The Evaluation of Cultural Elements in Two Different Translation Versions of D. H. Lawrence’s Novel Sons and Lovers in Terms of Translator Choices

Abstract

In recent years, considering the communicative function of translation, it has been observed that the number of studies focusing on the transfer of culture and cultural elements has increased in the field of translation studies. Especially in literary works, while the cultural elements contained in the texts are transferred to the target culture, they are reshaped by the translator's choices in the translation process. At this point, the decisions taken by the translator in the translation process and the way s/he applies these decisions in the translation text has a great importance for being understood and accepted in the target culture of the translated work. In this study, the literary work Sons and Lovers which is among the cult Works of English Literature and its two different translation versions written by Mete Ergin and Tülin Nutku are analyzed literaryly and theoretically in terms of Peter Newmark's classification of cultural elements and the comparative analysis methods proposed by Raymond Van den Broeck. In addition, the translation strategies preferred by the translators in the light of translator choices are discussed in the related section where the text units are compared. In the literature review about the study, it has been observed that many studies have been carried out under many different topics related to this work but a comprehensive review has not been done in the field of translation studies in which both text analysis and comperative translation criticism are made together. As a result, according to the evaluation, it has been observed that the initial norms of the two translators may be different thus the processes of their reading and interpreting the source text are different, and therefore there are some deviations in their translations.