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Article published In: Target
Vol. 12:1 (2000) ► pp.109–126

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Free Indirect Discourse in the Translation into Finnish

The Case of D.H. Lawrence’s Women in Love

 | University of Turku, Finland
Published online: 12 September 2000
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https://doi.org/10.1075/target.12.1.06rou
Abstract
Free indirect discourse (FID) is a narrative technique which purports to convey a character’s mental language while maintaining third-person reference and past tense. This paper deals with the problems the use of FID may create for Finnish translators of English literary narratives. A comparative analysis of D.H. Lawrence’s Women in Love and its translation into Finnish shows that the translator’s treatment of the pronouns he/she may shift the viewpoint from the character’s consciousness to the narrator’s discourse. The article concludes with the question of what stylistic norms could explain the translator’s avoidance of the spoken-language simulation typical of the source text.
Résumé
Le discours indirect libre (DIL) est une technique de narration qui vise à rapporter le langage mental d’un personnage en conservant l’usage de la troisième personne et les temps du passé. Cet article s’attache aux problèmes posés par le DIL aux traducteurs finnois de récits littéraires anglais. Ainsi, l’analyse comparée de Women in Love de D.H. Lawrence et de la traduction en finnois révèle que la traduction des pronoms he/she peut déplacer le point de vue en le faisant glisser de la conscience du personnage vers le discours du narrateur. L’article cherche ensuite à identifier les normes stylistiques qui ont pu inspirer le traducteur à éviter la simulation du langage parlé propre au texte original.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.FID as a Form of Thought Presentation
    • 2.1.FID and Its Linguistic Features in English
    • 2.2.FID in Finnish Original Writing
  • 3.English FID and the Translator: The Results of a Case Study
    • 3.1. Translation of the Pronouns He/She
      • 3.1.1.Replacement by Proper Names
      • 3.1.2.Replacement by Other Proforms
    • 3.2.Rendering of the Syntactic Features of FID
    • 3.3.Lexical Choice
  • 4.Conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
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