Many phraseological expressions singled out by V. Vinogradov as unities may reflect national features of the SL (reference to traditions, customs, events, geographical position). Being nationally distinct cannot have in the TL traditionally established equivalents or loan variants. As a result, most of them may have more than one version in the TL. It may be either a regular sense-to-sense variant (an interlinear-type translation) or an artistic literary version with the expressiveness, the picturesqueness.
There must be acknowledged at least 2 main levels of translating the national idioms:
1) the level of the interlinear rendering, i. e., sense-to-sense translation only;
2) the literary /artistic level, which not only the sense but also the expressiveness, the vividness and the aphoristic nature of the idioms should possibly be conveyed as well.
Faithful translatoin of national idioms/phraseologisms is mostly achieved via deliberate transformations performed first at the interlinear level and then at literary level:
- he, that doesn't respect, isn't respected: хто інших не поважає - сам поваги не має; поважатимеш інших - поважатимуть і тебе; the wind cannot be prevented from blowing.
Transformations become absolutely inevitable when the English idioms contain a passive voice structure, the introductory it/there, or some other analytical constructions (with the auxiliary verbs do, does).