Situational irony mechanisms in Maupassant’s "A Woman’s Life". Translating without judging?

Abstract

Our study focuses on the translation of the situational irony in the novel A Woman’s Life by Guy de Maupassant. We first define irony and discuss its marks and conditions, then we compare verbal and situational irony to establish their features. Both are based on a contrast, but the way in which the contrast is created is different. Situational irony is finely woven in the story and implies marks that are more subtle than those employed by verbal irony. Often, we may speak about extended irony. That is why the reception of situational irony is sometimes difficult and requires the analysis of the macrotextual and of the microtextual level, as well as the complicity between the author and the reader. The translation into English and Romanian of several excerpts referring to typical characters from the novel A Woman’s Life is examined in the final part of the study. Thus, we explore the following archetypes: the romantic young girl, the impoverished nobleman, the priest, the spinster, the Norman peasant. The two extreme trends noticed during the comparative analysis are overtranslation and undertranslation.