\u27Oh, how hard it is to play the translator’s game\u27: Translating Orality in the Grimms\u27 Rumpelstiltskin

The fact that the Grimms\u27 fairy tales are often read aloud is doubtless one of the main reasons for their lasting success. A major challenge for translators consists in adapting the read-aloud qualities of the text to new times, cultures, and audiences. I analyze and interpret the different translation strategies that affect the orality or read-aloud quality of four recent versions of Rumpelstiltskin in Dutch. The changes resulting from these strategies make it possible to reconstruct the implied dual addressees of the target texts. A distinction is drawn between stylistic, structural, and content changes. Most attention is paid to the stylistic changes, because they have the greatest impact on the way the text can be read aloud