French horror into Maltese : translating short stories from Auguste Villiers de l’Isle-Adam’s ’Contes cruels’

Abstract

This dissertation seeks to contribute towards French to Maltese literary translation in relation to the horror genre by focusing on the translation of three short stories from Auguste Villiers de l’Isle-Adam’s 'Contes cruels' (1883). For contextual purposes, this study also provides insight and sheds light on the horror genre in its entirety by exploring and providing further knowledge on some of its most important notions. The focus then shifts to the literary aspect of the genre and its literary translation. Furthermore, this study also looks into Villiers’s life and works for additional contextualisation and provides a systematic compilation of some of the translations in relation to his works, his Contes cruels and the short stories translated as part of this dissertation. This is followed by an outline of the methodology employed in this study, after which the Maltese translations are presented in the form of parallel texts and accompanied with additional commentary on the solutions arrived at for particular segments. Lastly, this study comprises a thematic analysis and discussion, focusing on some examples taken from the translated stories in an attempt to highlight how some of the most important attributes of the horror genre were translated into Maltese.