Investigating Four English Translations of Selected Poems from the Bustan of Saadi Using Catford’s theory of Shifts

Shabani, Enayat A.; Emadi, Nafiseh; Daftari, Fatemeh

doi:10.30465/lir.2021.32524.1195

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

¹ Assistant Professor of English Language Teaching, Department of Foreign Languages, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran. Iran

² Master of English Translation, Department of Foreign Languages, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, University of Tehran. Tehran. Iran

10.30465/lir.2021.32524.1195

Abstract

Using Catford’s shifts (1965), this study is an attempt to investigate four English translations by Clarke (1879), Davie (1882), Edwards (1911) and Wickens (1984) of selected poems from the Bustan of Saadi, the eminent Persian poet and writer. Five poems were randomly selected from the Bustan. Every line of the selected poems was investigated by the raters and placed in the related shift type specified by Catford (1965), namely level shift and category shift which in turn includes class shift, unit shift, structural shift, and intrasystem shift. Some lines were placed under more than one shift type as more than one change could be identified in them. The results revealed that the structural shift was the most frequently used shift by the four translators of the poems in the Bustan. Level shift followed by unit shift were the next most frequently used shifts. It was found that the four translators had a somewhat similar trend in terms of using shifts towards translating the selected poems of the Bustan of Saadi. Also, it can be concluded that structural and level shifts were inevitable in some places during the translation process.

Keywords

References

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Literary Interdisciplinary Research

Investigating Four English Translations of Selected Poems from the Bustan of Saadi Using Catford’s theory of Shifts

References

References

Volume 3, Issue 5 - Serial Number 5
May 2021
Pages 191-214

Investigating Four English Translations of Selected Poems from the Bustan of Saadi Using Catford’s theory of Shifts

References

References

Volume 3, Issue 5 - Serial Number 5May 2021Pages 191-214

Volume 3, Issue 5 - Serial Number 5
May 2021
Pages 191-214