tc dokuz eylül university institute of social sciences translation and ...

the acceptability and adequacy polar predominantly depends on the target readership
the translator chooses (Pacek, 2002).
Other than these valuable studies which had significant contributions to this
study, there are no dissertations found on punning, wordplay, pun translation or any
Alice or Lewis Carroll topics, nor are there articles related to these issues in Metis
Çeviri Dergisi, 1987-1992. Therefore, this present study is thought to be one of the
first examples on the issue of pun translation and to be the broadest study as well the
corpus of eighteen books in seventy five years time span is considered.
B. What are the strategies to translate puns?
As much as every translator has her/his own strategy in translating a written
or oral text, which is mostly constituted through experience, specific strategies might
be determined for pun translation as a special literary form. Below are some general
applications rather than 'strategies' since in most cases the translator chooses the best
possibility rather than choosing one of the listed strategies.
1. Pun-to-pun translation. When there is the same punning word, words or phrase
found in the target language, this strategy is possible but it is the least frequent
despite obviously being the most desirable. The translated pun in target language
may be more or less different from the original pun in terms of formal structure,
semantic structure, or textual function (Delabastita, 1996; 134).
2. Pun-to-Related Rhetorical Device. This strategy aims to reproduce the effect of
the source-text pun by replacing it with some word-play related rhetorical device,
e.g. repetition, alliteration, rhyme, referential vagueness, irony, paradox, etc
(ibid.).
3. Situational pun. In order to make a pun more obvious to the reader "they add
another dimension to the verbal pun", which means within the content of the
story the translator adds word pictures or a descriptive phrase to help give a
better understanding of the pun (ibid.). A pun may also be adapted to the local
setting to maintain the effect of it (Gottlieb, 1997; 210).
4. Literal meaning. If both of the meanings cannot be translated, the translator may
choose the literal meaning and disregard the second meaning, and thus lose the
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