The Interplay of Invisibility and Appropriation in the Translated Text of Oscar Wilde’s Play

Abstract

This paper explores the appropriation process in the classical Urdu translation of Oscar
Wilde's play, particularly around the concept of invisibility. Appropriation essentially refers
to the act of taking ownership of the original text and elevating target culture and language.
The research explores how appropriation influences translation, which often presents itself
at various levels, including the removal of words, phrases, sentences, expressions, the central
message of the original, and even the presence of the translators themselves. The source and
target texts were meta-textually analyzed in order to assess how appropriation gives rise to
invisibility. Antoine Berman's model of textual deformation formed the basis for identifying
elements of appropriation. Additionally, Eugene Nida’s principles of correspondence,
particularly formal and dynamic equivalence, were applied to explain translation extracts at
the word and sentence levels. Gerard Genette's concept of paratext helped to examine
promotional materials, reviews, prefaces, and copyright information in both the source and
target texts. The analysis shows that translators have used different deforming strategies of
omission, rationalization, clarification, ennoblement, expansion, quantitative
impoverishment, adjustments, and destruction of the original's structure. The findings
indicate that the combined forces of invisibility and appropriation often result in the
domestication of the source text, causing shifts in its linguistic and cultural nuances. This
study theorizes different concepts in the field of translation studies and provides an angle to
the translators to improve the process of translation.