Human and machine translation of occasionalisms in literary texts

Abstract Literary occasionalisms, new words coined by writers with a particular poetic aim in view, often pose great challenge for translators. Given recent advances machine translation (MT), could literary translators benefit from MT when it comes to the of occasionalisms? We address this question considering work Austria’s most important nineteenth-century comedy writer, Johann Nestroy (1801–1862). compare how human and two generic neural systems (Google Translate, DeepL) translated occasionalisms (compounds, derivations, blends) Nestroy’s play Der Talisman into English. While largely refrained creating target expressions, generated number viable coinages, them literal procedures. In an interactive human-computer environment, using output as repository which retrieve novel solutions or derive inspiration might open up avenues practice translation.