Translating voices in a polyphonic novel: A contrastive analysis of Polish renditions of dialect in “The Sound and the Fury” by William Faulkner
Translating voices in a polyphonic novel: A contrastive analysis of Polish renditions of dialect in “The Sound and the Fury” by William Faulkner

Summary/Abstract: This paper discusses Polish translations of “The Sound and the Fury” by William Faulkner, which, being a polyphonic novel, relies heavily on the use of linguistic varieties, especially geographical dialects. The article surveys selected approaches to the functions of dialects in literature and outlines the major strategies of dealing with linguistic variation in translation. Examples are drawn from the Polish translations of “The Sound and the Fury” by Anna Przedpełska-Trzeciakowska (1971) and Jędrzej Polak (1993), which highlight the translators’ changing assumptions on the dialect markedness as reflected in the choice of the strategy and particular linguistic features of translation. Both a qualitative and quantitative analysis is performed, leading to a conclusion that there are significant differences between the translators’ choices and the overall markedness of dialects in the Polish texts. We conclude that Polak’s overall style is more diverse and more colourful, thus more faithfully grounded in the grim reality of Yoknapatawpha County in the first half of the 20th century, and closer to the polyphonic character of the original.

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