Translation of attributive groups.

Translation of attributive groups presents some difficulties. English attributive groups are used to convey various adverbial ideas of location, purpose, cause, etc. Consider such groups as ‘Madrid trial’ (location), ‘profits drive’ (purpose), ‘war suffering’ (cause). Such groups may also express various action-object relationships: ‘labour raids’ (raids against the workers), ‘labour spies’ (spies among the workers). A word within an attributive group may sometimes alter its meaning. So ‘war rehabilitation’ is ‘rehabilitation of economy after the war’, that is ‘post-war rehabilitation’.

Many attributive groups are polysemantic and are translated in a different way in different contexts. ‘The Moscow proposals’ may imply ‘proposals made in Moscow’, ‘proposals made by Moscow (government of Russia)’, ‘proposals on Moscow(of political, economic or other nature)’. This dissimilarity gives rise to a number of translation problems.

The first group of problems stems from the broader semantic relationship between the attribute and the noun. As it has been pointed out the attribute may refer not only to some property of the object but also to its location, purpose, cause. As a result a translator has to make a thorough analysis of the context to find out what the meaning of the group is in each particular case.

Non-smoker compartment – купе для некурящих

Local authority staff – працівники місцевих органів влади

The second group of problems results from the difficulties in handling multi-member attributive structures. The English-speaking people make wide use of ‘multi-storied structures’ with complicated internal semantic relationships. The tax paid for the right to take part in the election is described as ‘the poll tax’. The states where this tax is collected are ‘the pool tax states’ and the governors of these states are ‘the poll tax states governors’. Now these governors may hold a conference which will be referred to as ‘the poll tax states governors conference’ and so on. Given the multiplicity of possible translations such structures should be analyzed in terms of factors influencing the choice of the TL variants: a glass reinforced plastics lifeboats construction – зміцнена склопластиком конструкція рятувального човна, The Sunday Express newspaper leader writer – автор передовиць газети ‘Санді експрес’, the City Cooper Square Community Development Committee – комітет по переплануванню площі Купера лондонського Сіті.

There are attributive groups with latent (скрытый) predication where a whole sentence is used to qualify a noun as its attribute.

He was being the boss again, using the its-my-money-now-do-as-you-are-told voice.

Here correspondences can be described in an indirect way only by stating that the attribute is usually translated into R\U as a separate sentence and that this sentence should be joined to the noun by a short introductory element.

The Judge’s face wore his own I-knew-they-were-guilty-all-along expression.

На лице судьи появилось обычное выражение, говорившее: «Я всё время знал, что они виновны».

Attributive groups which are phraseological units can be used both in literature and oral colloquial speech: a happy-go-lucky fellow – бесшабашный парень, set-the-Thames-afire gentlemen – господа, которые хотят удивить мир.

6.Attributes expressed by Participle II and adjectives in –ed.

Adjectives in –ed formed from nouns are widely used in E due to the tendency to use prepositional attributes. Some of such adjectives describing the appearance of a person are quite usual and have dictionary correspondences in the TL: blue-eyed - голубоглазый, fair-haired - светловолосый, long-nosed - длинноносый. Adjectives like ‘uniformed’ do not have traditional correspondences and are translated with the help of description.(одетый в форму)

They were leaving the French Quarter now, turning left on the boulevarded and tree-lined Esplanade Avenue. Выйдя из Французского квартала, они повернули налево, на обсаженную деревьями Эспланад авеню с ее бульварами. The window-sill was covered with potted plants. На подоконнике стояло много цветов в горшках.

Participle II in the function of the attribute can be both in preposition and postposition. Participle II with modifying words or participial phrase is usually used as an attribute in postposition. But again due to the tendency to use prepositional attributes participles with prepositions even if they have modifying words are used before the head word:

He had so much looked forward to meeting Steve one day, upon the constantly talked of but constantly deferred English visit. Ему так давно хотелось познакомиться со Стивом, а поездка в Англию, о которой постоянно говорили, все время откладывалась.

There are cases when elements of such attributive groups are spelled in a hyphen: e.g. that never-discussed subject, the never-ending settling of prices for piece work, the inside cabin had a mystifying tended-to look. Such spelling is possible as well as separate spelling.

This hyphenated spelling is used not only with participles but with adjectives as well: century-long struggle.

I wasn’t boy-crazy especially. Не могу сказать, чтобы я особенно увлекалась мальчишками.

I am extremely disturbed to see that one of the union-sponsored MPs has allowed himself to be drawn into a Tory-sponsored campaign which is designed to discredit the British trade-union movement and its efforts to strengthen East-West relations. Меня чрезвычайно обеспокоило то обстоятельство, что один из членов парламента, вышедший из рядов этого профсоюза, позволил втянуть себя в организованную консерваторами капанию, целью которой является дискредитировать движение Британских профсоюзов и их деятельность по укреплению отношений между Востоком и Западом. Penn was still disputing with Ann, one hand in the pocket of his dark-grey English-purchased flannels. Пени все еще спорил с Энн, засунув руку в карман своего темно-серого купленного в Англии костюма.

7. Adjectives in –al.

The tendency to use prepositional attributes resulted in the use of adjectives with the suffix –al, formed from nouns. As a rule such adjectives are translated into R/U by a noun in the oblique case (косвенный падеж) or a noun with a preposition: presidential candidate – кандидат в президенты, electoral college – коллегия выборщиков, managerial fraternity – «братство» управляющих.

8. The Structures A+of+N and N+of+N.

In E there are two attributive constructions A+of+N and N+of+N which have an emphatic force, e.g. frank of face, the devil of a man.

Men were rough of speech and often drunk. Речь мужчин была грубой, и они часто бывали пьяны.

The construction begins with the description of the characteristic feature. They are translated differently, the first element can be rendered by a noun or by an adjective, anyway it reflects the quality of the thing or person expressed by the second element.

The devil of a man – черт, а не человек, the darling of a dress – прелестное платье.

One more emphatic construction consists of a proper name and an adjective with evaluative force: that Spencer man – этот тип Спенсер, that Butler reprobate – этот негодяй Батлер.