Camus: Yabancı'nın dört çevirisi ve mizahi öğelerin çevirilebilirliği

Abstract

In this article we study four translations into Turkish of Albert Camus’s The Stranger and comparatively analyze the translation of humor. As is widely known The Stranger deals with the dichotomy between happiness/unhappiness, life/death, light/darkness. Humor, satire and comedy which provide a critical point of view, accompany the concept of the absurd, and the dichotomies stated above in forming the ideological structure of the text. Elements of humor formed through the use of contrasts such as small/big, white/black, wide/narrow, fat/thin and other features can be noted in the scene in which Meursault is condemned in the courts and the funeral scene. In these two scenes and others humor supports the absurd in the play. Camus accepts life with all these contradictions. The four translators Reşat Nuri Güntekin, Vedat Günyol, Samih Tiryakioğlu and Necmettin Arıkan have all considered this aspect in their translations; but they have chosen to disregard word for word equivalence in favor of an equivalence of content. As a conclusion the elements of humor forming the ideological content of the play have been translated to fulfill the criteria of equivalence of content.