Strategies of Russian-Spanish translation of gastronomy-related cultural referents in M. Bulgakov's novel The Master and Margarita

Abstract

The translation of cultural referents has been one of the key topics throughout the history of translation science many traductologists have offered dif- ferent systematisations of cultural referents, and they have analysed the difficulties that arise from the translation of these referents. Literary translation requires a de- tailed knowledge and understanding of both languages and cultures involved in order to evaluate the differences that exist and to define elements that will be treated as cultural referents. Later, these lexical units will be translated using specific tech- niques selected according to a previously established strategy (foreignisation or do- mestication). In this paper we will study the gastronomy-related cultural referents from “The Master and Margarita” by Mikhail Bulgakov and offer up proposals for their translation into Spanish. We will also analyse the translations offered up by Amaya Lacasa and Marta Rebón. We believe that the following factors must be con- sidered when translating a cultural referent: the meaning of the cultural referent (preparation, ingredients); its function within the context where it appears (i.e. prag- matic load); how the cultural referent is perceived by readers of the original; the ex- istence or non-existence of a similar cultural referent in the target language and cul- ture. The translation proposals are aimed at a non-specialist reader in the target lan- guage. The hypothesis we start out from is that, in most cases, gastronomy-related cultural referents should be domesticated, while a detailed analysis of the parameters related to their usage provides translators with all the necessary resources to under- stand the author’s intention, enabling them to create a translation that mirrors this in- tention