Is it a He or a She? Gender Differences in Italian Translations of Oscar Wilde’s Stories for Children

Rowena Coles

doi:10.2478/v10320-012-0041-6

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Is it a He or a She? Gender Differences in Italian Translations of Oscar Wilde’s Stories for Children

Gender Studies

Volume 11 (2012): Issue 1 (November 2012)

By: Rowena Coles

Open Access

|Feb 2013

Abstract

This paper examines how the gender of personification is affected in Italian translations of Oscar Wilde’s children’s stories. It shows how the conflict between natural and grammatical gender may be problematic for the translator and reveals how Italian children, who believe they are reading a text identical to the original, are in fact reading a somewhat different story.

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