Creativity in translation through the lens of contact linguistics: a multilingual corpus ofA Clockwork Orange

Abstract

Existing studies on the translation of Nadsatthe invented language in the novella A Clockwork Orangedo not provide an in-depth examination of Nadsat as a result of language contact between English and Russian, and ignore the role that translators play in linguistic innovation, as well as the motivating factors behind their creativity. This study addresses this conspicuous gap by examining a multilingual corpus of A Clockwork Orange from a language contact and language change perspective, and creating for the first time a link between adaptation, as understood in contact linguistics, and creativity in translation. The focus is on how Russian-derived nouns in the English version have been rendered in four versions of Nadsat (French, German, Greek, and Spanish), and how these differ from naturally occurring Russian loan nouns in these languages, in terms of gender assignment and inflectional suffixes. Results suggest that the level of creativity that translators demonstrate is not simply an indication of their talent, but rather a result of an interplay of factors related to translation, and that concepts from the field of language contact are particularly effective in reframing the way in which creativity is viewed in translation studies.

Ponying the Slovos: A Parallel Linguistic Analysis of A Clockwork Orange in English, French, and Spanish

“…In terms of unpacking Nadsat in ACO, LOM, and LNM, our formal categorisation offers a bottomup, language agnostic approach to categorising Nadsat across languages. This helped us to show that although the Spanish text may appear to reflect Nadsat's Russian origins better, the nuance and complexity of Burgess's Nadsat construction is simplified and, in many instances, lost in the Spanish version; in this sense we build on the work of Malamatidou (2017). This contrasts with LOM, which endeavours to create complex equivalences by reflecting the conceptual development of Nadsat.…”

“…In the context of Spanish-Nadsat, there is a general lack of linguistic research, but what exists provides some indications of strengths and weaknesses. Contrastive work by Malamatidou (2017) compares the French and Spanish translations in terms of how Russian-derived nouns are treated in relation to gender assignment and adaptation; that is, whether endings are retained from Russian or adapted in line with native norms, noting that the number of nouns involved in both translations is quite similar. She finds that, with respect to gender, the Spanish translation is more representative of the treatment of Russian loan-nouns in the language as a whole than the French translation.…”

“…Therefore, we can say that despite the longevity of both French and Spanish translations of ACO, they have differing reputations. Whereas the French translation is mostly praised (Bogic 2017, Pochon 2010, Radionovas 2009), the Spanish one has not been so well received (Malamatidou 2017, Pérez Palerm 2016. This may be due in part to the contrasting careers of the translation teams and differences in approach.…”

The language of A Clockwork Orange: A corpus stylistic approach to Nadsat

“…We conclude that Nadsat is an artistically created anti-language, with a core lexis of mostly Russian derivation, augmented by a series of smaller linguistic effects which we have quantified and examined. In future studies we hope to examine the strategies used by translators seeking to migrate Burgess’s invention into various target languages, a task already started by Malamatidou (2017).…”

Sketching the changing patterns in kaleidoscopes: New developments in corpus-based studies of translation features (2001–2021)

“…One of them is Kranich et al (2011), who propose 'language contact through translation' (LCTT) as a general technical term and present a stepwise approach to studying it by means of corpus methods. More recently, Malamatidou (2017) has further contributed to providing theoretical and empirical perspectives on complex mechanisms that govern the relationship between translation and language change. Likewise, Malamatidou (2018) has also innovatively developed the traditional language contact theories and attempted to integrate the two strands of translation and contact linguistics.…”