Theory and Practice of Translation

“Translation Criticism of English Short Story Entitled Kucing Hitam”

By:

Cori Resonia

1410732023

(Class B)

Lectured By:

Nova Linda, SS, M. Hum

English Department

Faculty of Humanities

Andalas University

2017
 Translation Criticism of English Short Story Entitled Kucing Hitam

Edgar Allan Poe was a famous writer and literary critics. His work such as
th
poetry, short stories are well-known in 19 century. Poe chooses mystery, horror, and
violence as the genre of his work. These genres decided by Poe none other than his bad
experience; surroundings by the death of people around him, his parents had died in his
one years old and his wife was killed because of tuberculosis. A number of his short
stories are The Black Cat, The Tell-Tale Heart, The Fall of the House of Usher, etc (back
cover, Kucing Hitam).

Anton Kurnia is a writer, essayist, translator and editor. He was born in Bandung,
West Java on August 9, 1974. He had studied at Geological Engineering Department
(ITB) and Science Journalism (IAIN Sunan Gunung Djati Bandung). A number of his
works such as short story, essay and translation of literary works are published in
various newspapers, magazines, and journals, including Horison literary magazines,
Jurnal Cerpen Indonesia, Kompas, Tempo, Media Indonesia, Replubika,
Suara Pembaruan, Sinar Harapan, Pikiran Rakyat, Suara Merdeka, Jawa Pos, The
Jakarta Post, and Asia Literary Review. Kucing hitam is one of his translation short
stories which are originally translated from The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe
(Wikipedia).

Kucing Hitam which originally was translated from The Black Cat by Edgar
Allan Poe is one kind of translation which is transferring ST (English) to TL (Indonesia).
In transferring ST to TL, I noticed that the translator utilizes domestication as the
ideology. By using communicative translation as the method, few procedures have
utilized by the translator such as shift or transposition and reduction and expansion.

In general, the translator utilized shift or transposition in translating the short

story. According to Newmark (1988), shift or transposition is a translation procedure
which changes the grammatical structure from source language to target language (1988,
p. 85). The reason is simply because of the grammatical structure SL (English) and TL
(Indonesia) is different. By this, the translator is transferring the source language to the
target language based on the grammatical rule of the target language to make the
translation comprehensible for the target reader. On the first paragraph, the translator
translated every sentence by using shift or transposition procedures. For instance, “For
the most wild, yet most homely narrative which I am about to pen, I neither expect nor
solicit belief”, the translator transferred it in Bahasa, “Aku tak berharap seorangpun
akan percaya kisah fantastis yang akan kuceritakan ini.” To verify this sentence was
translated by using shift or transposition, it can be seen from the position of the pronoun
in the sentence. The pronoun “I” in the source text placed in the middle of the sentence,
but when it is translated to Bahasa, the pronoun “I or Aku in Bahasa” put in the front by
the translator which compatible with the grammatical structure of the target language. It
is also found in this sentence, “Yet mad am I not- and very surely do I not dream”, the
translator transferred it in Bahasa, “Tapi, aku tidak gila, dan kutahu ini bukan mimpi.”
The pronoun “I” also put in the front by the translator, same as the previous sentence.

The other case of shift or transposition is changing the position of the adjective
in the target language. For example, “One night, as I sat half- stupefied in a den of more
than infamy, my attention was suddenly drawn to some black object, reposing upon the
head of one of the immense hogsheads of gin or of rum, which constituted the chief
furniture of the apartment,” in Bahasa, “Suatu malam aku pergi ke sebuah bar, aku
melihat sesosok benda hitam disudut ruangan.” In translating “black object”, the
translator transferred it to the target language by changing the position of the adjective.
By this, the translator is transferring the source text to the target language based on the
grammatical rule of the target language to make the translation comprehensible for the
target reader.

The translator also found to utilized reduction and expansion in translating the
short story. According to N ewmark (1988), reduction is a translation procedure by
reducing word in the source text in transferring to the target language that is considered
to be redundant word and expansion is a translation procedure by adding word depends
on a TL linguistics structure that opposed to a SL linguistics structure (1988, p. 90). The
reason is merely because of the matter of the grammatical structure, transferring the
source language to the target language based on the grammatical rule of the target
language to make the translation comprehensible for the target reader. For example, on
the twelfth paragraph, I noticed that the writer translated this sentence, “But this feeling
soon gave place to irritation. And then came, as if to my final and irrevocable
overthrow, the spirit of Perverseness” to “Namun, rasa sedih itu segera berubah
menjadi rasa sebal. Dan kemudian berubah menjadi sebuah semangat jahat.” By
counting the words that present in each sentence, the total of the words are different. The
amount of the sentence from the source text is 20 words, while in the target text; the
total of the words is 16 words. By this, it is obviously demonstrate that in the target text,
the occurrences of reduction occurred because the translator considered some words to
be redundant word. The noun phrase such as “gave place to” in Bahasa becomes one
word “berubah”. By this, this occurrence categorized as reduction procedure.

In conclusion, shift or transposition and reduction and expansion mostly occur in

the translation. Since the grammatical rule of English and Indonesia are different, the
translator changed the structure of the source text. This transform can changed the
position of adjective and the position of the pronoun in the target language. The
translator, in his translation, is reducing word in the source text in transferring to the
target language that is considered to be redundant word.
References

Hatim, B and Munday, J. 2004. Translation: An Advanced Resource Book. Oxon:

Routledge. pdf

Kurnia, A. 2004. Kucing Hitam. Bandung: Penerbit Nuansa. pdf

Menendes, J. The Black Cat. Elegant Ebooks. pdf

Newmark, P. 1988. A Text book of Translation. Great Britain: Prentice Hall. pdf

Wikipedia. Anton Kurnia. https://id.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anton_Kurnia. web