Lost in translation: on the problem of translating intralingual false friends in Nick Hornby's novels into Russian

Nick Hornby is a popular English writer who is known as a novelist, essayist, screenwriter, book critic, and lyricist. His seven novels have already become bestsellers and have been translated into several languages around the world, including the Russian language. Their action takes place in London, but the author introduces not only British characters whose «language records the everyday colloquial speech of Londoners and people from southern England typical in the 1990-s» [About a Boy by Nick Hornby: A Commentary On the Novel 2007: 24], but also Americans who use words or meanings peculiar to the English language as spoken in the USA (sometimes these words or meanings are also used by the author himself in contexts containing descriptions of American characters or descriptions of situations seen through «American» eyes). This fact makes the novels of Nick Hornby interesting not only in terms of literary and cultural analysis of relations between characters having different nationalities, but also from the point of view of linguistic analysis of words specific to different varieties of English. The same fact also poses challenges for translation practice, partly due to the existance of tricky words having different meanings in British English and American English.

The linguistic phenomenon of false friends — words which are similar in form, but different in meaning, is traditionally associated with different languages, either related (e.g. German

fast ‘almost’ and English fast ‘quick’) or unrelated (e.g. English sympathetic ‘kind to somebody who is hurt or sad’ and Russian симпатичный ‘pretty’). The formal similarity of such words may lead to an incorrect understanding of the text written in a foreign language or cause mistakes in translation.

A particular difficulty associated with false friends lies in the translation of British texts into other languages (in our case — the translation of Nick Hornby’s novels into Russian). This is indicated by active penetration of Americanisms into British English and the use of these lexical-semantic divergents in the American meaning.

Let us consider some remarkable examples of misinterpretations and tricky situations connected with the existence of false friends in British and American English. We shall analyze contexts from the novels by Nick Hornby which contain Americanisms with a different meaning in British English — About a Boy (1998), A Long Way Down (2005) и Slam (2007) and the corresponding extracts from their Russian translations — Мой мальчик (by К. Chumakova, 2004), Долгое падение (by A. Stepanov, 2013), Слэм (by V. Shubinsky, 2008). By Americanisms we will understand words or phrases specific to American usage.

An example of such misinterpretation is the Russian translation of the divergent pants in the novel Slam. The word is used by the narrator, a 16-year-old skateboarder Sam:

And when I woke up, I didn’t have Hawk cargo pants or a Hawk burning T-shirt anymore [Hornby 2007: 206].

Когда проснулся, у меня не нашлось маек и трусов с логотипом Хоука [Хорнби 2008: 201].

It is quite obvious that the word pants is used in the American meaning since it refers to the trousers of Sam’s hero Tony Hawk, an American professional skateboarder with whom Sam regularly has imaginary conversations. This fact is confirmed by the use of the word pants in the phrase cargo pants (these are typically worn by skateboarders).

Another example is observed in the translation of the noun loft in the novel A Long Way Down'.

Maureen didn’t want to come in with us, but we led her through the door and up the stairs into a room that was the closest thing I’ve seen to a New York loft since I’ve been here [Hornby 2005: 47].

Морин не хотела идти с нами, но мы ее все же провели в дом, потом вверх по лестнице, пока не оказались в помещении, очень похожем на нью-йоркскую мансарду [Хорнби 2013: 67].

The word loft is used by JJ, an American who comes to London, and serves as a reference to a typically American realia (a dwelling space, artist’s studio, etc. on an upper story of a converted warehouse or factory). The British meaning of the word is ‘an attic or atticlike space, usually not partitioned off into rooms, immediately below the roof of a house, barn, etc.’ [CCALEDBE], The use of the word мансарда seems to be irrelevant, since it has connotations of «home coziness», «comfort» and «warmth», whereas the word loft, on the contrary, brings up the idea of a modern industrial building. We assume that the most suitable translation would be the use of the loanword лофт which is commonly used in the Russian language nowadays.

A special instance of a difficulty associated with translating false friends into Russian is seen in the word nervy in the novel About a Boy. British and American lexical-semantic variants coexist in this word (‘anxious and nervous’ in BE and ‘brave and confident in a way that might offend other people’ in AE [OALD 2010: 1025]). The word is used in the description of Rachel who Will falls in love with when meeting at a New Year’s Eve party:

She looked a little bit like Laura Nyro on the cover of Gonna Take A Miracle - nervy, glamorous, Bohemian, clever, lots of long, unruly dark hair [Hornby 2000: 171].

Она была немного похожа на Лору Ниро с обложки диска «Для этого нужно чудо» - чувственная, очаровательная, умная, с копной непослушных темных кудрей и богемной внешностью [Хорнби 2004: 207].

The given context and the interaction of words used in the description permit us to assume that the word could also be translated as уверенная в себе (which is a development of the American meaning, since the British lexical-semantic variant ‘anxious and nervous’ doesn’t fit the context).

A similar correlation of lexical-semantic variants is observed in the above-mentioned word pissed in A Long Way Down'.

‘Have you got the money for more than one night?’ - ‘Yes, of course. The suggestion that she might not seemed to make her a little pissed. Pissed off. Whatever’ [Hornby 2005: 39].

А у тебя есть деньги, чтобы заплатить больше чем за одну ночь? Конечно, есть. Как мне показалось, предположение, что у нее, возможно, нет денег, было ей неприятно. Чертовски неприятно, если угодно [Хорнби 2013: 57].

The context shows that JJ, living in London, is well aware of both meanings of the adjective pissed and, having used the word in the American meaning ‘annoyed, irritated, or dissapointed’ [CCALEDAE], changes it into pissed off— the word which functions in both BE and AE in the same meaning. Thus, Л seems to be addressing a British reader and tries to avoid confusion. Since the differentiation between the verb pissed and its equivalent with a particle pissed off presents a difficulty for a Russian translator, A. Stepanov decides to use compensation by adding the word чертовски for emphasis instead of the particle in the English language.

In contrast to the lexemes examined above, we are faced with oppositions in which meanings inherent in AE coexist with general English meanings.

As an example of this type of intralingual false friends we may cite the use of the word man in the novel Slam^-.

‘Oh, man. She’s your mum. I never twigged’ [Hornby 2007: 12].

Ox, парень. Так она ж твоя мамка! Я как-то не въехал [Хорнби 2008: 15].

The context makes it clear that the word functions as an interjection which is mainly used in AE. Thus, the unit of translation should be the whole phrase Oh, man as an exclamation used to express surprise, rather than the word man as a form of address to a man or a boy [OALD 2010: 934].

As an interesting example, which illustrates this type of false friends one may refer to the translation of the phrasal verb knock up in the novel Slam^-.

‘I’d understand if you’d knocked her up or something. But...’ - ‘Oh, that’s lovely, ’ said Mum. ‘That teaches him responsibility, doesn’t it?’ [Hornby 2007: 150].

Я еще понимаю, если бы ты морду ей набил или что... Но... - Ох, как мило! - вспыхнула мама. - Это учит его обходительности, не правда ли? [Хорнби 2008: 149].

When Dad started talking about me knocking Alicia up, it was like he’d jumped the perimeter fence and was coming straight for me [Hornby 2007: 151].

Когда папа говорил о возможности дать Алисии в морду, он как будто перемахнул через заграждение и оказался прямо напротив меня [Хорнби 2008: 150].

The mistake made by the translator might be explained by the fact, that V. Shubinsky relied on one of the general English meanings of the verb knock ‘hit somebody hard’. The word knock up has nothing to do with hitting someone. It's an informal (slang) word with the meaning ‘to make a woman pregnant’ [OALD 2010: 855] which is used mainly in AE. It's used in the situation when Sam decides to run away to Hastings after he accidentally gets his girlfriend pregnant.

Another symbolic representation of situations in which false friends might produce confusion is the translation of the word deck in the novel Slam. The general English meaning of this word is ‘the top outside floor of a ship or a boat’. However, this noun has a specific meaning in skateboarder slang which wasn’t taken into consideration by the Russian translator, who rendered the meaning of the word as палуба корабля'.

I pointed at the skateboard and my bag, and he nodded. And then I got up, walked across the pebbles down to the sea and threw my mobile phone as far into the water as I could. Easy. Everything gone. I went back to the bench and spent a happy thirty minutes on my deck [Hornby 2007: 112].

Я указал на доску в мешке, и он кивнул. Тогда я встал, спустился по гальке к морю и зашвырнул мой мобильник в воду так далеко, как только мог. Легко. Все прошло. Я вернулся на скамейку и провел счастливые тридцать минут, глядя на море будто с палубы корабля [Хорнби 2008: 113].

The examples of mistranslating false friends presented in our article are just an illustration of numerous real situations in which these linguistic units may produce confusion. The study of intralingual false friends may help to avoid misunderstanding, which intralingual false friends may cause in communication, and predict cases of misinterpretation in English-Russian translation.