Od Elišky k Alence - Čtyři české překlady Alenky v říši divů Lewise Carrolla – Rambousek Jiří (2021)

Carroll's Alice in Wonderland, a phenomenon of world literature, was first published in English in 1865 and in Czech in 1902 and 1904. However, Alice was not yet named Alice at that time. In the translations by Jan Váňa and Jaroslav Houdek, she was called Eliška and Evička. Both of these Czech versions have largely faded into obscurity. The book became truly well-known in our country only in 1931 with a new translation by Jaroslav Císař, who named the main character Alice. Since then, it has been published in Císař's version, and later, from 1961, also in the translation by the couple Aloys and Hana Skoumal. Now, for the very first time, a unique parallel edition of the original Carroll's Alice in Wonderland and four traditional Czech translations (Váňa, Houdek, Císař, Skoumal) is being released. The comparison of the original with the Czech translations is accompanied by an informed detailed commentary on selected passages in the text, both of the original (meanings, contemporary cultural and literary contexts) and of the individual translations (interpretative tendencies, inaccuracies and their sources, significant errors in some editions). Thus, readers will be presented with a fascinating world of words and their meanings, translation possibilities and their differences, various qualities, and also different understandings of the original text.