Stylistic Devices and Creativity in Popular Science Headlines 317more instances of alliteration (22 to 2 in Polish). Moreover, in English we
also have phrasal verbs (5 cases), sayings (4 cases), word play (4 cases)
and one stimulating or rhetorical question. The comparatively frequent use
of alliteration in the English material is determined by the phonetic nature
of the English language which has more homophones.
Finally, one can also say that the headlines listed in the table of
contents are short, more explicit and more informative rather than implicit,
expressive or appellative, compared to the ones that open single articles in
the body of the magazine. This is true for both language versions, but
especially for the Polish one.
Stylistic devices in the translation of National Geographic
headlines in the body of the magazine
In this section all the articles published in National Geographic that have
been translated into Polish in the time period specified (from January 2013
to December 2014) will be taken into account. It has already been
mentioned in the previous sections that 91 such articles have been
identified. It is noteworthy that the translation of the stylistic devices
enumerated in the previous sections such as: novel metaphors, conventional
metaphors, alliteration, word play, sayings, stimulating questions will be
investigated. In the translation process these stylistic devices may be
preserved or conversely, they may be substituted by everyday expressions
or register. There are also cases where there are no stylistic devices in the
original version, but they appear in the Polish version.
In the following examples 3 conventional metaphors present in the
English version are translated as conventional metaphors in the target
language version: Rain forest for sale – Puszcza na sprzedaĪ (where the
conventional metaphor is ‘for sale’ or ‘na sprzedaĪ’), Quicksilver – ĩywe
srebro, Big fish – Gruba ryba.
In some cases, however, conventional metaphors can be substituted by
Polish sayings, for example: Breaking the silence – Wáadza siĊ wyĪywi or
by novel metaphors in Polish: Rising seas – Wysokie morza and The new
face of hunger – Ameryka chce jeĞü (literally, ‘America wants to eat’). It
may happen that there is no conventional metaphor in English as in the
headline Now you see it, but it is used in the Polish headline Korea
Póánocna zza kulis (where ‘zza kulis’ means ‘from behind the backstage’)
or the other way round, for example: The weed that won the West – Zielsko
na Dzikim Zachodzie (where the verb ‘to win’ makes the English headline
more metaphorical) and Cowboys on the edge – Kowboje z kraĔca Ğwiata
(where, ‘on the edge’ may mean ‘in danger of extinction’ or ‘at the end of