Transformations for Translating Word Play: the Case of Translating Fiction

Comics are one of the most popular media and fiction genres at the moment, and their translation is a relevant task. This research is devoted to the translation of such a common phenomenon in comics as word play. It creates problems for translators. The reason for this lies in the fact that word play often depends on the features of the structural characteristics of the source language, for which there may not be equivalent in the language of translation. The aim of this work is to study and analyze cases of translating instances of word play used in comics and to analyze translation transformations used in the translation of the following comics: “Spider-Man/Deadpool”, “Garfield”, and “Fables”. Semantic-contextual and comparative analysis along with random sampling were primary methods of research. In the course of the study, examples of word play in comic books were found, analyzed and then compared with the Russian translation. According to the obtained results, pun is the most frequently used type of word play. To properly translate puns and other instances of word play, it is necessary to use translation transformations. In the course of our research the following result was obtained: the most common translational transformations for translating wordplay in comics are loan translations, or calques (36.84%), omission and substitution (21.05% each). According to results of our analysis we also formulated recommendations for translating word play in comics.