Las Dificultades de Traducir el Humor: Astérix le Gaulois - Asterix the Gaul - Asterix el Galo.

Abstract

The process of translating humour, if already far from easy, verges on the sophisticated when such humour is based on cultural and linguistic allusion; in the case of the Asterix series, the worldwide success of versions in various languages is due to the personal craft of translators in conveying translatable aspects and even creating new jokes. This essay reviews the difficulties encountered and the techniques used in the Spanish and English versions of Astérix chez les Bretons and Astérix chez les Belges; we shall attempt to prove the superiority of the English translation compared to the Spanish one, and shall also list a number of fragments which, due to an extensive usage of puns, could be considered as an improvement on the French original.