What is actually lost in translation?

Literary translation represents a special domain within other types of translation. Despite the fact that all them have as their aim re-relating the same semantic content of the source text using a different language, the multi-layered semantic of the literary text impose a task to the translator that is widely more complex than any other forms of translation imply. This is already a well-known fact, and the rising number of studies on the theory of translation are a good proof for it. One of the reoccurring themes of these theories is the difficult balance between the so-called domestication and foreignization of the source text into the target one, the problem growing towards unsolvable but for the use of the translator’s intuition, as the
gap between the cultural frame and the structure of the two languages is greater. This is a highly important problem, and the way the translator can actually use his intuition in a proficient form is still unsolved. Therefore, another concept concerning translation has been coming up into the discussion, which is the idea of competence, concerning the translator. As it though should be, most of the studies on translation focus on linguistic equivalence issues. However, there seems to be a lack in the competence formation area, when it comes to the cultural and literary positioning and understanding, especially concerning the target language environment. Most of the translations are made by translators whose mother tongue
coincide with the target language. We therefore consider that serious studies on literature and culture for both the source and the target environments are needed, and this presentation is meant as an invitation and proposal for a collaboration between different fields of research with the aim of attaining the best variants of translation possible.