F ORMACIÓN P ERMANENTE : C URSOS DE P ROMOCIÓN E DUCATIVA

2.2.1. The need to find equivalents

As was shown in the previous section, tenses are different in French and English, and aspects are not conveyed in the same way in both languages, so it seems evident that translators need to resort to shifts (as defined in Chapter Three) in order to find satisfactory equivalents. When it comes to translating French tenses into English, be it grammatical tenses, voices (notably active and passive), or modes (in particular the French subjunctive), the

translator may face a number of difficulties, and the frequency of markers is one of them, as Hélene Chuquet and Michel Paillard explain:

the frequency of markers is not the same in the two languages, and some adverbs in particular are used differently and cause translations issues. (Chuquet and Paillard 1989: 103)

Adverbs are thus an element which requires meticulous attention from the translators, asshown earlier in this chapter, due to syntactical differences between French and English.

Another common difficulty is that the French present tense can be translated into English in many different ways (seven different ways, according to Vinay and Darbelnet), and the two linguists argue that the most problematic correspondence is that between French present and English present perfect continuous, as the following example illustrates:

J’écris depuis…: I have been writing… (Vinay and Darbelnet 1995: 132)

In the above instance, such equivalent is used in a specific context, namely when an action, which started in the past, is still relevant in the present.

Those issues affecting translators have to be dealt with using different strategies: for instance, translators have to determine whether the sentence at hand involves purely grammatical constraints (which force them to opt for one target text element or another), or if a subjective choice is to be made. If grammatical constraints weigh on the source text, the translator might have to respect target language norms, for instance, temporal markers such as depuis will determine what tense to use, bearing in mind that, in English, that same marker can be

translated differently whether it refers to a start (since), or a duration (for) (Chuquet and Paillard 1989: 82). Moreover, the same markers do not demand the same tense in the two languages, which is a further grammatical requirement which needs to be taken into account, as the following examples show:

Le 11 novembre 1918, l’Armistice est signé.

The Armistice was signed on November 11th 1918. and

J’ai vu un bon film hier soir.

I saw a good film last night. (Chuquet and Paillard 1989: 79)

In the above sentences, the temporal phrases le 11 novembre 1918/on November 11th 1918 and hier soir/last night do not induce resorting to the same tenses, as the past perfect is needed in English, whereas the French language can use either the passé composé (ai vu) or the historic present (est signé), which will be studied in more details in a later part.

We saw that grammatical constraints can affect the translation into the target text, especially through temporal markers (adverbs, temporal expressions, etc.), but there are situations when the translator needs to go beyond purely grammatical considerations and choose the best way to render emotional effects conveyed by the source text.

2.2.2. Conciliating grammatical constraints and subjective choices

This is shown by the following extract, taken from Hervey’ and Higgins’s Thinking French Translation, in which we are told of the tragic destiny of a schoolteacher in the French

resistance. The authors explain that the contrast between past historic and perfect gives its crucial effect to the text, which cannot be rendered through literal translation:

“Arrêtée avec un convoi d’enfants qu’elle accompagnait en Suisse, elle fut emprisonnée à Annemasse. Refusant l’offre d’être libérée sans les enfants, elle continua de leur prodiguer ses soins en prison.

Quelques jours après la Libération, on retrouva son corps dans un charnier. Elle a été fusillée le 8 juillet 1944 à l’âge de 23 ans.

Elle fut une militante exemplaire [...]” (Audisio 1945: 57)

The abrupt use of a perfect tense amid the past historic puts the emphasis on her brutal death at a young age, and contrasting those two tenses helps to intensify the emotion felt by the author (and her/his readers) while reducing the temporal distance. Hervey and Higgins note that ‘the English verb system does not in itself permit the expressive power which this ST derives from switching between tenses’, which implies that compensation of another kind (lexical, for instance) will have to be found (Hervey and Higgins 2004: 45). The above example illustrates how crucial the translator’s subjectivity is, and having to resort to compensation shows the impact which a chosen translation strategy has on the translation of tenses.

2.2.3. The impact of chosen translation strategies

The translation approach chosen by the translator is also pivotal in determining the choice of a structure in lieu of another, as can be seen with the following example dealing with verbal adjectives and participles:

‘botté et coiffé d’une casquette’ : ‘wearing boots and a cap’ (Chuquet and Paillard 1989: 102)

Here the strategy is that of transposition111_{, which aims to find a common equivalent in the} target language, instead of sticking to the source text structure. When a translator’s strategy is oriented toward the target reader (that is favouring domestication), s/he will be more prone to finding a target language equivalent, as opposed to translating literally.

A word-for-word translation would also often fail to convey the source text’s nuances, such as the stress on a specific word:

only a miracle saved the world : le monde n’a été sauvé que par miracle (Vinay and Darbelnet 1995: 140)

In Vinay’ and Darbelnet’s above example, using the passive in the French translation helps to place emphasis on the word miracle, the latter being thus positioned at the end of the sentence. A change in the voices (using the passive instead of the source text’s active voice) efficiently helps to render the focus of the source text’s message. It is reminiscent of de Beauvoir’s conclusion to Le Deuxième Sexe, when she purposefully ends her book on the French word fraternité, insisting on the need for men and women to recognise one another as equal. Interestingly enough, Toril Moi pointed out in her London Review of Books’ article that

Constance Borde and Sheila Malovany-Chevallier did not respect this emphasis, finishing their translation on the adverb unequivocally instead (Moi 2010), but that critique was then taken into account by the two translators, because later editions were amended, so that the final sentence is more in line with de Beauvoir’s views:

“C’est au sein du monde donné qu’il appartient à l’homme de faire triompher le règne de la liberté; pour remporter cette suprême victoire, il est entre autres nécessaire que par- delà leurs différenciations naturelles hommes et femmes affirment sans équivoque leur fraternité.” (LDS, II: 652)

111 _{as defined by Vinay and Darbelnet: ‘transposition consists of replacing one class of words by another}

“Within the given world, it is up to man to make the reign of freedom triumph; to carry off this supreme victory, men and women must, among other things and beyond their natural differentiations, unequivocally affirm their brotherhood.” (Borde and Malovany- Chevallier loc. 15336)

The above sentence shows how translators need to consider both the norms of the target language and the bottom line message conveyed by the source author. However, identifying the tone of the source text is particularly difficult, which is obvious when dealing with the translation of tenses. Indeed, we will now analyze three main common tense-related pitfalls for translators rendering French texts, namely the use of the conditional to convey doubt and uncertainty, the high frequency of the historic present, and the differences between English and French in the use of voices (which we already briefly mentioned above).

3. Common pitfalls for English translators rendering French texts