Lingua inglese III Literary Translation Lecture 1 Introduction

Lingua inglese III: Literary Translation Lecture 1: Introduction to Translation Studies Dr Jacob Blakesley jacob. blakesley@uniroma 1. it

Lesson plan • • • Objectives/texts for the module Group brainstorming: translation Discipline of Translation Studies Translation theory pre-1900 ‘Literary translation’

Module objectives • - to develop students’ understanding of key theoretical approaches to literary translation; - to familiarise students with the specificities of three types of literary translation through the discussion of case studies; - to equip students to combine theoretical understanding with practical observation in their own critical work on translation.

Structure of module • Lectures 1 -9: Theory: translation theory, equivalence, ideology, sociology, world literature, • Lectures 10 -18: fiction translation: Joyce, poetry translation: Dickinson, drama translation: Shakespeare • Guest lecture: Enrico Terrinoni and Fabio Pedone

Texts • Jeremy Munday, Introducing Translation Studies, 4 th edition, Routledge, London, 2016. • Lawrence Venuti, The Translator's Invisibility: A History of Translation (Routledge Translation Classics), Routledge, London, 2016. William Shakespeare, King Lear, any edition Edoardo Sanguineti, La tragedia di re Lear, Il nuovo melangolo, Genova, 2008 • James Joyce, Finnegans Wake, translated by E. Terrinoni and F. Pedone. Testo inglese a fronte. Vol. 3: I-II, Mondadori, Milan, 2017. Emily Dickinson, Tutte le poesie, translated by multiple translators, Mondadori (I meridiani), Milano, 1994. Non-frequentatori: Per i non-frequentatori e' necessaria la lettura di tutti i testi citati e anche il seguente: Jean Delisle and Judith Woodsworth (eds. ), Translators through History, John Benjamins, Amsterdam, 2012

Translation terms • • Source language (SL) [la lingua di partenza] Source text (ST) Target language (TL) [la lingua d’arrivo] Target text (TT)

Group discussion • What is translation? • What does literary translation mean? • What subjects does it cover?

Translation Studies

What is translation? Translation n. 1 the act or an instance of translating. 2 a written or spoken expression of the meaning of a word, speech, book, etc. in another language. (The Concise Oxford English Dictionary quoted in Hatim and Munday 2004: 3)

What is translation? Translation An incredibly broad notion which can be understood in many different ways. For example, one may talk of translation as a process or a product, and identify such sub-types as literary translation, technical translation, subtitling and machine translation; moreover, while more typically it just refers to the transfer of written texts, the term sometimes also includes interpreting. (Shuttleworth and Cowie 1997: 181, quoted in Hatim and Munday 2004: 3 -4)

Translate: from Latin trans (across) + latus (past participle of ferre, to carry)

Translation: definition • “We have here indeed what may very probably be the most complex type of event yet produced in the evolution of the cosmos. ” – I. A. Richards, “Towards a Theory of Translation, ” in Arthur F. Wright, ed. Studies in Chinese Thought (Chicago, 1953), p. 250.

Translation: definition • ‘The process of transferring the meaning of utterances in one language to another. ’ (Eugene Nida)

Translation: definition • ‘Translation is an operation performed on languages: a process of substituting a text in one language for a text in another. (Catford, 1965, p. 1)

Translation: definition • Translation goes from somewhere to somewhere. – Andrew Chesterman, Memes of Translation, 3

Translation categories Roman Jakobson, 1959 • Interlingual translation: ‘translation proper’ – English to Arabic • Intralingual translation: ‘rewording’ – Dante in modern Italian – Shakespeare in modern English • Intersemiotic translation: ‘transmutation’ – Film adaptation of book

Free-vs-literal translation • Normally binary • An exception: metaphrase/paraphrase/imitation (Dryden) • Different definitions of ‘literal’ – Word for word (gloss translation), ungrammatical – Closest possible grammatical translation

Equivalence • Equivalence – Binary (formal / dynamic equivalence) – Partial/whole equivalence – Natural translation – Back translation – Equivalence is an illusion (Snell-Hornby)

The practice of translating is long established, but the discipline of translation studies is new. (Munday 2001: 4)

Low status of translation • Translation is considered to be secondary or derivative.

Low status of translation Translation formed part of other disciplines: • Language teaching and learning • Comparative literature • Contrastive analysis • Applied linguistics

James Holmes (1972/2000) ‘The name and nature of Translation Studies’ Founding statement for the discipline.

Names for the discipline • • • The art of translation The craft of translation The science of translation The theory of translating The theory of translation The philosophy of translation Translation theory Translatology / Traduttologia / Traductologie Translation Studies

James Holmes/Gideon Toury ‘map’

Translation Studies expansion • Proliferation of specialised Translation & Interpreting courses at UG and PG levels, both on commercial and literary T&I. • Conferences • Books • Journals (Babel, Meta, Target, The Translator)

Translation Studies expansion • European publishers (John Benjamins, Multilingual Matters, Routledge and St. Jerome). • Courses • Translation Listserv: www. jiscmail. ac. uk/lists/translatio. html

‘Every text is unique and, at the same time, it is the translation of another text. No text is entirely original because language itself, in its essence is already a translation: firstly, of the non-verbal world and secondly, since every sign and every phrase is the translation of another sign and another phrase. However, this argument can be turned around without losing any of its validity: all texts are original because every translation is distinctive. Every translation, up to certain point, is an invention and as such it constitutes a unique text’ (Octavio Paz, quoted in Bassnett (1991: 38))

Hattim and Munday (2004: 8)

Translation Studies has begun to lose its overly European focus. Translation Studies has developed rapidly in India, in the Chinese and Arabic speaking worlds, in Latin America and in Africa. (Bassnett 1988: xiv)

Translation and linguistics

Translation and Linguistics Clearly, then, any theory of translation must draw upon a theory of language – a general linguistic theory. (Catford 1965: 1)

Translation and Linguistics The relationship can be twofold: • One can apply the findings of linguistics to the practice of translation, • One can have a linguistic theory of translation. (Fawcett 1998: 120)

The study of translation belongs to the field of semiotics. Semiotics is the science that studies signs (systems of signs). SIGN = Signifier (sound) + Signified (concept)

Beyond the notion stressed by the narrowly linguistic approach, that translation involves the transfer of ‘meaning’ contained in one set of language signs into another set of language signs through competent use of the dictionary and grammar, the process involves a whole set of extra-linguistic criteria also. (Bassnett 1998: 14)

Translation is more than the transfer of meaning through competent use of the dictionary and grammar.

Comparative Linguistics Edward Sapir claims that ‘language is a guide to social reality’… Experience, he asserts, is largely determined by the language habits of the community, and each separate structure represents a separate reality … (Bassnett 1988: 13)

Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis This hypothesis has two parts: theory of linguistic relativity and theory of linguistic determinism. The theory of linguistic relativity states that different cultures interpret the world in different ways, and that languages encode these differences. Some cultures will perceive all water as being the same, while others will see important differences between different kinds of water. The theory of linguistic determinism states that not only does our perception of the world influence our language, but that the language we use profoundly affects how we think. Language can be said to provide a framework for our thoughts.

No two languages are ever sufficiently similar to be considered as representing the same social reality. The worlds in which different societies live are distinct worlds, not merely the same world with different labels attached. (Sapir, quoted in Bassnett, 1991: 13)

Untranslatability • Total equivalence does not exist. • Translation Loss and Gain

Untranslatability The linguist J. C. Catford distinguishes two types: • Linguistic (when there is no lexical or syntactical substitute in the TL for an SL item). • Cultural (when there is an absence in the TL culture of a relevant situational feature for the SL text). (Bassnett 1988: 32).

Untranslatability • If absolute equivalence is impossible… • ‘Utopian task’ (Ortega y Gasset) • ‘Poetry by definition is untranslatable’ (Jakobson)

The purpose of translation theory … is to reach an understanding of the processes undertaken in the act of translation and, not, as is so commonly misunderstood, to provide a set of norms for effecting the perfect translation. In the same way, literary criticism does not seek to provide a set of instructions for producing the ultimate poem or novel, but rather to understand the internal and external structures operating within and around a work of art. (Bassnett 1988: 37)

Translation Theory: Romans until 1900

Rome • 1 st translator in the West: Livius Andronicus (285 -204 BC) • 1 st ‘commercial translators’: playwrights Plautus (died 184 BC) and Terence (190 -159 BC). • 1 st translation theorists: Cicero and Horace

Cicero, 106 BC – 43 BC • Cicero: I have translated into Latin two of the most eloquent and most noble speeches in Athenian literature, those two speeches in which Aeschines and Demosthenes oppose each other. And I have not translated like a mere hack (ut interpres), but in the manner of an orator (ut orator), translating the same themes and their expression and sentence shapes in words consonant with our conventions. In so doing I did not think it necessary to translate word for word, but I have kept the force and flavour of the passage. • [De optimo genere oratorum, The best kind of orator]

Horace, 65 BC – 8 BC • “You’ll win private rights to public themes, if you / Don’t keep slowly circling the broad beaten track, / Or, pedantic translator, render them word for word…” • [Ars Poetica]

St. Jerome, 347 -420 • Not only do I admit, but I proclaim at the top of my voice, that in translating from Greek, except from Sacred Scripture, where even the order of the words is of God’s doing, I have not translated word for word, but sense for sense [Letter 57, to Pammachius]

Martin Luther, 1483 -1546 • “We do not have to inquire of the literal Latin, how we are to speak German, as these asses [that is, the literalists] do. Rather we must inquiry about this of the mother in the home, the children on the street, the common man in the marketplace. We must be guided by their language, the way they speak, and do our translating accordingly. That way they will understand it and recognize that we are speaking German to them. ”

Martin Luther, 1483 -1546 • “We hold that a man is justified without the works of law, by faith alone” [Romans, 3. 28]. • “Alone” [allein].

Etienne Dolet, 1509 -1546 1. Translator must perfectly understand the sense and the material of the original author, although he should feel free to clarify obsurities 2. Translator should have a perfect knowledge of both SL and TL, so as not to lessen the majesty of the language 3. Translator should avoid word-for-word renderings 4. Translator should avoid Latinate and unusual forms 5. Translator should assemble and liaise with words eloquently to avoid clumsiness [La manière de bien traduire d'une langue en aultre, The way to translate well from one language to another]

Nicolas Perrot d’Ablancourt, 16061664 • The best Authors contain passages that must needs be altered or clarified…hence I do not always cleave to the words or thoughts of this Author, whilst keeping in sight his purpose, I fit things to our air and manner. Diverse times require not only different words, but different thoughts. I have translated many passages word for word, at least as much as one can do in an elegant Translation; there also passages wherein I have heeded more what should be said, or what I could say, than what he had said. [Preface to Lucian, 1654]

John Dryden, 1631 -1700 • All Translation I suppose may be reduced to these three heads. • First, that of Metaphrase, or turning an Author word by word, and Line by line, from one Language into another. The second way is that of Paraphrase or Translation with latitude, where the Author is kept in view by the Translator, so as never to be lost, but his words are not so strictly follow’d as his sense. The Third way is that of Imitation, where the Translator (if now he has not lost that Name) assumes the liberty not only to vary from the words and sense, but to forsake them both as he sees occasion. [Preface to Ovid’s Epistles]

Samuel Johnson, 1709 -1784 • Of every other kind of writing the ancients have left us models which all succeeding ages have laboured to imitate; but translations may justly be claimed by the moderns as their own. • [The Idler, 1759]

Alexander Fraser Tytler, 1747 -1813 1. The translation should give a complete transcript of the ideas of the original work 2. The style and manner of writing should be of the same character with that of the original 3. The translation should have all the ease of the original composition [Essay on the principles of translation, 1791]

Johann Gottfried von Herder, 17441803 • “The best translator must be the best critic; if only one could run that backwards as well, and bind the two together…Where is the translator who is at once philosopher, philologist, and poet? He shall be the morning star of a new day in our literature… • [On the more recent german literature: fragments, 1766]

Johann Gottfried von Herder, 17441803 • “A language before all translations is like a maiden who has not yet lain with a foreigner and borne a child of mixed blood: for the time being she is still pure and innocent, a true image of the character of her people. She is also poor, obstinate, and unruly; and as she is, so is the original and national language. ”

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 17491832 “There are three kinds of translation. • The first acquaints us with foreign countries on our own terms; a simple prosaic translation is best in this respect. • A second epoch follows in which the translator really only tries to appropriate foreign content and to reproduce it in his own sense, even though he tries to transport himself into foreign situations. • The third epoch, which is to be called the highest and the final one, namely the one in which the aim is to make the translation identical with the original, so that one would not be valued instead of the other, but in the other’s place. ”

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 17491832 • There are two maxims for translation: the one requires that the foreign author be brought over to us so that we can look upon him as our own; the other that we cross over to the foreign and find ourselves inside its circumstances, its modes of speech, its uniqueness. [The Two Maxims]

Madame de Stael, 1766 -1817 • There is no more distinguished service that can be performed for literature than to transport the masterpieces of human intellect from one language to another. There are so few works of the first rate; genius in any genre whatsoever is so rare a phenomenon that if any modern nation were reduced to its own such treasures, it would be forever poor. [On the spirit of translations]

Willhelm von Humboldt, 1767 -1835 • It has often been remarked, and both linguistic research and everyday experience bear this out, that with the exception of expressions denoting material objects, no word in one language is ever entirely like its counterpart in another. Different languages are in this sense only synonymous: Each one puts a slightly different spin on a concept, charges it with this or that connotation, sets it one rung higher or lower on the ladder of affective response. [Introduction to translation of Aeschylus’ Agamemnon, 1816]

Friedrich Schleiermacher, 1768 -1834 • Either the translator leaves the author in peace, as much as possible, and moves the reader towards him; or he leaves the reader in peace, as much as possible, and moves the author towards him. [On the different methods of translating, 1813]

Novalis, 1772 -1801 • A translation is either grammatical, transformative, or mythic. Of these, mythic translations are translations in the noblest style: they reveal the pure and perfect character of the individual work of art. The work of art they give us is not the actual one, but its ideal. Grammatical translations…require a good deal of learning but no more than expository writing skills…Transformative translations…verge constantly on travesty. [from Pollen, 1798]

Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792 -1822) • It were as wise to cast a violet into a crucible that you might discover the formal principle of its colour and odour, as seek to transfuse from one language into another the creations of a poet. The plant must spring again from its seed or it will bear no flower – and this is the burden of the curse of Babel. [The Defense of Poetry]

Edward Fitz. Gerald, 1809 -1883 ‘It is an amusement to me to take what liberties I like with these Persians, who, (as I think) are not Poets enough to frighten one from such excursions, and who really do want a little Art to shape them. ’ (Bassnett 1988: 3)

Robert Browning, 1812 -1889 • If, because of the immense fame of the following tragedy, I wished to acquaint myself with it, and could only do so by the help of a translator, I should require him to be literal at every cost save that of absolute violence to our language. The use of certain allowable constructions which, happening to be out of faily favour, are all the more appropriate to archaic workmanship, is no violence; but I would be tolerant for one – in the case of so immensely famous an original – of even a clumsy attempt to furnish me with the very turn of each phrase in as Greek a fashion as English will bear. [Preface to Translation of Aeschylus’ Agamemnon, 1877]

Richard Burton, 1821 -1890 • It is not pretended that the words of these Hindu tales are preserved to the letter…The merit of the old stories lies in their suggestiveness and their general applicability. I have ventured to remedy the conciseness of their language, and to clothe skeleton with flesh and blood. [Preface to Vikram and the Vampire]

Friedrich Nietzsche, 1844 -1900 • The degree of the historical sense of any age may be inferred from the manner in which this age makes translations and tries to absorb former ages and books. In the age of Corneille and even of the Revolution, the French took possession of Roman antiquity in a way for which we would no longer have courage enough – thanks to our more highly developed historical sense. And Roman antiquity itself: how forcibly and at the same time how naively it took hold of everything good and lofty of Greek antiquity, which was more ancient! How they translated things into the Roman present!

Nietzsche, continued • What was it to them that the real creator had experienced this and that and written the signs of it into his poem? They seem to ask us: Should we not make new for ourselves what is old and find outselves in it? Should we not have the right to breathe our own soul into this dead body? ” They did noti know the delights of the historical sense; what was past and alien was an embarrassment for them; and being Romans, they saw it as an incentive for a Roman conquest. Indeed, translation was a form of conquest. Not only did one omit what was historical; one also added allusions to the present, and struck out the name of the poet, replacing it with one’s own.

Benedetto Croce, 1866 -1952 • Ogni traduzione, infatti, o sminuisce e guasta, ovvero crea una nuova espressione, rimettendo la prima nel crogiuolo e mescolandola con le impressioni personali di colui che si chiama traduttore. Nel primo caso l'espressione resta sempre una, quella dell'originale, essendo l'altra più o meno deficiente, cioè non propriamente espressione: nell'altro, saranno, si, due, ma di due contenuti diversi. Brutte fedeli o belle infedeli… – [The Aesthetic as the science of expression and of the linguistic in general, 1903]

Literary Translation

What is literary translation? • ‘The translation of texts which are regarded as literary in the source culture’. • ‘The translation of a text—in principle, any text, of any type whatsoever –in such a way that the product is acceptable as a literary text in the recipient culture’ – Gideon Toury, Descriptive Translation Studies— and beyond, 199.

Literature, cultural institution • ‘The essential difference between the two senses of ‘literary translation’ stems from the fact that literature does not boil down to a body of texts, much less so a repertoire of features which allegedly have something inherently ‘literary’ about them which should therefore be realizable by any literature. Rather, literature is first and foremost a kind of cultural institution’. – Toury, 201.

Three types of translation (Toury) • Linguistically-motivated translation – Well-formed in terms of syntax, grammar, lexicon – No conformity to any target model of text formation • Textually-dominated mode of translation – Well-formed in terms of syntax, grammar, lexicon – conformity to text formation, but not to literary models • Literary translation

Acceptability • ‘it is not acceptance (or reception) which is the key notion, but acceptability’ – Toury, 203.

All writing is translation • No texts are original • Learning to speak means translating meanings into words (Chesterman, 9) • We translate every day in speech • When we read an author, we translate him in our own minds (e. g. , Dante, Shakespeare)