Evaluation of translation quality of a literary text: main criteria and their theoretical justification (on the basis of translations of British women's novels of the Victorian era)

Aim. To analyse the existing criteria of translation quality of fiction literature as up to now there are no standard systems of translated text analysis that let us evaluate its quality. Special attention is paid to the shift of “adequate / equivalent” criteria to those that the anthropocentric paradigm introduced into the modern language studies, for example, gender perception of the translated text.
Methodology. To conduct the present research the following methods were used: analysis, synthesis, descriptive method, methods of contextual and comparative-translational analysis, component analysis method, and semantic interpretation. The research is based on the idea that it is necessary to develop and implement the system of precise criteria of the translated texts quality evaluation which will allow to avoid misunderstanding, ambiguity, discrepancy that are often present in the translated texts.
Results. The translation quality implies not only a high command of the language and culture of another country, but also the translator’s ability to create the most accurate and close in meaning, as well as lexically commensurate meaning of the source text. Differences in translations are also explained by extralinguistic factors and the translators’ belonging to different eras which has a significant impact on the text of the translation.
Research implications. The theoretical significance of the article lies in the fact that it contributes to the development of the theory of equivalence and adequacy of the source text and the translation text. The authors believe that it is necessary to study in detail the correspondence of the source and translated texts not only from the viewpoint of adequacy and equivalence, but also the linguistic design of the literary text from the standpoint of translation strategies and gender linguistics

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