Features of the transfer of quasi-realies of F. Herbert's science fiction novel “Dune” into Russian and French

Likhodkina Irina ORCID: 0000-0001-6724-0824 Doctor of Philology Associate Professor of the Department of French Language, "Military University" of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation 111033, Russia, g. Moscow, ul. Volochaevskaya, 3/4 irina.lihodkina@gmail.com

Characteristics of the science fiction genre of fiction; formulation of the research problemScience fiction is a young modern genre of fiction, widely spread and recognized in the XX century, not losing its popularity in the XXI century.

Works of this genre describe the real or hypothetical influence of science and technology on society or individuals. Verisimilitude, which distinguishes science fiction from similar genres of fantasy and horror, is its main characteristic feature.

The term "science fiction" was popularized by the American publisher Hugo Gernsback in the 1920s, and since 1953 the Hugo Literary Prize named in his honor has been awarded annually. Despite the youth of this genre, which developed against the background of the scientific and technological revolution and universal computerization, its prerequisites are rooted in the distant past. Among the earliest examples, it is worth mentioning the satirical work of the II century A.D. "The True Story" by the ancient Greek writer Lucian, describing a trip to the Moon and having a significant impact on Western literature in general and on T. More, F. Rabelais, W. Shakespeare and J. Swift in particular. Nevertheless , the most obvious predecessor of science fiction is considered to be a French philosopher and poet of the XVII century . Cyrano de Bergerac, author of the dilogy "The Other World" ("L'autre monde", 1657 and 1962), the protagonist of which travels to the Moon and the Sun and meets there a utopian society free from war, disease and hunger ^[12].

French writer and playwright Jules Verne (1828-1905) is often called the first major author of science fiction adventure novels in which the reader gets acquainted with balloons, submarines, trains, mechanical elephants and other wonderful engineering inventions described with incredible pedantry and humor. The English writer H. G. Wells (1866-1946), on the contrary, is usually referred to as the father of serious science fiction, who popularized many of the main themes of this genre: time travel (“The Time Machine”, 1895), aliens from Mars (“The War of the Worlds”, 1898), incredible human abilities such as Invisibility (“The Invisible Man", 1897) ^{[8, p. 4]}.

By the 21st century, science fiction is becoming much more than just a literary genre. Her fans and promoters have created a worldwide subculture with a variety of products and entertainment: books, magazines, comics, movies, TV shows, computer games, collectibles, action figures, toy weapons, websites, etc.

The popularity of science fiction is explained by the opportunity to immerse yourself in a highly technological fictional world that has little in common with modern reality, but described so plausibly that it is easy to believe in it. Science fiction writers draw inspiration from everyday life, endowing it with non-existent elements and thereby fueling readers' interest in adventures and everything supernatural. 

Classic elements of a science fiction novel: space exploration and space travel, interplanetary wars, parallel or fictional worlds, alternative course of history, super-intelligent computers and robots, mind control, time travel, teleportation, telepathy and telekinesis, aliens, supernatural life forms and mutants. Most of these elements are inherent in F. Herbert's novel "Dune" ("Dune"), the factual material of our study.

An integral feature of science fiction literature is the realities of the fictional world by the author or the so-called quasi-realities ^{[5, 6]}. The transfer of realities from one language to another remains an urgent problem for linguists and causes difficulties for both beginners and professional translators. The purpose of this study is to identify and analyze ways of conveying the realities of F. Herbert's novel “Dune” ^[10] in translations into Russian ^[4] and French ^[11]. The logic of the research is based on the need, firstly, to classify the author's terminology of the novel, secondly, to identify ways to overcome translation difficulties, and, thirdly, to analyze the transformations made by Russian and French translators. The choice of the actual research material – F. Herbert's novel “Dune” – was not made by chance. It is explained by the significant influence of this work on the entire industry of world science fiction; the presence of prestigious literary awards "Hugo" and "Nebula", as well as increased interest in the universe of "Dune" caused by the new film adaptation directed by Denis Villeneuve. Previously, the novel was adapted by D. Lynch in 1984, and J. Harrison's mini-series was released in 2000 and 2003.

  American writer Frank Herbert (1920-1986), author of science fiction works dealing with the topics of ecology, human evolution, the consequences of genetic manipulation, etc., became famous after the publication of the novel "Dune" ("Dune") in 1965. It has been translated into 14 languages of the world, becoming the best-selling book (circulation 12 million copies) in the history of science fiction literature ^{[8, p. 184-185]}. The plot of the novel unfolds in the distant future in the cosmic universe ruled by the Padishah Emperor. The people inhabiting it abandoned the use of artificial intelligence due to the uprising of machines and began to develop their own abilities. To this end, they use the main valuable resource – "spice", mined only on the planet Arrakis or Dune, on which there is nothing but sand and huge sandworms. Fantastic terms-the realities of the novel are so complex and diverse that the author himself has compiled a glossary explaining their meaning.

Comparative analysis of the translation of F. Herbert's novel “Dune" into Russian and FrenchRoman F.

Herbert's "Dune” has been translated into Russian several times. The very first, anonymous, translation was carried out in 1990 and was named by readers by the color of the cover "Crimson Dune". Later translations of Yu were published . Sokolov (1992), A. Novy (1993), A. Birger (1994) and P. Vyaznikova (1999). A distinctive feature of these translations is the different transfer of the author's anthroponyms and terms-realities, for example, cf. versions of the name of the main character Paul Muad'Dib – Paul Muad'Dib, Paul Muad'Dib, Paul Muad'Dib and Paul Muad'Dib. Fans of the novel often criticize P. Vyaznikova for "changing" the usual names. On this occasion, the translator wrote an essay "His name was Paul" ^[2], in which he explained his translation decisions and expressed his opinion about the mistakes made earlier.

The study conducted a comparative analysis of the original text ^[10] and its translations into Russian and French, performed by Y. Sokolov (version published by AST Publishing house in 2020) ^[4] and M. Demuth, respectively ^[11]. Of particular interest for the study was not only in comparing the original with each translation separately, but also in comparing these translations with each other.

Classification of the novel 's realitiesA large number of scientific works are devoted to the realities, their classification and transfer from one language to another in domestic and foreign linguistics.

Nevertheless, this problem cannot be considered exhausted and does not require further in-depth study. The modern world is characterized by constant development and changes in social, political and cultural life that affect languages: a new vocabulary appears to designate new objects, objects and phenomena of reality, and vice versa, some words go out of use and become incomprehensible even to native speakers. Therefore, such a layer of vocabulary as reality does not go out of the field of view of scientists and is unlikely to cease to be relevant.

The word "reality" came from medieval Latin and originally meant real, i.e. material things as opposed to abstract ones. For the first time, Bulgarian linguists-translators S. Vlakhov and S. Florin undertook a deep study of the problem of realities in their work "The Untranslatable in Translation" ^[1]. They also introduced the modern definition of "realities" – "words (and phrases) naming objects characteristic of the life (life, culture, social and historical development) of one people and alien to another; being carriers of national and/or historical flavor, they usually do not have exact correspondences (equivalents) in other languages, and, therefore, they cannot be translated on general grounds, requiring a special approach" ^{[1, p. 47]}. This definition is also relevant for the terms-realities of the novel “Dune” with the only caveat that they function in the fictional world of the author.

The realities from the novel “Dune” can be divided into the following main groups:

· anthroponyms: Leto Atreides, the Kwisatz Haderach, the Princess Irulan;

· toponyms and ethnonyms: Arrakis, Caladan, Dune, Mount Syubi, Fremen;

· chrematonyms, including the designations of numerous weapons (a crysknife, a kindjal, a lasgun) and military equipment (a carryall, a shielded frigate), as well as various objects embodying the life and culture of the Dune universe (a jubba cloak, a nine-string baliset, filmbooks, a gom jabbar), etc.;

· interjections and onomatopoeia: drip-drip-drip, Ayah, lump-lump;

· vocabulary from fictional languages.

Realities, and even more so quasi-realities, are extremely difficult to translate and when transmitting them, one should be guided by the principle: to any concept, phrase, etc. you can choose an equivalent, an analogue or an adequate replacement, without violating the overall impression made by the original and the author's intention.

Transfer of onomastics of the novel

F. Herbert's novel is characterized by the presence of a larger number of proper names of the main and secondary characters, the names of their titles and nicknames. When translating anthroponyms, as a rule, two lexical transformations are used: transcription, transliteration or a combination of them. Other possible ways of transmitting such vocabulary are its preservation unchanged and the actual translation. The choice of method is determined by the type and spelling norms of the target language. In addition, it is necessary to take into account the nationality of the subject of speech, since it plays a significant role in making a translation decision. For example, the surname "Stern" in Russian will acquire the sound "Stern" if we are talking about an Englishman and "Stern" about a German ^{[3, p. 440]}. This rule is not difficult to follow when transferring the names of real people, but its application becomes less obvious with the names of fictional characters. Despite the fact that the novel is written in American English, there are few familiar English names in it, such as Paul and Jessica.

Let's consider an excerpt telling about relatives and friends of the main character of "Dune" Paul Atreides, later nicknamed Muad'Dib (Table 1).

Table 1. Excerpt from the novel “Dune” and its translations into Russian and French

It can be noted that in the French translation, all proper names remained unchanged, i.e. their original graphic spelling was preserved. This fact is explained by the fact that the basis of the original language (English) and the translation language (French) is one writing system – the Latin alphabet. Keeping the original spelling, the translator gives the reader the opportunity to choose the pronunciation rules himself.  The Russian language uses a Cyrillic alphabet different from the original, so such a method of transmitting anthroponyms is possible in very rare cases, for example, when transmitting well–known concepts such as the names of large companies or brands: Sony, Samsung, Nike, Chanel, etc. In the above passage, the reader is deprived of any choice, since he is given a specific the version proposed by the translator.

Here are a few more names from the novel with their Russian and French versions:

The Atreides / Atreides / les Atr?idesThe Harkonnens / Harkonnens / les Harkonnens

The Kwisatz Haderach / Kwisatz Haderach / le Kwisatz Haderach

Esmar Tuek / Esmar Tuek / Esmar Tuek

Kinet / Kinet / Kinet

Czigo / Tsigo / Czigo

Gaius Helen Mohiam / Gaia Elena Mohiam / Ga?us Helen Mohiam

It can be noted that the French translator chose the simplest and, in our opinion, the most suitable way of transmitting anthroponyms in this case: preserving their original form. Only in the spelling of some names are diacritics used, which are characteristic of the translation language and serve to clarify a particular sound. 

The transfer of the proper names presented above into Russian is carried out using transliteration or transcription from English, and in the latter case – from Latin.

The original nicknames of the characters, the "talking" names, in both compared languages are translated by suitable lexical equivalents. Cf.: Leto the Just / Leto the Just / Leto le Juste; Shai-hulud, Old Father Eternity / Shai-Hulud, Eternal Father / Shai-hulud, le Vieux P?re Eternit?; St. Alia of the Knife / Holy Aliya-from-the-Knife / Sainte Alia du Couteau.It is interesting to analyze the designation of the indigenous inhabitants of the planet Dune: "will-o'-the-sand people called Fremen" ^[10] / "a wandering people who called themselves Free–fremen" ^{[4, p. 11]} / "les Fremens, le peuple du vent de sable" ^{[11, p. 11]}.

The English phrase "will-o'-the-sand" or "will of the sand" literally means "will of the sand", and the quasi-ethnonym "Fremen" can be regarded as the result of the phrase free (free, free) + men (people, mn. ch. from man). This is the understanding observed in the Russian translation, which reflects the phonetic component of the above words: "fremen". When translated into French, the original name of this tribe (Fremen) remained almost unchanged, but acquired the plural ending –s.

The names of various structures are either translated: the Spacing Guild / Space Guild / la Guilde Spatiale, the Federated Great Houses of the Landsraad / Federation of Great Houses of the Landsraad / les Grandes Maisons du Landsraad, or transliterated: The Missionaria Protectiva / Missionaria Protectiva / La Missionaria Protectiva.

There is a difference in the transmission of the original abbreviations. In the Russian translation, abbreviations formed from full names are used, while in the French they are absent. Cf.:

the O.C. Bible (abbr. from the Orange Catholic Bible) / O.C. Bible (abbr. from the Orange Catholic Bible) / la Bible Catholique Orange;

the B.G. Way (abbr. from the Bene Gesserit Way) / the way of BG (abbr. from the path of Bene Gesserit) / la Mani?re Bene Gesserit.

The toponymy of the fictional universe by the American writer includes the names:

– planets:the planet Arrakis / planet Arrakis / la plan e te Arrakis; Dune / Dune / Dune; Caladan / Caladan / Caladan; Giedi Prime / Giedi Prime / Giedi Prime; Salusa Secundus / Salusa Secundus / Salusa Secundus, etc.;

– mountains: Mount Syubi / Mount Scooby / le mont Syubi;

– localities: Arrakeen / Arrakeen city / Arrakeen; megalopolis of Carthag / megalopolis of Carthag / Carthag, which are transmitted unchanged in French translation and transliterated / transcribed in Russian. A small part of the author's toponyms are translated in both languages compared: the Broken Land / Broken Land / la Terre Bris ?e, The shield wall / Barrier / Bouclier, the Great Erg / Great Erg / le Grand Erg.

Transfer of Roman chrematonyms

F. Herbert created many neologisms describing the features of the structure of the universe he created. These chrematonyms call objects, concepts, phenomena that contribute to a better representation of the image of the fictional world in the reader's mind and often complicate their interpretation by the translator.

The choice of certain translation transformations largely depends on the form and content of quasi-grammatical names, which can be divided into two groups. Firstly, these are quasi-grammatical names, whose internal content, a combination of components, allow us to understand their general meaning. For example: glowglobe / svetoshar / brilleur; the Truthsayer drug / potion of clairvoyance / la drogue de la Disease de v? rit ?; portable suspensors / gravipoplavki / des suspenseurs gravifiques; poison snooper / poison finder / go ? te-poison; a hunter-seeker / hunter-seeker / un tueur-chercheur; a crysknife / knife-chris / un krys.However, the meaning of such words is not always obvious.

So, in the neologism the Fremkit, it is possible to translate only the second part of kit, i.e. kit, kit. Yu. Sokolov formed the original word "frimplect" by combining transliteration (frim) and calcification (plect from kit). In the French version, this neologism was transmitted unchanged – le Fremkit.

Adequate lexical units were selected for the name of the main attribute of the inhabitants of the desert planet Arrakis stillsuit, where still is a distiller and suit is a suit: a condense suit and a distille.

The second group consists of quasi-grammatical names, the meaning of which is not definable from their graphic form. In such cases, their semantics are either explained within the text itself, or guessed from the context, or found in a glossary written by F. Herbert. In addition, with the consent of the writer, the terminology dictionary “The Dune Encyclopedia” was compiled and published, containing 526 pages ^[9].

The quasi-grammatical names of this group were transferred by transliteration/transcription into Russian and left unchanged or with minimal changes in French. Cf.: a gom jabbar/gom jabbar / un gom jabbar; a baliset/baliset / une balisette; kindjal /dagger / le kindjal. It is interesting to note that the last example has lost its exoticism in the Russian translation.

A large number of quasi-realies of both groups are often found in the novel in brief text fragments, like the example given below (Table 2).

Table 2 – Quasi-grammatical names in the novel “Dune” and its translations into Russian and French

To convey quasi-grammatical names from this passage, as well as from the entire work, semantic translation, morphemic translation, calcification and the creation of similar neologisms were used in both compared languages.

When translating fiction of the science fiction genre, in addition to the analyzed terms-realities, difficulties may arise with the transfer of the vocabulary of fictional languages. Thus, in F. Herbert's novel "Dune" words and expressions are used in the so-called hunting language "Chakobs", which is a mixture of dialects of the Gypsy language in the author's processing. In a scientific article, V.V. Shapoval ^[7] performed a detailed analysis of phrases in this artificial language and compared their translation into Russian by different translators.

Conclusions of the studyThe process of translating works of fiction of the sci-fi genre is complicated by the presence of a significant number of fictional realities or quasi-realities in them.

In the course of the study, the following quasi-realities were selected and classified using the continuous sampling method from the novel by the American writer F. Herbert “Dune”: quasi-anthroponyms, quasi-toponyms, quasi-ethnonyms and quasi-nematonyms. These lexical units have become the object of comparative analysis of the original text and its translations into Russian and French.

It was found that when transferring the author's anthroponyms, most toponyms and ethnonyms in Russian translation, lexical transformations of transcription and transliteration were used, whereas in French their original forms were preserved; this is possible only if the I and the I have the same writing (in this case, Latin). The effect of the techniques used is different: the French reader has the opportunity to choose the pronunciation rules at his discretion, and the Russian reader is provided with a specific option.

The original "speaking" names, the names of a number of structures in both compared languages are translated by suitable lexical equivalents.

When transmitting various quasi-grammatical names of the novel in both languages compared, semantic translation, morphemic translation, calcification, creation of similar neologisms and, in rare cases, transcription/transliteration (in the Russian version) and preservation of the original form (in French) were used.

In addition to quasi-realities, the translation of the novel is complicated by the presence of interjections, onomatopoeia and vocabulary from fictional languages by the author. The features of their transmission may become the subject of further research.

In conclusion, it is worth noting that there is no single universal way to transfer quasi-realities from one language to another, however, the basic principle that a translator should be guided by is the need to choose an equivalent, analogue or adequate replacement in such a way that the author's intention and the general emotional and aesthetic impression provided by the original are preserved.