Fumetti e traduzione multimediale. Tra codice verbale e codice visivo

Comics translation is seen as a type of medium-constrained translation, in which the translation of the written text is constrained by the visual text. This article considers exclusively the implications for transaltion of the interaction between the verbal and the visual code. The interpretation of idiomatic expressions and puns is often dependant of the interdependance of the two codes. Verbal expressions such as onomatopoeias, for instance, are often based on the communicative force of the graphic signs as well as on their being part of the visual text. After a short comparison of film and comics translation a number of examples are presented, in which translation choices with regards to the verbal narration are strongly constrained by the surrounding visual context. Instances of the “grammar of comics” such as visual puns, visual metaphors and onomatopoetic expressions, and the implications they have on possible translation strategies are discussed.