Translating another kind of literature – Graphic Novels

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Stan Tychinski explains that one of the first graphic novels was Benjamin Franklin’s Poor Richard’s Almanac, published in 1732 including satirical cartoons to make people aware of the American Revolution. Graphic novels can be of various types, such as adventure, crime, love, social or political etc. Christopher Murray explains it as being ‘a type of text combining words and images—essentially a comic, although the term most commonly refers to a complete story presented as a book rather than a periodical.’ It can be one single volume or a part of a series. As sometimes misunderstood by people, it is not only meant for children, but there are also many graphic novels created for adults informing about political matters or just intended for entertainment (as a normal book) with stories full of suspense, for instance. The plot is told in two ways; firstly there are images showing the situation and secondly speech bubbles accompany the images and include the words of the characters.

As a ‘normal’ book, graphic novels can also be translated into different languages to make them available for a broader public. A very famous graphic novel that has been translated in more than 70 languages and which has been produced by the Belgian cartoonist Georges Remi (who called himself Hergé) is Les Aventures de Tintin (The Adventures of Tintin).

Thematising a completely different subject, namely a detective story playing in the European Parliament is the series Troubled Waters drawn by Dominique David and written by Cristina Cuadra and Rudi Miel.

‘”Troubled Waters”, by David, Cuadra aTroubled watersnd Miel, presents the role and functioning of the European Parliament through the activity of one of its members.
The story uses all the traditional ingredients of a detective novel to illustrate the procedure in the European Parliament that ended with the adoption of a resolution on water policy, on 7 September 2000. Structured like a thriller, bit by bit it unveils the educational information that plays a real role in the overall understanding of the story and its developments.
Published in December 2002 by the European Parliament, the comic book was translated into more than 25 languages. Over two million copies have been distributed. “Troubled Waters” won the Alph-Art Communication award at the 2003 Angoulême Comics Festival.  Quoted from: http://www.letitbee.be/en/pages/06a.html

In her article Graphic novel in translation, Elettra Pauletto suggests that even though graphic novels are quite difficult to translate because of the ‘reconceptualizing images’, in her opinion, ‘the act of translation’ could ‘bring [some types of genres] back into popular consciousness’. She continues that graphic novels promote ‘cultural awareness’ to their audience.

Paolo Simonetti likewise takes up the idea of translating graphic novels and remarks in his article Translating a Book Into… Another Book? Graphic novels between Comics and Literature that translation is ‘an engagement with the original text that makes us see that text in different ways.’ For him, this would rather be an ‘adaptation’ of the original. This means that for him, it is more like a ‘revisit’ of the initial comic book. Additionally, he underlines the importance of translating at the one hand the graphic part and on the other hand also the non-graphic part.

Giel

 

 

Quote by Paulo Simonetti, Translating a Book Into…Another Book?

As reported by Simonetti in his quote above, the merchandising of graphic novels also changed with the name which is no longer ‘comics’ or ‘comic books’ which are now old fashioned. ‘Comic books’ is also above all more used to denominate ‘comic periodicals’

ArabLit made an interview with Chip Rossetti who had translated Magdy El Shafee’s graphic novel entitled Metro (in the English translation). At first, for him, it appeared to be ‘as though the stakes were even higher when translating a graphic novel rather than a novel or short story. Because of the visual element, there is a narrative immediacy to graphic novels — and particularly Metro, with its kinetic, intense style — that doesn’t leave a lot of room for translationese.’ Also, he continues by explaining that the style of the translated graphic novel should be lighter than in a novel and be in a ‘more naturalistic style’. Likewise, he underlines the fact that differing from the translation of a novel, this needs to fit the pre-set layout with determined word count, for instance.

The translation of a novel – whether it is a ‘normal’ book or a graphic novel can’t be translated word by word in the other language. What needs to figure in the other language on the one hand, the meaning of the whole idea exposed by the author and on the other hand, what the illustrator wanted to express. Besides, translating a novel or a graphic novel in another language will certainly promote it because it makes it accessible for a larger group of people who might prefer to read it in their mother tongue or in a chosen language.

Sources:

A brief History of Graphic Novels

Graphic Novel

“Troubled Waters”

Translating Graphic Novels

Chip Rosetti –  the translator of “Metro”

By: Cathy Ferrari, trainee from TermCoord