This book examines the possibilities of a science of translation and aims at the establishment of a unified methodology. The first chapter discusses textual analysis as part of translation along with critical opinions, the history of translation and problems of translatability. Special attention is devoted to the concept of 'total translation' in connection with language and text on the one hand, and literary trends such as Russian symbolism on the other. The second chapter attempts to construct a universal model of translation, with the help of which it is then argued that various types of intertextual relations can be accounted for. Various types of translation are then classified and the concept of 'translation method' is formulated. In the following chapter translation as a 'metatext' is analysed in the context of other types of metatext which together form a literature. In a final instance, some problems of intersemiotic translation are also discussed within the framework of the same universal model of translation.