Four theses in translation

The first thesis
Translation is the process of transferring a message from the source language into the target language.
The above thesis allows the following derivations:
1.1. Whatever can be said in any language can be transferred to any other language. Therefore, the concept of the "impossibility of translating" this´-or-that form of discourse in any language into another is fallacious. The process of translation acquires legitimacy by virtue of itself as a social and cultural activity, which is both necessary and required to -function- on all discourse without exception, just like the existence of languages themselves is socially necessitated. The degree of its difficulty lies in the degree of the artistic load contained in the original message, as well as in the translator’s level of competence.
1.2 The act of translation consists in conveying the message across languages, not within a single language. Therefore, the concept of intra-translation is a far-fetched metaphor stripped from the reality and from the nature of the act of translation, since it describes the pure process of “clarifying” the message to the recipient within the scope of one and the same language, not message-transference from one language into another.
1.3. Since languages may use different mediums of expression that are perceptible through the human senses of sight, hearing, and touch-;- then, all transference to´-or-across any of these different forms of expressions falls within the scope of the translation process.
1.4. Since every language in the world has six levels of realization (phonological, morphological, grammatical, semantic, pragmatic, and stylistic)-;- therefore, all translation inevitably requires changing the forms of the original message in all these six levels into the corresponding levels in the target language.
1.5. The exhaustiveness of this obligatory process of formal change entails that the discourse of translation is a new one that acquires an independent identity. The translated message is fundamentally different from its source, though related to it to this´-or-that extent.
1.6. Since the translated message represents another discourse on its own-;- then, it possesses all the elements of any discourse in authorship and literary creativity. This means that the translator - like the author of the original text alike - is a present author, not an absent´-or-a disguised one-;- and is as creative as her´-or-his translation work is.
1.7. Since translation is a multi-level changing process governed by the conditions of its completion, so the stages of its processing and the techniques of producing it are related to the conditions of its context, implementation style, and the competence of the translator who can use numerous available translation techniques, which always remain richer than the taxonomies of ready-made recipes.
1.8. Since translation is a process of linguistic message transformation, the evidence for it and its truth lie in the results of this very process. This means that the reality of translation lies within the outputs of the translation process itself, and not in translation theories, which always remain a foreign activity lying outside the act of translation, regardless of the linguistic schools upon which these theories are based.
1.9 Since the target language becomes the goal in the translation process-;- therefore, the goal of the source message requires to be diagnosed and -function-ally transferred into the target language. In this sense, translation is a goal-driven linguistic transfer.
The second thesis
Fidelity in conveying the source message is the only relative law in translation.
This law is of a purely relative nature and is conditioned by various acting variables. The following derivations follow when linked to the first thesis:
2.1. Since translation as a process of transferring the message from one language into another requires changing all the six levels of linguistic realization of the source message, and given that the forms of these levels are representative of the existential uniqueness of each language from other languages, therefore, this obligatory change - without which the translation process becomes impossible - means that the processes of all translation yield changed phonological, morphological, grammatical, semantic, pragmatic and stylistic systems that are different from those of the source language.. And since each of one the six systems of linguistic realization is a carrier of meanings in itself, as well the totality of their unique interconnections, then the translation process inevitably involves a communicative change that differs from that of the source message to a greater´-or-lesser degree at all of these six linguistic levels.
2.2. Accordingly, there is no alternative to both loss and gain in the outputs of all translation. This means that translation - by its very nature as a process of total change - dictates transforming the original message in as much as necessitated by the obligatory changes required in carrying out the process of translation. The conclusion is that the translated message is never an exact copy of the original one. Only the original message is the exact copy of itself, while the translation - to the extent that it faithfully transmits the original message - is a copy of itself as a transformed discourse that stands by virtue of itself rather than by any other entity.
2.3 The process of profit in translation occurs when the translator succeeds in identifying and realizing additional values to her/his message, as far as the systems of the six levels of realization in the target language allow.
2.4 Therefore, the person involved in carrying out the translation process requires to diligently search within the available phonetic, morphological, grammatical, semantic, pragmatic and stylistic options of the target language systems for those means that minimize compulsory losses as much as possible by maximizing the profit points that compensate for those losses, taking into consideration (3.1) ..
2.5 The process of maximizing profit by adding new values to the target discourse acquires special importance in the translation of literary genres, the most important of which is the re-production of the original text s poetics as represented by phonetic, morphological, grammatical, semantic, pragmatic, stylistic, and punctual parallelism.
2.6 Accordingly, translation requires the competent mastery and control of all the above systems in the source language as well as their corresponding systems in the target language at levels sufficient to realize the requirements of (2.5) above.
2.6 The translation process requires the addition, deletion, and substitution of the structures of the source message at their six levels of realization, and all of these changes are legitimate to the extent that they are obligatory, and are illegitimate to the extent that they are not obligatory.
The third thesis
Translation is a subjective act that reflects the personality of the translator, and the extent to which he conforms to the original and target language, and vice versa.
3.1 Conveying the message through translation is adequate to the extent that the translator masters both the source language and the target language. And it is inadequate to the extent that it does not master them-;- that is, to the extent of the knowledge gaps that occur in the networks of the translator’s control over them, which appear in the translation outputs. A capable translator is able to translate efficiently in both -dir-ections: from language A to language B, and vice versa-;- This dual ability – which includes genre reproduction – represents the minimal requirement to the competence of the translator.
3.2 Given that the process of transmitting the original message requires first comprehending and interpreting the meaning of this message, therefore, the degree and depth of this assimilation and interpretation are conditioned by all the cognitive, psychological and social variables that distinguish each person from others with regard to this person’s social, religious and cultural background and life experiences-;- in addition to personal preferences, biases, intellectual, political, situational, stylistic, psychological, circumstantial, and special intentions of the translator himself as a human being different from other human beings, as well as by many other personal variables. That is why the translation outputs of the same original message by many translators differ from person to another.
3.3 In essence and in practice, translation is the process of conveying a message via purely personal communicative production in its motives, goals, and outputs. In this sense, translation is not a science insofar as the act of personal linguistic communication is not a science. Therefore, all talk about translation being a "science"´-or-about "the search for a science of translation" has no scientific meaning and is not productive as far as the act of translation is concerned. In other words, translation is one distinctive form of linguistic communication, neither more nor less.
3.4 The evidence for translation lies in the merits of its outputs themselves, and all theories about translation remain alien to those outputs, regardless of their motivations.
3.5 The exercise of writing academic theses that assess the literary translations performed by past translators represents a purely personal point of view that is not binding to others. It is of a foregone conclusion, and its outputs are not generalizable. So it has no real academic value.
Fourth thesis
The semantic, pragmatic, and cultural equivalence of vocabulary items across languages are relative in nature.
4.1. Each word in the lexicon of every language represents a focal point of complexity and semantic convention which is socially, culturally, and historically unique in its denotations, connotations and associations to the speakers. There are no equivalents that are (100%) identical in all their connotations, polysemy, colors, shades and associations across languages. Therefore, all translation is a process of relative approximation as far as it is concerned with the necessity of replacing each lexical unit with a relatively equivalent unit across languages.
4.2 Each language has its own distinct fields of semantic, pragmatic, and stylistic crystals-;- and all of these require careful transfer as they are given in the source message to their parallels in the target language - never by imposing the overlaying of the target language upon the cultural fields of the source language.

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