The Carmen Martín Gaite’s colloquial language in Entre visillos: translating problems of his French version À travers les persiennes (I)

Abstract

In most Carmen Martín Gaite’s novels one can notice strength of colloquial language. It is precisely this feature what is going to cause problems when translating her works into French. This is shown in the study of the first novel that has been translated Entre visillos (À travers les persiennes), which never satisfied the author. We’ll point out the main difficulties which will cause a considerable loss not only of her peculiar style but also the inability to show the frequent alteration of the words in a sentence, the expressive nuances of meaning. On top of that, we’ll show the insufficient comprehension of expressions or phrases, as well as the shortage of literary devices the translator has had when facing this creative language. Of course, there are also some good points that we want to mention, regretting not having found too many.