3L: Language, Linguistics, Literature ® The Southeast Asian Journal of English Language Studies Vol 28(1), March 2022 http://doi.org/10.17576/3L-2022-2801-12 167 Indirect Translation and the Influence of the Mediating Text: The Case of Le Petit Prince in Malay HASLINA HAROON School of Humanities, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Malaysia haslina@usm.my ABSTRACT An indirect translation is a translation that is carried out based on a text which is also a translation. The source text for the indirect translation is therefore the text that mediates between the indirect translation and the original or ultimate source text. Considering the fact that an indirect translation is twice removed from the ultimate source text, a pertinent issue arising from this practice is whether there are differences between the indirect translation and the ultimate source text because of the use of the mediating text. This paper aims to explore this issue by comparing and analysing three texts: a French source text entitled Le Petit Prince, the English mediating text entitled The Little Prince, and an indirect translation in Malay entitled Putera Cilik. A comparison of the three texts first necessitates the mapping of each sentence of the Malay translation to its counterparts in English and in French. An analysis is then carried out on the sets of texts to determine whether there are discrepancies between the Malay translation and the French text. The findings show that generally, the Malay translation closely reflects the French source text. Where discrepancies do exist between the Malay translation and the French source text due to adjustments made in the translation, the English mediating text does play a role. It is, however, not necessarily the sole contributing factor, as some of the discrepancies can also be attributed to the translator of the target text. Keywords: indirect translation; mediated translation; mediating text; literary translation; The Little Prince INTRODUCTION Besides exploring the most common mode of translation in which translation is carried out directly from the source language into the target language, research within the field of Translation Studies has also looked into other modes of translation. Among them are self-translation (Al-Harahsheh & Al-Omari, 2019), re-translation (Ivaska & Huuhtanen, 2020), pseudo-translation (Verbeke, 2010), and back translation (Sun, 2014). Another mode of translation, which is currently receiving considerable attention from scholars in the field, is indirect translation. Indirect translation is defined as “the translation based on a source (or sources) which is itself a translation into a language other than the language of the original, or the target language” (Kittel & Frank, 1991, p. 3). It is “a translation of a translation” (Assis Rosa et al., 2017, p. 113). Indirect translation can thus be seen as a product resulting from a process which involves “a chain of (at least) three texts, ending with a translation made from another translation: (original) ST > intermediate text (IT) > (end) TT”, (Ringmar, 2012, p. 141), where “ST” indicates the source text, “IT” the intermediate or mediating text and “TT” the target text. Indirect translation has made it possible for readers to gain access to works which they otherwise would not have been able to reach because of linguistic limitations. Readers in Spain, for instance, were introduced to Chinese literature in the 20th and 21st century through the translation of Chinese works into Spanish via English and French (Ringmar, 2007). In China, the use of English as the mediating language made it possible for the drama of Henrik Ibsen to be