La rusałka è un’ondina? Sulla traduzione italiana dei nomi delle creature fantastiche in Andrzej Sapkowski

Is the rusalka an undine? On the Italian translation of the names of fantastic creatures in Andrzej Sapkowski’s works. The paper aims at analysing the techniques used in the rendition of the names of supernatural, mythological, and fantastic creatures in the Italian translation of The Witcher saga by Andrzej Sapkowski. After presenting the role played by different classes of names in the creation of an imaginary world based on intertextual procedures, the author identifies eight recurring techniques: borrowing, calque, recognised translation, generalisation, normalisation, lexical recreation, substitution, and omission. The paper shows that though the translation of Sapkowski’s series combines a foreignising and domesticating approach, naturalisation prevails in the rendition of Slavic elements, supplying the reader with a more “international” setting derived from a wide use of replacements and hypernyms.