Two Tales of Murder and Intrigue: The Study and Practical Application of Current French Translation Techniques

Name: Joseph Kalmar
Major: French and Francophone Studies
Minor: History
Advisors: Dr. Marion Duval and Dr. Harry Gamble
Second Reader: Dr. Laura Burch

This thesis seeks to examine the prevalent techniques of literary translation and their practical application in the context of thème (English to French translation) and version(French to English translation). The methodological chapter first explains the underlying concepts behind each of the five primary techniques that I used throughout my work: translation units, modulation, transposition, equivalence, and adaptation. Each section of this chapter includes three examples from the version chapter and one from the thème chapter in order to demonstrate how and why the translator would choose to make use of these techniques in certain contexts. For the version, I translated around twenty pages of Seule en sa Demeure, a novel published in 2021 by French author Cécile Coulon. The source text is placed side by side with my translation so that readers can easily compare sentences in both languages. The thème takes on the same format to display my translation of the short story “drownings,” taken from the short story collection What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours, published in 2015 by British author Helen Oyeyemi. I chose these two works not only for their captivating plots but also because these two authors both have incredibly unique writing styles, presenting distinctive challenges to the translator.

Posted in Comments Enabled, Independent Study, Symposium 2022 on April 26, 2022.

One response to “Two Tales of Murder and Intrigue: The Study and Practical Application of Current French Translation Techniques”

1. Maman says:

   April 28, 2022 at 9:14 pm

   So well done!!! I’m so proud of you I could burst! Love you!
   Mom