문학번역에서의 ‘삭제’의 문제

Abstract

Although any translator would aim for a translation that is faithful and equivalent in meaning to the original text, we often find deletions in literary translation. Considering the goal of ‘equivalence' in translation, it would be crucial to examine those deletions, which could be regarded as mistranslation, to see where they come from and what their effects are. It has been found that deletion took place at various levels of language, ranging from punctuation, vocabulary, phrases, sentences to paragraphs. Most deletions were found to be simple oversights by the translator; they were not used as a strategy to avoid the difficulties caused by cultural differences. All the cases of deletions were divided into three categories according to the resulting effect: first, natural translations by avoiding unnecessary repetition; second, incomplete translations resulting from the impairment in meaning; and lastly, misinterpreted or incomprehensible translations. Given that even a punctuation mark expresses the author's intention, this study suggests that it is problematic if a translator makes unwarranted deletions, except for the cases of deletions avoiding unnecessary repetition. Moreover, if such deletions undermine the author's intentions or make the text incomprehensible, in no case can they be tolerated.