The Shadow Over Innsmouth is a book written by H.P Lovecraft and is one of the first books in the genre of cosmic horror. The book has been translated several times by different translators from English to Japanese. Finding equivalence between two languages is always a challenge when translating, especially in Lovecraft’s case, whose texts are full of archaic expressions and words which are unique to the time and culture in which the book was written. Acknowledging these facts, this study aims to compare translation of religious metaphors used in the book. Lovecraft has a very distinctive view on religion that can be seen by the usage of religious metaphors in his texts. By comparing translations made by three different translators, this study shows different strategies and approaches when translating something as culturally sensitive as religion. By analyzing the metaphors, it becomes clear that there are contextual and intertextual levels that also must be considered when translating Lovecraft’s works. Results of this study show how different strategies and approaches affected the text and what kind of difficulties the translators had.

This thesis examines the use of religious metaphor as it applies to food in two literary works by Diana Abu-Jaber. First, The Language of Baklava, a culinary memoir published in 2005, reveals aspects of cultural identity and memory through food and metaphor. Second, Abu-Jabers most recent novel, Birds of Paradise, explores complex family relationships enacted through metaphor. The analyses of textual representations of food rely on a theoretical framework that includes a cultural anthropological perspective, as well as a rhetorical perspective, and uses textual analysis to examine metaphor and food narratives in literature. / Graduation date: 2012