KORANEN OCH ÖVERSÄTTNING. En historisk-litterär studie

Abstract

This essay aims to study three Swedish translations of the Qurʾān; Crusenstople from 1843, Zetterstéen from 1917 and Bernström from (1998)2005, and to make a comparision between them with the focus on how each of them has handled the litteral phenomenon hapax in sūrat al-Nisāʾ. The questions that the essay aims to deal with are first whether there really is a difference between the three translations as far as the phenomenon hapax is concerned, and second whether theese possible differences affect the readers understanding of the message of the text to the degree that it poses a problem. The conclusion that is reach within the frame of this essay is that the main differences between the three translations depend on their different chioces of translation methods and hence that it is not possible to say that one of them is more correct than the other, considering their different puroposes with and techniques for the translation process. The essay can not find that the difficulty in the translation of the litteral phenomenon hapax poses a problem as far as the hapaxes that are dealt with in this essay are concerned.