Obłoki czy chmury na mistycznym niebie? Religijne konotacje polskich pojęć obłok i chmura jako możliwych ekwiwalentów angielskiego cloud
'OBLOKI' OR 'CHMURY' IN THE MYSTICAL SKY. RELIGIOUS CONNOTATIONS OF THE POLISH CONCEPTS OF 'OBLOK' AND 'CHMURA' AS POSSIBLE EQUIVALENTS OF THE ENGLISH 'CLOUD'

Summary/Abstract: The article is an analysis of possible Polish translations of the English concept 'cloud' as either 'oblok' or 'chmura', based on a text in which the concept is used metaphorically: 'the cloud of unknowing' (oblok/chmura niewiedzy). The authoress presents networks of the meanings of the three concepts, the results of a survey performed among Polish respondents and concerning the use of these concepts. Selected excerpts of the original and its translations are then analyzed. The texts in question are an anonymous 14th-century English mystical treatise, in which the above metaphor is used in the title (The Cloud of Unknowing) and its three Polish translations. The theoretical frameworks which facilitate an analysis of non-metaphorical and metaphorical meanings of the above-mentioned concepts, as well as an examination of the degree of their equivalence in translation, is the cognitive theory of metaphor, the linguistic worldview conception and the cognitive approach to the unit of translation and translational equivalence. The results indicate that the choice of either 'oblok' or 'chmura' as the Polish equivalents of 'cloud' imposes on the Polish reader a different image of the mystical experience described in the English treatise: it differs mainly in the axiology of each Polish concept.

• Details
• Contents