Vogellaute linguistisch gesehen – translatorische Auseinandersetzung mit der Vogelsprache in den Kindergedichten von Julian Tuwim
Birds sounds from linguistic perspective – translational examination of the language of the birds in Julian Tuwim’s poems for children

Summary/Abstract: This article discusses the problem of translating into German the elements of bird speech that appear in Julian Tuwim’s poems for children. The analysis will therefore focus on onomatopoeias, or longer passages of a sound-mimetic nature, which by their sound are meant to imitate the sounds made by birds. The main purpose of the article is to classify the difficulties involved in translating this type of text passages and to show what solutions the translator proposed in each problematic case. At the same time, the analysis is intended to illustrate the extent to which the characteristic sound effect used in the original was preserved in the translation of individual onomatopoeias. The basis for the analysis are two poems by Julian Tuwim that both at the level of content and language describe and vividly depict bird speech – they are “Ptasie Radio” (“Vogelradio”) and “Mowa Ptaków” (“Die Sprache der Vögel”). At the same time, it should be emphasized that the sound plane – above all, the onomatopoeia - comes to the fore in the case of the aforementioned poems and significantly affects the entire organization of the text. Onomatopoeic elements not only enrich the stylistic layer and poetic expression of these texts, but also imitate through linguistic means the sounds made by birds, thus attracting the attention of (especially the youngest) readers and stimulating their imagination. It is because of this fact that an in-depth translational analysis of the aforementioned phenomenon appears to be an extremely necessary task.

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