Linguistic asymmetries as ann observation place of Polish-German literary translations

Genuine asymmetries (i.e. differences in the field of langue as e.g. the missing 'morphological' article in Polish) and a number of asymmetric conditions in terms of parole are among the most informative focal points in Polish-German literary translations and, accordingly, also in comparative analyses of Polish source and one or several German target texts. Asymmetries are especially relevant to ascertaining different degrees and types of translatory achievement, when they coincide with poetics of grammar (e.g. the functionalisation of the - optional - copula jest, the actualization of grammatical meaning of both verbal aspects as poetic device) or when they belong to personal aesthetics of an author. This study discusses translatory challenge connected with the missing article, the copula jest, the reflexive pronoun sobie, the grammatical meaning of the verbal aspects, interjections, diminutives and other instances of Polish-German asymmetry. The examples are taken from narrative prose, poetry and theatre plays by some of the most prominent authors of the 20(th) century: St. I. Witkiewicz, W. Gombrowicz, S. Mrozek, Zb. Herbert, Wislawa Szymborska, and T. Rozewicz. In some instances, translators can only try to reproduce certain amounts of the aesthetic sense offered in the Polish source text, in other instances, the target language even allows for creative translation.