Occasional compound word of James Joyce: characteristics and translation

The paper deals with translatability and / or untranslatability issue of occasional lexis of James Joyce in Ulysses - one of the most challenging novels in the world literature. The features of formation and functioning of occasional compound units in the text are considered, since it is this type of new words formation that dominates the novel. A significant number of occasional compounds with two or more roots is explained by the high degree of structural compactness of an English compound word, which causes a significant semantic load of the composite and allows any logical-objective and emotional connections between its parts. When forming such units James Joyce follows the English language word-formative laws, so the share of occasional lexis created by unconventional word building patterns (lexi-calization, blending) is relatively small. Additionally, certain results of the deeper comparative analysis of the possibilities of translating author’s occasional compounds into other languages are given. Five studied translations into German and Russian languages are produced by G. Goyert, G. Wollshlager, E.A. Kalashnikova, V. Khinkis, and S. Khoruzhiy, S. Makhov. Selected translations are separated by a considerable time distance, which makes their study even more attractive. It is noticed that the semantic depth of the text and stylistic features of the writer’s occasional compound words are a challenge for cross-cultural translation, and even the translators’ creative skills do not always allow them to convey the author’s complex idea to the full. Generally there is some regularity in the choice of translation method, particularly its dependence on genetic relationship between the source and the target languages, as well as word-formation patterns used by James Joyce.

Keywords

Authors

References