Brilliance in Translation # 1

 

There is the widespread idea that translation is a merely mechanical process that has little to do with creative writing and that its product is always deficient, a pale copy of a better original. This conception is based on the belief that a translation into Italian (or any other language) of, say, Hemingway, should aspire to be ‘what Hemingway would have written if he had written in Italian’. The brutal truth, however, is that Hemingway did not write in Italian and if he had, he wouldn’t have been Hemingway and would have written different books. Such a goal for translation appears, therefore, to be completely pointless and to judge a translation on this basis would be equally pointless.

In contrast to all that is said and written to highlight the shortcomings of translation, the posts in this series will highlight the brilliance of it, picking out examples where apparently insurmountable difficulties have been, in my opinion, overcome with exceptional grace and creativity.

 

The first example of brilliance in translation is an extract from Maurizia Balmelli’s translation into Italian of Cormac McCarthy’s Suttree. I came across it during a translation course in Turin. The English is:

‘Below him ravens rode up like things of wire and crepe weightless on the updrafts. They rocked and wheeled and slid away over the high vast emptiness with lost windmuted croaks.’

Anyone with some knowledge of Italian will appreciate the difficulties these few lines pose. First of all the variety of verbs that denote movement, which Italian cannot easily match. Secondly the brevity of the English (only two words contain more than two syllables), a feature so alien to the Italian language. Finally and crucially that single word ‘updrafts’, brief and clear in English, but which in Italian inevitably becomes the heavy and rather meteorological ‘correnti ascensionali’.

Maurizia Balmelli’s skillful translation is:

‘Sotto di lui i corvi si abbandonavano alle correnti ascensionali come cose di crespo e fil di ferro senza peso. Oscillavano e volteggiavano e scivolavano via sulle vaste altitudini del nulla con gracchi smarriti smorzati dal vento.’

Reading it, it almost seems easy.

 

You can read an interview with Maurizia Balmelli (in Italian) on the subject of her translation of Suttree here.

Enter Theory

What is theory?

Many translators are suspicious of theory and I think this is due partly to the fear of having someone telling them how to do their job. I do not think, however, that this is what theory tries to do.

So what, then, is theory? I have found the clearest explanation of what theory actually is in the words of Jean Boase-Beier. She defines a theory (of translation or of anything else) as ‘a picture of the world’ (2011:74), only one of the possible ways of looking at the object of our interest. She also points out that theories are not ‘static models’ but rather pictures that  are ‘regularly readjusted’ as they come into contact with other theories or with practical experience (Boase-Beier 2011:74). A strategy, on the other hand, is a ‘plan of action’ which is based on a particular theory and which can or cannot be put into action (Boase-Beier 2011:78). So if we take the well-known work of Venuti, we could take his theory to be one that ‘in the tradition of Poststructuralism and Postcolonialism, emphasizes difference over universality’ (Boase-Beier 2011:76), whereas ‘foreignization’ is a translation strategy based on such a theory.

So theories are not strategies but simply different ways of looking at translation. Each theory focuses only on certain aspects of translation and therefore it is important to bear in mind that no one theory can give a complete picture of translation. It is precisely for this reason that for each theory that holds a particular view there seems to be at least one other that contradicts it. However, one thing that seems evident to me is that the more theories you engage with, the more complete a picture of what translation is and how it works you will have. In my opinion translators – like all professionals – should know the ins and outs of their discipline. This means knowing what is going on, not just in translation practice but also in translation theory, particularly since, as we shall see in a moment, theory can affect practice.

Can theory affect practice?

In my opinion the answer is very simple: yes. Once again, Venuti’s work provides the perfect example. The Translator’s Invisibility started off as a piece of academic work but certain ideas expressed in it have been taken up by the practical world of translation and have concretely affected it. Not everything Venuti said has been recognized as important for translation practice. Indeed practice has probably picked the only element which it felt, at the time, had some relevance for it: the professional invisibility of the figure of the translator. Compensation fees, contractual conditions and social status have all fallen under the scrutiny not only of single individuals but also of organizations and newborn unions. I think it is safe to say that Venuti’s work and its discussion within the translation community have inspired many initiatives of organizations such as CEATL (its 2008 survey Comparative Income of Literary Translators in Europe, its forthcoming survey on the cultural visibility of literary translators, its collection of book covers on which the translator’s name is mentioned) and Biblit (its 2011 survey on translation fees in Italy). In addition, I also believe that practice is now ready to take a step further and consider other implications of Venuti’s work and of more recent theoretical studies – but more about this in a later post. This one is about  theory, not invisibility.

Translation is such a broad subject and so much has been written about it that, for someone who wants a general idea of what the different theories of translation may be, it can be hard to know where to start. There are many introductory manuals to translation studies but I would recommend A Critical Introduction to Translation Studies, by Jean Boase-Beier, because it is up to date (both in terms of publication date and in terms of its content and approach), clearly written and it actually makes for an enjoyable read.

References

Boase-Beier, J. 2011, A Critical Introduction to Translation Studies, London: Continuum.

Venuti, L. 2008, The Translator’s Invisibility. A History of Translation, London: Routledge.

Incontro con Edith Grossman

“Why Translation Matters”: conferme e smentite tra teoria e pratica

Il mio resoconto di un intervento di Edith Grossman, sul blog di Tradurre. È stato diviso in due parti, non perdetevene una!

I parte

II parte

Una contraddizione in termini

 

Il titolo di questo blog può sembrare un ossimoro. La teoria, per definizione, non è pratica. Nel mondo della traduzione il divario tra l’ambito teorico è un fatto noto che i teorici amano discutere ma di cui i traduttori professionisti, comprensibilmente, si curano poco. La mia esperienza mi ha portato a entrare in contatto sia con il panorama traduttivo italiano, a mio avviso orientato verso la pratica, sia con il panorama traduttivo inglese che, invece, mi pare più orientato verso la teoria. Mi ritengo fortunata di aver vissuto questa duplice esperienza ed essa mi ha insegnato l’imprescindibile valore di entrambi i poli dell’ossimoro.

Questo blog si occuperà sia di aspetti pratici della traduzione che di questioni teoriche, tentando, per quanto possibile, di mettere gli uni in relazione alle altre e di fornire una visione davvero completa del panorama traduttivo anglo-italiano. Il blog è diretto a chiunque abbia un interesse per le lingue, la traduzione e la letteratura ma, forse proprio per la sua natura ibrida, si addice soprattutto a un pubblico di studenti di traduzione e aspiranti traduttori.