An Example of Translation Criticism considering Skopos Theory: Adaptation of W. Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream into a Children’s Theatre Play Bir Yaz Masalı
Yeşim Pirpir Avan, Lale ÖzcanChildren’s theatre translation can be defined as the translation/adaptation of theatre plays written for adults or children in the source language for children in the target language. This study includes Bir Yaz Masalı, a children’s theatre play, adapted from A Midsummer Night’s Dream by Shakespeare, the preface written by the translator to the book of the play (2021), and an online translator interview. The play is analysed in accordance with the steps of translation criticism built considering Skopos theory by Hans J. Vermeer and applied by Tellioğlu in her master’s thesis. (Tellioğlu, 1996). As a result of the analysis, it is concluded that a theatre practitioner and translator, Emel Bala, establishes relatively short and plain sentences in a nondidactic way and creates musical and poetic language via Turkish proverbs, idioms, rhymes, and lyrics, paying attention to the principles “suitability for children” and “children’s reality” (Şirin, 2016, p. 24). It is significant that translators translate or adapt a theatre play for children in light of children’s developmental features, language development, inner world and expectations. We put forward that this article will contribute to the field of children’s theatre translation, which is unexplored, and inspire further research in the field.
Skopos Kuramı Bağlamında Bir Çeviri Eleştirisi Örneği: W. Shakespeare’in A Midsummer Night’s Dream oyununun Bir Yaz Masalı çocuk oyununa dönüşümü
Yeşim Pirpir Avan, Lale ÖzcanÇocuk tiyatrosu çevirisi, çocuklar ya da yetişkinler için yazılan tiyatro oyunlarının çocuk okur veya seyirci için erek dile çevrilmesi anlamına gelmektedir. Çocuk tiyatrosu çevirisinin ayrı bir çeviri türü olarak ele alınması, bu çeviri türünün gerekliliklerinin belirlenmesi alana katkı sağlanması açısından önemlidir. Çalışmamızın bütüncesini Shakespeare’in A Midsummer Night’s Dream adlı oyunundan uyarlanan Bir Yaz Masalı (2008) adlı çocuk oyunu, çevirmenin bu oyunun kitap versiyonuna (2021) yazdığı önsöz ve çevirmenle yapılan çevrimiçi görüşme oluşturmaktadır. Söz konusu çocuk oyunu Hans J. Vermeer’in skopos kuramı kapsamında oluşturulan ve Tellioğlu’nun (1996) yüksek lisans tezinde uyguladığı çeviri eleştirisi basamakları doğrultusunda incelenmiştir. Bu inceleme sonucunda, tiyatrocu-çevirmen Emel Bala’nın oyunda kısa ve yalın cümlelere başvururken didaktik bir dilden kaçındığı, atasözleriyle, deyimlerle, kafiyeli söylemlerle ve şarkılarla şiirsel ve estetik kaygısı yüksek bir dil kullandığı, dilde ve içerikte “çocuk gerçekliği” ve “çocuğa görelik” ilkelerine uyumlu bir eser yarattığı tespit edilmiştir. Yetişkinler için yazılan klasik bir oyunun çocuk oyununa dönüşümünde skoposun da değiştiği, erek kitle olan çocukların gelişimsel özellikleri, ruhsal dünyası ve beklentileri doğrultusunda bir çeviri/uyarlama yapmanın önemi ortaya çıkarılmıştır. Bu alanda yabancı literatürde çok az çalışma bulunduğu tespit edilmiş, yerli literatürde ise herhangi bir çalışmaya rastlanmamıştır. Makalemizin çocuk tiyatrosu çevirisi alanına katkıda bulunacağına, daha sonra yapılacak çalışmalara öncü olabileceğine inanmaktayız.
In today’s world, the traditional notion of childhood that used to regard children as miniature adults gave rise to the modern notion of childhood. Therefore, it has been accepted that children differ from adults in terms of their developmental features, world knowledge, skills, and expectations. When children started to be addressed as a subject instead of an object, children’s literature and art for children came up. Moreover, a need for making theatre for children emerged, and children’s theatres were founded (Akyüz, 2019, s. 1164).
Theatre plays written for children differ from those written for adults in terms of text structure and language, characters, content, and length. Clarity and plainness in language and content should not mean simplicity. As the principles “suitability for children” and “children’s reality” (Şirin, 2016, p. 24) show, it is significant to use rich and poetic language that improves children’s language development and is not above their reception level in accordance with their developmental features. Besides, as children cannot sit still for a long time as adults can, theatre plays that are shorter, full of movement and action and written with good rhythm and flow will engage their attention.
Children’s theatre translation means translating/adapting plays written for children or adults in the source language into the target language for children. As there is a large research gap in this area in both foreign and domestic literature, accepting children’s theatre translation as a specific type of translation and determining its requirements and features would contribute to translation studies.
This study includes a children’s theatre play, Bir Yaz Masalı, adapted from A Midsummer Night’s Dream by Shakespeare, the preface written by the translator to the book of the play (2021), and an online interview conducted with the translator herself. The children’s play is analysed in accordance with the steps of translation criticism established in the light of Skopos theory by Hans J. Vermeer (Tellioğlu, 1996). These are the steps used in evaluating the data and reorganised when needed; “(1) the determination of the function of the translated text, (2) the determination of intra-textual coherency of the translated text, (3) the determination of the intra-textual coherency of the original text and (4) the determination of the intertextual coherency of the translated text and the original text” (Tellioğlu, 1996, p. 51-53).
In the first step of translation criticism, it is stated that the translator adapted Shakespeare’s play for Turkish children with the purpose of introducing Shakespeare and a classic theatre play to them so that they become familiar with a great English writer and his play, enriching their language via poetic and rich language full of proverbs, idioms, rhymes, lyrics and songs and paving the way for them to turn into selective theatre goers in the future. In the second step, the play is evaluated in terms of its text and language structure, characters, and themes. As a result of this analysis, it is found that the dialogues produce rhyme and movement to engage children’s attention, the language is full of proverbs, idioms, rhymes and lyrics similar to Shakespearean poetic and figurative language, proper names are translated with domestication strategy in a way names point out the characteristics of the characters and the major themes of the original play are kept but changed to some extent taking children’s reception level, inner world and cultural differences into account. In the third step, as the ultimate goal of the study is to evaluate and describe children’s theatre plays and their features and requirements, English play is not analysed but the language of Shakespeare’s plays is described generally and briefly. In the last step of translation criticism, it is determined that the skopos of the children’s play differs from the skopos of the original play, as children’s play is written first for children, which entails different translation strategies and attitudes compared to the plays written for adults.
In short, it can be put forward that Emel Bala, a theatre practitioner and translator, creates rich and poetic language in a nondidactic way leading to movement and contributing to children’s language development and follows the principles “suitability for children” and “children’s reality” (Şirin, 2016) both in language and content of the play with also an aesthetic concern. The function of the original play changes when it is adapted or translated for a different target group, in our case, for children. The ultimate goal of this translation or adaptation process is to create a play that both works on stage and on page firstly for children who exhibit various developmental features and have different inner world and world knowledge compared to adults. We put forward that this article will contribute to the field of children’s theatre translation and inspire further research in this field.
