Descripción
Translation studies are still new as a science, but old as a topic of debate. And
also, since translation is a task of endless complexity, that involves meaning-producing
subjects, it is important that more studies in the area are developed. In order to think
about translation and, more specifically, translation of characters, this study was
dedicated to look at the character Juliana Burgos, from the short story La Intrusa by
Jorge Luis Borges, published in the book El Informe de Brodie. The short story,
originally written in Spanish, describes the conflict experienced by the Nilsen brothers
when they fell in love with the same woman. Through a grammar-lexical analysis, the
objective was to think and analyze Juliana’s construction based on the choices made
by the translators in the Portuguese and English versions. To reach this goal, the
versions produced by the Brazilian writer, literary critic and translator Davi Arrigucci
Junior, published by Companhia das Letras, were chosen, as well as the version
translated by the North American Norman Thomas de Giovanni, made in collaboration
with Jorge Luis Borges, published by Penguin Books. The text that was taken as
original is this paper was the one published by Contemporánea. To achieve the
objectives, this work debated the construction of literature as a science and the
importance of characters in the elaboration and evolution of the plot, as well discussed
and historicized the construction of a theory of translation and its importance in the
popularization of literature. The duality between freedom X literality, form X content,
dichotomous relations that permeate the studies of translation was strongly
approached. The most recent studies were also considered, which recognize the
importance of the reader/translator in the construction of the work's meaning, inserting
concepts of subjectivity to the translation processes. In addition, part of this writing was
dedicated to understand and establish the importance of the Argentine writer Jorge
Luis Borges in two of his diverse actuations: Borges was contextualized as an author,
giving him due importance prominence in Latin American and world literature, besides
of giving attention to his role as translator, since his actuation in this area cannot be
underestimated, once he has a fundamental importance for the construction of
contemporary theories of translation. For the translation analysis proposed by this
study, were used the concepts presented by Diccionario de la Lengua Española of the
Real Academia Española, by Gramática y Prática de Español para Brasileiños from
Santillana publisher, by the English dictionaries Merriam-Webster Dictionary, North
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American, and Cambridge Dictionaries Online, from England, the English Grammar in
Use, online dictionary Aulete Digital and the Nova Gramática do Português
Contemporâneo. After comparative reading and observations of the translation choices
involving the story elements and, mainly, the character Juliana Burgos, it was possible
to identify that emerges, in each version, the construction of different Julianas Burgos,
that have subtle differences in personality expression of their desire, but that keeps the
same essence in them, allowing the reader to identify the Juliana built by Borges in
the, considered, original version.
