Literary-Text Research from the Perspective of Literary-Translation Research: Criticizing Overtly Erroneous Errors in Literary Translations Based on Text Linguistic Models

Abstract

Translation research and criticism can be considered a branch of text research. The present study deals with the overtly erroneous errors detected in the two English translations of a Persian novel. Based on the findings, the challenging lexical items for the two translators did not belong to the same categories. Since the non-native translator had faced more difficulties while rendering terms categorized under linguistic items (especially idioms and noun phrases), generally, all non-native translators are recommended to fully familiarize themselves with the source-text idiomatic expressions. The native translator had revised his work three times. The findings also revealed that the non-native translator had committed three times as many overtly erroneous errors as the native had made. This implies the significance of revising the target text, the importance of considering the issue of text-dynamism, and the requirement of native translators’ more active participation in rendering the literary masterpieces of their own culture.

Keywords

• text-research
• text-dynamism
• overtly erroneous errors
• literary texts translation
• translation criticism