ALAN PATON'S CRY, THE BELOVED COUNTRY IN ZULU, Schemes and Mind Maps of English

Download ALAN PATON'S CRY, THE BELOVED COUNTRY IN ZULU and more Schemes and Mind Maps English in PDF only on Docsity! TRANSFERRING CULTURE: ALAN PATON'S CRY, THE BELOVED COUNTRY IN ZULU by VICTOR NDLOVU submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of 1\'IASTER OF ARTS in the subject AFRICAN LANGUAGES at the UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH AFRICA SUPERVISOR: PROF. D.B.Z. NTULI CO-SUPERVISOR: :MRS ALET KRUGER JUNE 1997 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I wish to acknowledge my indebtedness to everybody whose assistance made it possible for me to undertake and finish this study, particularly the following: my supervisor, Prof D.B.Z. Ntuli of the Department of African Languages (Unisa), and my co-supervisor, Mrs Alet Kruger of the Department of Linguistics (Unisa), for their professional guidance and constructive criticism throughout the different stages of this study. Their willingness to offer any type of help I needed was an invaluable source of inspiration to me. Prof C. T. Msimang for his guidance at one stage in helping me solve certain problems. Mrs Kim Wallmach and Mrs Ingrid Andrews of the Department of Linguistics, the University of South Africa, who made valuable comments throughout the whole study. Mr David Levey of the Department of English, University of South Africa, who assisted me at the odd occasion. I also wish to extend my sincerest gratitude to my wife, Lesego, for her moral support and understanding. 3.4.2 The text 3.4.2.1 Time 3.4.2.2 Characterisation 3.4.2.3 Focalisation 3.4.3 Narration 3.5 Summary CHAPTER 4: vTHE ZULU NARRATIVE SYSTEM: 4.1 4.2 4.2.1 4.2.2 4.2.3 4.3 4.4 4.4.1 4.4.2 4.5 A SOCIO-CULTURAL PERSPECTIVE Introduction The influence of translation on the development of Zulu literature Early beginnings: orature Devotional literature and translation Secular literature and translation An examination of some translated Zulu novels C.L.S. Nyembezi Birth and early years Nyembezi' s literary achievements Summary CHAPTER 5: /~COMPARATIVE ANAYSIS OF CULTURAL ASPECTS IN PAGE 49 49 51 57 62 64 66 66 66 67 69 70 73 78 78 79 81 CRY, THE BELOVED COUNTRY AND LAFA ELIHLE KAKHULU 83 5.1 5.2 5.2.1 5.3 5.3.1 5.3.2 5.3.2.1 5.3.2.2 5.3.2.3 5.3.2.4 5.3.2.5 5.3.3 5.3.3.1 5.3.3.2 Introduction Translation strategies to transfer culture Categorisation of translation strategies in Lafa Elihle Kakhulu Cultural aspects Proper names Terms of address Reverend Stephen Khumalo and his wife The Reverend and his wife addressing children Reverend Khumalo and his siblings The Reverend, members of the church and other people Whites addressing each other Ideophones and idiomatic expressions Ideophones Idioms 83 84 87 88 88 92 93 94 98 99 102 103 103 106 5.3.4 Figurative speech 5.3.4.1 Simile 5.3.4.2 Metaphors · 5.3.4.3 Personification 5. 3. 5 Aspects of contemporary life 5.4 Summary CHAPTER 6: FINDINGS AND CONCLUSION 6.1 Findings 6.1.1 6.1.2 6.1.3 6.1.4 6.1.5 6.1.6 6.2 6.3 Introduction Proper names Terms of address Ideophones and idiomatic expressions Figurative speech Aspects of contemporary life Conclusion Future research LIST OF SOURCES ADDENDUM A systematic account of all examples of aspects of culture recorded between Cry, the Beloved Country and Lafa Elihle Kakhulu 1 TRANSLATION STRATEGIES 1.1 Place names 1.2 Personal names 1.3 Other proper names 1.4 The Zulu use ofwords in the ST 1.5 Domesticated words 1.6 The use of cultural words 1.7 Descriptive equivalents 1.8 Couplets 1.9 The use of ideophones 1.10 Literal translation 1.11 Negative for positive/positive for negative 1.12 Additions 1.13 Omissions 1.14 Figures of speech and idiomatic expressions 1.15 Fixed cultural expressions 1.16 Shifts or transpositions 1.17 Paraphrase PAGE 109 110 112 114 116 118 120 120 120 121 122 123 124 125 125 126 127 132 132 132 133 134 134 135 137 137 137 138 138 139 139 140 141 143 143 144 1 CHAPTER! L~TRODUCTION 1.1 Statement of the problem An awareness of cultural differences and similarities of all socially conditioned aspects of human life is essential to the interpretation of meaning. Culture is used here in its socio­ linguistic and anthropological sense to mean the way of life of a society. To quote the Encyclopedic Dictionary of Semiotics (Ulrych 1992: 71): Culture is the totality of the signifying systems by means ofwhich ... a particular group maintains its cohesiveness (its values and its interaction with the world). These signifying systems ... comprise not only all the arts (literature, cinema, theatre, painting, music, etc.), the various social activities and behaviour patterns prevalent in the given community (including gesture, dress, manners, ritual, etc.), but also the established methods by which the community preserves its memory and its sense of identity (myths, history, legal systems, religious beliefs, etc.). Culture conditions people's behaviour and is reflected in the language they speak and write. Language therefore is an integral part of culture. One way of 'opening up' a foreign culture is through interlingual translation. In fact, translation is viewed as the (re)production of culture because the act of translating literary texts in particular involves transferring aspects of the culture of one group to that of another. Over the centuries translation has played an important role of enrichment, so much so that it can be said that the beginnings of modern national literatures, and that of minority languages in particular, can often be traced back to translations of originals from 'prestigious' literary systems. Complex and dynamic interaction between translated texts and the receiving culture's own literary production takes place. When the minority literature is still young it is open to foreign influences and translated literature can then actively contribute to the development of its language and culture. This is what happened in Zulu literature when the first translation ofBunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress appeared in 1883 as Ukuhamba Kwesihambi (Ntuli 1993: 140). A second translation of The Pilgrim's Progress appeared in 1895, followed by historical accounts and sketches before the first novel in Zulu, Insila KaShaka by Dube, appeared in 1930 (Ntuli 1993: 141 ). By accepting The Pilgrim's Progress in translated form the Zulu people indicated that they \ ,' were ready to introduce a new model into their literary system which up to then had consisted of mainly orature and translated religious material. 4 texts. In light of the above, a tertium comparationis will therefore comprise an independent, constant (invariable) set of dimensions in terms of which segments of the target text( s) (TT) and source text (ST) can be compared or 'mapped' on to each other. 1 As mentioned above (par. 1.2), th~_aillu:>f thissJudy_i~_tg_ill~~!!g(lte t!J.~JiitferenLtranslatiQ11 ~~gi_es'll~e~ to transfer aspects of culture that appear in an English novel into ~ul1;1. T~ ~urce text, i e Oy-'-_!':!f!§eloved Country by Paton (1966), will be con1pared to its Zulu _translation, i.e, Lafa Elihle Kakhulu by Nyembezi (198J ), in terms of the follow:ing_cultural dimensjop.~: ~~---,·-·""' personal and place names terms of address idiomatic expressions figurative speech, and aspects of contemporary life. Aspects of culture such as the above dimensions would then constitute the tertium comparationis: TC ~ Aspects of culture ~ - Proper names - Terms of address - Figurative language - Etc. ST =Source Text TC =Tertium Comparationis TT =Target Text Figure 1: The tertium comparationis ~ompar_atiy~~~ly_sis_pe._tw~~n !:WQJ~~ts, the translation critic has to take into account a complex network of relations between, on the one hand, the source text and the political, The abbreviations ST for Source Text, SL for Source Language, TT for Target Text and TL for Target Language will be used from now on in this study. 5 social, cultural, literary and textual norms and conventions of the source system, and, on the other hand, the target text(s) and the political, social, cultural, literary and textual norms and conventions of the target system. This network and the process of comparison can be represented diagrammatically as follows (Kruger & Wallmach, 1996): ~~~%~;:::::.1 • T e>..iual norms and conventions of Source or Target system Political, social, cultural and literary norms and conventions of Source or Target system TC = Tertium comparationis ST = Source Text TT = Target Text A =Author R =Reader T = Translator Figure 2: Networks of relations in comparative analysis According to Kruger and Wallmach (1996), analysing the broader cultural context implies that the researcher examines political, social, cultural, literary and textual norms and conventions in both the source and target systems, as well as: contrasts/ shifts between macro- and micro-levels and between text and theory (norms, models, etc.); intertextual relations (with other originals and translations); and intersystemic relations with other genres and styles. T~s approach assists the researcher in gaining systematic insight into text rules and conventions and translation rules and conventions, leading to questions such as the following posed by 6 Lambert and Van Gorp (1985: 50): Does the translator conform to the same rules as his/her fellow translators? Does the translator show a conscious awareness of rules, norms, models? Does s/he theorise about them? If so, is there a discrepancy between theory and practice? On which points? Is the translator's work innovative, or does it conform to existing translation conventions? Is there any conflict between the translator's norms and the expectations of the target readership? Lambert (1985: 38) states that the following questions may also provide insight into the source and target systems: Are the literary norms and models imported or not? Are they traditional or not? Which is the dominating literary centre? For how long has this been the case? What are the (dominating) genre rules? With which centres does it have links? (Are these from abroad or not? Are there dominating/ dominated relationships?) From which literary systems do they import texts? Are these translated texts? Who is translating them? According to which selection and translation rules does this happen? Are there positive/ negative links with literary traditions? (From which traditions and when have there been shifts in these literary traditions? Are these shifts parallel in all literary systems, from the chronological point of view, and from the point of view of norms and models?) To what extent does the attitude towards tradition influence the attitude towards import? Are there any historical revolutions in this respect? These questions form part of the whole open-ended approach taken by descriptive translation studies, and in the subsequent chapters of this study some of these questions will be answered, where applicable. In general, descriptive translation theorists recommend that the researcher analyse the TT first. However, in order to carry out a meaningful comparative analysis between the ST and the TT, it makes sense to describe the ST in the source system first, the reason being that the translation has derived from the ST and not vice versa ( cf Van den Broeck 1985 in this regard). Another reason for this is that the translation critic needs a thorough knowledge of the ST and the source system in which it is embedded. The researcher therefore takes into account constraints CHAPTER2 A CULTURAL MODEL FOR THE DESCRIPTION OF NOVELS TRANSLATED INTO ZULU 2.1 Introduction 9 A translation is usually made to fulfil a particular function in a particular speech community with particular cultural values. If such a translation is a fictional work of art such as a novel it can play an important role in enriching the receiving culture, in particular if the literature of the receiving culture is still being developed. However, translating a novel is problematic because it is a product of the author's culture and time and culture-specific elements are difficult to transfer from one society to another. The aim of this study is to investigate the different translation strategies used to transfer aspects of culture in the Zulu translation of Paton's (1966) novel, Cry, the Beloved Country. In order to do so, a model of translation which takes culture into account has been adopted. The aim ofthis chapter is therefore twofold: first, to provide information on contemporary translation theories, concentrating on a key concept in translation studies, namely equivalence, and the manner in which this concept influenced theoretical thinking on the translation of culture and literary texts, and secondly, to outline the model itself An excursion into descriptive translation research, which is the theoretical framework within which this particular model was developed, is necessary to understand how this particular cultural model for translation came into being. The following section deals with culture in literary texts so as to show how cultural elements affect their translatability. 2.2 Culture in literary texts As mentioned above, culture is used in tlus study in its sociolinguistic and anthropological sense to refer to the way of life and its manifestations that are peculiar to a society. Culture conditions the behaviour of the people of that society and is reflected in the language they speak and write. Although culture is a general phenomenon and not specific to English and Zulu, it is important to mention some culture-specific categories which should be taken note of when translating English into Zulu. Newmark (1988: 1 03) lists the following: (1) Ecology: animals, plants, local winds, mountains, plains, ice, etc. (2) Material culture (artefacts): food, clothes, housing, transport and communications (3) Social culture: work and leisure ( 4) Organisations, customs, ideas: political, social, legal, religious, artistic (5) Gestures and habits (often described in 'non-cultural' language). 10 Zulu people have their own cultural values which differ from those of the English because they conceptualise reality differently. They name objects differently, they have different customs, rituals and ceremonies than the English, they address and greet one another differently. For example, it is taboo for a Zulu youngster to call an elderly person by name. The English, on the contrary, have no problem with this. This means that a Zulu translator will not find replacements for the English segments; he2 will have to make use of special translation strategies in order to overcome the cultural barrier. The literary translator has to deal with many problems that could affect the interpretation of a novel. In a novel the characters, place names, events and so on, are usually fictitious. This implies that the problems encountered by the translator do not only stem from the semantic content of words. For example, if an author decides to locate his characters in a place that does not exist in the world, should the translator retain the place name as it is in the original or should the phonemes of the word be changed so as to make it acceptable to the target reader? The translator should therefore have a good knowledge of the grammar of both the source language (SL) and the target language (TL). In the case of Zulu and English, the translator has the added problem that the level of development of these languages is not the same. This means that the Zulu translator has to employ creative translation strategies in order to overcome this problem. In the case ofliterary texts the SL author can also use words artistically in such a way that one word can have polysemous meanings. The title given to a novel is a good example. A title can consist of one word, a phrase or a full sentence which can be interpreted in different ways by different readers, sometimes only after the whole text has been read. This means that the translator, as reader, is free to interpret the ST according to the effect it has on him. Different translations of the same title by different translators clearly show .their different interpretations. Literary texts of necessity reflect the distinctive ideas, customs, achievements, outlook, etc. of a given society or group in a given period (Guralnik 1976:345; Brown 1993 : 568). The translator will be forced to make decisions on culture-bound elements like forms of greeting, terms of address and figurative language because the translator is writing for his target 2 In this study the generic pronoun he will be used to denote both male and female. 11 community and if the translation sounds too 'foreign' and 'strange' it might not be read at all. The following expressions, which may be uttered by different characters in a novel, show that the literary translator does not only deal with the semantic meaning ofwords: English Good night Keep well Zulu Ulale kahle (lit. Sleep well) Sala kahle (lit. Remain well) Every Zulu speaker will agree that the Zulu translations of the above expressions are acceptable, though they are not literal translations. The reason for accepting these expressions as 'correct' is that in Zulu they are used in the same circumstances where the English expressions are used, not because of semantic equivalence. Naming characters should also receive attention in the translation of novels. In Zulu people's names are not only a means of identification because names are usually meaningful. The name Sipho (lit. a gift) may mean that the family members were thanking the Lord for the son that He gave to them. The following names also carry meaning in a particular context: Ntombizodwa (lit. Only girls) Bafana (lit. Boys (only)) Sibongile (lit. We say thank you). Translating names in a novel therefore would mean that the translator either retains the English names (whose meaning has become lost in time) or replaces them by meaningful Zulu names. If the latter approach is adopted the translated text will be more acceptable to the new readers. The translation of proper names in Cry, the Beloved Country is discussed in detail in Chapter 5, par. 5.3.1. A novelist may also use figurative language so as to clarifY concepts that cannot be described by ordinary everyday language. In such cases there may be a Zulu idiom which is similar to the one used in English and then the translator could simply substitute the English expression by a Zulu idiom or proverb. For example, the Zulu expression (lnkomo) lkhaba eyikhabayo; ikhotha eyikhothayo (lit. The beast or cow kicks the one that kicks it; it licks the one that licks it) is similar to the English expression Tit for tat. But the translator will have a problem if there is no similar figurative expression in the TL. For example, the expression Ayingangamlomo (lit. The matter is not as big as the mouth) has no equivalent in English. The translator could then explain that the proverb means that a person does not always carry out one's boasts with a resultant loss of local 'colour'. The translation of figurative language in Cry, the Beloved 14 culture? Catford (1965: 99) refers to this kind of problem as "cultural untranslatability". Cultural untranslatability arises if "a situational feature, functionally relevant for the SL text, is completely absent from the culture ofwhich the TL is a part". A linguistic approach could not solve this problem because the translator will fail to find a TL item which will be linguistically equivalent to that of the SL. The translator will then have to resort to a creative translation strategy in order to solve the problem ( cf. Chapter 5). More and more translation theorists became aware of the controversy surrounding the concept of equivalence. But instead of abandoning this concept, some tried to redefine it. For example, the renowned Bible translator, Eugene Nida, made a distinction between two types of equivalence, namely formal correspondence and dynamic equivalence, which emanate from the problem of style versus content. Nida and Taber (1969: 13) state: Though style is secondary to content, it is nevertheless important. One should not translate poetry as though it were prose, nor expository material as though it were straight narrative. The view expressed therefore is that the style of the original should be retained if it is meaningful. This, however, depends upon the structure of both the ST and the TT. If, for example, the structure of the ST has no equivalent in the TL, as often happens in Bible translation (which in many cases initiates a written tradition in a language), the content or message receives priority over style. In such a case the translator should aim for dynamic equivalence, defined as follows: Dynamic equivalence is therefore to be defined in terms of the degree to which the receptors of the message in the receptor language respond to it in substantially the same manner as the receptors in the source language. This response can never be identical, for the cultural and historical settings are too different, but there should be a high degree of equivalence of response, or the translation will have failed to accomplish its purpose (Nida & Taber 1969: 24). The underlying rule for dynamic equivalence is that the readers of the target text must receive a similar message as those of the source text. This is not surprising because in Bible translation the principal aim is spreading the Gospel. It is clear that Nida and Taber's (1969) work in Bible translation has highlighted problems in the transfer of culture between languages. A classical example of cultural untranslatability is the phrase Lamb of God, where Lamb symbolizes innocence. Trying to translate Lamb according to what it means would create problems to Eskimos, who previously had no knowledge of sheep. Dynamic equivalence should therefore have priority over formal correspondence. Lamb of God could be translated by Seal of God because in the Eskimo culture the seal is associated with innocence. In this case the Eskimos 15 will get the same message as the readers of the English Bible but whether their response to the message will be similar, is to be questioned because it cannot be empirically verified. However, although dynamic equivalence seems to solve cultural problems in Bible translation, literary translators have the added problem of structure that has to be taken into account. In a novel, structural elements such as setting, character portrayal and speech are also meaningful, not only the 'content'. The fact that the cultural context within which a text is embedded has to be taken into account led to the next phase of linguistics-based thinking about translation which focused on text­ linguistics in the late 1970s. Proponents of the text-linguistic approach to translation observed that considering a contextless sentence as a unit of study in translation does not make provision for diversity in culture. They realised that concentrating on the sentence is a futile exercise because certain sentence constructions of a language do not 11Work11 in another situation or culture. For example, the utterance Sikhulekile ekhaya (lit. We greet you all at home) is pronounced by a Zulu stranger when paying a visit to a Zulu home or when asking for accommodation at a particular home before being welcomed by the owner. On the contrary, this greeting custom does not exist in Western culture, and an Englishman who visits that particular home, would knock on the door, say Hi I and enter the house. This would never be accepted in Zulu culture. Only a Zulu would know that the above expression has to be made when paying someone a visit. The unit of translation in the text-linguistic approach became the text as a whole. Followers of this approach start with the text; and then go to the paragraphs, to the sentences and end up with the word. Textlinguists see the text not as an isolated verbal construct but as an attempt at communication that functions in a certain way in a certain situation or culture and may not work with the same degree of success in another situation or culture. Textlinguistics therefore adds a much-needed functional dimension to the analysis of the translation process and the analysis oftranslated texts (Lefevere 1992: 9). House (1981), for example, wants a translation to function as the equivalent of its source text in a different culture or situation, but she also wants the translation to use equivalent pragmatic means to achieve this functional equivalence. In her definition of translation as 11the replacement of a text in the source language by a semantically and pragmatically equivalent text in the target language 11 (House 1981: 29-30), the key concept is still equivalence. In House's model for assessing translation quality, the ST is the norm. The translation critic starts by analysing the ST by means of a set of dimensions (which in comparative text analysis functions as the tertium comparationis), on the basis of which a textual profile of the ST is 16 obtained. These dimensions are divided into two categories, namely language user (which includes geographic origin, social class and time) as well as the language usage (which includes the type of medium used by the language user, participation between addresser and addressee, social role relationship between addresser and addressee, the style of the text as well as the subject of the text). The textual profile which is obtained by analysing the ST in terms of these dimensions is then used as the yardstick or norm against which the profile and function of the TT can be measured and assessed for quality. Then a given translation text is analyzed using the same dimensional scheme, and in the same detail, and the degree to which its textual profile does not match the source text's profile is the degree to which that translation text is inadequate in quality(House 1981: 50). '· , , 1 · •• •t, The underlying rule is that the TT must match the function of the ST in order to be regarded as adequate. Any mismatches will surface in the comparison between the S T and the TT. According to House, a mismatch between the source text and the target text results from two types of errors: covert and overt errors. The idea that a mismatch on a particular dimension constitutes a covert error, presupposes (1) that the socio-cultural norms, or more specifically, the norm­ conditioned expectations generated by the text, are essentially comparable ... (2) that the differences between the two languages, ... are such that they can largely be overcome in translation ... (3) that no special secondary function is added to TT, i.e., translations for special addressees (e.g., classical works 'translated' for children) and translations for special purposes (e.g., 'interlinear translations' which are designed for a clarification of the structural differences between the two languages) are excluded from [the] scheme (House 1981: 58). These presuppositions indicate that differences between the source culture and the target culture as well as the linguistic differences between the SL and the TL can be overcome by the translator. The resultant translation will therefore read like a "second original" (House 1981: 190). Alternatively, according to House (1981: 56-57) overt errors result either from a mismatch of the denotative meanings of ST and TT elements, or from a breach of the target language system, and which do not involve dimensional mismatching ... Cases where the denotative meaning of elements in ST have been changed by the translator will be further subdivided 19 equivalence altogether. According to Nord (1993: 59), the concept of equivalence is illusionary because it makes unrealistic demands. "Translation proper", as Nord (1993: 59) defines equivalence-based translation, requires pragmatic equivalents in that the TT has to fulfil the same function or produce the same communicative effect as the ST; linguistic equivalents in that the TT must imitate the stylistic features of the ST, and semantic equivalents in that the TT must convey the same meaning or message as the ST (Nord 1993: 60). As an alternative to equivalence, Reiss and Vermeer (1984) argue that texts should be translated according to the predominant function or scopos, the Greek word for intent (goal/function) (Gentzler 1993: 71). According to Nord ( 1992: 3 9): the overall frame of reference for the translator should not be the original and its function ... but the function ... the target text is to achieve in the target culture. The intended target function or 'translation scopes' is primarily determined by the addressees of the translation ... and sets the standard for any decision the translator is to take in the course of the translation process. This is a radical position because the recipients of the translation expect it to resemble the original, and, because they do not know the SL, they must trust the translator. This approach implies the solution to all cultural problems because the function of the TT requires cultural adaptation for the target readership. According to this approach, the ST is no longer the norm, what matters is not faithfulness or equivalence, but whether or not the translation has fulfilled the initiator's needs and can function as an independent text in the target culture. It is for this reason that Nord (1992: 40) adapted Reiss and Vermeer's (1984) functionalist translation theory by introducing the concept of loyalty. On the one hand the translator should consider what the initiator of the translation expects from him; on the other the TT readership expects the TT to be related to the ST, and this expected relationship is culturally governed (Nord 1992: 3 9). In other words, each language community has its own definition or convention of what constitutes a translation. It is clear that according to Nord's (1992) theory the translator is not expected to follow strict rules. He is there primarily to satisfy the needs of the interested parties: the initiator (who may require a TT which is completely different to the ST), the TL readership, as well as the SL author (because apart from the initiator who might have a knowledge of the SL, the translator knows both languages): Functionality + loyalty means, then, that the translator should aim at producing a functional target text which conforms to the requirements of the translation scopes fixed by the initiator, respecting, at the same time, if necessary, the legitimate interest of both the author of the original and the readers of the 20 translation (Nord 1992: 40). According to Nord (1992), the advantage of her theory is that it can be applied to the translation of all types of text, including literary texts. However, it has been found that her model, which is based on the New Rhetoric Formula of questions (Nord 1992: 43), i.e.: Who transmits to whom, what for, by which medium, where, when, why, a text with which function? On what subject matter does he say what (what not), in what order, using which non-verbal elements, in which words, in which kind of sentences, in which tone, to what effect? is still too limiting for the criticism of literary translations as it does not make provision for structural elements. It is assumed in this study that the elements of a literary text such as the theme, character portrayal, setting and point of view of a novel, constitute what Van den Broeck ( 1978: 41) calls the "invariant" of the text. These are the structural elements that the translator must preserve in translation. Nord's (1992) functional translation model is therefore deemed unsuitable for the examination of translation strategies used to transfer culture in the Zulu translation ofPaton's (1966) Cry, the Beloved Country. However, theorists conducting linguistics-based translation research were not the only ones who had problems with the concept of equivalence. In accepting the fact that a linguistic­ oriented approach to equivalence has its limitations, many other translation theorists have confirmed their view that translation as mirror-image of the original is unattainable- it always involves a degree of subjectivity and reformulation because of the number ofvariables involved in the process. According to Heylen (1993: 4), the main shortcoming of prescriptive translation theories is the fact that they completely ignore the socio-cultural conditions under which translations are produced so that they may function in the receiving culture as acts of communication. The conditions required to produce equivalence differ from period to period, and from language culture to language culture so that a text which functions as a translation today may not be called a translation tomorrow and may be named a 'version' instead, or a translation strategy (e.g. turning prose into verse) which was valid in the past may be completely unacceptable today. Furthermore, what was regarded as 'good' translation at one moment was rejected as 'bad', or inadequate, at another and considered either unfaithful or unacceptable by later generations (Van den Broeck in Nord 1991 : 92). This is particularly true of literary translations. Because such translations are produced at different times and under different conditions they inevitably turn out differently, not because they are good or bad, but because they have been produced to satisfy different demands. It cannot be stressed enough that the production of different translations at different times does not point to any 'betrayal' of absolute standards (Bassnett & Lefevere 1990: 5). 21 The realisation that translations are never produced in a vacuum, unaffected by time and culture, and the desire to explain the time- and culture-bound criteria which are at play have led certain translation theorists working from a literary-theoretical perspective to criticise the notion of the ST as the ideal, and as a direct result, also a source-oriented notion of equivalence - in short, to reject prescriptive theories and adopt a descriptive reception-oriented approach towards the study oftranslated literature (cf Toury 1985: 16-41). It is this approach which helped to establish translation studies as a discipline in its own right in the early eighties. An excursion is now made of descriptive translation research so as to show how the cultural model for translation came into being. 2.4 Descriptive translation research After the publication of The Manipulation of Literature: Studies in Literary Translation (Hermans 1985), a certain group of translation scholars (Andre Lefevere, Jose Lambert, Susan Bassnett, Theo Hermans, Raymond van den Broeck, Gideon Toury) earned themselves the nickname of the Manipulation School, because they believe that all translation implies a degree of manipulation of the ST for a certain purpose. They started describing (and explaining) literary texts and their translations in terms of shifts or manipulations that have taken place. Hermans (1985: 10) explains the origin ofthe Manipulation School as follows: Since about the mid-1970s, a loosely-knit international group of scholars has been attempting to break the deadlock in which the study of literary translation found itself Their approach differs in some fundamental respects from most traditional work in the field. Their aim is, quite simply, to establish a new paradigm for the study of literary translation, on the basis of a comprehensive theory and ongoing practical research. The new paradigm that Hermans refers to is Descriptive Translation Studies (DTS) which was initially based on the concept of the literary polysystem (cf par. 2.4.1 below). According to Hermans (1985: 10-11), these theorists have the following in common: a view of literature as a complex and dynamic system; a conviction that there should be a continual interplay between theoretical models and practical case studies; an approach to literary translation which is descriptive, target-oriented, functional and systemic; and an interest in the norms and constraints that govern the production and reception of translations, in the relation between translation and other types of text processing, and in the place and role of translations both within a given literature and in the interaction between literatures. 24 2.4.2 Translation norms According to Delabastita (1993: 47-48) a norm is both a sort of performance instruction and a criterion for evaluating the performance afterwards - it acts as a constraint on the members of a community whenever they want to carry out the kind of behavioural activities that the norm bears on. Translation is such a behavioural activity where different lines of action are possible, so that translation norms can be considered as constraints guiding translators in their selection of 'suitable' and 'appropriate' translation methods. Thus, from the translator's point of view, every instance of decision-making in the translation process is governed by certain norms. In contrast, from the researcher's or critic's point of view, norms are "a category for descriptive analysis of translation phenomena" (Toury 1980: 57), for they determine "what type of translational relation, at what textual level, there will be between a source and a target text" (Hermans 1991: 158). According to Gentzler (1993: 136), "norms determine the way foreign material is 'impoq:ed' and 'domesticated' [into the target culture]. Thus, the very definition of translation becomes dependent upon norms and how they work in any given system/ society." Toury (1980: 53-56) distinguishes between three kinds of translation norms, viz. preliminary, operational and initial norms. Preliminary norms involve factors determining the selection of texts for translation and the overall translation strategy. Because the definition of translation varies historically, certain preliminary questions need to be answered in order to establish the cultural context which frames the translation process, e.g. What is the translation policy of the target culture? What authors, period, genres, etc. are preferred by the target culture? Operational norms concern actual decisions made in the translation process: additions, omissions and textual norms revealing linguistic and stylistic preferences. According to Toury (1980: 55) the third translation norm, i.e. the initial norm, governs the basic choice a translator makes between adherence to the source text's structure and the source culture's norms, and striving to meet the linguistic, literary and cultural norms of the prospective new readership in the target culture. In practice, however, a translation is generally a compromise between these two extremes and will be primarily (not totally) source-oriented or primarily (not totally) target-oriented (cf Heylen's 1993 model below). Gentzler (1993: 128) points out that historically, translation criticism has been characterised by its tendency to find fault with the ttanslator because the actual text can never meet the ideal standards of the two abstract poles: from a linguistic point of view, errors can always be pointed out and better solutions proposed; from a literary point of view, the functional elements can invariably be judged as less dynamic or innovative than the source text's features. In summarising this issue, Baker (1993: 240) says that the concept of norms tips the balance not only in favour of the target text (as opposed to the traditional obsession with the source text), but, more important, it assumes that the primary object of analysis in translation studies is not an individual translation but a coherent corpus of translated texts. Norms do not emerge from a source text or a body of source texts. Equally, they do not emerge from the target system nor from a general collection of target texts. They are a product of a tradition of translating in specific ways, a tradition which can only be observed and elaborated through the analysis of a representative body of translated texts in a given language or culture. 25 According to Baker ( 1993: 23 8) recognising translated literature as a system in its own right was quite a valuable step because systemists "shifted the attention away from individual literary translations as the object of literary studies to the study of a large body of translated literature in order to establish its systemic features". As explained in Chapter 1 (par. 1.3 above), the present study deals with a small corpus, i.e. only one text and its translation. However, this study aims to make an important first contribution to the description of translated Zulu novels and the Zulu narrative system. More future research into the translation tradition of Zulu novels is necessary before more global conclusions can be made on the norms which determined the way foreign material has been imported into the Zulu narrative system. So much for the theoretical background on descriptive translation studies, polysystem theory and norms. Recently, however, translation scholars such as Andre Lefevere, Susan Bassnett and Romy Heylen have been distancing themselves from polysystem theory, which they find to be "too formalist and too restrictive", to adopt more of a cultural studies model in which they focus both on "institutions of prestige and power within any given culture and patterns in literary translation" (Gentzler 1993: 13). This reorientation of perspectives has taken place gradually over the years and is the logical consequence of their having conducted descriptive translation research in which literary translations are approached from the perspective of the target culture and described in terms of norms and constraints operating in a specific culture and at a specific historical moment. What then does such a cultural model for translation entail? 1/ u 26 2.4.3 A cultural model for translation As we have seen from the discursion through equivalence-based translation models, they are ill-equipped to open up the necessary number of perspectives needed to describe the effect translation has on the development of literature within a given receiving culture (Heylen 1993: 137), and consequently, to describe the transfer of culture in a translated Zulu novel. This view stems from the claim made by Lefevere and Bassnett (1990: Preface) that translation is a rewriting of an original text. According to them, all rewritings, whatever their intention, reflect a certain ideology and a poetics and as such manipulate literature to function in a given society in a given way. Rewriting is manipulation, undertaken in the service of power, and in its positive aspect can help in the evolution of a literature and a society. r;.: .f In other words, from the point of view of the target literature, all translation implies a degree of manipulation of the ST for a certain purpose. What becomes important therefore, is the function of the translation in the target culture. All translations should be goal- and audience­ oriented, since they are not produced in a cultural vacuum: "rewriting takes place in a very clearly inscribed cultural and historical context" (Bassnett-McGuire 1991[1980]: xvii). According to Heylen (1993: 10), despite the objections levelled against the polysystem theory, this theory remains useful for the development of a historical-relative, socio-cultural translation model in that "it rejects normative approaches on the basis of their a priori and ahistorical conception of translation". Translation is not a derivative or secondary activity. In fact, it is depicted as a negotiation process between two (or more) sets of cultural codes and systems; it is the product of 'transcoding' different cultures and not solely the result of a crossing of linguistic barriers (Heylen 1993: 20). Normative approaches do not examine specific translations at a specific moment in time; they are source-oriented because they use the ST as yardstick against which the translation is measured. In contrast, systems theory allows7 translations to be studied within a broader cultural framework so that the effect of social, 1 economic and political circumstances on the production and reception of both the STand the ·• TT can be taken into account. Literary translation in particular is regarded as "a creatively controlled process of acculturation" (Hey len 1993: 21) in that, guided by an initial norm (i.e. an initial choice between source­ oriented or target-oriented translation), translators can take an original text and either import it with little attempt to acculturate its unfamiliarities or adapt it to a certain dominant poetics or ideology in the receiving culture; furthermore, they can devise some sort of compromise between the two different sets of poetics or ideologies of the source and target cultures. It 29 originals and describe this in terms of norms or constraints reigning in the target culture at a particular time that may have influenced the production of the translation. Because descriptive translation research was initially based on the concept of the literary polysystem, this theory allows translations to be studied within a broader cultural and historical framework so that social, economic and political factors can be taken into account. Literary translation in particular is regarded as "a creatively controlled process of acculturation" (Heylen 1993: 21) in that translators can take an original text and either import it with little attempt to acculturate its unfamiliarities or adapt it to a certain dominant poetics or ideology in the receiving culture; furthermore, they can devise some sort of compromise between the two different sets of poetics or ideologies ofthe source and target cultures. In a nutshell, these are the three kinds of translations comprising the historical and socio­ cultural model for translation that was adopted for the present study so that the influence of translation on the development of Zulu literature, and the different translation strategies used by Nyembezi to translate culture in Lafa Elihle Kakhulu (1983), can be described and explained. The next chapter provides a socio-cultural perspective on the source cultural system and Paton's novel as a 'translation classic'. CHAPTER3 THE SOURCE SYSTEM AND PATON'S NOVEL AS A 'TRANSLATION CLASSIC' 3.1 Introduction 30 As mentioned in the section research methodology ( cf. Chapter 1, par. 1. 3 above), descriptive translation theorists usually start off with a description of the translated text and the target system. However, in order to conduct a comparative text analysis of cultural aspects between the source text and target text chosen as the corpus to be examined in this study, the source text and the source system are examined first; the reason being that the target text was derived from the source text and not vice versa and therefore a critic needs to be acquainted with the source text and the source system in which it is embedded. A description of the Zulu literary system, and in particular, the role played by translation in the development ofthe Zulu novel, as well as information on C.L.S. Nyembezi, the translator of Lcifa Elihle Kakhulu, are given in Chapter 4. The pr~mary, aim of this chapter is to describe Cry, the Beloved Country (Paton 1966) as a novel. Henceforth the title of the novel will be abbreviated as Beloved Country. The chapter commences with a description of the life and times of Alan Paton so as to show how socio­ political and other events influenced the writing of Cry, the Beloved Country. The description of Paton's life will largely be based on his autobiography, entitled Towards the Mountain (Paton 1980). :Following this broad background of the source system is a structural analysis of the novel. Such , an analysis is essential because the translation critic needs a thorough understanding of the 1 source text in order to do a comparative analysis between the ST and the Zulu translation. The analysis of Cry, the Beloved Country is conducted in terms of structural narratology because the different levels constituting the structure of this particular novel can be taken into account. 31 3.2. Alan Paton: a product of South African society 3.2.1 Birth Alan Stewart Paton was born on January 11, 1903, at 19 Pine Street in Pietermaritzburg, Natal. He died in 1988, at the age of85. The time of his birth is very important because his novel can only be understood if the South Mrican socio-political circumstances of his life and times are taken into consideration. His father, James, was a Scot from the Glasgow area who came to South Mrica in 1901 during the Anglo-Boer war. He did not come to fight, however, being a Christadelphian and therefore a conscientious objector. He was a shorthand writer to the Supreme Court and died when Alan was only fourteen. Paton's mother, who was a few years younger than his father, was a school teacher. 3.2.2 Religious background Paton was brought up in a deeply religious home. The Christadelphians, who are known as the brothers of Christ, and who address each other as "brother" and "sister," were founded by John Thomas in 1848. They believe that Christ was raised from the dead and will come again at the time of the last war of Armageddon, and rule the world for a thousand years. After this millennium God himself will reign and there will be peace forever. All who are judged accountable will be raised from the dead, and those who are worthy will enter the kingdom of heaven; those who are judged unworthy will enter the state of eternal death. This was foretold by the prophets, notably Ezekiel and Daniel, and again by John of Patmos, in the book of Revelation. Though Christ was human, He has been made the Lord, and He is remembered at every 'meeting' ofthe brothers and sisters in the 'breaking ofbread'. The 'meeting' is simple; it consists of prayer, reading, the singing of hymns, the breaking of bread, and the preaching ofthe Word (Paton 1980: 11). Paton's brothers and sisters were simple in life, abstemious in habit, upright in conduct. They kept themselves away from the world, except in such measures as was necessary for keeping themselves alive. This withdrawal from real life, as one may put it, could be the reason why Paton took a long time before he could see things as he expresses them in Beloved Country. Paton (1990) admits that it took him a long time to change, meaning that change had to be brought about through education. This is true if we consider the withdrawal of his family from the affairs of the country: Paton therefore took a long time to understand life outside his home. 34 prize. In 1909 he went to school at a newly-built school, called Havelock Road Boys - not far from his home. When he turned ten he reached the top class at Havelock Road Boys, and was eligible for the Natal Bursary Examination. He won a bursary and went to Maritzburg College (a high school) in February 1914, having just turned eleven. He then spent his twelfth year in Form IIA, and was promoted with the brightest boys ofiiA to Form IV A. This shows that Paton was a bright student. The fact that his Beloved Country also includes aspects of history indicates that he liked it as a subject because he even won the history prize in the matriculation examination. He entered the Natal University College in March 1919. It should be emphasized that by then Paton was not yet involved in the political activities of his country. It was still the religious background that was guiding his way of life. He even agrees with this when he says: Of these political events that were happening around me, I knew almost nothing. I did not know that I was watching the first scene of a drama that was in the end to determine the course of my life (Paton 1980: 55). He then decided to become a teacher. At the teachers' college he was lucky to find somebody who, like his religious background, had a great influence on his life. This influence is acknowledged by Paton (1980:59) in the following lines: [Railton] Dent was ... a committed Christian. Committed Christians have faults just as commonly as other people, but I could see no fault in him. He was, I think, the most upright person I was to know, and his influence on me was profound. He did not make me into a good man, that would have been too much. But he taught me one thing, the theme ... that life must be used in the service of a cause greater than oneself The lesson that Railton Dent taught Paton is similar to that of the washing of the disciples' feet, i.e. if one claims to be a Christian, one must be committed and prepared to serve others. Urged by Dent, Paton joined the Students' Christian Association. Here Paton discovered that their codes were almost similar to the ones he met at home. The greatest of the greater moralities of this association was not chastity or purity but obedience, according to Paton. It was to have a purpose for one's life, and this purpose was to serve others (Paton 1980: 62). According to Paton (1980), Dent was also committed to serving black people and, of course, black children. His dedication was without racial prejudice and discrimination. This observation by Paton is essential because he also, later on, decided to fight racial discrimination. It is clear that Dent had a great influence on Alan Paton, and that this influence was reinforcing the 35 religious beliefs that Paton had acquired when he was still young. These beliefs are expressed in his novel, Beloved Country. The aim of the next section is to discuss Beloved Country as a protest novel. This will be done by considering Alan Paton as one of the creative writers who were involved in protest writing in South Mrica. 3.3 Cry, the Beloved Country as protest novel 3.3.1 Theme Shipley (1968: 309) defines theme as "the subject of discourse; the underlying action or movement; or the general topic of which the particular story is an illustration". This definition implies that, in order to ascertain the theme of a narrative text, the reader has to discover what topic is being illustrated. In this regard the definition that Wales (1990) supplies in A Dictionary of Stylistics, is more apt: "Theme is the 'point' of a literary work, its central idea, which we infer from our interpretation of the plot, imagery and symbolism, etc." In a novel the different elements constituting the structure of the narrative text all collaborate to convey a particular theme that the author has in mind. A number of secondary themes can also be intertwined to convey a main theme. This means that all the elements of the narrative text should be taken into consideration in analysing such a text and this is what will be done in the rest of this chapter. Beloved Country was first published in 1948, a watershed year in South Mrican politics. This was the year in which Smuts's South Mrican Party was defeated by Malan's National Party y, i"V'which then became the ruling party until the first democratic elections in 1994. This was also ',w ' the year in which the National Party instituted their dreaded policy of 'apartheid', or racial A \ .~~"01 ~bgregation; a policy that would cause more than forty years of intense racial conflict in this \ ~ country. Racial conflict therefore has deep roots and surfaced in all spheres of South African c> ·-1;. society, least of which were the country's different literary systems. In this field, too, apartheid has made "its evil influence" felt ( cf Gerard 1993: 60). : c__, c. ! . , . • .-·- •• . ·,J· L 'a ' ~ Paton was not the first creative writer to be involved in protest writing in South Mrica. The. first protest writers were the oppressed people - the Mricans themselves who were reacting against the deplorable situation in which they found themselves. By means of their writing they protested against what they felt were the constricting laws of the country. In doing so many black writers and journalists suffered because of the Censorship Act. For example, one of them ·-~ -;-··,__.:.~:·:·:.-::- was Ingoapele Madingoane who was one of the poets of the Black Consciousness Movement 36 in the 1970s and a founder in 1976 ofthe Medupe Writers' ~~~~c;i'!!~_~I,!t_which was banned a year later. One of the consequences of the policy of apartheid was the breaking up of the African tribes in the reserves; people migrating :from the reserves to the cities caused endless social problems. As noted by Clarke (Paton 1966: 255): The African population had already been segregated in reserves ... but as a result of the overcrowding and low standards of living there, it was found ( 1946) that half of them were working outside the reserves. Although most of these workers left their families in the reserves while they worked outside, more and more of them came to live with their families in or near the cities, where they were responsible for some of the social problems described in Cry, the Beloved Country. According to Gerard (1993: 54): The social upheaval and its moral consequences was a central theme in Bantu language writing between the wars. It materialised in the Jim-goes-to-Jo'burg motif, which was adumbrated in two early Xhosa novels: U-Nomalizo (1918) by EnochS. Guma (1896-1918) and U-Nolishwa (1931) by Henry M. Ndawo (1883-1949). It was the basic theme of R.R.R. Dhlomo's An African Tragedy, A novel in English by a Zulu writer (1928). Black writers were, however, not alone, as white Afrikaans and English authors also started protesting against the inj~stice and brutality ~f t~e National Party's regime .. For e~am~le, "'/0 novels by well-known Afnkaans author, Andre Bnnk, were banned, thus practically s1lencmg · him and forcing him to publish in English. He also had to suffer because of the Censorship Act, but in a different way: But once the authorities were driven to a point where they had to take the step of banning the first Afrikaans book- which unfortunately happened to be mine - once they had crossed this psychological barrier, it seemed to become much easier for them to act against Afrikaans writers than against English writers, so that in the course ofthe seventies several Afrikaans books were banned which, had they been written in English, most probably would not have been banned. Because the authorities then adopted the attitude that we expect criticism and attacks and hostility from English writers, because they are different from us anyway ... (Brink in Welz 1987: 58). Paton was the first white English writer to protest against the ruthlessness of the regime in his Beloved Country. Before this novel was written, the English-speaking community were, as 39 Authorised Version (Clarke in Paton 1966: 259-260). The characters created by a novelist are not real people. This means that their speech forms are also contrived and not presented as phonetically true or correct. For this reason a novelist will usually simply use an "eye dialect" (Leech and Short 1983: 168), i.e. a few marked or non­ standard forms, to create the illusion of a dialect, sociolect or idiolect. The novelist presents such speech forms in the novel at three levels: the grammatical-syntactic (sentence construction), the phonological (spelling) and the lexical (vocabulary). For example, in Beloved Country, through the use of marked forms (lexis and grammar) a very distinctive style is produced to create the illusion that the Zulu characters are actually speaking (and thinking) in Zulu. 'Transfer' is the term coined by Coetzee (1988: 117) to refer to the particular process that novelists use to render "(imagined) foreign speech in an English stylistically marked to remind the reader of the (imagined) foreign original". And, as is evident from the following example in which a fellow Zulu explains gold mining to the Reverend Kumalo, quoted by Coetzee, Paton creates "the impression that a transfer from Zulu has taken place" (Coetzee 1988: 127): We go down and dig it [the ore] out, umfundisi [sir]. And when it is hard to dig, we go away, and the white men blow it out with the fire-sticks. Then ... we load it on to the trucks, and it goes up in a cage, up a long chimney so long that I cannot say it for you (Paton 1966:17). According to Coetzee (1988: 127), the speech of Kumalo' s informant here is marked for Zulu origin, not only by the transcription of Zulu words like umfundisi but by words like fire-sticks (i.e. dynamite), chimney (the shaft), and go away (take cover), as well as by an ungrammatical use of the English definite article ("the fire-sticks"). The reader cannot be blamed for concluding that Zulu lacks words for the concepts dynamite, shaft, take cover, that the speaker is using the best approximations his language provides, and that Paton has given literal translations of these approximations, in accord with the practice of transfer. In fact this conclusion is false. The Zulu for mine shaft is umgodi, a word quite distinct from ushimula, (chimney), whose English origin is clear. The word for dynamite, again of English origin, is udalimede, which has nothing to do with fire-sticks. Banda (to take cover) is clearly distinguished from suka (to go away). It is necessary to point out here that in Chapter 5 (par. 5.2), the term transference will be used in its narrow sense to denote a translation strategy whereby the translator transfers an SL word 40 to a TL text unchanged, i.e. the SL word is retained in the translation as a loan word. This can almost be regarded as a 'fine-tuning' ofCoetzee's (1988: 127, 129) use ofthe term transfer where the reader has to imagine that the "phantom Zulu" which is used by the black characters (and James Jarvis) has been transferred (i.e. retained) from real Zulu into English. Coetzee (1988: 127) points out that the "artificial literalism" of passages such as the above conveys "a certain naivete, even childishness, which reflects on the quality of mind of its speaker and of Zulu speakers in general". The "phantom Zulu" represented in the novel is both syntactically simple and lexically archaic; "this archaism makes for a certain ceremoniousness in the verbal exchanges, whose effect it is to hold any unseemly display of emotion at bay" (Coetzee 1988: 128). However, the archaism of the English implies something else too: an archaic quality to the Zulu behind it, as if the Zulu language, Zulu culture, the Zulu frame of mind, belonged to a bygone and heroic age (Coetzee 1988: 128). In the following dialogue the Rev. Kumalo meets James Jarvis, who does not yet know that it was the reverend's son who had killed Arthur Jarvis: - You are in fear of me, but I do not know what it is. You need not be in fear of me. - It is true, umnumzana. You do not know what it is. - I do not know but I desire to know. - I doubt if I could tell it, umnumzana. - You must tell it, umfundisi. Is it heavy? - It is very heavy, umnumzana. It is the heaviest thing of all my years. (Paton 1966: 155) By means of marked forms such as the above, e.g. be in fear of (instead of be afraid of), desire (instead of would like), heavy (instead of serious), the impression is created that Paton's Zulu belongs to "an earlier and more innocent era in human culture" - the "symbolic language of parable" (Coetzee 1988: 129). This observation ties in with Clarke's (Paton 1966: 259) claim mentioned above that the style of Beloved Country is based on that of the Authorised Version of the English Bible. And it plays an important role in conveying the theme of the novel, which, as explained above (cf par. 3.3.1 ), is an adaptation of the parable ofthe Prodigal Son. Speech is used by the novelist as an important characterisation technique in narrative fiction. The reader has to deduce character traits from what the character says and thinks in order to interpret what kind of character is being represented. What a character says is therefore just as important as the way in which it is said. The speech used by Paton's Zulu characters "tells us that they belong in an old-fashioned context of direct (i.e. unmediated) personal relations based on 41 respect, obedience, and fidelity" (Coetzee 1988: 129). It will, however, be pointed out in Chapter 5 that some of the black characters' expressions in 'phantom Zulu' are not acceptable to Zulu readers, though Paton views them to be of Zulu origin. According to Nida and Taber (1969: 13), the style of a source text should be retained ifit is meaningful. As mentioned above, the Biblical style in Paton's novel is used to suggest the poetic quality ofthe Zulu language and to differentiate the broken and stilted English of the black characters from that of the white English speaking characters. It will therefore be necessary in Chapter 5 to examine how the translator dealt with these aspects when he translated the text into Zulu. The next section comprises a structural analysis of Beloved Country. 3.4 The structure of Cry, the Beloved Country The analysis of Beloved Country takes place within the framework ofRimmon-Kenan1 S (1983) semio-structuralist approach to narratology, which is a synthesis of contemporary literary approaches to literature and narrative texts, such as Russian Formalism, New Criticism, Prague and French Structuralism, and semiotics. To illustrate theoretical aspects, all examples will be taken from Paton1s novel, Beloved Country. Rimmon-Kenan (1983: 2) classifies novels, short stories and detective stories as examples of narrative fiction which she defines as 11the narration of a succession of fictional events 11 • She explains that the term 'narration1 suggests (1) a communication process in which the narrative as message is transmitted by addresser to addressee and (2) the verbal nature ofthe medium used to transmit the message (1983:2). By this definition of the term narration Rimmon-Kenan (1983: 2) gives a clear distinction between narrative fiction and fictional stories which are transmitted through other media , viz. film, dance, and so on. She also explains that narrative fiction differs from other literary texts such as poetry because, unlike the latter, narrative fiction represents a succession of events. An event here means something that occurs. An example of an event in our novel is the murder of Jarvis's son, Arthur. Rimmon-Kenan (1983:3) also emphasizes the fact that the events that are referred to here are fictional, which differentiates narrative fictional texts from other texts such as history books, 44 terms with his son's commitment. He then commits himself to alleviating the sufferings of the blacks at Ndotsheni. This commitment is also brought about by the mutual suffering and compassion of Jarvis and Kumalo, both of whom have lost their sons. The events can be chronologically arranged as follows: Book I: 1) The Rev. Stephen Kumalo's brother in law (Gertrude's husband) goes to Johannesburg; he was recruited for the mines. 2) He does not return to Ndotsheni. 3) Gertrude and her son go to Johannesburg to look for him. 4) She does not find her husband. 5) She starts making and selling liquor - she turns to prostitution. 6) Stephen Kumalo's son, Absalom, goes to Johannesburg to look for his aunt. 7) He meets bad friends and turns into a criminal. 8) He too does not return to Ndotsheni. 9) Msimangu writes a letter to Stephen Kumalo about Gertrude being 'sick'. 1 0) Kumalo goes to Johannesburg to save his sister and her son, and to look for his own son. 11) Absalom, his cousin and another young man (Johannes Mphafuri) are involved in the murder of Arthur Jarvis. 12) They are arrested. Book II: 1) Absalom, his cousin and Johannes Mphafuri are involved in murdering Arthur Jarvis. 2) The police inform Arthur's father (James) about the murder. 3) James Jarvis seeks to understand his son by reading articles, papers, etc. in Arthur's study. 4) Absalom is sentenced to death. 5) James contributes money to a club for the achievement of Arthur's objectives. Book III: 1) Stephen Kumalo goes back to Ndotsheni. 2) He tries to restore Ndotsheni so as to prevent people from leaving the place. 45 3) James Jarvis helps Stephen to restore Ndotsheni: he sends milk for the children; he prepares for the construction of the dam; he gets a young demonstrator to teach people farming. 4) Jarvis' wife dies and Jarvis decides to leave Ndotsheni. 5) Jarvis starts building a church for the Ndotsheni people. 6) Absalom is hanged. The above events, which have been arranged chronologically here, form the story. One can now ask how these events were selected and arranged by the author to tell the story, i.e. to form the plot. Rimmon-Kenan ( 19 83: 16) classifies two different kinds of events - "those that advance the action by opening an alternative ('kernels') and those that expand, amplify, maintain or delay the former(' catalysts')". If one receives a letter, depending on its content, one can either decide to ignore it or to respond. Such an event which opens an alternative, is called a kernel. Kernels therefore advance the action because characters are compelled to make a choice. The above events are kernels in Paton's novel. \Vhen Stephen Kumalo receives a letter from Theophilus Msimangu, he has two alternatives to choose from - whether to go to Johannesburg, as requested by Msimangu, or just ignore the letter. He decides to go to Johannesburg so as to save his sister. Therefore, the action that has been triggered by Msimangu's letter is advanced. But there are other events which do not advance the action, e.g. the death of James Jarvis's wife. If other selected events are examined, it is obvious that characters have to choose between alternatives. Gertrude, after failing to find her husband, has two alternatives to choose from. Instead of returning to Ndotsheni with her brother and her son she decides to stay in Johannesburg. The young man who is responsible for Arthur's death, Absalom, compels the court to choose suitable punishment - his hanging, etc. 3.4.1.2 Actors Another important element which forms part of the abstracted story level is the actors or participants who are involved in the events. The term actor shows that characters or personages who participate in the events are seen in certain roles or 'functions' in which their individual characteristics are irrelevant. The question now arises as to whether such characters exist as characters at all or whether they should be subordinated to the events. Theorists who believe that characters should be subordinated to events hold that events are the more important element of the whole work. Mudrick, as cited by Rimmon-Kenan (1983: 31) writes: One of the recurring anxieties of literary critics concerns the way in which a character in drama or fiction may be said to exist. The 'purist' argument - in the ascendancy nowadays among critics - points out that characters do not exist at all except in so far as they are a part of the images and events which bear and move them, that any effort to extract them from their context and to discuss them as if they are real human beings is a sentimental misunderstanding of the nature of literature. The 'realistic' argument - on the defensive nowadays - insists that characters acquire, in the course of an action, a kind of independence from the events in which they live, and that they can be usefully discussed at some distance from their context. 46 The two views expressed in this paragraph are, on the one hand that characters do not exist - the names of participants mentioned in the narrative text are just images which merely advance the action. On the other hand, characters are viewed as independent and as actors they can be abstracted from the story and analysed. The first view is followed by structuralists such as Greimas ( 1966) who believe characters should be subordinated to events. He suggested a model for the division of actors into categories which is based on the assumption that human thought and action are purposive. The participants in a literary work strive towards a specific aim; this goal can be the achievement of something favourable or the avoidance of something unfavourable. Greimas (1966) then differentiates between different categories of characters which he calls 'actants'. An actant is a group of characters with a common attribute. Such a group is in a specific relationship to the events and other groups of actors in the story. In this model the number of actants is reduced to six: sender -t object -t receiver helper -t subject -t opponent According to Greimas' actantial model, Arthur Jarvis in Beloved Country, together with those who bear the suffering when he is murdered, are regarded as senders. What Arthur dies for, that is, justice for the natives, is the object; and, the natives are the receivers. While the subject, in this case Arthur Jarvis, is trying to achieve his object Qustice for the natives), he experiences opposition but at the same time also receives help. The oppressors are the opponents; but those who support Arthur by encouraging him to come and talk at their meetings and by other ways, 49 Urban whites, too, do not have the problems that are experienced by blacks. The Johannesburg residents in the novel are depicted as enjoying high wages and good living conditions. Consequently their perception of the problems of the country is affected and they cannot find solutions to these problems. In contrast, Arthur Jarvis is the only white character who is depicted as being able to perceive the social circumstances of all South Africans objectively. His murder by young black criminals is therefore the axis around which the plot evolves. When James Jarvis discovers that he is able to understand and share the humanitarian views held by his son, his attitude towards the less fortunate blacks change, hence the assistance that he offers to the people ofNdotsheni, and, ultimately, his ability to forgive his son's murderers. In this novel, therefore, setting actively assists in developing the themes of racial tension and forgiveness which feature so prominently. In the previous section it was shown that 'story' means the abstraction and restructuring of events in their chronological order from the concrete text. The story is therefore one element constituting the structure of the narrative text. In the following section the concrete text, as an element of narrative fiction, is examined. 3.4.2 The text It has already been mentioned above that text refers to the concrete text which the reader has to read so as to understand the story presented in it. This implies that the novelist skilfully manipulates other macro-elements such as time, characterisation and point of view to achieve certain objectives in the novel. The following sections will deal with how Paton uses these elements in his novel. The author's manipulation of time will receive attention first. 3.4.2.1 Time If the term story means that the events are reconstructed and arranged chronologically at an abstract level, time entails that events are arranged according to what happened first - and from there which events followed. But the writer is not bound to follow this chronological order. He may start with any event in order to achieve artistic effect such as creating suspense. Time as explained by Rimmon-Kenan (1983: 46), may be viewed in three respects- order, duration and frequency: Statements about order would answer the question 'when?' in terms like: first, second, last; before, after, etc. Statements about duration would answer the question 'how long?' in terms like: an hour, a year; long, short; from x till y, etc. Statements about frequency would answer the question 'how often?' in terms like: x times a minute, a month, a page. 50 Usually, the writer rearranges events in a particular order to achieve a certain effect. In Beloved Country, Paton does not start with the event which occurred first in the story, namely the departure of Gertrude's husband from Ndotsheni. Instead, the novel starts with the eighth event; Stephen Kumalo receiving a letter from Theophilus Msimangu: This young woman is very sick, and therefore I ask you to come quickly to Johannesburg. Come to the Rev. Theophilus Msimangu, the Mission House, Sophia-town, and there I shall give you some advices (Paton 1966: 6). This letter has an impact, not only on Stephen Kumalo, but, also on the reader, because by means of the letter Paton succeeds in inviting the reader to read his story. Had Paton started with the event that occurred first in the story, that of Gertrude's husband going to Johannesburg, the effect would have not been the same. The arrangement of events in the text leads to two types of method of indicating time in a narrative text, namely flashback and foreshadowing. Genette (1972) calls these methods 'analepsis' and 'prolepsis' respectively and these are defined by Rimmon-Kenan (1983: 46) as follows: An analepsis is a narration of a story-event at a point in the text after later events have been told. Conversely, a prolepsis is a narration of a story-event at a point before earlier events have been mentioned. The narration, as it were, takes an excursion into the future of the story. In this study little can be said with regard to prolepsis, the only example being at the beginning ofthe text: The great red hills stand desolate, and the earth has torn away like flesh. The lightning flashes over them, the clouds pour down upon them, the dead streams come to life, full of the red blood of the earth. Down in the valleys women scratch the soil that is left, and the maize hardly reaches the height of a man. They are valleys of old men and old women, of mothers and children. The men are away, the young men and the girls are away. The soil cannot keep them any more (Paton 1966: 4). The author starts by talking about the beauty of the land; and then foreshadows the desolation that is going to play a role in the novel: he tells us about the young men and the women who have left the land. The reader now starts to wonder why these people have left the land. But, as indicated above, a flashback has been used to trigger off the action in this novel. 51 The time that the events are supposed to have taken to occur and the amount of text devoted to their narration (duration), is also important in analysing a narrative text. An example of duration in Paton's novel is that of the prosecution of Absalom and the other young men. It took Absalom a short time to murder Arthur Jarvis, but many pages are devoted to this event in the text; we also find that the court proceedings are given ample time in terms of pages (Paton 1966: 138-147; 171-178; 238-245). The author did not summarise the court proceedings; so he must have regarded these as important events in the novel. They are indeed important because the person who was murdered plays a major role in this novel. Arthur Jarvis is killed by one of those he is trying to help- the blacks, and this event symbolises the fact that those who suffer cannot identify the "servant" that has come to their rescue. As defined above, frequency means that an event that occurs once only on the abstract story level may be narrated more the once in the text. On the other hand, an event that occurs several times in the story may be narrated only once in the text. But a problem arises as to whether two or more events are the same. According to Rimmon-Kenan (1983: 57) strictly speaking, no event is repeatable in all respects, nor is a repeated segment of the text quite the same, since its new location puts it in a different context which necessarily changes its meaning. For the sake of this study it can be assumed that events that have almost the same qualities are the same. When the narrator refers repeatedly to an event that occurs only once, such an event plays an important role in that narrative text. In contrast, when an event that occurs more than once is narrated only once, the degree of importance is reduced. Arthur Jarvis' murder can again be taken as an example. It occurred once, but it is cited more than five times in the story. Thus, it is an event that has been foregrounded in this novel. The following section deals with characterisation, another macro-element in the novel. 3.4.2.2 Characterisation It has been explained above (par. 3 .4. 1.2) that, based on Greimas' ( 1966) actantial model, the term 'actor' (not 'character' or 'personage') is reserved for the abstract story level to show that the participants in the events are seen in certain 'roles' or 'functions' to which their distinctive characteristics are irrelevant. However, when the actors' individual differences are relevant, the traditional term character or personage is used because a character or personage has human qualities. Various methods are used for the individualisation of actors to fully fledged Ndotsheni. Yes, and with a greater humility, for had his own sister not been a prostitute? And his own son a thief? And might not he himself be the grandfather to a child that would have no name? (Paton 1966: 76). 54 All these thoughts come to him after visiting Johannesburg. This different environment, where Kumalo is like a fish out of water, helps the reader to understand him much better. Kumalo is a good man to whom crime and prostitution are a disgrace. He is also a man of faith who believes that God will help him restore Ndotsheni. This is revealed by his reaction to the help he receives from James Jarvis: Kumalo stood up, and he said in a voice that astonished the Bishop, This is from God. It was a voice in which there was relief from anxiety and laughter and weeping, and he said again, looking round the walls of the room. This is from God (Paton 1966: 231). Theophilus Msimangu: Msimangu is a compassionate man. The fact that Gertrude makes her living as a prostitute disturbs him deeply. He then decides to write Kumalo a letter so as to save the poor woman. This kindness is also shown by his willingness to help Kumalo with accommodation and by the assistance that he gives Kumalo while he is in Johannesburg. In his letter to Kumalo he writes: Come to the Rev. Theophilus Msimangu ... and I shall give you some advices. I shall also find accommodation for you, where the expenditure will not be very serious (Paton 1966: 6). When Kumalo goes back to Ndotsheni, he gets all that Msimangu possesses: the money in his Post Office book. To show that he is truly God-fearing, he turns into a monk - a life of complete self-sacrifice. Msimangu's new life that he has chosen and the money he gives to Kumalo, is summed up by his own words: I am forsaking the world and all possessions, but I have a little money. I have no father or mother to depend on me, and I have the permission of the Church to give this to you, my friend, to help you with all the money you have spent in Johannesburg, and all the duties you have taken up. Thts book is in your name (Paton 1966: 187-188). Arthur Jarvis: He is indeed, as noted by Duncan (1987: 126) the Suffering Servant in this story: Out of the "darkness" of suffering triggered by the murder, therefore, emerges the "light" of reconciliation and restoration in Book III of the novel. And as the Servant dies vicariously for those who do not understand his mission, so Arthur Jarvis is murdered by the very people to whose welfare he has dedicated his life and talents. Also like the Servant, he offers himself without resistance: the newspaper report of the robbery and murder states that "there were no signs of any struggle". 55 This interpretation by Duncan is accurate because Paton, as influenced by his religious convictions, believes that a Christian should serve people. Like Christ who was killed by the people He wanted to save, Arthur Jarvis is killed by someone that he is trying to help and uplift. John Kumalo: John Kumalo is introduced to the reader as a politician. He no longer cares about religion, his culture, his people or the place where he grew up. He feels that there is nothing that the Church and the traditional life can do for him: The Bishop says it is wrong, he said, but he lives in a big house, and his white priests get four, five, six times what you get my brother... That is why I no longer go to Church (Paton 1966: 32). Down in Ndotsheni I am nobody, even as you are nobody, my brother. I am subject to the chief, who is an ignorant man. I must salute him and bow to him, but he is an uneducated man. Here in Johannesburg I am a man of importance, of some influence. I have my own business, and when it is good, I can make ten, twelve pounds a week (Paton 1966: 30). What John says implies that he does not worry about his tribe that was broken up by the white man (Paton 1966: 22). Instead, he thinks that the new order has brought hope for him. He is now an important person in the city. This shows him to be the direct opposite of his brother, Rev. Stephen Kumalo, who believes that he has to dedicate his life to the restoration of his people. What matters to John is his possessions. He does not even care about his brother's son who is to be executed, as long as his own son gets acquitted: - Yes, yes, John Kumalo interrupts him, and smiles at him. - Who will believe your son? he asks. He says it with meaning, with cruel and pitiless meaning (Paton 1966: 89). Paton also presents John as being morally corrupt, because in Johannesburg he lives with a woman who is not his wife. This shows that he has abandoned his culture because in Zulu culture such behaviour is not allowed. But it is important to note that John is involved in the practical problems ofhis country. This is what can be labelled as the good side of this character. He is aware of the injustice of apartheid and the recruitment system the bosses use for securing labour for the mines: We live in the compounds, we must leave our wives and families behind. And when the new gold is found, it is not we who will get more for our labour. It is the white man's shares that will rise, you will read it in all the papers (Paton 1966: 31). 56 James Jarvis: James Jarvis plays an important role in the novel because he contributes to the process of restoring Ndotsheni. Although his son is killed by a black, he is able to forgive and does not bear hatred. As a result, he assists the reverend in his attempts to restore Ndotsheni. What helps him bear the pain of losing a son is understanding what his son was aiming to achieve -justice and better lives for black people. In his letter to Kumalo he writes: Umfundisi: I thank you for your message of sympathy, and for the promise of the prayers of your church. You are right, my wife knew of the things that are being done, and had the greatest part in it. These things we did in memory of our beloved son. It was one of her last wishes that a new church be built at Ndotsheni ... (Paton 1966: 231 ). It is clear from this letter that Jarvis, together with his late wife, is not only encouraged by his understanding of his son's aims in life, but also by Kumalo's commitment to restoring Ndotsheni. Mrs Lithebe: Mrs Lithebe shows that although she stays in Johannesburg, she is not influenced by the evils of the city. In her home she welcomes and treats Kumalo with respect: Her husband was a builder, a good and honest man ... He built her this fine big house, it has a room to eat and live in, and three rooms to sleep in. And one she has for herself, and one for the priest that she is glad to have, for it is good to have a priest, it is good to have prayers in the house (Paton 1966: 102). Jarvis' grandson: In the novel this young boy is the symbol of the post-apartheid generation. For him all South African citizens, black and white, are equal. This, he shows spontaneously. Kumalo sees a 'brightness' in this young man- similar to his father, Arthur Jarvis (Paton 1966: 240). In the novel the boy becomes the 'light' of South Africa - a symbol of hope and reconciliation. Both methods of presenting the qualities of characters have been employed effectively by Paton in his Beloved Country. Some of the characters' attributes are presented to the reader through their biblical names given to them by the author. Such characters truly represent the biblical characters. Theophilus Msimangu, whose first name denotes him as a God-fearing man, truly shows that he loves God by the sacrifices he makes. Paton is also able to present the traits of characters indirectly. John Kumalo's actions, for example, show that he is a selfish man who 59 examine the difference between perceiving the focalised objects from without or from within. Both the external and the internal focalisers may perceive the focalised object either from without or from within. Perceiving the focalised from without entails concentrating on its outward manifestations, and, perceiving it from within entails concentrating on its inner manifestations (feelings and thoughts if it is a person) (Rimmon-Kenan 1983: 76). It is important to note that it is the external focaliser who is able to penetrate the thoughts and feelings of the characters. This is due to the fact that he has an overall knowledge of the events of the story and knows what will eventually happen to the characters. This does not mean that the internal focaliser cannot perceive a focalised object from within. Rimmon-Kenan (1983: 76) explains: an internal focaliser may perceive the object from within, especially when she herself is both focaliser and focalised, ... but his or her perception may also be confined to the outward manifestations of the focalised ... This observation may be interpreted as follows: Since the character-focaliser knows his own thoughts and feelings, it is easier to penetrate his own thoughts and feelings. But, given the fact that his perceptions are based on his experiences in the fictitious world, such perceptions are usually confined to the outward manifestations of the focalised. We shall now illustrate the two ways of perceiving the focalised object by means of examples: He had heard that they could eat what they wished on a morning like this. Strange that a man should ask for food at such time. Did the body hunger, driven by some deep dark power that did not know it must die? Is the boy quiet, and does he dress quickly, and does he think ofNdotsheni now? Do tears come into his eyes, and does he wipe them away, and stand up like a man? Does he say, I will not eat any food, I will pray? Is Msimangu there with him, or Father Vincent, or some other priest whose duty it is, to comfort and strengthen him, for he is afraid of the hanging? Does he repent him, or is there only room for his fear? Is there nothing that can be done now, is there not an angel that comes there and cries, This is for God not for man, come child, come with me? (Paton 1966: 244). This is an example of how the external focaliser (the narrator) penetrates the feelings and thoughts of Stephen Kumalo. Kumalo thinks of his son who is about to be hanged. He was told that a person who is about to be hanged is allowed to eat anything he likes, but he wonders whether it is possible for such a person to feel hungry on the day of the execution. He also wonders what his son is doing on this day and who is with him to support him. In this example the focalised object (Kumalo) is perceived from within. The following is an example of a focalised object perceived from the outside: His brother John, who was a carpenter, had gone there, and had a business of his own in Sophiatown, Johannesburg. His sister Gertrude, twenty-five years younger than he, and the child of his parents' age, had gone there with her small son to look for the husband who had never come back from the mines. His only child Absalom had gone there, to look for his aunt Gertrude, and he had never returned. And indeed many other relatives were there, though none so near as these (Paton 1966: 5). 60 Here the external focaliser (the narrator) does not penetrate the thoughts and feelings of the character, i.e. Kumalo. Instead, he tells us (from Kumalo's perspective), how his brother, his sister and also his son had left Ndotsheni to go to Johannesburg. To explain the concept focalisation further we shall now look at its different facets. b) Facets of focalisation The perceptual facet Rimmon-Kenan (1983: 77) holds that "perception (sight, hearing, smell, etc.) is determined by two main coordinates: space and time". To explain what Rimmon-Kenan means by this statement we shall first look at space. The events as presented in the text occur at specific places. Only the narrator-focaliser is able to perceive what happens at point A, B, C, etc. at the same time. He is able to see what all the characters do at the same time, unlike the characters themselves who cause or experience the events. Their observations are limited to the places in which they find themselves. For example, in the extract quoted above, the narrator-focaliser penetrates the thoughts and feelings of Stephen Kumalo and so illustrates the perceptual facet clearly. In this extract only the narrator-focaliser knows what is happening to Rev. Kumalo's son in Johannesburg. Because the reverend can only see what is happening at Ndotsheni, he is a limited observer. Time is also important in studying focalisation. The narrator-focaliser is again at an advantage: he knows what happened in the past, what is happening to the characters at a particular point of the presentation of the story, and, also, what will happen to the characters in future. The temporal knowledge of the character-focalisers is limited to what they experience at a particular point in time. For instance, Kumalo's son (Absalom) did not know that by killing Jarvis he 61 would be hanged. On the other hand, the narrator-focaliser knew beforehand what would happen to him. The psychological facet Rimmon-Kenan (1983: 79) states that the psychological facet concerns the mind and emotions of the focaliser. A focaliser may possess a certain degree of knowledge about the fictitious world, he/she may believe in something, remember something and be emotionally involved in something in the fictitious world. Only the narrator-focaliser possesses unlimited knowledge of the fictitious world, he can be trusted and his emotions are regarded as being objective by the reader. A character-focaliser, on the other hand, has limited knowledge ofthe fictitious world, he cannot be trusted and his emotions are regarded as being subjective. John Kumalo is an interesting character if examined from the psychological facet of focalisation. He is deeply involved in politics and is concerned about the manipulation of blacks by whites: There was a change in his voice, it became like the voice of a bull or a lion. Go to our hospital, he said, and see our people lying on the floors. They lie so close you cannot step over them. But it is they who dig the gold. For three shillings a day ... And when the new gold is found, it is not we who will get more for our labour. It is the white man's shares that will rise, ... (Paton 1966: 31) John feels that blacks are treated unjustly, and that whites are immoral, but he himself lives with a woman who is neither legally nor customarily his wife. John's emotional involvement in the affairs ofhis country is subjective since what he preaches is contrary to what he practises. He cannot therefore be believed to be honest. The ideological facet According to Uspensky, as cited by Rimmon-Kenan (1983: 81 ), "this facet, often referred to as 'the norms of the text', consists of'a general system ofviewing the world conceptually', in accordance with which the events and characters of the story are evaluated". The norms referred to here are those of the fictitious world. The norms or opinions of the narrator­ focaliser are usually regarded as authoritative by the reader. The norms or opinions of the character-focalisers, on the other hand, are always subordinate to those of the narrator­ focaliser. The views ofwhites on native crime can be used to illustrate this facet (Paton 1966: 65-69). 64 that is why in the quotation below heavy can be interpreted to mean serious: - You must tell it, umfundisi. Is it heavy? - It is very heavy, umnumzana. It is the heaviest thing of all my years (Paton 1966: 155). At grammatical level some stilted and awkward constructions such as the following appear in the text: " .. .it goes up in a cage, up a long chimney so long that I cannot say it for you" (Paton 1966: 17) These speech forms clearly show that these characters are not English mother-tongue speakers. The question that will have to be addressed in the comparative analysis between the ST and the TT is how the translator managed to "back-translate" the phantom Zulu of the source text into "real" Zulu as supposedly used by "real" characters. And furthermore, whether the speech forms used in the translation are acceptable to the target readership. 3.5 Summary The above discussion shows that Alan Paton's religious background, his education and the socio-political situation of the time had a major role in the production of his Beloved Country. It is because of his religious background that he portrays Arthur Jarvis as a kind of"suffering servant". Like Jesus Christ, Arthur is portrayed as committing the ultimate sacrifice. The archaic, biblical style that Paton uses in Beloved Country effectively differentiates the English used by the black characters from that of the white characters and helps to convey the novel's main theme of forgiveness and compassion. The macrostructural elements of Beloved Country all assist in conveying this theme and the secondary theme of racial conflict between black and white: at the abstract story level it is shown how the Reverend Kumalo's family members leave the reserve because the soil is "sick" and barren. They go to big cities like Johannesburg in search ofjob opportunities. Some of the blacks do away with their culture, like John Kumalo. Some, especially the youth, resort to crime and prostitution. This unacceptable social behaviour is the result of the breaking up of the tribes by the white government. The fact that Absalom leaves his home at N dotsheni, goes to Johannesburg and never returns home, indicates that Paton is basing his plot on the parable of the Prodigal Son. At the level of the text, it was shown how Paton makes use of both direct definition and indirect presentation to portray the characters of Beloved Country. It was also shown that the characters, as internal focalisers, do not perceive things as objectively as the narrator-focaliser 65 because they are inside the fictitious world and can therefore not be believed and trusted by the reader. In contrast, the narrator-focaliser is an external focaliser who is able to point out the characters' shortcomings. Furthermore, it was pointed out that at the level of the narration itself, Paton either allowed the narrator to let the characters (speak) to the reader themselves, or to act as mediator between the characters and the reader. Those cases where the black characters (speak) for themselves are particularly revealing because they are made to converse in a so-called "phantom Zulu" to create the impression that they are actually speaking (and thinking) in Zulu. The next chapter provides a socio-cultural perspective on the Zulu narrative system so that the researcher can take into account the constraints imposed upon the target text, i.e. Lafa Elihle Kakhulu, by the relevant political, social, cultural, literary and/or textual norms and conventions of the target system in which it is embedded. 66 CHAPTER4 THE ZULU NARRATIVE SYSTEM: A SOCIO-CULTURAL PERSPECTIVE 4.1 Introduction In the previous chapter the life and times of Alan Paton were examined so as to show how the source system and culture had influenced the production of Beloved Country. Thereafter a detailed analysis was made of the different elements constituting Beloved Country in terms of structuralist narratological principles. Such an analysis is essential because in a literary text the translator transfers far more than mere words, phrases and sentences at microtextual level.\ 1 When describing a translated novel the translation critic should have a thorough understandingl\f'J f? of both the microtextual elements of the novel and the macrotextual elements, such as \ characterisation, focalisation, setting and theme as well. As mentioned above, the systemic approach to literature and literary translation which forms the theoretical backdrop of the cultural model for translation that is used in this study ( cf Chapter 2, par. 2.4.1 above) has shown that the development of a literary genre is better understood if cognizance is taken of the broader cultural context in which it is embedded. The ----- """""""'""""-""~~ ... ""·-... ,-"" aim of this chapter is therefore to e~;~ine-the target system.;nd culture, .that-is, the Zulu narrative system and, in particular, the influence of translated texts on the development of the Zulu novel. In doing so socio-cultural as well as literary and intertextual norms and conventions that influenced the development of the Zulu literary system are taken into account. The first section of this chapter looks at the role translation played in the development of Zulu literature, and thereafter some translated Zulu novels are classified and discussed in terms of the cultural model in order to determine the norms (and conventions) of the target system that influenced the production ofNyembezi's (1983) Lafa Elihle Kakhulu. Lastly, information is supplied on the birth, early years and literary achievements of the translator, Sibusiso Nyembezi, himself. 4.2 The influence of translation on the development of Zulu literature 4.2.1 Early beginnings: orature Before the arrival of white missionaries in South Africa, blacks were illiterate. But they had no difficulty in communicating with one another in their own distinct ways. Zulu girls, for example, since it constitutes the only indigenous background against which the Zulu novelist composes his production, it being the only genre that resembles the novel (Msimang (1983: 1). 69 According to Msimang (1983), a folktale (inganekwane ), like the modern short story, has few characters and a relatively simple plot structure. The characters are usually 'flat' and show no development, e.g. the hare is always cunning and a cannibal always becomes a fool at the end ofthe story. 4.2.2 Devotional literature and translation As explained above ( cf. Chapter 2, par. 2.4.1 ), the beginnings of modern national literary systems, and that of a developing language such as Zulu in particular, can often be traced back to translations of originals from so-called 'prestigious' literary systems. According to Even­ Zohar ( 1990), complex and dynamic interaction between translated texts and the receiving culture's own literary production takes place. When the developing literature is still young it is open to foreign influences and translated literature can then occupy a central position in the literary system and could provide models for the whole system. This is why it can be said that translations of the Bible, of semi-religious and didactic works and of the so-called 'classics' from world literature, initiated creative secular writing in Zulu and the other indigenous languages of South Africa. The arrival of the Christian missionaries brought major changes to the mainly oral nature of the existing Zulu literary system. The missionaries' major aim was to spread the gospel. They realised that this aim could be achieved more successfully by teaching Africans to read and write. This is why the first written Zulu texts were translations of portions of the Bible, the catechisms and some hymns. One of the most eminent translators of devotional literature into Zulu was Bishop John W. Colenso from the Church of England. The first Zulu translation of the whole Bible was published in 1883. In addition to their spiritual message, the Bible translations represented an important step in the emergence of a written literature for the Zulu people. Although they had been undertaken for religious purposes, the translations unlocked a considerable portion ofworld literature ... The Bible enabled South African peoples to share experiences with other nations of the world and introduced them to almost all the contemporary forms of literature, giving prospective writers numerous models - fantasy, novellas, hymns, laudations and other forms of poetry, fragments ofthe dramatic, etc. There were also examples of literature in which readers could recognise their own oral art, such as the formulatory patterns in the Book of Psalms and the Proverbs (Ntuli & Swanepoel 1993: 20). 70 As can be expected, translated scriptural texts have always had a far-reaching effect on creative writing and biblical rewritings also appeared in Zulu. For example, the theme of the prodigal son is featured inK. Bhengu's Baba Ngonile (Father I have sinned) (1972), B.J. Dube's Ukufa Kuyosihlanganisa Ekugcineni (Death will unite us at the end) (1971) and C.L.S. Nyembezi's Mntanami Mntanami! (My child, my child!) (1950). The theme of Jim going to Johannesburg, which became so popular with black writers later on and which is a secondary theme of Beloved Country (Paton 1966), can be regarded as a reworking of the biblical parable: Absalom goes away, sins and is forgiven by his father, but does not return to his father's house. As regards semi-religious and didactic works, research shows that Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress was a key text in the transition to secular literature in the African languages because quite a number ofrewritings have appeared over the years (Ntuli & Swanepoel1993: 20-21). The missionaries probably regarded the theme of The Pilgrim's Progress as a useful vehicle by means of which to 'civilise' the Africans. The first translation by Colenso (Ukuhamba Kwesihambi) appeared in 1883. Another translation appeared in 1895 by J.K. Lorimer and B. Executa. These translations were easily imported into the Zulu literary system as the Zulu narrative system was still young and no model for narrative prose yet existed. According to Ntuli and Swanepoel ( 1993: 21-22) both the "rambling character" and moralistic orientation of later novels can be ascribed to the influence of these translations. The missionaries also established the first schools to educate the Africans. In order to provide reading material, they started recording and publishing oral literature and so paved the way for the emergence of secular literature in the indigenous languages. 4.2.3 Secular literature and translation Canon Callaway, one of the missionaries working amongst the Zulu people, produced his lzinganekwane Nensumansumane Nezindaba Zabantu (Tales and stories of the people) already in 1868. This collection represents the first Zulu narrative texts in writing (Ntuli 1993: 140). Influenced by Callaway's collection of tales the Zulus who had learnt to read and write at the missionary schools wanted to record some of their oral art themselves. But they needed a forum in which to do so. This was provided by J.L. Dube who established the first Zulu newspaper, Jlanga LaseNatal (later the Jlanga), in 1903. In this paper the Zulus not only published their own folktales, poems, historical accounts, sketches, idioms, proverbs and riddles, but also 71 political writings because for the first time they could express their frustration with the British political system forced upon them at the time. For example, during the Bhambatha rebellion of 1906 Dube made use ofthis forum to point out the problems that faced the African people. He wrote an article entitled "Vukani Bantu" (Arise, 0 people) which was published in Ilanga LaseNatal on May 4, 1906. In this article Dube argued that his people had to collect money to send representatives to England to demonstrate against the unfair Poll Tax, the pass laws, and the oppressive labour system. The response of the British authorities was to call Dube before Governor McCallum and force him to make a public apology. As a political activist, Dube was also a founder of the South African Native Council (later known as the African National Congress or ANC) in Bloemfontein in 1912 and served as its President until 1917. This organisation, Dube believed, would allow the Africans social opportunities within the colonial system. Dube's ultimate aim was "Africa for the Africans" (Marable 1976: Abstract). Dube was the first black person to establish and direct an African school, the Ohlange Institute, in 1900. Himself a product of the mission schools, he showed that blacks were capable of running their own affairs. In Natal the teaching of Zulu was from 1885 onwards prescribed for all black pupils although at this stage English and Dutch were the only official languages. Afrikaans replaced Dutch in 1925 as the official language next to English. This state of affairs was to prevail until 1948, the year in which the National Party took over and the African languages came to be regarded as the 'official' languages in the so-called homelands only. In the period between 1920 and 1929 pioneering work on non-religious themes emerged in Zulu narrative fiction (Ntuli 1993: 140). The first novel to be written by a Zulu, An African Tragedy by R.R.R. Dhlomo, was written in English in 1928 and is testimony to the strong influence that the English language and literature had on the developing African languages. The year 1930 is generally regarded as "heralding the birth of modern literature in Zulu" (Ntuli & Swanepoel 1993: 44). J.L Dube made history by producing the first Zulu novel, Insila KaShaka (Shaka's personal servant), in 1930. This is a historical novel with a traditional setting, modelled along the lines of the one introduced by the translation of Bunyan's The Pilgrim 's Progress. The success of Dube's pioneering work became apparent when other Zulu writers also produced novels. B.W. Vilakazi followed with Noma Nini (Any time) in 1935 and UDingiswayo Kalobe (Dingiswayo, son of J obe ), which was produced in 193 9. Vilakazi' s third novel, Nje Nempela (Verily so) followed in 1943. This is based on the Bambatha rebellion of 1906. Dhlomo produced several works on famous Zulu kings, thereby establishing the trend 74 model. As explained above, according to Even-Zohar ( 1990: 50) translations will tend to be more 'faithful' to the original text's structure if the receiving literary system has not yet developed its own models. F .L. Ntuli's translation of Rider Haggard's Nada the Lily in 1954 as Umbuso KaShaka (The reign of Shaka) is such a .!~ans!ct~i()n bec.al,l~E) Jhe tra,nslatioiLs.eemsJoJl~ retained the macrostlldf.tlJ&~ C>f1llE) original text. _I! ~onsists of almost the.. s~rne IlJJll19er of pages as the original. Both texts consist of36 chapters. A study of the headings given to the chapters ~ ·--··----~-~~·-·~ -~- __ .J • ' • •• - ·- .,,,' •• ' ~~J(lti()n indicates that most of them have been translated literally. Atmicrotextual l~yel there are several instances where the translator seems to have retained the figurative language used in the original: I) 2) 3) ST: ... his chest was big as the chest of two ... his eye flashed like a smitten brand (Haggard 1949: 44) TT: .. .isifuba sakhe singangesabantu ababili ... amehlo akhe afana nesikhuni somlilo esivuthayo (Ntuli 1979: 33). ST: (Lit. His chest is like that oftwo people ... his eyes are like a burning piece of wood.) ... his justice is bright and terrible like the sun (Haggard 1949: 45) TT: .. .isinqumo sakhe siyakhanya siyesabeka njengelanga (Ntuli 1979: 33). (Lit. His ruling is bright and terrible like the sun.) ST: ... his voice was like the voice of a bull (Haggard 1949: 50) TT: ... ngezwi elifana nelenkunzi (Ntuli 1979: 39). (Lit. ... with a voice like that of a bull.) !he examples above indicate that the translator was trying to negotiate a cultural compromise betw~~I?:wh.at is accepted in both the Zulu and the English cultures. However, the result is a tU!:_nslation whlch.only partially acculturates the original w()rk. The translation of Rider Haggard's King Solomon's Mines by J.F. Cele (s.a. but supplied as 1958 by Ntuli & Swanepoel 1993) as Jmigodi Yenkosi USolo"moni is an interesting example. Contrary to the above-mentioned translation (Umbuso KaShaka), this particular translation showstha,tthe original work was condensed from320 pa,ges to 88 pages. The trans~y ~~~ seventeen chapters whereas the original has twenty chapters. ii is therefore marked by extensive omission as translation technique. Furthermore, the translator also made use of _p(lf~phrasing (i.e. amplification or explanation- see Chapter 5, par. 5.2 below) to a large extent. 75 ,}his shows that Cele only translated those sections of the novelthat he deemed important for WJ:jnt~rpretation of the story. Although he retains many of the ori¥~nal headings given to the different chapters, stylistic factors were largely ignored. -:::----,-·---~' --'~""·"'' The phenomenon of _exten~_iy~ 2II1issiog may be characterised in several ways. In recent research, Milton (1995) classifies condensations of novels as covert and overt. Covert translations are usually indicated euphemistically on the title page as being "special translations". They are usually produced by publishing houses for book clubs and, because of production costs, texts have to fit into a certain number of pages. In contrast, in the case of overt condensations it is usually stated on the title page that the original has been abridged or adapted. Therefore, owing to the fact that there is no indication on the title page that Cele has abridged, condensed or adapted the original, his translation of King Solomon's Mines could be classified as a covert translation. It can further be said that Cele attempted to acculturate the<)Eiginal by tn.eansof excessive ~~~IQE:~rmdparaphrasing as translation techniques. A tentative explanation for Cele's neglect of the structure in favour of content (the story) should perhaps be sought in extra-literary factors. Like the translation ofRider Haggard's She by A.V. Nyembezi (s.a.), Cele's translation of King Solomon's Mines was published by APB (i.e. Afrikaans Press Booksellers) in The Bantu's Publishing Home series, which would lead the critic to assume that both translations, i.e. 'simplified' translations of classics in condensed format, were meant as setworks for school pupils. Publishing houses naturally gained financially from the publication of setworks and therefore these translations appeared to supplement the ~.omestic repertoir~. It goes without saying that this kind of economic straitjacket constrained creative activity on the part of literary translators. M.N. Makhambeni's (1992) translation of Achebe's No Longer at Ease, as Kwakwenzenjani (What had really happened?) is another interesting case. The translator does not seem to have used the original English text but rather a retold version (a guided reader at intermediate level) by Heinemann Publishers meant for English learners, as source text. In other words, Makhambeni' s translation is a translation of a condensation of Achebe' s original novel. The translation is almost similar in length to that of the retold version. The number of chapters are equal but the prologue is longer than that of the original. It is interesting to note that in many instancesthe translator added certain segments to the original to 'explain' and simplify the Qriginal, e.g.: 76 ST: In the courtroom. Everyone in Lagos was talking about the trial. On the last day of the trial, the courtroom was full. (Achebe 1960: 5) TT: Endlini yokuthetha amacala. Kusenkantolo lapha kuthethwa khona amacala (lit. In the courtroom where cases are tried). Bonke abantu bakule ndawo bakhuluma ngale nsambatheka yecala. Leli yilanga lokugcina lecala. Leli gumbi okuthethwa kulo icala ligcwele ngokuphindiwe namhlanje. Abanye abantu balunguze ngamafasitela imbala (lit. Some people are even peeping through the windows). (Makhambeni 1992: 1) ~~d~tions such as these show a definite attempt by the translator to acculturate the original text ~ brit:J:gii?:g_iJ! the cultural codes of the target language. A study of the headings given to the different chapters also indicates an attempt to acculturate the original text, e.g. ·~g~tit]d!~s '"theJitl~ofChapter 9,1 Cannot Marry You, by the Zulu proverb/nkomo ingazala umuntu (lit. A cow can give birth to a human being). Although not explicitly stated, it can therefore be assumed that the simplified translation of Achebe's text was also aimed at (Zulu) school children. C.T. Msimang's translation of Achebe's Things Fall Apart, namely Kwaja Gula Linamasi (The calabash with sour-milk broke) (1996), provides yet another interesting example. The story is set in Igboland in Eastern Nigeria in the nineteenth century, before and after the arrival of the white man with his culture and Christian religion. It depicts the clash between the cultures of the Igbo society and that of the Europeans which was imposed upon the Igbo community in the name of Christianity. The title of Achebe's novel connotes that the intrusion of Christianity and European culture make things fall apart in the Igbo community. The main character in this novel, Okonkwo, believes that his culture is superior and that the foreign culture has come to destroy the African value system. He is not prepared to become a Christian because he believes that the Europeans' value system is marked by extreme individualism and materialism. By contrast, the Igbo people believe in communal life. Their life is marked by a complex network of relationships which is peculiar to the Europeans. Young couples build their homes within larger homes; extended families form small local communities; the scattered social groups live in peace with no tribal affiliations - until the advent of Christianity and European culture. To him it is clear that the arrival of the white man will cause the disintegration of the Igbo society and he feels that it is his responsibility to resist this foreign intrusion. 79 ministers from circuit to circuit every five years; so Nyembezi's father, Reverend I.N. Nyembezi, was transferred at regular intervals which meant that the children had to move from place to place with their parents. This practice naturally caused disruptions to their family life and the children's education. Reverend Nyembezi and his wife realised that the future of their children lay in a good education. Therefore, in order to solve the problems caused by his transfers from one circuit to another, Rev. Nyembezi and his wife took their children to their mother's family to enable them to attend a school in Driefontein. This decision ensured that the children would have a stable education. From Driefontein the young Sibusiso proceeded to high school at Nuttal Training College at Edendale. Later on, he was trained as a teacher at Adam's College. Sibusiso Nyembezi started teaching but continued his studies as a private student until he matriculated. He obtained his first degree in 1944 from the South African Native College at Fort Hare. Thereafter, in 1946, he completed an honours degree with the University ofthe \Vitwatersrand. He joined the University of the Witwatersrand in 1948 as the Zulu language assistant after the death ofB.W. Vilakazi. The University of the Witwatersrand awarded him an MA degree in 1950. In 1954 he joined Fort Hare University College and became the chairperson of Bantu Languages. He was the first Zulu to be appointed to a professorship. After resigning from his post, he worked as an editor for Shuter and Shooter Publishers in Pietermaritzburg. According to personal communication, Nyembezi's decision to translate Beloved Country was preceded by personal communication with Paton himself In 1976 the D.Litt. Honoris Causa was conferred on him by the University of Zululand. Similar honarary degrees were conferred on him by the universities of the Witwatersrand, Natal and Rhodes. During his lifetime, Nyembezi was not only involved in reviewing texts, but also produced his own literary texts. 4.4.2 Nyembezi's literary achievements Nyembezi can be said to be a novelist, a translator and a producer of educational materials. It is important to note that his literary work shows that his main objective is to preserve Zulu cultural elements. His first novel is entitled Ubudoda Abukhulelwa (To do manly deeds does not depend on age). It was only published in 1953, after his second novel, Mntanami! Mntanami! (My child! My child!, 1950). In Ubudoda Abukhulelwa, the main character, the 80 young Vusumuzi, shows that he can do a man's deeds when, as an orphan, he solves many problems and becomes a respected member of his society. Nyembezi's second novel, which is regarded as the best, is based on the theme of the prodigal son. Jabulani leaves his home and goes to Johannesburg where he becomes involved in criminal acts, violence and murder. Fortunately, a girl whom he loves, Alice, saves his life. Nyembezi' s third novel is Inkinsela YaseMgungundlovu (The tycoon of Pietermartzburg, 1962). This novel has fraud as its theme, to show how the main character (Ndebenkulu) takes advantage of the simple rural community ofNyanyadu. Ndebenkulu claims to be a tycoon from Pietermaritzburg who wants to save cattle owners from the law that was passed by the white government. According to this law cattle owners had to reduce their livestock so as to solve the problem of overgrazing. Ndebenkulu, the crook, is arrested before he leaves with the cattle of this community. This novel shows Nyembezi's artistic maturity. It has already been translated into Southern Sotho (Kgabane ya Mokokotlofo, 1983) by R.C. Bodibe. Two English novels were translated into Zulu by Nyembezi. Lafa Elihle Kakhulu (1958), which is examined in this study, is his translation of Beloved Country (Paton 1966). If it is considered that the translation was first published in 19 57, four years after the passing of the Bantu Education Act of 1953, it is clear why it made such an important contribution to the teaching of Zulu in black schools. These two texts will be compared in Chapter 5 as regards certain aspects of culture. Nyembezi' s Nakho Phela (1981) is a translation and adaptation of the Zulu writer, Senzenjani Lukhele's, English detective story which was never published. Owing to the scarcity of detective novels in Zulu, this translation could be regarded as the first model of this genre for the Zulu literary system. As a preserver of Zulu cultural elements, Nyembezi produced different works on the culture of the Zulus. His Zulu Proverbs appeared in 1954. He then produced lzibongo Zamakhosi (The praise poems of chiefs and kings) in 1958, the year after Lafa Elihle Kakhulu appeared. Inqolobane Yesizwe (The storehouse ofthe nation, 1960), comprises important aspects ofthe Zulu culture, definitions of Zulu words and the explanation of idioms and proverbs. Zulu schools in particular, benefit a lot from Nyembezi's books. His novels are prescribed for secondary schools and universities. The lower classes make use his of !gada (The rope) as school readers. He also made a valuable contribution as regards Zulu grammars, dictionaries and anthologies of poetry. Uhlelo LwesiZulu (1956) is based on C.M. Doke's Zulu Grammar (1927). Together with G.R. Dent, their Compact Zulu Dictionary (1959) came into being. In 81 1969 they produced the Scholar's Zulu Dictionary. Nyembezi's contribution to poetry includes a series of anthologies of Zulu poetry, lmisebe Yelanga (The rays ofthe sun, 1959 to 1961). He also edited the following anthologies of Zulu poetry: Jmikhemezelo (Soft rains, 1963), Amahlunga Aluhlaza (Fresh green grass, 1963), Izimpophoma Zomphefumulo (Spiritual cascades, 1963) and Jsibuko Senhliziyo (The mirror ofthe heart, 1980). Other contributions include health education books: Saphela Yingozi Nokuphelwa wubuntu (yVe are destroyed by accidents and the lack ofhumaneness, 1952), Izincwadi Ezintsha Zempilo (New books on health, 1971, a series for standard 3 to 6) and Better health (in conjunction with G.R. Dent & S.R Dent, 1973). It is clear that C.L.S. Nyembezi has made an invaluable contribution to the Zulu language and literature. 4.5 Summary Before the arrival of the white Christian missionaries Zulus could not show their artistic skills (i.e. poetic, narrative and dramatic skills) in writing because they could not read and write. These forms of art were presented orally from one generation to another. The dominating form in the poetic genre is the praise poem. The dominating form in the prose genre was the folktale; but now many novels are being produced. The main aim of the missionaries working amongst the Africans was spreading the gospel. They realised that their objective would be met with ease if the African people were able to read, and therefore opened missionary schools. This led to the translation of sections of the Bible until the whole Bible was produced in the relevant Mrican language. The missionaries furthermore showed an interest in developing secular literature in the Mrican languages by recording folktales in writing and translating semi-religious texts such as Bunyan's The Pilgrim Progress. Once the prose form was introduced, indigenous writers had a model according to which to develop their own work. This is what also happened in the case of Zulu. J.L. Dube' s first novel, Insila KaShaka, was modelled along the lines of The Pilgrim's Progress and appeared in 1930; thereafter Zulu writers started publishing their own work. After the missionaries had given way to the Bantu Education administration, which came into being as a result of the passing of the Bantu Education Act in 1953, there was a dire need for more literary texts to be prescribed in schools and this led to an abundance of indigenous writing, including novels. English novels such as Beloved Country and adventure stories were translated into Zulu to supplement the indigenous repertoire. 84 ~o11wi:ll now be paid to a categorisation of translation strategies, in particular those used to transfer culture. ___ ,.~-'·· .. 5.2 Translation strategies to transfer culture Critics have traditionally identified five microtextual transformation procedures or strategies that are used in the translation of a text. These strategies operate at the level of lexis or syntax t.9 de.Cl.l with various types of non-equivalence, namely substitution, repetition, deletio9, ~~?ition, permutation (Delabastita 1993: 3 3-3 8). In translation direct equivalence occurs only in a very limited number of cases so these procedures involve essentially adding structural or lexical items to those present in the ST or subtracting from them; eliminating items that are obligatory in the ST but unnecessary in the TT or with no counterpart there; replacing ST elements with more or less equivalent TT elements; modifying elements of the ST or even compensating for the lack of such elements by creating a situation analo_gg~s to the situation ( ,.--, ' ' } f "'t in the original. ·· · · ~ ' '· · •r."' ·. "'(' For Delabastita (1993: 35), substitution implies that the relevant ST item is replaced by a relevant TT item as happens in 'normal' translation. The second category, repetition, implies that the ST item is not substituted, but repeated or transferred directly from the ST into the translation. Some or all of the formal features of the item are reproduced. Using deletion as a translation strategy means that the ST item is not rendered in the TT at all. This is a very frequent phenomenon in actual translation practice and often cannot be avoided (e.g. IJ..~n into non.:pun). 1;'!1e opposite occurs in the case of addition, where the TT turns out to contain linguistic, cultural or textual items which did not occur in the ST. There are various reasons why these items are inserted in the TT. The complex structure of the original text may be an important constraint. Delabastita (1993: 37) comments that deletion and addition often go hand in hand, especially if the translator wants to retain the macrostructural properties of the ST or the same volume of text. Very often, however, additions will be found that have to be explained by other principles. For instance, it is well known that translators show a tendency to expand the TT as compared tci the ST. This is partly due to their understandable concern with clarity and coherence, which prompts them to 'explain' complicated passages, provide missing links, lay bare implicit meanings and generally elaborate on the original. In other cases, additions are due to conscious intentional interventions of the translator, who may believe that he can enhance the aesthetic qualities of the translation by adding rhyme, or stronger metaphorical constructions, for instance. The fifth category, permutation (also referred to as compensation), does not pertain to the actual transfer of individual ST items but rather to the relationship between their respective textual positions within the STand TT. For Delabastita (1993: 38) compensation refers mainly to metatextual references added to the translation in the 85 form of prefaces, footnotes, parenthesis, italics. ---·------- However, these categories are very broad and therefore unsuitable for dealing with the transfer of aspects of culture in translation. It was therefore decided to consult authors such as Newmark (1988), Williams (1990) and Baker (1992) in order to set up a categorisation of strategies that could be used to describe the transfer of culture-specific terms in a novel. As is evident from Table 1, Williams's (1990) seven categories, aimed specifically at the translation of culture-specific terms, are based on Newmark's (1990: 81-93; also ch. 5). TABLE 1: TRANSLATION STRATEGIES Delabastita (1993) Newmark (1988) Williams (1990) Baker (1993) Substitution *Cultural equivalent *Cultural equivalent *Cultural substitution ("proper translation") (SL cultural word translated by a TL cultural word) *Neutralisation/ *Functional equivalent *More general word/ (also: *functional /or (use of a culturally-free/ superordinate in TL for *descriptive equivalent) neutral term) STword (neutralises/ generalises) *More neutral/ less expressive word in TL for STword *Descriptive equivalent *Descriptive equivalent (to explain an SL term) *Literal translation *Literal translation (SL grammatical (translation of words+ constructions are converted sentences) to their nearest TL equivalents) *Through translation *Through translation (literal translation of (names of institutions) collocations, names of organisations) Repetition *Transference *Transference (mostly *Loan word (direct transfer) (also "loan word" and abbreviations) transliteration) *Naturalisation (adapts SL word to normal pronunciation + morphology ofTL) 86 Deletion *Deletion *Omission (also reduction) Addition Expansion+ reduction *Paraphrase (amplification *Paraphrase or explanation e.g. in - related words gloss/ notes) - unrelated words Permutation/ Compensation (loss of compensation (preface, meaning in one part of text footnotes, parenthesis) is compensated in another) Shifts/ transpositions (change in grammar from SL to TL) *Couplet (combining 2 *Couplet *Loan word+ or more of the above) explanation Modulation (further divided into 11 categories) Illustration The strategies marked with * seem to have been regarded as most suitable for transferring aspects of culture. Newmark's (1988) categorisation was found to be too detailed and fuzzy ( cf his statement that literal translation is "the basic translation procedure, both in communicative and semantic translation", but "above the word level, literal translation becomes increasingly difficult" Newmark (1988: 70)). It was also found that these authors tend to group more than one category together, e.g. Newmark (1988) uses three terms to refer to neutralisation, whereas the categories literal and through translation seem to be mutually inclusive. I also found it strange that, despite her claim that "literal translations are rarely appropriate since they tend to obscure rather than clarify meaning", Williams (1990: 58) actually includes literal translation as a category. Furthermore, Baker (1993), whose categorisation was found to be least confusing and most useful, does not provide for indigenisation (i.e. naturalisation or domestication). With the above shortcomings in mind, a tentative list of categories was used in a pilot analysis to check which translation strategies were used to transfer culture in Lafa Elihle Kakhulu (Nyembezi 1983). This list was subsequently refined and is given below. (See the Addendum for a systematic categorisation of aspects of culture in the STand TT in terms of this list of translation strategies.) 89 No important events are associated with these characters. The former is introduced right at the beginning of the novel where he is killed in Johannesburg. The name Elizabeth is given to one of the members of Khumalo' s church. This girl is mentioned by Khumalo' s wife when she reminds him that he must go and see the girl as she was sick. From then on the girl is never mentioned again. These characters are less significant in the development of the plot and it is ~ ... ---·-'-·•·""~-...- ~or this reason that Nyembezi decided to domesticate these characters' names so as to acculturate his text. However, although the spelling of Kumalo and Msimangu' s surnames has been indigenised to Khumalo and Msimanga, the following characters' first names have not been changed in the translation: StephenKumalo (1966: 4) = StephenKhumalo (1983: 12) Theophilus Msimangu (1966: 6) = Theophilus Msimanga (1983: 14) Absalom (1966: 7) =Absalom (1083: 15) / ""',_ They are the main African characters of Paton's novel, Beloved Country. In Chapter"3it was indicated that the first three names (Stephen, Theophilus and Absalom), carry religious connotatiQD.S. The translator seems to have been aware of this fact and has therefore transferred ............. ~~/"· these names to the translation unchanged. However, had the translator domesticated these names as Stefanu Khumalo, Theyofilu Msimangu and Abisalomu respectively, they would have been more accessible to the Zulu reader. In fact, the domesticated forms appear in the Zulu Bible and it may therefore be valid to assume that the Zulu reader will not associate the names retained in the translation with those of the Bible characters. Consequently, any religious connotations these names might have carried, may be lost in Nyembezi's translation. In translation, English names given to European people are also retained so as to show that they belong to the English system as in the following cases: James Jarvis (1966: 7)- James Jarvis (1983: 127) Arthur Jarvis (1966: 63)- Arthur Jarvis (1983: 76) An interesting case presents itselfwhere Nyembezi uses a pet-name for one of the female black characters and Gertrude becomes "Gertie". The full form of this name is never given, instead, all the other characters only refer to her as Gertie. One possible explanation could be the fact that this character becomes a prostitute in the city. This could be the translator's motive behind giving her a pet name - the implication being that she would only be known in N dotsheni by her full name; in Johannesburg, where she now stays and renders her services as a prostitute, she 90 is called Gertie. This could be an indication of a Zulu translator making use of English names with the intention of making them carry meaning. The above examples show that a translator can either decide to retain or domesticate European or Christian names given to black characters in a novel. It seems that, in Zulu, the retention of European or Christian names in a translation has to do with a situation where the translator is not concerned with the meaning of the name. It may be necessary to cite an example ofwhat I experienced as a literary translator whilst I was translating children's stories for Knowledge Unlimited Limited. I was told that The Walt Disney Company requires that characters' names be retained, though no reason was given. But the fact that the illustrations of the white characters were retained in the translations made me understand the reason behind the instruction: the characters had to remain white and could therefore not be given Zulu names. But, depending on the leeway given to the translator, personal names may be acculturated, i.e. domesticated, or replaced by Zulu names. European names given to white characters may be retained in their foreign form so as to show that they belong to the English or another European language system. Place names are also important in a novel. The fact that events occur at specific places is significant as these have a direct bearing on the setting (cf. Chapter 3, par. 3.5.3 above). Also, place names chosen by the novelist contribute towards thematic development when studied in intratextual relation with other elements of the novel, such as plot and characterisation. For Zulus, place names usually carry meaning, just like personal names. This entails that the Zulu translator, in an attempt ~t the settin&.. will, if possible, domesticate place names so as to make the translation more accessible to the new readership. However, such a strategy does not mean that the translator has lost sight of the function of a specific setting in the original. The research into South African place names conducted by Rosenthal (1961) and Raper (1987) provides the translation critic with some interesting information on the etimology of the place names used in Beloved Country and Laja Elihle Kakhulu. The first examples to be considered show that if a translator thought his readers would have difficulty in pronouncing place names, he could resort to the original forms used by the local people who inhabit such a place. In the following case the spelling of the place names in the ST shows how white South Africans have transformed the Zulu names into forms they can pronounce: Ixopo (1966: 3)- iXobho (~983: 11) Umsindusi (1966: 12)- uMsunduze (1983: 22) Umkomaas (1966: 12)- uMkhot?azi (1983: 22). 91 As is, the names which appear in the ST (also on official documents and on road signs), are meaningless. In contrast, the Zulu names used by the translator, are meaningful. IXobho means 'marsh' and denotes the marshlike characteristics of the area. UMsunduze is derived from the Zulu term, isundu for a palmetro tree (Phoenix reclinata), which grows on the banks of the uMsunduze tributary. The Zulu uMkhomazi takes its name from the Mkhomazi River, which is said to mean 'whale-cow river'. Examples of place names that were substituted by their African names in the translation are Johannesburg (1966: 4) and Drakensberg (1966: 12). After the discovery of gold in the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg developed as a major city. Especially blacks, who were forced to live in reserves where the soil is described as being "sick" (Paton 1966: 12), and therefore flock in droves to Johannesburg in search of a better living. In the novel, this is the city which also attracted characters like Gertrude's husband and it is therefore important in the development ofthe plot. However, the name "Johannesburg" has no meaning as such, except that it was named after Johann Rissik, former principal clerk of the office of the Surveyor­ General of the Transvaal Republic of the time and Christiaan Johannes Joubert, former Chief ofMining and member of the Volksraad of the Transvaal. Nyembezi used the Zulu form, iGoli (1983: 13), i.e. 'place of gold', for obvious reasons. Drakensberg, the name of the mountain range dividing the province ofNatal (now KwaZulu­ Natal) from the Transvaal (now Gauteng) and the Orange Free State (now Free State), is of Dutch origin and means 'dragon mountain'. It is true that this name is meaningless to many Zulu readers and for obvious reasons Nyembezi used the original Zulu name, uKhahlamba (1983: 22), meaning 'anything thrown on a heap', which aptly describes the rugged mountains of the Drakensberg. Some of the places mentioned in the ST were named after the arrival of whites in South Africa. These places are important in Paton's novel because they represent those places which were reserved for whites only during the apartheid era. A good example is Edendale (1966: 12), the land bought by the Wesleyan Methodist minister James Allison, who established a mission settlement and called it Edendale, believed to be after the Biblicaf Eden. The translator decided to acculturate this name by domesticating it as Yideni (Nyembezi 1983: 22). Nyembezi did not only domesticate European place names, he also transferred some names unchanged to the translation. Examples of place names transferred to the TT are: Donnybrook (1966: 12)- Donnybrook (19183: 22) Springs (1966: 11)- Springs (1983: 20).