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Article published In: Translation and Challenges of the Third Millennium
Edited by Frans De Laet, Brankica Bojović and Boris Hlebec
[Babel 65:6] 2019
► pp. 769–786

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Bram Stoker’s Dracula and its undead stories of translation

 | West University of Timișoara
Published online: 17 January 2020
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/babel.00124.cri
Abstract
Studying the translations of Bram Stoker’s Dracula, one of the most successful novels of all times, may reveal, even nowadays, several surprises. First published by Constable on 26 May 1897, Bram Stoker’s Dracula has never been out of print, and it has been translated into about 30 languages (Light, Duncan. 2009. “When was Dracula first translated into Romanian?”. Journal of Dracula Studies 111: 42–50.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar). This article starts with an analysis of some keywords in Bram Stoker’s sources on Transylvania and their translations from Romanian into English, and points to some inaccurate translations which influenced the novelist to locate the action in Transylvania and change the name of the main vampire character. The following subchapters examine the recent research on the first translations of Dracula, discussing the Hungarian translation (1898), the Swedish variant (1899) and the Icelandic versions (1900, 1901), and the last section is dedicated to the translation into Romanian, published in 1990.
Résumé
L’étude des traductions du Dracula de Bram Stoker, l’un des plus grands romans à succès de tous les temps, peut révéler des surprises, même aujourd’hui. Publié pour la première fois par Constable le 26 mai 1897, le Dracula de Bram Stoker n’a jamais été épuisé et a été traduit dans une trentaine de langues (Light, Duncan. 2009. “When was Dracula first translated into Romanian?”. Journal of Dracula Studies 111: 42–50.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar). Cet article commence par une analyse de quelques mots clés dans les sources de Bram Stoker sur la Transylvanie et leurs traductions du roumain en anglais et relève quelques traductions inexactes qui ont incité le romancier à localiser l’action en Transylvanie et à modifier le nom du personnage principal du vampire. Les sous-chapitres suivants examinent les recherches récentes sur les premières traductions de Dracula, en discutant de la traduction hongroise (1898), de la variante suédoise (1899) et de la version islandaise (1900, 1901), la dernière partie étant consacrée à la traduction en roumain, publiée en 1990.
Article outline
  • 1.Translations in Bram Stoker’s sources for Dracula
  • 2.The Hungarian translation (1898)
  • 3.The Icelandic version Makt Mirkranna (1900, 1901)
  • 4.The Swedish version Mörkrets makter (1899)
  • 5.The Romanian translation (1990)
  • References
References (27)
References
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