ON THE ISSUE OF TRANSLATING AUSTRALIAN СULTURE–BOUND LEXEMES INTO RUSSIAN (BASED ON COLLEEN McCULLOUGH’S NOVEL “THE THORN BIRDS”)

The article is devoted to the study of the peculiarities of transferring Australian сulture-bound lexemes into the Russian language taking the novel by Colleen McCullough “The Thorn Birds” as an example. The comparison of the original and its translation made by Nora Gal made it possible to analyze in detail the semantics of culture-bound lexemes, their stylistic functions in the specific context and the effectiveness of translation techniques employed by the translator. The relevance of the problem discussed is determined by the fact that the problems of translating culturally marked vocabulary are the most difficult problems in literary translation. It is very difficult (and sometimes impossible) to transmit the meaning of such words in full, but the translator should still strive to avoid significant losses in conveying their semantics, stylistic functions and pragmatics. Adequate translation of the considered lexemes, their adaptation to the Russian context are necessary for presenting to the Russian reader a complete panorama of the life in the country described. The purpose of the study was to consider and assess the methods used by the translator for translating culture-bound lexemes in one particular novel. The following methods of analyzing the data were employed: comparative analysis, lexicographic analysis, contextual analysis. The study revealed some losses of culturally significant information, as well as its deformation, i. e. distorted interpretation and unjustified pragmatic adaptation to the host culture. The conducted research allowed to make some conclusions concerning the most optimal ways of presenting Australian culture-bound lexemes in the Russian context, in some cases we offered our own translation solutions.