Theory of Translation 1 Introduction

(III) Pronouns and Articles
The sender of a message (I) cannot be identified with the writer or the reader, and so 
on. The definite article is usually used to refer to items already known. So, when it is 
used at the beginning of a text, the reader is informed of what is a part of the ‘known’ 
of the fictional discourse. The deictics are used to establish ‘the spatio-temporal’ 
perspective of a narrative. 
(IV) Tense 
The normal narrative tense in a novel is simple past, but it is a ‘generic marker’ and 
not temporal marker. In dialogues in a novel, however, tense has its temporal value. 
As the novels are often told by a narrator who relates events as though they are part of 
real happenings, the narrative tense is simple past. The perfect tenses have a deictic 
function within the fictional discourse and other tenses do not have these function. 
The language of a literary discourse differs interestingly from a standard language. 
The pragmatic interpretation of a perfect tense differs from the interpretation of the 
simple past (Black, 3-6). 
2.13.4.8 Stylistic Challenges in Translation 
The discussion above shows that a literary writer has a number of choices in creating 
a text. Although these choices shape the meaning of the text, they could also be 
looked at as various styles. To translate a text, these stylistic choices of the writer 
have to be taken into consideration by the translator. The creation of the stylistic 
nuances in the translation create host of problems for a translator. The literary 
language in the texts has a function of foregrounding. The features of the 
‘foregrounded’ text are not found in the standard language as discussed above. As a 
result, the corresponding translation in the TL runs a risk of producing ‘strange’ text. 
From the point of view of the target language too, the ‘systemic differences’ and 
cultural diversities between the two languages pose certain complexities to the 
translator. The target text with its aesthetic values could become incomprehensible, 
strange or odd for the target reader. Also, the different kind of readership of the 
source language and the target language may also create difficulty. 

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In addition to the challenges in literary translation practice, there are some theoretical 
issues related to the nature of translation which remain problematic. When the literal 
translation cannot work, the translator may strive for compensation to translate the 
stylistic features of the ST which are culturally distant. Here, we again come across 
Popovic’s concept of ‘shift of expression’ in the act of translation. These shifts, 
according to Popovic, are the most important aspect of translation and show the 
directions of the movements of values of expression in translation: 
The identification of the shifts of expression and their semantico-stylistic 
interpretation should be considered as the most important aspect of translation 
analysis (Shift, 85).