ACCORDING TO THE COLLINS COBUILD ENGLISH Language Dictionary (1987:1555) translation 'is a piece of writing or speech that has been translated from a different language'. This definition does not help if the word 'translated' is not translated to the reader. However much dictionaries try to explain the act of translating, its definition seems to be beyond the sentence. The above cited explanation does not seem to wholly embody the complexity of a translator's work. As Bassnett (1980) states, the translator not only faces problems with the lexical selection of a target language (TL), but also with the interpretation of a source language (SL) text. The translator must work with the SL text so that the TL version approximates the SL version in terms of meaning, style and form. Bassnett also claims that "exact translation is impossible" (p. 22) due to a series of factors such as different cultures, societies and linguistic systems, amongst others . On the face of it, it is possible to suggest that the SL text considerably constrains the TL text and, therefore, that the translator's work to achieve a desirable similarity is an extremely complex task.
