TYPES OF STYLISTIC ERRORS IN TRANSLATION

Abstract

The article describes the change in the approach to the definition of a “translation error” which consists in the shift from an error in understanding to an error in realizing a communicative task. In modern translation studies a translation error is seen as any “wrong-doing” in completing translation and three types of errors are distinguished, i.e. pragmatic, cultural and formal. In this paper we focus on the debatable issue of differentiating between proper language errors and proper translation errors. As language errors in a translated text also can cause a fail in the main function of the translation, they can be also referred to as translation errors. Certain difficulties in differentiating between translation errors of non-stylistic and stylistic types have led to the lack of a well-established definition and an accurate typology of stylistic errors. Present-day classifications of translation errors have stylistic errors as opposed to non-stylistic ones with regard to the language levels (lexical, morphological, syntactic and phonetic). Stylistic errors are not split into any types but are grouped together as units of a certain language level. Our study shows that stylistic errors in translation can also belong to all kinds of language levels within the whole language system. This paper presents the results of the analysis of functional-stylistic errors and violations in the translation process resulting from copying lexical and syntactic structure of the original text, transferring its connotations, strengthening or weakening its expressive function, changing the author’s judgement, violating the stylistic norm and usage of the target language. The authors of the article suggest a way to distinguish the notions of a «stylistic error» and a «stylistic flaw». If a violation of stylistic nature on the text level results in the blurring of the text content, they should be treated as stylistic translation errors. If the genre and style characteristics of the text as well as its content are conveyed properly, certain usage violations can be regarded as stylistic flaws.