An exercise on literary translation: the Arabic translation of The Namesake

Literary translation is one of the most challenging fields of translation. This is due to the fact that it is a special use of language that is deviant from ordinary, everyday, non-literary language. Besides rendering the semantic qualities of the text, it is the translator\u27s mission re-create the Source Text as a work of art, and he/she attempts to keep the unity of content and form and the text\u27s national, individual and linguistic qualities. Unlike other types of writing, literature is rich with connotations and indirect messages which are the real challenge for the translator. This paper is an exercise on literary translation and the difficulties the translator faces when dealing with the four following elements: the translation of (1) abbreviations, (2) phonetically significant words, (3) specialized vocabulary and idioms, as well as play on words, (4) and finally colors. The Source English Text is Jumpha Lahiri\u27s novel The Namesake (2003) and the Target Text is the Arabic translation of the novel by Sura Khrais (2015). The paper concludes that literary translation is complete cognitive process which involves a perception not only of the content and its connotations, but also of all the other linguistic, phonetic and figurative features which have created the Source Text and given it its literariness