their policy, whereby systems of politics, governance, diplomacy, economy, education, and agriculture, social planning, and so on were to follow the soviets’ ways as much as possible for the sake of the country’s development during its early years and its Communist future. And one should not be unfamiliar with the slogan “Să învățăm de la fratele nostru mai mare” (Soviet Union). Thus, with the presence of this marvelous equivalent in Romanian with the same associations, ‘Big Brother’ and “Fratele cel Mare” is a perfect match.

Then, let us examine the remainder of the slogan ‘is watching you’, first in English language then in Romanian. In English language is a copular predicate containing the present participle. In transitive usage relevant to this context, ‘to watch’ means: first, ‘to keep under guard’; second, ‘to observe closely in order to check on action or change (e.g. being watched by the police)’; third, ‘to observe’; and, fourth, ‘to look on at (e.g. watch television)’. In an English-Romanian dictionary it is translated as follows: “to watch”- a urmări; a se uita la; a îngriji; a fi în așteptare; a fi atent unde pășește; a avea grijă de; a se feri de. Mihnea G. chose none of the versions. He chose a Romanian phrase: “a sta cu ochii pe cineva”. He considered that the idea inducted by Orwell, that of surveillance, would be more intense with this phrase then with a simple literal translation like: “Fratele cel mare te urmărește/ te privește”.

Mihnea G. seems to have chosen to tell the readers more about the story at this stage by translating ‘is watching’ this way, which is without doubt an appropriate sense because the people of Oceania do live in constant surveillance by the ‘telescreen’ (translated into Romanian- Tele-ecranul) and ‘Thought Police’ (translated into Romanian – Poliția Gândirii). Towards the end of the first part of the novel where Winston looks at one side of a coin, we get the idea that Winston Smith is still not sure if Big Brother is ‘good’ or ‘bad’. But he certainly knows of what the ‘telescreen’ and ‘Thought Police’ are doing; and, he also knows that life is without freedom. But the authority of Oceania knows how to create slogans so as to ‘educate’ and pacify its people who are supposed to feel content even under those living conditions and war hysteria.

Other slogans that deserve our attention are those translated by Mihnea G. ad-literam:

„WAR IS PEACE.

FREEDOM IS SLAVERY.

IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH.”

Translation:

„RĂZBOIUL ESTE PACE.

LIBERTATEA ESTE SCLAVIE.

IGNORANȚA ESTE PUTERE.”

The translator has chosen to keep the capital letters for the slogans or for the words that had a specific connotation in the book. Keeping the format, the reader pays more attention to these and the way they had been repeated over and over again in the novel. You cannot ignore or forget these slogans once you finished the book.

The Oceania world is seen through his main character’s eyes: Winston Smith. We, as readers, identify with him and we see the world from his point of view. In a world gone wrong Winston is the innocent one. The suffering that exists in the totalitarian system of Oceania is felt and understood through him. It is not hard to imagine that we are in his place, because Winston is so common and so real at the same time.

3.2. Translating verses

Under the spreading chestnut tree- Sub castanul înfrunzit

The ‘chestnut tree’- (castanul) song is of symbolic significance in the story. The song will later become the bitterest irony for Winston Smith when, near the end, he sits emotionlessly still at the Chestnut Tree Café upon release from Room 101. Earlier in the novel he recalls his feelings when he heard it and saw Jones, Aaronson and Rutherford. The tune is ‘something hard to describe’; ‘a peculiar, cracked, braying, jeering note’; ‘a yellow note’.

‘Under the spreading chestnut tree’ – sub castanul înfrunzit is the first line from a popular poem ‘The Village Blacksmith’ (1839) by the famous American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807–1882). His poems are remembered for their easy rhymes, simple language and obvious contents. That is why many nursery rhymes are parodies of his poems. There is even a campfire song (date unknown) that goes like this:

‘Under the spreading chestnut tree,

There we sat just you and me

Oh how happy we would be,

Under the spreading chestnut tree.”

With this in mind, the reader English version of 1984 should have spotted in it the structure of a campfire song or nursery rhyme as soon as he reads the ‘cruelly’ altered song in Nineteen Eighty-four. In these kinds of writings, the use of a simple rhyming scheme and eye rhymes is common. And this is not a novelty. Agatha Christie’s Poirot adventure One, Two, Buckle My Shoe is just one similar case: a nursery rhyme for a book of murder and crime. All these are just a preparation for the contradiction of feelings. Its apparent incompatibility between the song’s musicality and book’s cruelty is what fascinates us. From the conscious man’s ear it sounds like a loud classic donkey cry of mockery (‘braying’ and ‘jeering’); it is no child’s song. It is definitely intended to deride: the three senile dead-men-walking were the objects of ultimate ridicule.

“Under the spreading chestnut tree

I sold you and you sold me:

There lie they, and here lie we

Under the spreading chestnut tree.”

In the original version the first line is repeated in the last and both count eight syllables, the second and the third count seven. The imagery depicted by the original poem is one that gives a feeling of joy, serenity and security under the shelter of the umbrella-like chestnut tree. This is to contrast in utter irony with Orwell’s adaptation of the campfire song.

One Romanian variant of the translation would be:

“Sub castanul înfrunzit

Tu m-ai vândut eu te-am vândut:

Acolo mint ei, aici mințim noi

Sub castanul înfrunzit.”

The translation of Mihnea G. succeeds to capture the meaning and a rhyme as well:

“Sub castanul înfrunzit,

M-ai înșelat, te-am fraierit,

Și-unul și-altul, păcălit,

Stăm sub castanul înfrunzit.”

In his translation Mihnea G. used two verbs: a înșela and a fraieri for one English verb: to sold. The translation into Romanian of this verb is “a vinde”. Mihnea’s choice for the two verbs is understandable. He captured the essence of Orwell’s intention of using that song. Perhaps readers had never seen a chestnut, but that is not important. You don’t have to imagine how it looks like, you just have to capture the meaning of a simple song related through simple words. Though Orwell uses simple words to describe the voice “singing” it, one could still wonder why it should be ‘a yellow note’. No matter how he says of this voice from the official channel of the telescreen (tele-ecran), this comment echoes his hate against the ‘horrible plumy voice from the radio.

The voice who sang the odd song was described as “peculiar, cracked, braying, jeering note”. Mihnea G. translated them as follows: “notă bizară, spartă, de zbierăt, de caraghioslâc……notă galbenă”.

When we use the word ‘cracked’ (translated into Romanian using the word spartă) to describe a person’s voice, it is usually one which has ‘an unusual harshness or pitch, often due to distresses. The verb ‘to bray’ – a zbiera , translated using the word “zbierăt” means ‘to cry out, to utter a loud harsh cry’. It also refers to the cry of “horses, oxen, deer”, and hence a contemptuous human voice; likewise, it means ‘to make a loud harsh jarring sound’ with musical instruments. The verb “to jeer” means “to speak or call out in derision or mockery” “to address or treat with scornful derision”, or “to deride, flout, openly mock or scoff at”. The Romanian translation for it was a noun: “caraghioslâc”. Mihnea’s choice for this noun is extraordinary. It does justice to the author’s intention with the original one. So we know that the tune is a very bizarre and unpleasant one to hear. And an equally obscure word is used to describe it – ‘yellow’. In dated usage, the word, as a verb, means “to yelp” or “to bellow”. The former refers to a loud, high-pitched cry made by human, dogs or certain birds; the latter refers to a roar by a cow or a ‘cry in a loud and deep voice’ of depreciative nature or due to pain.

Now let us see how the word ‘yellow’ is translated. Mihnea translated it easily like anyone would: galbenă. What if this time he lacked inspiration? This obscure word plays its magic here because it may well be in a close relation with cracked- spartă, braying –de zbierăt and jeering-de caraghioslâc at the same time. However, there appears imperfection with his translation. It might fail to convey the necessary meanings delivered by the three words in the original. Consequently, this could perplex the reader of the translation because the word does not at all sustain any connection with the three specific qualities of the tune, thus rendering the original term ‘yellow note’ (coined by Winston) irrelevant. Perhaps another option for this translation could have been more appropriate to the context in which it appears. For example: a sad note, a crying note, instead of a yellow note. The query “why” was translated in that way remains in the reader’s mind.

The original word ‘note’ means, in one sense, a single tone of definite pitch made by a musical instrument or the human voice, and, in the other, a particular quality or tone that reflects or expresses a mood or attitude. We would add that the translation of the word ‘note’ refers to a stated quality or feeling. Thus, we can see that the word (as used in the original) also focuses on the ‘mood’, ‘attitude’, ‘quality’ and ‘feeling’ that can be shown by the lyrics and the way that they are sung. Therefore, Mihnea’s G. simple version might be the best option.

Oranges and lemons

In addition to the chestnut tree poem, the church bell rhyme is yet another item of similar nature for its direct reference to many specific locations in England. The first half of the rhyme appears in chapter eight, Part One, and O’Brien is to fill in two forgotten lines in chapter eight, Part Two. Still the text has not given the rhyme in full.

"Oranges and lemons" say the bells of St. Clement's

"You owe me five farthings" say the bells of St. Martin's

"When will you pay me?" say the bells of Old Bailey

"When I grow rich" say the bells of Shoreditch

"When will that be?" say the bells of Stepney

"I do not know" say the great bells of Bow

"Here comes a candle to light you to bed

Here comes a chopper to chop off your head

Chip chop chip chop – the last man's dead."

The place names relate to some of the many churches of London and the tune that accompanies the lyrics emulates the sound of the ringing of the specific church bells. The words of the nursery rhyme are chanted by children as they play the game of 'Oranges and lemons' the end of which culminates in a child being caught between the joined arms of two others, emulating the act of chopping off their head! The reason for the last three lines of lyrics is easily explained. The 'Great Bells of Bow' were used to time the executions at Newgate prison, which for many years were done by means of beheading. The unfortunate victim would await execution on 'Death Row' and was informed by the warder, the night before the execution ' here comes the candle to light you to bed' of their imminent fate and to make their peace with God! The executions commenced when the bells started chiming at nine o'clock in the morning. When the bells stopped chiming then the executions would be finished until the following day!

One of the obvious features of this rhyme is that it contains the names of four local buildings. These all are famous locations readily known to the people of England, but not necessarily to readers of Romania. Luckily enough, there is in the narration indication as to what and where the buildings are. For example, St Clement Danes is ‘outside the Law Courts’ and ‘a church at one time’; St Martin’s is ‘in Victory Square, alongside the picture gallery’, ‘a building with a kind of a triangular porch and pillars in front, and a big flight of steps’. But it seems the reader knows only that much, with Old Bailey and Shoreditch left unexplained. The reader will find a short explanatory note most helpful. But The Romanian translator does not give one.

“Portocale și lămâi, zice-un clopot la Sîn Clement,

Ai să-mi dai trei gologani, zice altul la Sîn Martin,

Când mi-i dai, zi, când mi-i dai?- zice altreilea la Justiție.

Când oi avea, răsună turnul de la Shoreditch.”

Mihnea G. gives archaic versions for the translation of some words as well and he uses the popular future to translate the English present simple tense (oi avea). He uses unstressed forms of the personal pronoun for the text’s authenticity (mi-i dai).

Although these verses are not so important to our understanding of the novel, a sensible translator should not be tempted to withhold some extra information about the cultural background of the original only to avoid footnotes when it is possible to include a short one for the sake of dispelling confusion. There might be of great help if a reader could find some explanation notes at the end of the page or even at the end of the book.

3.3. Translating expressions of a political nature

INGSOC is the first expression we are going to study as how it was translated and what it meant in the original version. As the political issues are of special importance in the novel, all the expressions must be studied carefully.

INGSOC is the acronym for English Socialism and it was translated in Romanian language SOCENG. Mihnea G. also used an acronym to give the expression meaning. It is understandable and not difficult for the readers. The English Socialism has deep implications in Orwell’s life. Acronyms and abbreviations are also among his concerns about language being manipulated by politics. As Orwell says in ‘Politics and the English Language’:

not only do acronyms compress the word form, they also suppress associations; the latter is obviously the political objective of making a long word short in order to narrow thought and, if ever possible, to control emotions.

This idea surely outweighs the need for convenience in remembering the term. There is mentioned that INGSOC is the term in the Newspeak- Nouavorbă and English Socialism in Oldspeak- Vechivorbă. We might add that the translations chosen for some acronyms were a little bit funny even though this is not a funny novel at all. Despite the fact that this kind of foreign terms might draw the reader’s special attention, the reader would be burdened by the unnecessary impulse to look them up in reference books for details, in the appendixes or prefaces. And this information search should actually be one of the preliminary tasks of the translator but Mihnea G. doesn’t do this. He avoids using footnotes or explanations as to help the reader’s understanding.

The next example is be the name of the group of common people that constitutes 85% of Oceania’s population. It occupies an important position in the novel as well as in the historical context of socialism: “proles”.

According to the Merriam-Webster Online dictionary, the word ‘prole’ is derived from ‘proletarian’ meaning ‘a member of the proletariat’; the word ‘proletariat’ means: ‘

1: the lowest social or economic class of a community;

2: the laboring class; especially: the class of industrial workers who lack their own means of production and hence sell their labor to live’.

In the novel the proles are the “swarming disregarded masses” 85% of the population of Oceania. The translations of the proper noun ‘proles’ are of intense interest and deserve detailed discussion. The word comes from ‘proletarian’, meaning ‘a member of the proletariat’ – the lowest or the labouring class. In chapter one (Part One) of the book, it first appears at the end of Winston’s long diary paragraph about the ordinary people’s reaction to a brutal bloody scene at the cinema:

a woman down in the prole part of the house suddenly started kicking up a fuss and shouting but nobody cares what the proles say typical prole reaction they never – ’

this is translated as follows:

dar o femeie din rândurile de proli a început bruc să facă gură și să țipe – cui îi pasă ce zic prolii tipică reacție de proli ăștia niciodată.

Mihnea’s choice for the translation is rather expected. He used an ancronym to translate another one. But he could have used the same word „prole” given the fact that in Romanian language we do have the word proletar or proletariat. We do not know why he chose the word „proli” we can only make assumptions: to mock the politics.

In chapter five, Syme (the language expert working on the final and perfect edition of the Newspeak dictionary) and Winston are talking about the making of the new edition. Syme is amazed when imagining that by the time it is released not a single human being will be alive who could understand such a conversation as they are having. No sooner has Winston uttered ‘Except –’ – which is supposed to be Except the proles – in disagreement than Syme ‘carelessly’ pronounces The proles are not human beings. The translations are as follows:

Te-ai gândit vreodată, Winston, că până în 2050, cel mai târziu, n-o să mai trăiască nici măcar un singur om care să poată înțelege o dicuție cum purtăm noi acum?

– Afară……. –

– Prolii nu sunt oameni.

(Cap. 5, Partea I, p.61)

And in chapter seven, the word ‘proles’ appears again in an important moment as Winston writes in his ‘secret’ diary: If there is hope it lies in the proles. If there was hope, it must lie in the proles.- That was translated into Romanian as follows. dacă există vreo speranță, ea stă în proli.

Furthermore, the ‘proles’ in the sentence ‘But the proles, if only they could somehow become conscious of their own strength would have no need to conspire…’ is translated as: „În timp ce prolii, dacă ar putea cumva deveni conștienți de puterea lor, nu au nevoie să comploteze. ”(cap. 7. p.79) It is to be noted the fact that the last part of the sentence was translated into Romanian language through the use of the present tense of the Romanian verb although in English we have a pressumption.

The expression „proles- eng”- “proli- rom”, evidently carries a communist connotation as we have mentioned before. We have just come across the origin and definition of the word ‘proletariat’ and its derivations‘proletarian’ and ‘prole’. The modern usage comes from the French prolétariat in the middle of the 19th century when Marx and Engels published The Communist Manifesto in 1848, and it is often used as a reference to Marxism. Thus, Mihnea’s translation of proles into proli is justified.

There are a lot of specific names of governmental bodies in Oceania that require special attention. The names of Ministries and “novel-writing machine” are of distinctive value and prove Orwell’s creativity in language.

Some of the more resourceful renditions are amongst the proper names. Let us look at the names of the ministries and departments of Oceania in normal English and, if they are there, in Newspeak: ‘Ministry of Truth / Minitrue’; ‘Ministry of Peace /Minipax’; ‘Ministry of Love / Miniluv’; ‘Ministry of Plenty / Miniplenty’; ‘Pornosec’. And their Romanian translation is as follows:

Ministry of Truth / Minitrue- Ministerul Adevărului/Miniadev

Ministry of Peace /Minipax- Ministerul Păcii/ Minipax

Ministry of Love / Miniluv – Ministerul Iubirii/Miniiub

Ministry of Plenty / Miniplenty- Ministerul Abundenței/Minabund

Pornosec- Pornosec (o subsecție a secției de literatură axată pe producerea de pornografii de doi bani care să fie apoi distribuite în rândurile prolilor). (Chapter 8/ p.92)

As we could expect, our translator tried to follow the same rules as Orwell did. He came up with new words as well as to keep the short version in connection with the original. For two of them he kept the same words: Minipax; Pornosec. Mihnea G. has attempted to closely follow the original in its characteristic aspects such as the descriptions and examples of Newspeak and so he succeeded in making the Romanian version sound like the original.

What Orwell did with the Newspeak was to contract the words. That is in fact the prevailing feature. In view of the fact that in Romanian the names are actually formed in the same way with three syllables, it seems that further contraction would not be as effectual as in Newspeak where the number of syllables is largely reduced – all to three except and so an extra amazing effect has been provided.

But do the readers understand it? In the original English version of the book, Orwell specifies that you can read more about it in the Appendix at the end of the novel. Mihnea Gafița does not provide such information. This could put the reader into great difficulty or even complicating his capability of understanding.

Orwell provides in the Principles of Newspeak at the end of the novel reasons and rules for the contractions. The name of each Ministry is in itself an utter irony and the name and the reality is a pure contradiction. The translation of names, and their combinations have not produced subtle effects and we do have consistency (of using the same pattern).

An unusual translation of a simple term also appears in the name of a civil organisation – Fiction Department translated into Romanian as Secția de Literatură. (chapter I, p. 13).

The ‘Fiction Department’ is the place where Julia handles one of the numerous ‘novel-writing machines’ to produce leisure reading materials for the people of Oceania. Obviously, ‘fiction’ is a sort of creative production of literature by humans. However, products from this department are far from manmade, they are machine-made instead. Perhaps one can be satisfied with the conclusion that ‘fiction’ of this kind is the falsest such that becomes a suitable word here and the readers knows it.Instead of trnslating it as it is Departamentul de Ficțiune, the translator has chosen to adapt it to the real life and made the connection between his fuction (writing fiction for the proles). However, although the term tells how ‘novels’ are ‘written’, the reader may mistake the function of the Department and think that it also performs tasks, among others, similar to the ‘Records Department’ (where Winston works) such as rewriting newspapers and falsifying documents.

An expression of communist connotation is ideological battles translated into Romanian language as confruntările ideologice. (chap.5/p.170) The first half of the twentieth century saw waves of ideological struggles, there were those which only remained as polemical wars, and others which eventually led to actual wars. Orwell had witnessed many of these instances himself (as mentioned in chapter II) before the world was divided into two polarised extremes by the Cold War. So ii is not a surprise to see coined expressions relating to these world events in Orwell’s works. Similar terms existed even before Orwell had used his in the novel: terms such as ideological warfare, ideological war and ideological foe appeared in the press including literary works.( the term ideological warfare appeared in the Times in 1939; the term ideological war in Ezra Pound’s 1940 poem collection Cantos)

She had grown up since the Revolution and was too young to remember the ideological battles of the Fifties and Sixties.

Translated as follows:

Julia a crescut în anii de după Revoluție și este mult prea mică pentru a ține minte confruntările ideologice ale anilor cincizeci și șaizeci. (cap.5/p170)

What is notable about the translation is that the Romanian translator chose to keep the present tense simple although Orwell has chosen the past perfect tense and past simple.

The translation of another term of specific reference to the text is the word vaporized in its figurative sense. In Oceania, the usual fate of thought criminals, traitors and the like is death and their existence will be denied and then forgotten.

He knew that in the cubicle next to him the little woman with sandy hair toiled day in day out, simply at tracking down and deleting from the Press the names of people who had been vaporized and were therefore considered never to have existed.

(chapter 4/ p.53)

Translated as follows:

Știe că în boxa de lângă a lui lucrează femeia cea mică de statură, cu părul ca nisipul, care se chinuie zi de zi să urmărească și să radieze din presă numele celor care au fost vaporizați si, deci, se cheamă că nici nu au existat.

(cap. 4/p.50)

The translation has the same changes of tenses. The meaning of the verb to vaporise is a figurative one: to disappear . The Romanian translator chose to translate this one not by using the verb to evaporate, the one that really has the meaning of the verb to disappear/vanish, but the verb a vaporiza. The last one is specific to liquids, in Romanian language.

Perhaps abolished-suprimat or annihilated-distrus would have been a better option for the translation. The word really means” to become vaporous” – a se evapora as a physical phenomenon and it gives rise to the figurative sense of „disappearance”- dispariție. When one thinks of death, one thinks of „dust and ashes”- praf și țărână. Now Orwell creates an image in which a person passes off in vapour and thus to represent the terrible thoroughness of the authority’s annihilation of someone’s life.

Other important terms that require our attention are those created by Orwell. The expressions that makes the novel unique: Newspeak; Oldspeak; Artsem; Doublethink; Speakwrite; Telescreen; Thoughtpolice; Thoughtcrime.

What is extraordinay about the translation is that Mihnea G. found a way to keep the same elements as in the original, therefore keeping the element of creation as well. He invented new words starting from Orwell’s imaginative writing.

Newspeak was translated into Romanian language as Nouvorbă. Perhaps it does not render the same modern arrangement of the original word but it follows the same rules.

Oldspeak was translated into Romanian as Vechivorbă.

Artsem is the English acronym for artificial insemination. Mihne G. did the same thing with the word. He created an acronym starting from our definition- inseminare artificială translating it as Artinsem.

Doublethink sounds perfect in English. The Romanian translation of it i somehow funny but the translator followed the same rules as he did with all of the new words: Dublugândi.

Speakwrite in the novel was a party tool used to translate spoken word into written word and it was translated into Romanian as Scrievorbitor. Such words do not exit in any of the TL or the SL. Orwell created a new vocabulary and so did the translator.

Thoughtcrime was translated as Crimăgândit. For some of the words the translator chose to make an inversion to get them close to the original version. We feel at times that it is a little too much, but the reader often ends up being fascinated with the new vocabulary. We are not sure if this translation satisfies the true meaning of the word. Another proposal for the translation would be: Gindirecrimă. But the word gândire does not exist in the Nouvorbă and so the translator could not make other translation.

Thoughtpolice was translated as Poliția Gândirii. „It was the arm of the Inner Party that seeks out those against the Party, searching out anyone with even the smallest thoughts against the Party or Big Brother. Their powers of observation force everyone to live as though they are always being watched or listened to. Mr. Charrington is a member.” (http://www.gradesaver.com/1984/study-guide/glossary-of-terms)

The primary aim of Newspeak is to reduce the meaning of language as well as the number of words possible. To this end, Newspeak removes all synonyms and antonyms. Bad instead becomes ungood (translated into Romanian as nebun), warm becomes uncold- (translated as nerece), and so on. Notably, ungood or uncold are used and yet unbad or unhot are not; the fictional “Party” controls which antonym of a word is used (e.g. warm and hot are both antonyms of cold). By choosing which words the populace can use, The Party can choose to shift thought in a more positive or negative direction to suit their needs; ungood (nebun in Romanian language), for example, makes the populace feel less negative than bad would, and conversely, most associate more negative emotions with the word cold (and therefore, uncold, which actually means hot) than with the word warm. Synonyms do not exist; words like satisfying, great, or excellent, for example, would all revert merely to some form of the word good.

Translating ungood as nebun may create a little bit of confussion considering the fact that this word into Romanian language means crazy. That is why, again, we think that there should be some footnotes or explanations made inside the book.

Comparative and superlative adjectives are dispatched in a similar manner: for example, there is no word for better or best in Newspeak. Instead, the prefix plus- or doubleplus- is added to intensify words; better becomes plusgood (translated as plusbun) and best would become doubleplusgood (translated as dubluplusbun). By reducing the number of words available, as well as reducing the intensity and emotion behind the words that people in 1984 can use, The Party is able to further suppress their population’s thought and emotions.

Newspeak also has different rules when it comes to forming adverbs and certain adjectives. To create an adjective one would add the suffix –ful to a noun; for example, instead of rapid, quick, or fast, one would say speedful (this word has a funny translation into Romanian as vitezal for „rapid” and vitezește for “iute”). The translator wanted to follow the same rules required by Newspeak. Instead of sick, ill, or diseased one would say diseaseful. Similar rules create adverbs with the suffix –wise, as quickly or rapidly would become speedwise and sickly would become diseasewise. As with any language, there are some exceptions to this rule, as certain adjectives like good, soft, and strong remain in Newspeak, but this is uncommon. In this fashion, a single base word can convey any part of speech. In the same vein, tenses require a smaller number of words; in Newspeak the suffix –ed is the only way to change a word to the past tense. For example, the irregular past tenses drank or ran would no longer exist, and in their place drinked and runned would be used. By limiting the number of ways to describe the world, The Party is able to limit the population’s very perception of the world.

(http://blog.oxforddictionaries.com/2014/09/george-orwell-newspeak/)

3.4. Translating proper nouns of a cultural or a colloquial nature

IV. CONCLUSIONS

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Online sources:

http://www.gradesaver.com/1984/study-guide/glossary-of-terms

http://www.merriam-webster.com/

http://public.oed.com/history-of-the-oed/

http://www.powerfulwords.info/nursery_rhymes/oranges_and_lemons.htm

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2001/may/05/artsandhumanities.highereducation