USV – Messages Sages and Ages

TRANSLATING (MR. BENNET’S) MOCKERY: TWO ROMANIAN VERSIONS OF JANE AUSTEN’S PRIDE AND PREJUDICE – Mirela Antonovici

Throughout the years, translation scholars have reached the conclusion that humour is one of the most challenging elements to translate, one of the reasons being its culture-bound nature. In literature, the main sources of humour are usually irony and sarcasm. Jane Austen uses irony in her novel Pride and Prejudice not only to criticize the values of Victorian society but also to make fun of them, humour being thus an essential aspect of her writing. Mr. Bennet is one of the main characters from the novel that uses irony to mock all those that show signs of stupidity. Lazy and intelligent at the same time, he delivers throughout the novel memorable lines, a combination of irony, sarcasm, and mockery. By comparing two Romanian versions of the novel from different periods (1970 and 2014, respectively), I aim to show how the humorous aspect of Mr. Bennet’s lines is represented in the target language and whether the original meaning of the text was preserved or not.

Mirela Antonovici

Author

    Mirela Antonovici holds a BA in English and Romanian Language and Literature (2022) from the Ştefan cel Mare University of Suceava, Romania. Her final paper is a study of Jane Austen’s irony in Romanian translation.