Comparing Two Translations of Abdel-Tawab Youssef’s A Biography of Prophet Mohammad Peace Be upon Him in Twenty Stories: A Skopos Functional Approach

The present paper is a comparative study probing the two translations of Abdel- Tawab Youssef’s (2008) book حياة محمد صلى الله
عليه و سلم فى عشرين قصة the first by Calderbank in (2010) and the second by Enani in (2017a), using Nord’s (2005, 2018) text analysis, looping model. The source text (ST) is intended for young readers, as a biography of the Prophet related by animals and objects. It has referential, expressive and appellative functions
exhibiting literary ingenuity. Applying Nord’s functional extratextual and intratextual factors proves that the two translators adopt dissimilar translational strategies, resulting in variant target texts (TTs) with divergent skopoi. Calderbank adopts a documentary, literal type of translation creating a market-oriented text, greatly echoing the ST with rather simple diction and mostly paratactic constructions, targeting mainly young children, however with less originality and amusement. Enani adopts an instrumental, well schemed type of translation resulting in an ingenious target language-oriented text, with rather elevated diction and mostly hypotactic constructions, targeting mainly elder, more mature readers withchildren best seller, while Enani’s TT skopos is creating a mediating channel between the TR and the SC, in cross cultural translational communicative action notable resourcefulness and inventiveness. Thus, Calderbank’s TT skopos is empowering the hit of an amusing