Overcoming Constraints in Literary Translation: A Case Study of Rendering Saud Al-Sanousi’s Saq Al-Bambu into English

Theoretical Review

Empirical Studies

Studies on literary translation have attracted the attention of researchers over the years. Petrulione (43) investigated the translation of two of Joanne Harris’s novels into Lithuanian using Davis’s classification of translation strategies. The practical part of the analysis included seven strategies: preservation, addition, omission, globalization, localization, transformations, and creation. The results demonstrated that the strategy of globalization, in which culture-specific references are replaced with ones that are more neutral or general to make them accessible to audiences from a wider range of cultural backgrounds, was adopted more frequently in the translation of the chosen novels. The majority of proper names were translated while paying full attention to the phonemic aspect and grammar rules of the Lithuanian language.

In the same token, Dabbaghian and Sanaz (280) applied Baker’s taxonomy on the rendering of Persian cultural terms and conducted a Translation Quality Assessment (TQA) on the Persian translation of George Orwell’s Animal Farm by Ali Akbar Akhondi. The results indicated that most mistranslations occurred at the word level.

Similarly, Alwafai (320) investigated two Arabic translations of Ernest Hemingway’s novella The Old Man and the Sea to find the problems and strategies of literary translation into Arabic. Their data were analyzed based on Baker’s theory of equivalence. Two levels of equivalence were taken into consideration: equivalence at the word level and equivalence at the collocation level. The findings showed that untranslatable, culture-specific items could be rendered in various ways, such as paraphrasing, rewording, lexicalizing new concepts, and adapting them culturally.

In the same vein, Farghal and Bazzi (114) explored the translation strategies adopted when rendering English fiction titles into Arabic. One hundred English fiction titles were collected and compared with their Arabic counterparts. The study found that literal translation works very well when the title is lexically and culturally transparent. However, when the title includes culture-bound references or allusions, adaptation seemed to be the most used strategy. In some cases, related words and explication were employed to render the title more attractive. Paraphrasing produced flat and unnatural titles, while transliteration works well with proper nouns but has to be supplemented by other procedures in some cases.

Rahmani (16) also investigated the translation process of the Moroccan cultural terminologies mentioned in Leila Abouzeid’s novella, ‘Ām al-fīl. Arabic culture-specific items related to the Moroccan culture and their English translations were identified and classified into various cultural categories according to Newmark’s approach (1988), Baker’s approach (2011), and Ghazala’s approach (2008). The results showed that the culture-specific items were often rendered using loan words accompanied by an explanation. When the words were not lexicalized in the TL, the translator used more neutral/less expressive words by close alternatives or paraphrases even if they did not deliver the same meaning from SL into TL. Although the studies mentioned above discuss literary translation from many perspectives, this study is different in that it investigates a novel, Saq Al-Bambu, that received little attention in the literature. Saq Al-Bambu discusses multiple topics that could create a dilemma in translation, such as identity, racism, and multiculturalism, which add to the translation process’s difficulty and complexity.

Social Constraints

Social constraints include social relations and actions that may represent how people and groups are named in a particular culture.

• - Nomenclature

Nomenclature refers to naming things which is a part of human communication. These names may differ from one culture to another, and hence, pose challenges for translators.

Isa spent his entire childhood roaming around the streets and towns of the Philippines; therefore, he provided a thorough explanation of these cities and the tribes he had contact with during his childhood. The names of the tribes were rendered in different ways, as shown in Table 1.

The first example includes the tribe/nickname of particular groups of people with a detailed explanation of their history. A first example is Isa’s explanation of the story of his mother’s financial struggle before she went to Kuwait, when a neighbor of theirs told them that he knew people who could lend Josephine some money to help her pay for her plane ticket: the “Indians.” According to Baker’s taxonomy, the strategy that the translator adopted here is translation using a general word; the footnote mentioned that the group’s name, “Bombai,” is the old name for the Indian capital Mumbai. But in the Philippines, this name is given to a group of Indians who finance the poor with small sums of money for interest and visit houses to offer electronic devices for several installments.

The second example is the translation of the word “كويابو” (Quiapo in English). Quiapo is a district of Manila, the capital of the Philippines, and is often referred to as the “Downtown.” The translator rendered the word كويابو as “old Manila,” adopting the same strategy of using a more general word.

The addition of footnotes in the ST provided a full explanation of the history of the “Bombai” and “Quiapo,” which was not mentioned in the TL at all. Not only did the translator waste an opportunity to draw readers into the events of the fiction and create a brand-new alternative dimension to help them grasp the novel as the author intended, but he also chose not to translate the groups’ names, instead substituting them with more general words like “the Indians” and “old Manila” and severely under-translating the text in the process.

In example (3), Isa mentions the names of Ghassan’s friends in the army’s music choir, most of whom were arrested, their bodies later found and received by their families after being recovered in mass graves in Iraq. The translator rendered the word “أبو فارس“ to “Abu Fares” instead of using the literal translation of the word: “Fares’s father.” He used a loan word, which is a strategy that is often associated with culture-specific items like giving nicknames to parents as the father of “Abu” (first male child’s name) and mother of “Um” (first male child’s name).

It is worth mentioning that the footnote in the TL provided background information on the lives of the musicians mentioned above (Abu Fares’s friends). According to the footnote, Abu Faris was a Kuwaiti poet called Fayeq Abd Aljaleel, who was born in 1948 and captured in 1991. His remains were found in a mass grave in Karbala’a – Iraq in 2006. His family received his remains and buried him in Kuwait in June 2006. “The man who wrote the music for the operetta” is Abdullah Al Rashid, Abu Fares’s best friend, who was captured during the occupation. His remains were identified on 25 July 2007.

The names provided in the novel are names of real musicians that were killed defending their homeland. Translating their names would not have added any additional information to the text. Still, it would definitely add a whole new human perspective to the novel among readers of the TL, especially after learning that the fiction they are reading is interwoven with reality. Reading names and occupations of people who died defending their country would undoubtedly provide a human depth to the fiction. The footnotes did not only mention the martyrs’ identity but also their occupations, the instruments they played, achievements they accomplished during their service, the circumstances that led to their death, and, finally, the year and place in which they passed.

No one could argue that reading this footnote was very touching and heartbreaking. Alsanousi also did thorough research on their accomplishments to honor their memory. Obviously, this footnote was very personal to the author since he added so much background information about their lives.

Political Constraints

Translators face problems when rendering a political text, including clashing ideologies, neologisms, adopting the wrong approach, translational inaccuracy, and political metaphor.

• - War-Related Terms

In August 1990, former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein ordered his army to invade Kuwait in a 2-day military operation that ended with his forces seizing all Kuwaiti territory on August 4. One of Saddam’s first ferrets was the formation of a sham government in Kuwait, headed by Colonel Alaa Hussein, which lasted only 5 days. On 9 August 1990, Saddam announced the “annexation” of Kuwait to Iraq as “governorate number 19” and submitted new names for the Kuwaiti streets, institutions, and even the capital.

Saud Alsanousi would have known the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait as a well-known war with consequences that spread to affect the entire Arab region. Therefore, it is highly likely he wrote his novel confident that his target audience would surely understand who the subject of specific actions was. But since most of Jonathan Wright’s target audience is likely far less acquainted with the Gulf war, he needed to use translation by illustration or cultural substitution to give more context and provide a better understanding of the course of the war (Table 2).

The political situation in the Arab world is usually very sensitive and complicated, and it becomes even more complicated when its discourse and language are translated. Translators should be aware of the choice of words and their implications since political and ideological discourses are extremely sensitive and may offend either party of the translation, the ST readers or the TT readers.

In example (4), Wright had to substitute “حرب الخليج الأولى” , which is literally translated to “The First Gulf War,” with the parties of the war, which are Iran and Iraq. According to Baker’s taxonomy, cultural substitution aims to create the same effect between readers of the SL and the TL. The First Gulf War is a well-known term among the Arab audience, but may be less commonly used among the English readers and therefore, identifying the conflicting parties in the name given in the translation was more conventional.

In example (5), when Rashid sees the dead body of his best friend on the television, he breaks down into tears. In order to guarantee that the TT readers are as engaged as the ST readers, Wright added contextual information by saying that supporting Iraq against Iran caused the hijacking of the plane that led to the death of Walid Rashid’s best friend. The translator uses translation by addition as an attempt to overcome the ambiguity of the pronouns that are used in the ST. He then needed to elaborate on the characters’ words to deliver meaning more accurately.

In example (6), the translator elaborated on the plane hijacking incident by adding the nationality of the kidnappers, indicating that this incident is directly associated with the consequences of the First Gulf War.

In example (7), the translator substituted the lexical item “الجيش المحتل” which is literally translated to “occupying army,” with the phrase “Iraqi army” to clarify that the Second Gulf War had begun. This time, the war was between Kuwait and Iraq.

Cultural Constraints

Saud Alsanousi often uses footnotes to explain Filipino and Arabian cultural thoughts and backgrounds. The rich, interesting cultural content of these footnotes helped expand the limits of the narrative outline, presenting new heuristic models for further understanding and offering new, different story threads for the TL reader to become familiar with. In addition, this cultural content can be a playful, fun way of providing an alternative experience that enables and provides the reader with a whole new perspective of dealing with the text.

• - Habits, Traditions, and Beliefs

Cultural adaptation and bending the text to fit the target audience’s ideologies, religion, culture, and tradition are sometimes necessary. Still, the translator should be aware and capable of assessing that any adaptation that has to be done should not ruin the general theme of the literary work (Table 3).

In example (8), Isa narrates the events of a fight that happened between his aunt Aida and her father. The footnote in the ST provided an additional explanation by mentioning that people in the Philippines believe that Ophthalmia (which was referred to in the translation as “eye disease”) could be contagious in case of direct eye contact between a healthy person and in infected one. This is another example of a cultural piece of information that readers of the TT could not become familiar with, because the translator did not translate the footnote which would have clarified the meaning. Regardless, Wright used a general word to render the quotation listed above, which led to a weaker rendering of the Filipino cultural belief and, therefore, a translation outcome that is less expressive and engaging than the sentence in the ST.

In example (9), Isa narrates his family’s terrible financial situation after his father stopped sending money to the Philippines. The novel’s footnotes provided a further explanation that knocking on wood is a popular habit in both the Philippines and the Arab world in situations when someone says anything that is considered to be a bad omen, as Filipinos believe that it will permit turning what just had been said (bad luck) into reality while Arabs believe knocking on wood will kick out evil spirits and envious eyes. Therefore, the translator paraphrased using related words and clarified the meaning of knocking on wood as a cultural habit that is thought to bring good luck.

• - Arabic Taboos and Curse Words

In the Arab world, socially structured cultural norms and beliefs demonstrate that sex should never be discussed in front of anyone. Many cultures do not allow open conversations or depictions of such events since it is a profoundly intimate act. Therefore, anything containing the concepts of sex or sexual experiences is considered taboo and should be rephrased and referred to in more culturally acceptable terms (see Debbas and Haider; Haider and Hussein) (Table 4).

In example (10), the protagonist talks about his first “sexual” experience that enabled him to enter manhood and leave his childhood behind. Arab readers understand that what Isa had experienced is a “wet dream” without actually reading words that refer to that. As an Arab, Alsanousi also understands that explaining what a wet dream is will probably cause slight backlash from his target audience because it is culturally inappropriate. On the other hand, the translator used a more general word strategy because he understands that his target audience mostly doesn’t mind sexual terminologies. He added the term to deliver the idea better.

The novel has many Arabic and Filipino terms, influenced by Isa’s life in Kuwait and in the Philippines. This quotation is derived from a dialogue between Isa and his half-sister Khawla when he asked her what his grandmother was saying when she was talking about the Filipina maid in Al Tarouf’s household. In the second example, the translator, in his rendering of this sentence, adopted the strategy Baker suggested: the translation of a loan word. He had to explain what the word “ himara ” meant to readers of the TL, a terminology that is already present in the dictionaries of the readers of the SL. But by this addition, Wright delivered a less than accurate rendering of the sentence. The Arabic quotation did not mention that Khawla clarified what the word himara means, indicating that Isa is still ignorant that his grandmother often insults the Filipino maid by calling her a donkey. But the English rendering indicated that Isa is now aware that his grandmother often insults the maid, which could, in the TL reader’s mind, provide an additional reason for the mutual hatred between Isa and his grandmother at the beginning of their relationship — which may not be accurate.

• - Clothing, Songs, and Musical Instruments

The names of clothing items and musical instruments vary from one culture to another because each culture has its own distinguished, traditional way of getting dressed and expressing itself through songs and music. Translators have to be well acquainted with both the ST and TT’s cultures in order to provide an accurate rendering of the “material culture” (Table 5).

The translation strategy used to render example (12) was translation using a loan word, which could be easily observed in the rendering of the word “oud,” an oriental music instrument that looks like a guitar. In the rendering of the title of the patriotic operetta, “al-sumoud,” there was an explanation of what it meant to make the readers of the TL more aware of the content of the music they were making during the Iraqi occupation.

Example (13) provided the translation of traditional Kuwaiti clothing items. The translator adopted Baker’s strategy of translation using a loan word accompanied by an explanation to render the clothing items “الثياب التقليدية البيضاء” and “غطاء الرأس الأبيض”. He took the items’ names and translated them literally, word-for-word to English, because these items do not exist in the English culture. Therefore, there is no direct way to render these words. In the rendering of the word “طاقيات”, the translator used the cultural substitution strategy suggested by Baker because the word “طاقيات” means “caps” in the English language, a word that is not fit in this context. Therefore, the translator used the word “skullcaps” (a clothing item that is often worn to support and prevent the white headdress that men of the Gulf wear from sliding), which is a more accurate rendering of the word “طاقيات“ in this context.

Religious Constraints

Translating religious-related texts could be difficult for the translator to overcome. This difficulty easily happens in religious texts because of some culture-specific terms that do not have a direct equivalent – not to mention the high level of accuracy required to render this type of text. Cultural and religious sensitivity varies from one culture to another; therefore, becoming familiar with the TT culture is the best way to enable a translator to produce a culturally appropriate work. Sometimes, what is culturally and religiously allowed in one culture is considered a taboo and a highly sensitive topic in the other. For example, consanguine marriage is a common practice in the Arab region but is considered a great sin in Christianity and is extremely rejected as a form of incest in western cultures. As a result, translators have to use several translation strategies to overcome these barriers.

The Bamboo Stalk is a novel diverse with religious content, derived from full verses and practices of religions like Islam, Christianity, Buddhism, and some South-East Asian religions (Table 6).

For example (14), Isa explains the news of the kidnapping and execution of three American missionaries in the Philippines and how this incident caused the spread of islamophobia in the Philippines. But the fact that the executed Americans were Christian missionaries was hidden from readers of the TT.

Wright omitted the occupation of the Americans that were in the Philippines in his translation. Based on the resulting translation, TL readers could build a narrative that an Islamic group is randomly killing western foreigners living in the Philippines and that the three Americans were there by chance, were perhaps even Christian tourists, and the Islamic “terrorist” group decided to kill them for being Christian. This reading results from hiding the original cause of their visit to the Philippines – spreading Christianity in Muslim territories – that eventually causes their death.

Islamophobia has been a hot topic of discussion in western outlets since the beginning of the twenty-first century. The incorrect Islam-related translations in different kinds of transcultural communication caused and deepened the misunderstanding against Islam and Muslims in general. Translators, unfortunately, play a very distinct, negative role in increasing that gap and pushing people further from knowing the truth.

In a different scenario, example (15) narrates Isa’s visit to the Buddhist temple and when he begins to pray. He began his prayers by saying: “ابن الرب. لست أدري كيف أصلي لك” which is literally translated to: “son of god… I don’t know how to pray to you” but was translated by Wright to: “Buddha. I don’t know how to pray to you.” The translator did not refer to Buddha as the “son of god” as Isa did; instead, he used the cultural substitution strategy that Baker suggested. The translator’s judgment in these sensitive cases is what makes the TT culturally and religiously palatable since “the son of god,” according to Wright’s target audience, is Jesus Christ. Nonetheless, sometimes it becomes extremely difficult for scholars to decide whether to attribute the ideological differences spotted between the ST and the TT to the translator as a consequence of his/her subliminal ideological belief system or of their consideration to their target audience’s deliberate ideological and religious views.