Narrative intelligence represented in translational success: issues of coherence, gaps, complexity and aesthetics

Abstract

Among the recent trends in researching translation and interpreting, the psychological aspects of translation process and the translator’s cognitive state are swiftly developing and thriving trends among the scholars in the field. This study sought to implement this psychological approach in translation studies and investigated the possible effect of the cognitive concept of Narrative Intelligence (NI) on successful performance in translation. Over one hundred Iranian undergraduate English translation students were invited and 104 volunteers participated in the study. This qualitative study traces and contrasts the narrative features in translation of two groups of high and low NI English translation students studying their senior year in Iranian universities. The results showed that the translation performance of high NI group reflected a closer congruency with narrative features than that of the low NI group. The findings of the study relating to a) narrative coherence, b) the degree of text complexity/simplicity, c) gaps in translation, and d) creative/aesthetic merit are presented and discussed.