Translating Ghazala’s Al-Mutalazimāt Al-Majāzīyah into Malay: A Case Study of Naguib Mahfouz’s Aulād Ḥāratinā

Abstract

Literary translation between Arabic and Malay presents unique linguistic and cultural challenges, particularly concerning idiomatic collocations (al-Mutalazimāt al-Majāzīyah). This study investigates the translation of figurative expressions in Naguib Mahfouz's allegorical novel Aulād Ḥāratinā (Children of the Alley) into Malay. Grounded in Ghazala's (2007) classification of al-Mutalazimāt al-Majāzīyah and Newmark's (1988) translation procedures, this qualitative content analysis evaluates five selected samples from the novel. The study reveals that the existing Malay translation frequently employs normalization, free translation, and rhetorical omission, leading to a significant loss of the source text's aesthetic and cultural imagery. By proposing alternative translations utilizing dynamic and semantic equivalence, this paper demonstrates that the rich figurative repertoire of the Malay language can adequately capture Mahfouz's complex idiomatic, proverbs, and similes. The findings emphasize the necessity for literary translators to balance semantic accuracy with cultural resonance to preserve the pragmatic force of the original Arabic text.