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Dealing with "Scottishness" in translating Janice Galloway's The Trick is to Keep Breathing

British Cultural Studies:Cross-Cultural Challenges, Zagreb 26-28 February 1998:talk given by Tina Mahkota, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia.

I talk from an ambivalent position of both a practicing literary translator and a translator scholar about the approach   (macro strategy) which I have adopted in translating Janice Galloway's novel The Trick is to Keep Breathing (Polygon)   into Slovene. This piece discusses the position of the novel in its source culture, and the position of Scottish writing   in as translated literature into Slovene. Focusing on translation-specific problems, I will examine:

• culture-specificity of the source text;
• problems in dealing with local colour and realia;
• the otherness/the sameness of the source culture;
• "domesticating translation strategies" versus "foreignizing/deviant translation strategies";
• the metonymics of the translated text.

As translation is a norm-governed behaviour (and could be, in its broadest sense, defined as an act of cross-cultural communication...of rewriting, or even manipulation), the discussion of translation phenomena should include reference to extratextual factors as well as intertextual ones ... since the decisions as to what does get translated and what does not (or, I should rather say, eventually gets published) are subjected not only to dominant aesthetic values or poetological norms, but (equally or even more so) to dominant ideology. The processes of inclusion or exclusion, canonization and marginalization all reflect dominant certain linguistic and cultural policies of the target system. Discussing my approach to dealing with culture-specificity of Galloway's novel, her use of local colour, and linguistic features characteristic of Western Scotland, as well as realia (even trivia), I am going to challenge binary opposition models for describing translation phenomena which tend to analyse translation either as faithful or unfaithful (les belles infideles), source or target oriented, documentary or instrumental (Ch. Nord, 1993), adequate or acceptable, domesticating or foreignizing (opaque or transparent) (Venuti, 1995) and will advocate the use of a more flexible notion of the metonymics of translated texts allowing space for seeming inconsistencies that appear in translation strategies (Tymoczko, 1995).

The position of Scottish writing in Slovene culture
To justify my deviant, or foreignizing translation (and possible inconsistencies arising from such a decision) I must begin by outlining the position of Scottish (in particular, contemporary) writing in Slovene culture. By retaining as many local references as possible, I want to rewrite the source text in such a way that it will "resist easy reading and will in a way sound foreign" (Venuti, 1995). To justify such a position, it is necessary to highlight certain features of Janice Galloway as a Scottish writer and at the same time of Janice Galloway as a woman writer, which facts contribute to The Trick is to Keep Breathing as a challenging and subversive text, undermining national and gender stereotypes and constructed identities both in the source-language culture as well as in the target culture.

It has to be said that Scottish Literature occupies a very minor position in the system of translated literature into Slovene. With the exception of canonical authors, such as Robert Burns, Walter Scott, R.L. Stevenson, whose works can be read in numerous Slovene editions and reprints (all of them, however being recognized, canonized and anthologized as representatives of English pre-romantic movement, historical novel or adventure stories), Muriel Spark was, until recently, the only Scottish writer to have won so much recognition to be available in Slovene translation (Memento mori, Maribor:Obzorja 1973, transl. M. Stanovnik Blinc). Since his 1994 Booker Prize, some of James Kelman's short stories and excerpts from novels have been translated for the Slovene national radio, and the translation of Irvine Welsh's Trainspotting was published in the summer of 1997 (a strong illustration of the importance of extratextual factors in the processes of inclusion/exclusion.)

In contrast to Rob Roy/Braveheart tartanry, Galloway's imaginary world is the harsh non-romanticised reality of urban landscape lacking any sentimentality. The Trick is to Keep Breathing is set in a dreary suburban estate, a place which has no real history and very little local colour, so it can be an image that most people, and also potential Slovene readers, have access to. In spite, or perhaps, precisely because of this apparent familiarity, I made the decision to retain as much as possible the realia of the source culture and text to affirm the otherness of the target culture. The point here (as made by Venuti in 1995) is that foreignizing or deviant translation takes the form not just of deviant translation strategies, but also attempts to include foreign texts that deviate from dominant literary canons in the target-language culture *.

The Trick is to Keep Breathing and its position in the source culture
Since the publication of her first, critically acclaimed, prize-winning novel, The Trick is to Keep Breathing in 1989, Janice Galloway has been hailed and praised as one of the most prominent voices of contemporary Scottish writing. Apart from emphasizing the fact that Galloway's writing was nurtured in Scotland, her work has also been given recognition in the context of a wider history of women's writing ** Her novel, then, does not challenge only the concept of Scottishness, or Scottish identity , but does the same with stereotypes about women, the entire mythology of women. In its explorations of gender and rendering of just what it feels like to be entrapped in an unwanted male gaze, Galloway's novel is marked by utter mistrust of roles. At the same time, as many critics have observed, Galloway's writing is set in a recognizably Scottish cultural milieu and uses the language and rhythms of speech specific to the West of Scotland. Indeed, Galloway has on a number of occasions pointed out Leonard and Kelman's use of their local idiom as a great inspiration, and added that reading them was a very liberating experience.

The Trick is to Keep Breathing has also been praised for its experimental approach to form and typography. Divisions in the text are emphasized by two main scripts. Encountered at the very beginning, the italicized script tells the story of the death of Joy Stone's lover, Michael. The other story, recorded in standard script, is set in the present, in which the reader is given access to the inner and outer lives of the main character. In order to fragment the narrative, Galloway uses a number of other devices (lists, playscripts, marginalia, signs, speech bubbles) to break up the writing and to mock and be ironic about the roles of patterns of behaviour imposed on women by the magazines. As the narrative in the present tense progress, we become familiar with Joy's inability to function on an everyday level. As Metzstein points out in her account, "Joy is getting increasingly disconnected from her body, and the objects and events in her world at the different stages of grief. In part, the reason for the disembodiment of Joy is that she has no place to grieve. Her lover, Michael, had a wife, although separated from him, and this leaves Joy only one possible role, that of mistress. Therefore, when Michael dies, the smooth machinery of legitimised institutions springs into action and operates to negate and label Joy Stone. Her presence must be denied. If she is not mother-wife-daughter-sister, who is she? There is no legitimate name for her in relation to Michael, which means she must not exist."(Metzstein, 1993).

At various points of the novel, Galloway reproduces dialogues which read like short scenes from a play script. These often occur with men who have, or think they have, power over Joy, and rank from interviews with her doctor or psychiatrist to conversations with her ex-boyfriend or betting-shop boss, Tony. The game they want Joy to play is that of the obedient, pliant other who will be the good patient, the distant ex-lover or the gratefully seduced. But she cannot behave any more and the powers of constraint which used to operate through an internalised model of the good girl no longer function successfully. Finding out that there is no reward , the immutable material fact of Michael's death becomes the catalyst which leads to her breaking down the good girl that she had become and beginning to imagine new possibilities for herself.

Foreignizing translation strategy
As Galloway's occasional departures from the standard norm and her use of Scottish English, let alone her numerous local references and the use of realia (trivia) might suggest, the novel's occasional unintelligibility to non-Scottish readers (even her possible obscurity for non-native speakers of English) is a strong possibility. Embarking on a translation of such a text, in which a translator will inevitably have to face a number of difficulties dealing with culture-specificity, the concept of the metonymics of translated texts, which was suggested by Maria Tymoczko (and was primarily pertaining to translations of non-canonical or marginalized literatures), becomes extremely useful.

Although, strictly speaking, in Tymoczko's view non-canonical and marginalized texts are those that have been excluded or omitted from the canon(s) of world literature as defined by Western standards, her concept of every element of source culture being a target culture metonymy of the source culture, can be utilized in devising a macro strategy for my translation of a contemporary Scottish writing which certainly occupies a very minor and marginal position in the system of Slovene translated literature. Accordingly, it can be anticipated that the information load of such a translation would be very high, and reception problems acute. Taking into account editorial decisions that will take place in the process of the final publication of the text, inconsistencies (that is, departures from the initial strategies and, for example, replacements of realia by functional target culture equivalents, or omission of proper names being replaced by generic ones) may occur as well, since the dominant norm for translation still remains fluency. On the other hand, I am positive that it is the reader who can negotiate and create the meaning him/herself without being frustrated to the point of communication breakdown. Despite the pressures possibly experienced from decision makers within the publishing house advocating domestication and adherence to the repertoire of the literary language and acculturating of the source text, I have taken the decision to retain as much as possible of the realia of the source text to affirm the otherness of the source culture. The adoption of such strategy is based on the belief that the two cultures in question (the Scottish and the Slovene) share enough elements that the continuity of the text is maintained and that most of the metonymic aspects of the source text will become transparent to target readers. Although the target readers may lack background knowledge possibly possessed by source readers, the decision to maintain the otherness of the text is based on the expected readers' willingness to negotiate the meaning of seemingly obscure spots by drawing on their own experience. The reader is perceived as the necessary element filling in gaps or indeterminacies in the process of his/her interaction with the text. Thus, a concrete object, realia, or trivia, is seen just as a stimulus, a cue for the reader to draw on his/her personal experience to negotiate the meaning. This strategy at the same time frees the text from the dilemma whether to be source or target orientated ("Scottish" or "Slovene" or "international", for that matter) in its universality of conveying the message.

Such argument seems to be in line with Galloway's interpretation of her work when saying that it is about outsiders, about women who don't feel at ease in Scotland at all. Additionally, the novel being set in a dreary suburban estate, a place which has no real history and very little local colour, can be an image that most people, and also potential Slovene target readers, have access to.

Attempting to translate such a culturally-based novel as The Trick is to Keep Breathing, one is immediately faced with the obvious and frequently addressed issue of creating the equivalent effect on target readers, or, broadly speaking the problems of domestication and appropriation of a culturally based text as opposed to its foreignization. As the notion of target readers is somewhat problematic in itself, the dilemma between domestication or foreignization is not really the one of binary opposition between the two poles, but a sort of continuum, a scale. Being the initiator of the translation myself, I deliberately attended to avoid the so-called functional equivalents, or analogues, that is the substitution of convenient or a familiar object or a concept for an inconvenient or unknown one, or the contextual translation in which all local color is lost.

By way of conclusion, I would like to draw on on my previous experiences in translating culture-specific texts abundant in local colour. I can quite realistically expect that in the process of final editing, to which my translation will be subjected, I will have to negotiate changes in my original translation in order to reach some sort of compromise. (As we all know, it is a long, and sometimes laborious process involving a number of mediators in the person of literary editors, language editors, proof-readers constraining the foreignization and imposing their internalized norms on translators, as a result of which, the so-called inconsistencies are bound to occur. It is almost a norm that translators are often subjected to heavy pressure when they want to abandon and deviate from the norms and are, more often than not, asked to abandon some of their original choices during the process of negotiation. Regularisation, domestication, standardization are represented throughout the system. These norms are thus vigorously carried out by a large body of decision makers, including editors, publishers, critics, and various other groups within the literary institutions, who function as strong pressure groups, representing a set of constraints the translators cannot ignore. Very often, domesticated translations are a result of the deliberate effort to suppress the otherness of the source text and to impose the target culture cultural values and norms on the source text.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Even-Zohar, B. 1990. Translation Policy in Hebrew Children's Literature: The Case of Astrid Lindgren. Poetics Today, 13:1, 231-45.

Florin, S. 1993. Realia in Translation. In Translation as Social Action. London: Routledge.

Freund, E. 1987. The Return of the Reader. London: Methuen.

Galloway, J. 1989. The Trick is to Keep Breathing. Edinburgh: Polygon.

Literary friction. 1994. Scotland on Sunday, 4 December.

Lockerbie, C. 1994. The trick is to write, The Scotsman, 1 Dec.

Nord, C. 1993. Scopos, Loyalty, and Translational Conventions. Target, 95-107.

Mahkota, T. 1997. Literarni ve"er: Janice Galloway ( Dihati moraö, to je vsa skrivnost. Radio Slovenija, prvi program. 6 november.

Metzstein, M. 1993. Of Myths and Men: Aspects of Gender in the Fiction of Janice Galloway. In The Scottish Novel Since the Seventies. Wallace, G. (ed.) & Stevenson, R. (ed.), Edinburgh: University Press.

Robyns, C. 1994. Translation and Discursive Identity. Poetics Today 15:3 45-60.

Tymoczko, M. 1995. The Metonymics of Translating Marginalized Texts. Comparative Literature 47/I: 11-24.

Venuti, L. ed. 1992. Rethinking translation: Discourse, Subjectivity, Ideology. London: Routledge.
( 1995. The Translator's Invisibility. London: Routledge.

Wekker G. & Wekker H. 1992. Coming in from the cold: Linguistic and socio-cultural aspects of the translation of Black English Vernacular literary texts into Surinamese Dutch. Babel 37:4 221-239

1 In the case of The Trick is to Keep Breathing to be published in Slovene translation in 1999 by ätudentska zalozba, Ljubljana, I have to emphasize the fact that we are dealing with a translator-driven translation, which was, however, partly made possible by the Scottish Arts Council's system of grants awarded to translators in order to promote Scottish writing abroad, which is clearly a reflection of a certain cultural policy.

*For some time a columnist and music critic for Scotland on Sunday, Galloway would weigh in heavily against the establishment, attacking bureaucracy, the Scottish tradition of Calvinism and, most memorably, railing against the fact that in a newspaper "I can write 'I pulled the rope tight round his neck till his face turned blue', but nor describe a loving thing I can do to someone with my mouth."
(Scotland on Sunday, Literary friction, 4 December 1994)

**She tackles the male-dominated world head-on, often being deliberately provocative in the process: "There's still that hellish phalic thing that you have to write the big stiffie before the establishment takes you seriously," she once said. (Scotland on Sunday, 4 December). Or: "I'm a feminist, so the personal is political... to write about female sexuality is a massively political act"

"Scottish Education: apportion blame that ye have not blame apportioned unto you. It wisny me, it was you/him/her/ a wee man and he ran away." (The Trick, p. 49)

"Love/Emotion=embarrassment: Scots equation. Exceptions are when roaring drunk or watching football. Men do rather better out of this loophole."(The Trick, p. 82)

"I can't think how I fell into this unProtestant habit. I used to be so conscientious. I used to be so good all the time.
(where good=productive/hardworking/wouldn't say boo(
I was a good student: straight passes down the line. First year probationer taking homes reams of paper, planning courses and schemes for kids that weren't my own. People made jokes, I was so eager to please. That's how good I used to be.
(where good=value for money)

(...) If I was a good (ie patient, thoughtful, uncomplaining( girl long enough I would reap the reward.
(The Trick, p. 81)

As an aside: in my capacity as a teacher of translation I have used excerpts from the novel very effectively by exposing the students to them in isolation and asking them what cues helped them to decode text types, genres, etc.