(Nie)przekładalność: ekwiwalenty terminów technicznych na przykładzie chińskiego tłumaczenia "Prawieku i innych czasów" Olgi Tokarczuk

Abstrakt

Untranslatability is defined as an inability to express a text in a target language so that it evokes identical or similar associations as in the source language. It has often been claimed that technical terms, such as the names of food, money units, and clothing, are untranslatable. This article argues that even technical terms can be translated from one language to another. It aims to identify the translation strategies and equivalents used by Yi Lijun and Yuan Hanrong to translate the names of dishes, food products, beverages, and vegetation into Chinese in the translation of Olga Tokarczuk’s Primeval and Other Times. I show that technical terms can be translated using functional equivalents, word-to-word equivalents, description, phonetic adaptation, and omission. What is more, some of the equivalents used in the translation are incorrect. This article contributes to research on literary translation from Polish into Chinese. Also, it suggests what strategies should be used properly to translate technical terms.