This paper is an introduction to a field mentioned above. It tries to
explain how to translate from similar languages when the translator
focusses on the expressive, instead of the cognitive function of language.
It also tries to define a specificity of drama translation: the stress is on
the “physical” level of the translation so that the most important thing is
ease of pronunciation, and not the “optical” correspondence between
original and translated text.
Theater plays were often translated in Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and
Herzegovina and Montenegro from the Slovenian and Macedonian
languages; in Slovenia from Serbo-Croatian and Macedonian; in
Macedonia from Serbo-Croatian and Slovenian. This paper tries to
indentify typical errors in one Slovene translation of a Serbian drama
Koštana; it also tries to answer the question of status of Serbian, Croat,
and Macedonian drama on Slovene theater stages, and to put together its
bibliography.
