Abstract
Values become especially cherished when at their most vulnerable; houses and homes are particularly vulnerable in wartime or directly afterwards. Głaz explores the English renderings of the Polish dom (‘house’, ‘home’) in three post–World War II novels: Andrzejewski’s Ashes and Diamonds, Tokarczuk’s House of Day, House of Night, and Huelle’s Moving House. Stories. The valuation inherent in the Polish (con)texts is considered on several interwoven levels: the lexical systems of the two languages and the symbolism they activate, the properties of the texts being translated, or the broad cultural background underpinning the interpretation of the novels. Głaz considers what use is made by the translators of the linguistic instruments at their disposal in carving up the conceptual space in the English (vs. Polish) fashion.
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Notes
- 1.
All etymologies come from Online Etymology Dictionary.
- 2.
Compare the words for ‘currency’ in other languages: Croatian valuta, Italian valuta, Lithuanian valiuta, Polish waluta, Romanian valută, Swedish valuta, Ukrainian валюта, or even Hungarian valuta and Finnish valuutta, borrowings from their Indo-European neighbours.
- 3.
I prefer the term vehicle to Scheler’s (1992) bearer, if only to avoid operating within specifically Schelerian model.
- 4.
A case can be made here for a distinction, à la Scheler (1992), between higher spiritual values (HOME and what it stands for) and lower material values (HOUSE). This is a distinction but not a separation: houses are material, but they make up homes, and homes both are and stand for values—thus arises a chain of ‘states of affairs that we prefer’, which can only be broken in an arbitrary fashion.
- 5.
A relatively recent tendency for home to mean ‘a private house or residence considered merely as a building’ (Oxford English Dictionary 2015) is puzzling. The slogan homes for sale can be a marketing strategy encouraging prospective buyers to purchase something more and better than a ‘mere’ building.
- 6.
This also happens across varieties of English; compare homely ‘simple in a way that makes you feel comfortable’ in British English (American English homey) versus the same word meaning ‘not very attractive’ in American English (LDOCE 2005).
- 7.
The concentric arrangement presented here is hardly original; compare Danaher (2015, chapter 4) for a discussion of Václav Havel’s conception of the Czech domov ‘home’ in terms of circles (kruhy/vrstvy domova), a notion Havel borrowed from the philosopher Jan Patočka.
- 8.
Chapter 2 by Underhill in this volume offers more on boundaries, borders, and barriers.
- 9.
For some elaboration, see Underhill (2015).
- 10.
On leaving home compare Part VI of Rowles and Chaudhury (2005), esp. Chap. 19 by the editors.
- 11.
Compare Rapoport (2005) on the use of home and place in late life.
- 12.
The English HOME does extend onto the planet Earth—as a precious and fragile ball, with no racial, social, or political boundaries, in a huge and potentially dangerous universe. The feeling is called ‘the overview effect’ and has often been experienced by astronauts (White 1987). The English translation of Pope Francis’ recent encyclical (Francis 2015) contains the frequently used phrase our common home (i.e. the planet Earth jeopardized by the irresponsible exploitation by humans). HOME can also be heaven; compare John 14,2, which for the Greek οἰκία uses house in a great majority of translations, but also home in a handful, for example ‘There is more than enough room in my Father’s home’ (New Living Translation).
- 13.
A somewhat different case of the translator falling victim to the unscrupulous requirements of the target-language’s lexical system is the Czech svědomí as understood by Havel versus its English counterpart conscience (Danaher 2013).
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Głaz, A. (2016). Vulnerable Values: The Polish Dom (‘House, Home’) in English Translation. In: Blumczynski, P., Gillespie, J. (eds) Translating Values. Palgrave Studies in Translating and Interpreting. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-54971-6_14
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