Rap battle in Hades : on the loss and recovery of humor in Aristophanes' Frogs
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2016
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Abstract
In modern English translations of the comedies of Aristophanes, much of the
humor is lost simply as a result of cultural distance. To attempt to regain this
humor in the Frogs, I want to present the jokes in order to make my modern
audience react in something like the way that the Athenians might have reacted to
each joke of Aristophanes. Thus, I propose a translation that makes use of
dynamic equivalence, a method formulated by theorist Eugene Nida. Dynamic
equivalence emphasizes phrasing a translation in such a way as to hit the target
audience with the same force with which the original words hit the original
audience. In my translation, I have, among other things, replaced Athenian
celebrities with figures in my culture that parallel them; defined particular cultural
references of the original more specifically in the dialogue; and broken the fourth
wall in alluding to the distance of Aristophanes' original humor. I think that,
compared with other translations, of which most are not nearly as liberal, the
result is funnier for a modern audience.