Archaization techniques in translation of military topics in French medieval texts: The Song of Roland and The Conquest of Constantinople by Geoffrey de Villehardouin (from the experience of translation)

Abstract

The article discusses some archaizing Russian language techniques for translating Old French texts of the 12th–13th centuries, namely The Song of Roland and the memoirs of Marshal of Champagne Geoffrey de Villehardouin, The Conquest of Constantinople, which recount the events of the Fourth Crusade. The author of the article relies on the concept of M. L. Gasparov, who identifies two types of translation: “approximating” (domesticating) and “distancing” (foreignizing). Archaization is seen in the article as a means of creating a “distancing” translation. The article discusses problems associated with archaizing the Russian language in translation and the ways to solve them, which were used by the author in her own translations. Difficulties with archaization arise, on the one hand, due to the fact that the specifics of the development of the Russian literary language offer us options no earlier than the end of the 18th century, and on the other hand, the use of an outdated term may be too brightly tainted by national color, and foreignization in time may turn into domestication in space. The possibility of archaizing the language of the poetic epic in the transmission of military topics is seen, first of all, as a reliance on formulaic poetics, which distinguishes the epic text from a work of modern poetry. Russian prose does not provide this option, and the author talks about the possibility of “soft” archaization, which does not make the text too incomprehensible, but refers to outdated forms of Russian vocabulary and grammar, as well as to Russian folklore.