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The paper attempts to list the dilemmas proper names present to literary translators based on the author’s own and others’ literary translations. There is no consistent rule governing whether or not to translate proper names in Hungarian. Generally names embedded in the text are dealt with according to the client’s requirements, the context and the literary translator’s resources. This is the case even if a name does not simply serve as an identifier, to separate an entity unambiguously, but has significant meaning, refers to something important or contributes to the overall ambience. There are arguments for and against the translation of proper names; using the originals is timesaving, cost-efficient and makes reference to the original easier, while translation provides the reader with extra information, to say nothing of the ’magical vibes’ of the name, the evoked feeling of unfamiliarity or familiarity, the atmosphere produced by it. As every case differs, a translator must take all significant factors into consideration and make a decision that will greatly influence the reception of a literary work. Although it may seem logical to expect consistency within a work, series or oeuvre, the paper attempts to show why consistency in dealing with proper names is something a literary translator aspires to, but never fully achieves.

The paper provides an onomastic examination of the fantasy book series entitled A Song of Ice and Fire by George R. R. Martin, mainly focusing on personal and animal names. The author explores the system and rules behind name giving in the novels, with respect to the different characters and societies that appear in the story. The paper also seeks to find similarities to and differences from the relevant aspects of real life name giving practices, such as dynastic name giving or bynaming. The magical powers of names play an important role in the novel sequence. The possibility, precision and motivation of translating personal and animal names is also treated in the paper. Finally, the author gives a short, thus incomplete overview of the potential in a deeper onomastic examination of the A Song of Ice and Fire series.

The aim of this study is to present the problems that may be raised by the translation of proper names on different levels of context, and the methods with which translators can solve these issues. To this end, using the framework of relevance theory, the author first clarifies the concepts of translation, meaning and context. Section 4 attempts to define a proper name and then, comparing the semantic structures of proper names and common names, proposes that there is no qualitative semantic difference between the two categories. Consequently, the translation of proper names essentially raises the same questions as the translation of common names, thus the translation operations applied to them must be selected with as much regard to the context as in the case of common names. Section 5 defines four translation operations called transfer, translation (proper), substitution, and modification. Following which Section 6 illustrates their uses in solving translation problems on various levels of context through examples.

Recently prestigious local publishing houses have been publishing a growing number of geographical descriptions of Hungary in English. While these publications are of outstanding design, the authors do not use the names of geographical objects in Hungary in a standardized manner. As a result, the foreign reader may find distinct variants of the same name within the same book. This can encumber the interpretation of information, and the identification of certain geographical features on maps. The author examines the peculiarities of naming lakes in Hungarian and in English while exploring the spelling rules behind the name forms in both languages. The author then compares several examples taken from Hungary with the names of lakes in English-speaking countries. Finally, the author proposes that the English standardized equivalents of the Hungarian names for lakes should be used more consistently.