Lingua- cultural problems of translation

1.2. Strategies of translating allusions
Proper names, which are defined by Richards as "names of a particular person, place or thing" and are spelled "with a capital letter," play an essential role in a literary work. For instance let us consider personal PNs. They may refer to the setting, social status and nationality of characters, and really demand attention when rendered into a foreign language.
There are some models for rendering PNs in translations. One of these models is presented by Hervey and Higgins who believe that there exist two strategies for translating PNs. They point out: "either the name can be taken over unchanged from the ST to the TT, or it can be adopted to conform to the phonic/graphic conventions of the TL". Hervey and Higgins refer to the former as exotism which "is tantamount to literal translation, and involves no cultural transposition" and the latter as transliteration. However, they propose another procedure or alternative, as they put it, namely cultural transplantation. Being considered as "the extreme degree of cultural transposition," cultural transplantation is considered to be a procedure in which "SL names are replaced by indigenous TL names that are not their literal equivalents, but have similar cultural connotations".
Regarding the translation of PNs, Newmark asserts that, "normally, people's first and sure names are transferred, thus preserving nationality and assuming that their names have no connotations in the text." The procedure of transference cannot be asserted to be effective where connotations and implied meanings are significant. Indeed, there are some names in the Persian poet Sa'di's work Gulestan, which bear connotations and require a specific strategy for being translated. Newmark's solution of the mentioned problem is as follows: "first translate the word that underlies the SL proper name into the TL, and then naturalize the translated word back into a new SL proper name." However, there is a shortcoming in the strategy in question. As it seems it is only useful for personal PNs, since as Newmark, ignoring the right of not educated readers to enjoy a translated text, states, it can be utilized merely "when the character's name is not yet current amongst an educated TL readership."
Leppihalme proposes another set of strategies for translating the proper name allusions: I.Retention of the name: a. using the name as such. b. using the name, adding some guidance. c. using the name, adding a detailed explanation, for instance, a footnote. II. Replacement of the name by another: a. replacing the name by another SL name. b. replacing the name by a TL name III. Omission of the name: IV. omitting the name, but transferring the sense by other means, for instance by a common noun. V. omitting the name and the allusion together. Moreover, nine strategies for the translation of key-phrase allusions are proposed by Leppihalme as follows: I. Use of a standard translation II. Minimum change, that is, a literal translation, without regard to connotative or contextual meaning, iii. Extra allusive guidance added in the text. IV. The use of footnotes, endnotes, translator's notes and other explicit explanations not supplied in the text but explicitly given as additional information V. Stimulated familiarity or internal marking, that is, the addition of intraallusive allusion VI. Replacement by a TL item
VII. Reduction of the allusion to sense by rephrasing. VIII. Recreation, using a fusion of techniques: creative construction of a passage which hints at the connotations of the allusion or other special effects created by it IX. Omission of the allusion. Although some stylists consider translation "sprinkled with footnotes" undesirable, their uses can assist the TT readers to make better judgment of the ST contents. In general, it seems that the procedures 'functional equivalent' and 'notes' would have a higher potential for conveying the concepts underlying the CSCs embedded in a text; moreover, it can be claimed that a combination of these strategies would result in a more accurate understanding of the CSCs than other procedures. Various strategies opted for by translators in rendering allusions seem to play a crucial role in recognition and perception of connotations carried by them. If a novice translator renders a literary text without paying adequate attention to the allusions, the connotations are likely not to be transferred as a result of the translator's failure to acknowledge them. They will be entirely lost to the majority of the TL readers; consequently, the translation will be ineffective. It seems necessary for an acceptable translation to produce the same (or at least similar) effects on the TT readers as those created by the original work on its readers. This paper may show that a translator does not appear to be successful in his challenging task of efficiently rendering the CSCs and PNs when he sacrifices, or at least minimizes, the effect of allusions in favor of preserving graphical or lexical forms of source language PNs. In other words, a competent translator is well-advised not to deprive the TL reader of enjoying, or even recognizing, the allusions either in the name of fidelity or brevity. It can be claimed that the best translation method seem to be the one which allows translator to utilize 'notes.' Furthermore, employing 'notes' in the translation, both as a translation strategy and a translation procedure, seems to be indispensable so that the foreign language readership could benefit from the text as much as the ST readers do.