Kreatives Übersetzen von Idiomen. Ein didaktisches Experiment

The present contribution aims at investigating the interrelation of creativity and level of competence in students of translation science. In order to find out whether creativity increases or decreases with the acquisition of more advanced competencies and skills in text analysis, translation and translation assessment, a didactic experiment was devised that involved students from different courses (both at Bachelor’s and Master’s level). The experiment focused on the translation of idiomatic expressions, which often pose a challenge for translators and are supposed to enhance creativity. The author first classified the translations according to a typology of correspondences, in order to assess the students’ degree of basic creativity. In a second step, the quality of the provided solutions was judged, in order to establish the degree of what has been termed successful creativity. The results are encouraging, although further studies are certainly needed.