Speech Acts and Implicatures in Literary Translation: A Comparative Pragmatic Analysis of Two Arabic Translations of Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms

Abstract

This paper explores the translation of speech acts and conversational implicatures of two Arabic versions of A Farewell to Arms, which may face a longstanding problem in literary translation in terms of the translation of pragmatic meaning achieved by using ellipsis, hedging, rhythm, and turn-taking. The analysis is based on the Speech Act Theory and Gricean pragmatics, and it is operationalized following the translation procedures presented by Vinay and Darbelnet. The samples are fifty pragmatically salient interactions identified in dialogic passages. Data in the form of source-text exchanges were coded by illocutionary force, type of implicature, form of carriers of inference (e.g. ellipses, hedges, clipped turns) and data in the form of target-text renderings were coded in terms of translation procedures (literal, equivalence, modulation, adaptation) and operations (reduction, amplification, omission, explications). There was a four-dimensional evaluative rubric consisting of meaning adequacy, illocutionary preservation, implicatures retention, and style/register. The results suggest that the strategy profile where literal or equivalence procedures are mandated with controlled reduction is more reliable in maintaining illocutionary contours and form-bearing implicatures. However, another profile marked by amplification and modulation or adaptation, commonly involving explications and some omissions, neutralized the hedges and resolved productive ellipses and high register, which have reconstructed pragmatic force. The study has practical implications on Arabic translation of minimalist prose because emphases have been found upon formal carriers of implicatures and dialogic rhythm by preserving structures of directive and permission where they are pragmatically motivated, avoiding unjustifiable overexplicational. Future studies are recommended to focus on reader reception to determine how translational choices can affect interpretive uptake.