The national character in a situation of a moral choice (I. Turgenev's story “Birjuk” in French translations)

The research presents the results of the comparative analysis of the plot, composition and speech structure of the source text - “Birjuk” by I. S. Turgenev - and seven target texts in French. The object of the research is the translator’s interpretation of the Russian character in a situation of a moral choice, forms and ways of national psychology transfer in the target texts stylistics. The research data is the system of the story’s images-characters, and an image of the author-storyteller who plays a key role in the story and the whole cycle composition. The translator’s reception analysis is based on the specificity of the plot movement: ways of the conflict creation, its initiation and heading to a climactic scene. The authors revealed that each stage in the plot movement is characterised by a certain type of a speech pattern. An inference about ways to transfer the plot and composition peculiarities of I. Turgenev’s story in the target texts is deepened by investigation of methods of interpretation aimed at understanding the portrait characteristics, mode of life and interior. The analysis of those objective difficulties which translators meet, creating a language picture of the foreign cultural environment, is given. The analysis reveals that over one hundred years the target texts of «Birjuk» (as well as the target texts of other stories of the cycle) have accumulated the change in the French translator’s reception strategy caused both by factors of culture, and development of the principles of professional activity in the translation sphere. It determined the transition from the adaptive sociological principle of target text interpretation to transfer of special psychology of the Russian national character.