Problems and Solutions in English Translations of Malay Short Stories

The Malay stories of Pelanduk yang Bijak, Peniup Seruling and Seuncang Padi were translated to English, and analysed to identify the translation problems. The procedures were also investigated to find solutions for the problems using translation procedures as the framework for data analysis. After the translation of the stories, the source and target texts were analysed to identify problems and procedures. The findings of the study indicated two types of problems in the Malay-English translations of the stories; structural or semantic problems, and problems arising from cultural differences. Among various translation procedures used in the translations, literal translation was the most common procedure in the translation of the Malay stories. The findings from translations and the analyses in this study could be utilised in translator and interpreter training classrooms. Finding solutions to the translation problems could improve translators‟ ability to better theorise while translating, and thus produce “good” translations, particularly in the translation of literary works from Malay to English. This study could have pedagogical significance, as the Malay short stories contain moral lessons by which Malay culture could be further introduced and “exported” to the English-speaking audience through literature.


Introduction
Malay literature has a long history, having been passed down through generations in oral and written forms, which can be further categorised as works of prose or poetry (Salleh, 2010). In this study, the translations of Malay literary prose were investigated. Specifically, three Malay stories, namely Pelanduk yang Bijak, Peniup Seruling and Seuncang Padi which were obtained from Himpunan 366 Cerita Rakyat Malaysia (A collection of 366 Malaysian folk tales) by Puteh (1995), were translated into English and then analysed. This book contains Malay folklore from different parts of Malaysia, featuring aspects of Malay culture, such as their way of life, form of humour and cultural values. Each story also has moral lessons for readers, with themes such as filial piety, kindness and honesty. In this study, source language (SL) refers to the language of the original text, target language (TL) refers to the language that the text is translated into, source text (ST) refers to the original text being translated, and target text (TT) refers to the target/translated text.
There is a gap in literature about the translation of Malay literary prose to other languages. Among the few studies on Malay to English literary translations, translations of poems, or pantun in Malay language, have been explored more compared to other types of literary works, such as in Shanmugam (2017) and Shunmugam (2015). Like poetry, prose can also convey cultural meaning and values to readers (Ali and Mohideen, 2017;Peng and Ishak, 2009;Yaacob and Rahim, 2016). This gap in the literature was also observed by Haque (2012), who noted that in general, translators emphasise too much on the translations of poetry, and that "there should be more research regarding the particular problems of translating literary prose".
This study may help to export Malay culture to international audiences through the translations of the Malay stories into the English language (Amini et al., 2015). As the stories contain moral lessons, the translated stories may also be beneficial for English-speaking readers, especially children, in terms of learning life lessons and values. Finally, this study may enhance current research on Malay to English translations, as well as on the problems and translation procedures used in literary prose, which are lacking in the literature.

Literature Review
There are several studies on translations of literary texts, but only a few have addressed literary prose. Guedes et al. (2017), investigated the Brazillian Portuguese translation of an English short story, Tenth of December, and found that literal translation occurred the most, indicating a tendency to maintain proximity of syntax in both texts. Additionally, "loan" was the most frequent procedure for problems in translating cultural items.
In her analysis of the Vietnamese translation of Romeo and Juliet, however, Luong (2016) found that omission was the most common strategy used for translation of culture-bound, Shakespearean words, such as "star-crossed". Luong points out that while her findings indicated the translator"s limitations in terms of vocabulary, the translation could be considered successful domesticating, i.e., "TT-friendly and familiar to the Vietnamese audience" (p. 60).
Similarly addressing the problem of translating culture specific items, Sasaninejad and Delpazir (2015) found that substitution strategy was used the most in the Persian translation of the novel Spartacus. They suggested that the use of substitution could make the translation more target-oriented and thus "improve its readability and acceptance among Persian readers" (p. 44). In contrast, Alrasheedi (2016) who identified the problem of translating implicit meanings as in the case of metaphors in the Arabic versions of Shakespeare"s Hamlet, argued that faithfulness to the ST must be the priority, as faithfulness determines the reliability of the TT. Moindjie (2016), also compared the Malay and French translations of Hamlet. He examined how grammatical peculiarities in the two languages could lead to strange and unnatural translations. He suggested that the procedures of transposition and modulation should be used. Alshammari (2016) conducted a similar study to Alrasheedi (2016), focusing on a different type of figure of speech, that of similes. He analysed two Arabic translations of similes in the novel The Old Man and The Sea, and found that literal translation was the most employed strategy for translating the similes. According to the researcher, this indicates that the translators were oriented towards the source culture, which Alrasheedi (2016) advocates in his study. Movahedi (2016), examined the Persian translation of neologisms in the novel A Clockwork Orange. Similar to Alshammari (2016), Movahedi found that literal translation was the most frequently used strategy by the translator in his study. However, the researcher also found instances where the translator"s use of this strategy caused mistranslations, which led to loss of meaning in the TT.
The problem of comprehensibility by TT readers was addressed by Haroon and Daud (2017) as well, in their study of the Malay translation of foreign words in A Thousand Splendid Suns. They found that the translator overcame issues of TT comprehensibility while still being faithful to the ST by employing a mix of translation strategies, with the source-oriented procedure of retention making up 51% of the procedures used, and targetoriented procedures such as specification, generalisation, substitution and omission making up the other half. The researchers called this a "balanced approach" to translation (p. 176).
Studying Malay to English translation of literary prose, Aveling (2016) analysed the translation of Hikayat Hang Tuah (The epic of Hang Tuah). He identified problems related to genre conventions, cultural concepts and the nature of the original manuscript. However, this formed only a small part of his study, as Aveling (2016) was more concerned with chronicling the life and stylistic growth of the translator of Hikayat Hang Tuah; i.e., the Malay poet and scholar Muhammad Haji Salleh. This approach was also used by Shunmugam (2015) who entirely focused on translations of Malay poetry, analysing the creative style of two translators -C.W. Harrison and J.L. Humphreys.
In summary, the problems that translators face in translating literary prose concern figures of speech, neologisms, implicit meanings and missing text. The most frequent problem is perhaps translating cultural items. The translation procedures, however, vary in different studies, which indicates the different ways the problems are interpreted and solved, and the tendency or preference towards the source or target cultures.
Aveling (2016), study is probably the most related to the present study in terms of the language variable (Malay to English translation), although his focus on the problems and procedures of translating Malay literary prose was partial.

Methodology
This section includes a discussion of the framework used in this study and the data. The procedures were proposed to handle incompatibilities between SL and TL structures.
There are two distinguishable major methods of translation, i.e., Direct Translation (DT) and Oblique Translation (OT). Direct Translation refers to the general word for word quotation of the original message in the TL. The three categories under Direct Translation are Borrowing, Calque and Literal Translation. Borrowing or Loan is the procedure that involves the use of the same word or expression from the ST to the TT. Calque refers to the translator creating or using a neologism in the TL. This is done by adopting the structure of the SL to the TL. Literal Translation refers to the word by word translation from the ST to the TT. This in turn achieves a text in the TL which is as close to the ST and is idiomatic.
The other major method of translation is Oblique Translation, which refers to the translator"s interpretation, elaboration or summary of the explicit contents of the original text. There are four types of Oblique Translation, namely Transposition, Modulation, Correspondence (Equivalence) and Adaptation.
Transposition is the movement of one grammatical category to another category without changing the meaning of the text. In other words, it introduces a change in the grammatical structure of a sentence. Modulation refers to changes in the form of the text which introduce changes to the semantics or perspective of the text. Correspondence or Equivalence, is the procedure which applies a totally different expression to portray the same reality. Names of institutions, interjections, idioms or proverbs can be translated with this technique. Adaptation is a procedure that involves cultural substitution, where a cultural element replaces the ST with one that is better suited for the culture of the TL.
Moreover, Pym (2014) also came up with a list of "prosodic effects", which refer to solutions that operate closer to the sentence level. There are six types, namely Amplification, Reduction, Explicitation, Implicitation, Generalisation and Particularisation. Amplification is when the translation uses more words than the ST to express the same idea. Reduction refers to when the translation uses less words than the ST to portray the same idea. Explicitation is when the translation provide specifications which are only implicit in the ST. Implicitation is the opposite of Explicitation, and is used when terms are regarded as common knowledge in the target culture. Generalisation happens when a specific term is translated to a more general term. Particularisation has the opposite effect of Generalisation, in that a general term is translated to a more specific term.
The data were texts of short stories from the book, Himpunan 366 Cerita Rakyat Malaysia. Out of 366 short stories in this book, three short stories were selected to be translated and analysed: (1)

Results and Discussion
The three short stories were translated from the Malay language (SL) to the English language (TL). The texts were analysed in three different sections, following each story to produce a clear and concise analysis. Each story was analysed in terms of problems and procedures as follows.

Pelanduk Yang Bijak
The first short story that was translated and analysed is Pelanduk yang Bijak. The translation of the title also involved literal translation, i.e., "The Smart Mouse Deer".
Problems: During the translation process, there was a significant problem, as some words or phrases did not have any literal equivalents in the TL, and if literally translated, they would not make sense or the main idea, or author"s intention would not be conveyed to the reader. For example, some of the phrases that could not be literally translated were: "seutas jerat" "kemaslah ikatan" "mulutnya berbuih" "cermatlah kamu" Procedures: Several procedures were used during the translation process to make the TT more understandable in the TL. The first procedure was Amplification, where the word "around" was added in the translation of the Malay word "meronta-ronta". The literal translation would be "thrashed" which does not fully express the idea of the Malay word. However, with the addition of "around", making it "thrashed around", the aggressive action was more accurately translated.
Additionally, the word "was" was added in the translation of "peladang marah". This is because if the sentence was to be literally translated, it would be "angry farmer", which is not the intended idea in the ST. Thus, the addition of "was" in the sentence "The farmer was angry", made the sentence grammatically correct and more sensible in the English language.
The second procedure was Reduction. This was used for the ST segment of "taruk keledek dan taruk ubi kayu", where "taruk", which literally means "shoot", was used twice by the author. When translating this segment, the word "shoot" was used only once as it sufficiently expressed the idea of the mouse deer eating the shoots of the sweet potato and tapioca. Thus, the segment was translated as "sweet potato and tapioca shoot". Other than that, the sentence, "melepaskan diri daripada tali jerat itu", was translated and shortened to "free itself". This is because the two words already expressed the idea that the mouse deer was trying to break free from the trap.
The third procedure was Correspondence. "Kemaslah ikatan", literally meaning "neatly binding", would not make any sense in the context of the story, as it should express the idea that the rope on the mouse deer"s leg becomes tighter with movement. Thus, "the tighter the binding became", was used instead to represent the idea mentioned above. Another phrase was "mulutnya berbuih", literally meaning "its mouth bubbling". This would not make sense as mouths do not bubble, thus the word "foam" was used instead as an equivalent translation to "berbuih" to express the idea more appropriately in the TT.

Peniup Seruling
The second analysed short story was Peniup Seruling, translated to English as Flute Player. The translation of the title did not involve literal translation and is further discussed below in procedures.
Problems: There were a few problems in the translation of this short story: "Aman" and "Mamat" Titles "Orang Kaya" and "Hamba" Polysemous words "Petang" Unnatural in TT context "Peniup", "insaf" and "menghiburkan hati" The first problem was the translation of proper names. There were two proper names in the short story; "Aman" and "Mamat". The second problem was the translation of titles; "Orang Kaya" in which there is no equivalence in the TT and "hamba" that was used to show consideration of status rather than for its literal meaning. The third problem concerned polysemous words in the ST; "petang" which has several meanings in English. The fourth problem concerned words and phrases through which literal translation would result in "awkward" translations, such as "peniup", "insaf" and "menghiburkan hati", which if literally translated, would not make any sense in the TT context.
Procedures: Some translation procedures were applied to solve the translation problems. The first procedure was Loan, in which proper names and titles such as "Orang Kaya" was kept in the TT. This is because there were no equivalents in the TT, thus the words were loaned to maintain the cultural effect in the TT.
The second procedure was Amplification, where the word "once" was added to the translated sentence, "Ada seorang pemuda bernama Aman". If the sentence was literally translated, it would be, "There was a young man named Aman". However, with the addition of "once", the meaning is amplified in "There was once a young man named Aman", as it sounds more natural for English readers. Furthermore, the word "finally" was added to the translation of the sentence, "Usaha dan doa Orang Kaya Mamat dimakbulkan Tuhan". If it were to be literally translated, the sentence would be "The effort and prayers of Orang Kaya Mamat were answered by God". However, with the inclusion of the word "finally", the sentence changed to "Finally, Orang Kaya Mamat"s effort and prayers were answered by God", adding to the literary effect and coherence in the TT.
The third procedure was Reduction, where "Dia terus berusaha mengubati anaknya dengan menjemput beberapa orang dukun lain", was translated to "He kept trying to cure his daughter by asking other medicine men to come to his house". The word "beberapa" ("a few") from the ST was omitted from the translation as the word "men" already denoted plural form.
The fourth procedure was Explicitation, where in "Aman, whose name means peaceful", the name "Aman" was made explicit to describe the character, making it meaningful for TT readers. "Orang Kaya Mamat" was also translated explicitly as "Orang Kaya (a title, meaning Rich Man) Mamat" to explain what "Orang Kaya" means. The phrase "Dia insaf" which could mean regret or realisation, was explicated in the TT with "He realised that he was wrong".
The fifth procedure was Modulation, which was used for the word "hamba", meaning "servant". The word is used by Aman throughout the story. He refers to himself as "servant", not because he is actually Mamat"s servant, but more to show respect towards Mamat"s status. Thus, in the TT, the word "hamba" was changed to neutral pronouns such as "me" and "I". The significance of the word was lost when the perspective changed, but this was necessary to avoid confusion for TT readers. Perhaps this could also be analysed as a "generalisation" procedure, in terms of a specific cultural word being translated into a more general term.
The sixth procedure was Correspondence. The word "peniup" in the title literally means "blower"; however, if the title "Peniup Seruling" was translated literally, it would be "flute blower". This sounds unnatural in English, thus the correspondent term of "player" was used to make the title more coherent; "The Flute Player". "Menghiburkan hati", literally meaning "entertained the heart", would not holistically express the intended idea of the ST. Therefore, the phrase was translated as "comforted his heart", as this would be a more faithful translation.
The seventh procedure was Particularisation. The word "petang" in Malay can equate to afternoon or evening in English. However, based on the context of the short story, the word was translated specifically as "evening".

Seuncang Padi
The third analysed and translated short story was Seuncang Padi. Literal translation was used in the title of the short story; "A Sachet of Paddy".
Problems: As most of the translations from the Malay language to the English language involve literal translation, one significant problem concerned the phrases in the ST that could not be translated literally. Two examples of the phrases are presented in Table 3. "Si miskin" "gendong kain" The first problem was related to the titles of the characters, as they could not be literally translated without losing some meaning. The second problem was due to the lack of equivalence in the English language to portray the phrases correctly.
Procedures: Translation procedures were applied during the translation process to make the TT more truthful/faithful and coherent for the TT readers. The first procedure was Loan in which the word "padi" was loaned in the TT as "paddy" to capture the authenticity of the word and the essence of the story.
The second procedure was Correspondence. The phrase "gendong kain", literally meaning "carrying a cloth", does not represent the author"s intention. Thus, the phrase was translated as "cloth bag", as it would make more sense in the TT.
The third procedure was Amplification. The sentence "berkat nasihat orang tua itu" was translated as "listened and followed the old man"s advice". The addition of the phrase "listened and followed" to express the word "berkat" would make the TT more detailed and comprehensible for TT readers. "To any of his needs" was added in the translation of "menjamu orang tua itu" to provide more explanation of the ST segment.
The fourth procedure was Reduction, which was used for "Kami orang miskin", translated as "We are poor". The literal translation would be "We are poor people". However, "people" was omitted as "We are poor" already expresses the word "orang" in the ST, and there is no need to confuse the readers.
The fifth procedure was Explicitation in "Si miskin". It is regarded as a title in the Malay language, thus it does not have a literal translation in the English language. The word should be either omitted from the translation, or a more general term could be used to express the idea, such as "the husband", or "they" to refer to the couple. This means it could be categorised under the Generalisation procedure as well.
The sixth procedure was Transposition. For example, the sentences "mereka berdua sangat malas bercucuk tanam. Mereka lebih suka membuang masa" were translated as "they are both very lazy as they would rather laze around and waste time than farming". Rather than being translated as short rigid sentences, the two sentences were combined when translated to let the story develop smoothly. The grammatical structure was also changed to make the ST segment more comprehensible in the TT.

Conclusion
The problems the researchers faced in translating the three stories could be summarised as 1) phrases that would be unnatural in the TT if literally translated, 2) polysemous words, 3) proper names, and 4) titles. The first two problems mainly concern structural or semantic differences, while the latter are caused by cultural differences. These two broad categories of problems in translations of literary prose are in line with the findings of the previous studies (Aveling, 2016;Moindjie, 2016).
Literal translation was the most common procedure in the translation of the stories. This is supported by the findings of Guedes et al. (2017). However, there were situations where literal translation would result in "awkward" or unnatural translations. These instances were discussed as problems. Hence, a variety of translation procedures were used. For example, Amplification and Explicitation procedures were used to make the TT more comprehensible to TT readers, and to maintain the truthfulness and sense of the translation. Other procedures, such as Loan retained cultural aspects of the story like names and titles, exposing TT readers to Malay culture.
In conclusion, the problems in translating the three Malay short stories of Pelanduk yang Bijak, Peniup Seruling, and Seuncang Padi into English language were identified, and the translation procedures were used as solutions to those problems.
This study has several implications. The translations of these three short stories help to further introduce Malay culture to the English-speaking audience. This exposition is crucial for nations that intend to build and enhance their literary and cultural values. Translation could be a great means for this purpose in delivering the merits of one"s culture to other cultures.
Translations of Malay stories can be used for pedagogical purposes as they contain moral lessons and are beneficial for teaching moral values (Ali and Mohideen, 2017;Peng and Ishak, 2009;Yaacob and Rahim, 2016). Additionally, English translations of the Malay literary works can also be useful for language teaching and learning purposes (Ali and Mohideen, 2017). Teachers and learners could use literary texts and their translations actively in the classroom to discuss and identify explicit and implicit meanings in short stories, as literature could facilitate learning a foreign or second language.
Last but not the least, these translations and the analyses could be utilised in translator and interpreter training classrooms, particularly for literary translations from Malay to English. Translators and interpreters are actively theorising while translating (Pym, 2014), and literary texts have been widely used by translator trainers. Therefore, comparison of the problems and procedures in literary texts, particularly prose, to find solutions to the problems could improve translators" ability in better theorising and producing "good" translations (Amini et al., 2015), for instance by identifying the problematic segments and overcoming the problems with appropriate procedures, techniques and strategies, as solutions to the identified problems. Novice Malay-English translators should be encouraged to translate more literary works and compare different translations of the same work. A comprehensive profile of the problems and solutions in every genre of Malay literature would facilitate this aim.
This study has limitations, in that only three stories were translated and analysed. More translations and analyses of the texts from the same genre should be performed for better validation and generalisation of the findings.