TRANSLATION OF REALIA: A COMPARISON OF TWO ITALIAN TRANSLATIONS OF THE NOVEL DICTIONARY OF THE KHAZARS

Abstract

This paper explores some challenges in literary translation from a contrastive perspective through the lexical analysis of two Italian translations of Milorad Pavić’s novel Dictionary of the Khazars. The study aims to delve into the issues surrounding the transfer of cultural elements and the selection of translation methods in cases involving two distant cultures. This is achieved by analysing two Italian translations of Pavić’s novel: Branka Ničija’s translation published in 1988 and Alice Parmeggiani’s translation from 2020. Through a comparative analysis of the original lexical elements and those employed in the Italian translations, the study seeks to investigate whether differences in the treatment of source culture realia in the target language are discernible due to a thirty-two-year gap between the two translations. In other words, the study aims to determine whether the most recent translation of Pavić’s novel reflects an ambition to preserve the original cultural elements in the Italian rendition.