The Song of Earendil from The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien: Translation Issues

This article is concerned with translation issues of The Song of Earendil by J. R. R. Tolkien, the poem included in The Lord of the Rings and incorporated into the narrative with Bilbo as the internal author and Frodo as the listener. The first part of the research provides detailed analysis of the poem contextual role as well as its perception by the characters and the reader. Imbued with various details and proper names, The Song highlights Еarendil’s voyage, one of the most essential narratives in Tolkien’s mythology (the Legendarium), however left beyond the bounds of The Lord of the Rings and not completely understood by the reader or Frodo, for the latter is listening to the Song being in a most peculiar, dreamlike state of mind evoked by elven singing he previously attends to. Frodo’s mood correlates not only and not so much with the poem’s narrative, but with its style and poetic features, especially the verse form and the rhyme scheme. The latter uses triple assonances as additional rhyme, connecting the clauses of the odd lines with the first halves of the subsequent even lines and bringing forth a notably melodical, ‘elvish’ impression.

In this respect, the verse form of The Song of Earendil takes on particular importance in relation to poetic translation; and retaining the main metrical and phonoaesthetic features of the poem seems necessary for achieving translation equivalence as well as maintaining the effect derived from the context of the novel. These features are considered using the example of four Russian translations of the Song (by A. A. Kistyakovsky, I. B. Grinshpun, S. A. Stepanov, and V. G. Tikhomirov). Comparative analysis of these translations shows a tendency for the translators to change the verse form significantly either by using more fluent rhyme schemes and stanzaic structures (as Kistyakovsky or Tikhomirov do), or by simplification (e.g. Grinshpun) and neutralisation of some other poetic features (like the use of proper names). The most consistent, although partial, representation of the original poetic form, can be found in Stepanov’s translation only. As for some other translation solutions regarding verse form and vocabulary, they appear to be non-equivalent. At the end of the article, the author presents his own translation of The Song of Еarendil, aimed at retaining the above listed features of its poetic form.

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