This article examines stylistic transformations in Russian and Uzbek translations of Theodore Dreiser’s novels, focusing on how each target language reconstructs or alters the author’s idiostyle. Dreiser’s narrative is marked by heavy descriptive syntax, philosophical commentary, naturalist detail, and psychologically motivated narration. These features frequently undergo modification in translation, especially across typologically distant languages such as Russian and Uzbek. The analysis draws on selected textual fragments from Sister Carrie, Jennie Gerhardt, An American Tragedy, and The Financier, comparing lexical, syntactic, and pragmatic changes in the target texts. The methodology combines comparative stylistics, translation-shift theory, and limited corpus-driven frequency observations. The findings reveal that Russian translations tend toward syntactic normalization and domestication, whereas Uzbek translations display explicitation, expansion, and semantic clarification. Both traditions modify Dreiser’s authorial commentary, though for different linguistic and cultural reasons.
A Comparative Stylistic Analysis Of Russian And Uzbek Translations Of Dreiser’s Fiction
DOI:
Keywords:
translation shifts
Dreiser
Russian translation
Uzbek translation
idiostyle
Abstract
References
Dreiser, T. (1900). Sister Carrie. New York: Doubleday, Page & Co.
Dreiser, T. (1911). Jennie Gerhardt. New York: Harper & Brothers.
Dreiser, T. (1925). An American Tragedy. New York: Boni & Liveright.
Dreiser, T. (1912). The Financier. New York: Harper & Brothers.