Lingua inglese III: Literary Translation

1. Lingua inglese III: Literary Translation Lecture 1: Introduction to Translation Studies Dr Jacob Blakesley jacob.blakesley@uniroma1.it

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

3. 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.

4. 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

5. Texts • Jeremy Munday, Introducing Translation Studies, 4th 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 editionEdoardoSanguineti, La tragedia di re Lear, Il nuovomelangolo, Genova, 2008 James Joyce, Finnegans Wake, translated by E. Terrinoni and F. Pedone. Testoinglese 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 tuttiitesticitati e ancheilseguente:Jean Delisle and Judith Woodsworth (eds.), Translators through History, John Benjamins, Amsterdam, 2012 

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

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

8. Translation Studies

9. What is translation? Translationn.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)

10. 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)

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

12. 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.

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

14. 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)

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

16. Translation categoriesRoman Jakobson, 1959 • Interlingualtranslation: ‘translation proper’ • English to Arabic • Intralingual translation: ‘rewording’ • Dante in modern Italian • Shakespeare in modern English • Intersemiotic translation: ‘transmutation’ • Film adaptation of book

17. 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

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

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

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

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

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

23. 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

24. James Holmes/Gideon Toury ‘map’

27. 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)

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

29. ‘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))

30. Hattim and Munday (2004: 8)

31. 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)

32. Translation and linguistics

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

34. 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)

35. 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)

36. 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)

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

38. 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)

39. Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis This hypothesis has two parts: the theory of linguistic relativity and the 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.

40. 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)

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

42. 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).

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

44. 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)

45. Translation Theory: Romans until 1900

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

47. 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 (utinterpres), 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 optimogenereoratorum, The best kind of orator]

48. 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]

49. 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]

50. 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.”