TEXT LINGUISTIC CRITICISM OF LITERARY TRANSLATIONS: AN INTUITIVE HEURISTIC CHECKLIST

Abstract

Text linguistics is a designation of any work oflanguage science devoted to the text as the primary object of enquiry (Dijk 1979). Following Beaugrande (1995), 'text' is viewed here as "an empirical communicative event given through human communication rather than specified by a formal theory". This communicative event rests on a "dynamic dialectic" between the "virtual system" oflanguage and its realisation in the form of an "actual system" emanating from selections made by the text producer (Sa'Adeddin 1995, 1998). These selections are effectuated in terms ofthe expectations and presuppositions (Bloor and Bloor 1991) of the target world audience (see Sa'Adeddin 1987a, 1990, r991) and/or schemes that the producer has on them. A priori, the field of Comparative Literature is as legitimate an area of investigation for the text linguist as it is for the lettrist. This is particularly tnte given the fact that literature is a form of linguistic performance with special status and value, par excellence. As translation is, in the final analysis, a tex:t lir1guistic a_ctivity across langU:a..ge com.munities and a prin1e tool for the comparatist, it is feasible to see it as a bridge between the two disciplines. Being essentially Translation-based, Comparative Literature ;;;n a. l: the bilingual comoaratist in a oaiiicular form of ·.innate' translation, structured on a complex process of interpretation and re- interpretation (see Sa'Adeddin 1990). Translation Criticism involves all the constituents which contribute to text-production and text experiencing (Sa'Adeddin 1995), and which need to be observed in quality assessment, if the comparatist is to proceed with maximum confidence. The intuitive heuristic checklist suggested here may provide the initial grounding for a systematic text analysis procedure, which would be of special relevance to the comparative lettrist. .