Translation in French and Franc Op Hone Literature and Film

FRENCH LITERATURE SERIES
Since 1974 the French Literature Series has been published in conjunction with the annual French Literature Conference, sponsored by the Department of Languages, Literatures, and Cultures of the University of South Carolina, Columbia, South Carolina, USA. In addition to the scholarly papers selected for publication by the Editorial Board, it also accepts notes on the conference topic. The conference, which is scheduled for the end of March or beginning of April each year, focuses on a pre-announced topic. The deadline for submitting conference papers is November 1; for scholarly notes, the following May 1. Submissions should be prepared according to the MLA Handbook and should not exceed fifteen pages (25 lines per page, double-spacing, with ample margins). Reading time at the Conference is limited to twenty minutes. Scholarly notes should not exceed eight pages. Authors should submit two copies of their contribution, accompanied by return postage if they wish their paper to be returned. The essays appearing in the French Literature Series are drawn primarily from the Conference papers. Authors are informed of the inclusion of their papers in the volume when their papers are accepted for the Conference. Exceptionally, FLS does publish outstanding contributions from authors not participating in the Conference. To be considered for inclusion in the volume, such essays should not exceed twenty typed pages. A style sheet is available upon request or online at
<http://www.cas.sc.edu/dllc/fren/Events.Activities/flc/Style%20guide.pdf>.
All communications concerning the Conference should be addressed to the Conference Director, and those concerning the French Literature Series to the Editor, Department of Languages, Literatures, and Cultures, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC, 29208, USA. The French Literature Series is published by Editions Rodopi. Communications concerning standing orders or purchase of individual volumes or back volumes should be addressed to: Editions Rodopi B.V. Tijnmuiden 7 1046 AK Amsterdam-Holland The Netherlands Tel.: 31 (0) 20 611 48 21 Fax: 31 (0) 20 447 29 79 Internet: <http://www.rodopi.nl> info@rodopi.nl USA/Canada: 248 East 44th Street 2nd floor New York, NY 10017 USA Tel: 1-800-225-3998 Fax: 1-800-853-3881
Future Volumes and Conference Topics

Stealing the Fire in French and Francophone Literature and Film: Adaptation, Appropriation, Plagiarism, Hoax (FLS Vol. XXXVII, 2010)
March 18-20, 2010: French Psychoanalysis and Psychoanalysis in French: Language, Literature, Culture 38th Annual French Literature Conference <http://www.cas.sc.edu/dllc/fren/Events.Activities/flc/index.html>
FRENCH LITERATURE SERIES

Editor James Day
Editorial Board University of South Carolina William Edmiston Freeman G. Henry Paul Allen Miller Marja Warehime Daniela DiCecco Jeanne Garane Nancy E. Lane Jeffery C. Persels
Advisory Board Michael T. Cartwright McGill University Ross Chambers University of Michigan Pierre Ronzeaud Universit de Provence Franc Schuerewegen Universit dAnvers / Universit Radboud (Nimgue) Albert Sonnenfeld University of Southern California Marie-Odile Sweetser University of Illinois at Chicago Ronald W. Tobin University of California, Santa Barbara Dirk Van der Cruysse Universiteit Antwerpen
Roland Desn Universit de Reims Ralph Heyndels University of Miami Norris J. Lacy Pennsylvania State University Gerald Prince University of Pennsylvania
Le papier sur lequel le prsent ouvrage est imprim remplit les prescriptions de ISO 9706: 1994, Information et documentation - Papier pour documents Prescriptions pour la permanence. The paper on which this book is printed meets the requirements of ISO 9706: 1994, Information and documentation - Paper for documents Requirements for permanence. An electronic version of this volume is included in print subscriptions. See www.rodopi.nl for details and conditions. ISBN: 978-90-420-2648-3 E-Book ISBN: 978-90-420-2649-0 Editions Rodopi B.V., Amsterdam - New York, NY 2009 Printed in The Netherlands
(French Literature Series, Volume XXXVI, 2009)
TRANSLATION
in French and Francophone Literature and Film

Edited by James Day
Amsterdam New York, NY 2009
From the Editor This volume of FLS originated with the peer-reviewed submissions selected for our thirty-sixth annual French Literature Conference. Superbly organized by my indefatigable colleague, Jeanne Garane, this event brought together an imposing group of academics and translator-scholars. A published translator herself, Jeanne has provided a detailed introduction with commentary on such issues as retranslation, self-translation, and deliberate mistranslation, along with the inevitable verbal frustrations, the daunting cultural dimension, the insightful solutions, and the problematic market for translations of foreign literature in the U.S. Acknowledgment goes also to the editorial board, which determined final rankings after providing at least two blind evaluations of each submission. In cases where special expertise was required, our international advisory board stood ready to provide counsel. Both the annual conference and FLS are indebted to the Department of Languages, Literatures, and Cultures, to the program in Comparative Literature, and to the College of Arts and Sciences of the University of South Carolina for their generous support. James Day
Contents Introduction Public Language and the Aesthetics of the Translating City Sherry Simon Translation and the Triumph of French: the Case of the Decameron Marian Rothstein This Time the Translation is Beautiful, Smooth, and True: Theorizing Retranslation with the Help of Beauvoir Luise von Flotow Redefining Translation through Self-Translation: The Case of Nancy Huston Carolyn Shread Images et voix dans lespace potique de Saint-Denys Garneau: analyse du pome Le Jeu et dextraits de ses traductions en anglais et en hongrois Louise Audet Translation as Revelation Marjolijn de Jager Werewere Liking as Translator and Translated Cheryl Toman The Great White Man of Lambarn by Bassek ba Kobhio: When Translating a Colonial Mentality Loses its Meaning Anny Dominique Curtius ix
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Traduire la reine Pokou: fidlit ou trahison? Sarah Davies Cordova Object Lessons: Metaphors of Agency in Walter Benjamins The Task of the Translator and Patrick Chamoiseaus Solibo Magnifique Rose-Myriam Rjouis Translating Maryse Conds Clanire cou-coup: Dislocations of the Caribbean Self in Richard Philcoxs Who Slashed Celanires Throat? A Fantastical Tale Rachelle Okawa Intercultural Politics: Translating Postcolonial Lebanese Literature in the United States Christophe Ippolito Vu dici et l-bas: Le roman contemporain franais publi en traduction aux tats-Unis Cindy Merlin
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FLS, Volume XXXVI, 2009
Translation
Jeanne Garane
University of South Carolina
Translation in/and French and Francophone Literature and Film: An Introduction
In March, 2008, a diverse group of scholars gathered at the 36th Annual French Literature Conference at the University of South Carolina to address the theme, Translation in/and French and Francophone Literature and Film. The resulting variety in approaches to translation that characterize the essays collected here reflects the current state of Translation Studies as a vast, international, and interdisciplinary field whose scope continues to expand. Despite growing attention to the field in the United States, however, translation continues to be one of the most important vehicles of cultural transfer, and at the same time one of the least studied (von Flotow and Nischik 1). As Lawrence Venuti so aptly shows in The Translators Invisibility, contemporary English-language translation continues to privilege a kind of fluency that masks the translation as translation. According to Venuti, a fluent translation is immediately recognizable and intelligible, familiarized, domesticated, not disconcertingly foreign... (5). Such an ideology means that a good translator makes his or her work invisible in order to produce an effect of transparency that simultaneously masks its status as an illusion (5). Under this regime, just as the translated text masks itself as a translation, the translator must efface him- or herself, and stand in the authors shadow. This masking is coterminous with the denial of the translators legal status as author, so that translations are not only often effectuated for relatively little pay, but they are also denied the kind of copyright protection afforded to authors of original works because
FLS, Vol. XXXVI, 2009
translations are viewed as derivative and secondary. 1 In the American Academy, this denial means that book-length translations are often not considered as single or even coauthored books in evaluations of scholarly performance, unlike single-authored scholarly books or works of fiction. Such a stance is highly ironic, given that, as Venuti points out, while the fact of translation tends to be ignored even by the most sophisticated scholars, these same scholars must often rely on translated texts in their research and teaching (Scandals 32). At the same time, translations are often taught without any acknowledgement of their status as such. The papers collected in the current volume are intended to add to the growing body of scholarship in the field of Translation Studies and to increase scholarly awareness of translation in short, to make translation more visible. The variety of critical approaches represented here testifies to the current diversity of the field, from feminist translation practices to issues surrounding nationalism, postcoloniality, and globalization, to accounts of personal translational and editorial practices, to analyses of the marketing of translations in the United States. Despite this diversity, one constant concern is the attention to translation as a creative, transformative process that overturns the traditional understanding of translation as an inferior copy of an original. Indeed, as Sherry Simon emphasizes in her opening essay, Public Language and the Aesthetics of the Translating City, translation is transfigurative, and cities are the optimal spaces in which the relational nature of translation comes into play. Simon proposes that in todays multilingual cities, translation is in fact a key to citizenship, since citizenship is the creation of shared social space. As the index of accommodation and incorporation of languages into the public sphere, writes Simon in this volume, translation determines what enters a given cultural system and what remains outside. Nevertheless, recent new work on the city has paid remarkably little attention to language. However, as Simon shows in her analysis of the visual presence of language as public art in Montreal and Vancouver, language relations are part of the imaginative world that defines the city. In Translation and the Triumph of French: the Case of the Decam
1
See A Call to Action in The Translators Invisibility, 311-13.
Introduction
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eron, Marian Rothstein examines language relations in a different historical context. In her analysis of the paratexts surrounding sixteenth-century French translations of Giovanni Boccaccios Decameron, Rothstein reminds us that the rise of multiple centers of power during the Renaissance replaced the Roman model of a single linguistic center, resulting in nationalist calls for the use of vernacular languages in place of Latin. In this context, translations of the Decameron from Tuscan into French are appropriative acts, instances of cultural conquest, whereby the original is consumed through imitation and replaced with an improved French version that bests the source text. Here, the task of translation is to make vernacular French the language of the French nation by displacing the former imperial language, Latin. In contrast to this model of translation as appropriation, Luise von Flotows essay, This Time the translation is beautiful, smooth, and true: Theorizing Re-translation with the Help of Beauvoir, interrogates the very possibility of a final best translation of any given text. Instead, through recent critical reappraisals of Simone de Beauvoirs translated works, von Flotow proposes a feminist view of translation as a work of seriality and generation (authors emphasis), capable of proposing new understandings and readings of source texts by individuals who are able to read differently. Following Littau, Von Flotow proposes Pandora rather than Babel to figure translation as multiplicity, thereby positing translation and re-translation as regeneration rather than as deficiency. Arguing along similar lines in Redefining Translation through Self-Translation: The Case of Nancy Huston, Carolyn Shread also calls for a reconceptualization of translation models. Shread uses Nancy Hustons self-translations as strategic examples for deconstructing binary models of translation which cast translated texts as secondary, inferior, or inauthentic. Critical neglect of self-translation, Shread argues, can be tied to a monolingual paradigm in which translation compensates for a linguistic lack, while simultaneously erasing the multilingual nature of its task. Shread argues that self-translation involves degrees of reciprocal interference to an extent that undermines the traditional idea of a hermetic original confined to a single, pure language. Similarly discarding the idea of a hermetic original in Images et voix dans lespace potique de Saint-Denys Garneau: analyse du
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pome Le Jeu et dextraits de ses traductions en anglais et en hongrois, Louise Audet draws on the work of cognitive linguists Charles Fillmore and George Lakoff, and from Gilles Fauconniers work on mental spaces. Audet posits that the translation of poetry is a process analogical to the construction of idealized cognitive models, idiosyncratic mental representations by the translator of poetic texts. Audet likens the semantics of understanding as theorized by Fillmore to the process that takes place in translation as a successful interpretative act. Marjolijn de Jager, the translator of such celebrated African writers as Ken Bugul, Assia Djebar, Werewere Liking, and V. Y. Mudimbe, among others, not only sees translation as interpretation, but Translation as Revelation. De Jager discusses three types of revelation linguistic, cultural, and political revealing her personal translation practices and what she has discovered in the process. She quotes from the last lines of Robert Frosts poem Revelation in order to articulate her vision of the mission of the literary translator: So all who hide too well away / Must speak and tell us where they are. For de Jager, the translator must tell the reader of a different language and culture what the author of the original text hides away, what she must say, and where she is. Among those reading de Jagers translational revelations is Cheryl Toman. In Werewere Liking as Translator and Translated, Toman analyzes the ways in which Cameroonian playwright and novelist Werewere Liking redefines orality through the incorporation of Bassa linguistic and cultural elements into French, thereby gaining ownership of the French language. Toman concludes that the task of Likings English-language translators is to minoritize English as a means to decolonization, just as Liking herself has done with French. In The Great White Man of Lambarn by Bassek ba Kobhio: When Translating a Colonial Mentality Loses its Meaning, Anny Dominique Curtius analyzes the ways in which at least four types of audiences are constituted in a scene where Albert Schweitzer preaches in French to a group of Gabonese. While his sermon is translated into Fang by an interpreter, the English subtitles do not translate the interpreters speech correctly. Using Fang speakers herself to translate the interpreters speech, Curtius discovers that while the interpreter generally adheres to the intent of Schweitzers speech, the anonymous
Introduction
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translator of the English-language subtitles completely subverts Schweitzers message through a deliberate mistranslation, unbeknownst to the filmmaker himself, as Curtius discovers in an interview. In Traduire la reine Pokou: fidlit ou trahison?, Sarah Davies Cordova uses the tropes of fidelity and betrayal in order to read Vronique Tadjos retelling of one of the founding national legends of Cte dIvoire. In the legend, Queen Pokou sacrificed her infant son to save the Baoul people. According to Davies Cordova, Tadjos translation of this legend into a multifaceted concerto at once unmasks the violence inherent in the sacrifice, the violence of the translation of the legend from the fluidity of orality to the fixity of written History, and points to the sectarian violence that has erupted in contemporary Cte dIvoire. A similar concern with the violence of history informs Object Lessons: Metaphors of Literary Agency in Walter Benjamins The Task of the Translator and Patrick Chamoiseaus Solibo Magnifique. Here, Rose Rjouis, the translator with Val Vinokurov of Chamoiseaus Texaco and his Solibo magnifique, examines the question of agency for cultural insider-outsiders such as Walter Benjamin and Patrick Chamoiseau. In order to make the connection between two writers who may at first seem culturally distant from one another, Rjouis takes up the image of Benjamins fractured urn in The Task of the Translator as a metaphor for a kind of writing that transforms cultural insecurities into cultural agency. Whereas Chamoiseau writes against a history of colonial terror, the more discrete insider-outsiderness in Benjamins work foreshadows Nazi discourse on Jews as Europes threatening insider-outsiders. In Translating Maryse Conds Clanire cou-coup: Dislocations of the Caribbean Self in Richard Philcoxs Who Slashed Celanires Throat: A Fantastical Tale, Rachelle Okawa examines the particular teamwork (or lack of it) that exists between Guadeloupean writer Maryse Cond and her husband and translator, Richard Philcox. While Maryse Cond favors a textual opacity meant to challenge the reader, Richard Philcox sometimes aims to make Conds novels more transparent for his English-speaking readership. As Okawa demonstrates in her analysis of American advertisements and reviews of Conds works, Philcox cannot easily escape from the
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demands of an Anglo-American market that favors fluency and transparency rather than opacity. Christophe Ippolitos Intercultural Politics: Translating PostColonial Lebanese Literature in the United States turns the readers attention to the negotiation of cultural meaning between audiences in Lebanon and the United States. As the editor of a bilingual edition of poetry by the Lebanese poet Nadia Tuni, Ippolito gives a practical account of the challenges encountered in the publication of this work, pointing out that the main issue underlying the project was that of the very possibility of translating a culture, specifically the translation of the tensions of the Lebanese civil war in a post-9/11 American context. Ippolito concludes that the negotiation of meaning between two culturally different audiences can be facilitated both by a welldeveloped critical apparatus and by working with a team of translators able to present multiple points of view. Similarly, in Vu dici et lbas: Le roman contemporain franais publi en traduction aux tatsUnis, Cindy Merlin examines the ways in which critics, academics, translators, and editors as producers of culture determine the translation, publication, and reception of French writers in the United States. Citing Lawrence Venuti, Merlin reviews the translation crisis in the United States, showing that while large, commercial American presses are highly profitable overseas, their investment in the translation of foreign books in the United States is abysmally small. Merlin shows that the translation of French-language novels is left to small presses that often lack the means to market the works to a larger American public. As this overview has shown, the essays in this volume collectively demonstrate that translation is a vital element of cultural and linguistic plurality. As Sherry Simon shows in Translating and Interlingual Creation in the Contact Zone. Border Writing in Quebec, translation accompanies cultural and linguistic overlap and draws attention to the fact that intercultural relations contribute to the internal life of all national cultures (58). In an era when it is still possible to see bumper stickers commanding us all to Speak English, this important point can never be repeated too often.
Introduction Works Cited
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Flotow, Luise von, and Reingard M. Nischik. Introduction. Translating Canada. Ottawa: University of Ottawa Press, 2007. Simon, Sherry. Translating and Interlingual Creation in the Contact Zone. Border Writing in Quebec. Post-colonial Translation: Theory and Practice. Ed. Susan Bassnett and Harish Trivedi. London: Routledge, 1999. 58-74. Venuti, Lawrence. The Scandals of Translation: Towards an Ethics of Difference. London and New York: Routledge, 1998. _____. The Translators Invisibility: A History of Translation. London and New York: Routledge, 1995.
Translation
Sherry Simon
Concordia University, Montreal
Public Language and the Aesthetics of the Translating City

The increasingly visible public artworks in todays cities are forms of public communication. In Montreal, where art can be a form of signage, the public art of Gilbert Boyer sends fruitfully mixed messages. Contributing to the spatial francization of Montreal, Boyers playful messages can be read in dialogue with other parodic uses of language in city space, notably Henry Tsangs Welcome to the Land of Light along the sea wall of Vancouvers False Creek.
________________________ A Montreal vignette. Some years ago during a provincial election campaign, I walked by a campaign poster for a political party whose slogan that year was OSER, (0-zay), to dare. Instead of drawing a moustache on the candidates face or adding glasses, some joker had done something simpler, but more damaging. This wiseacre scratched out a big L in front of OSER, turning an infinitive into a noun, an O into an OO, a rousing French challenge into an insulting English taunt, and prematurely condemning the candidate to the status of a LOSER. This is the kind of bilingual joke that makes Montreal the home of language games of the sort Doris Sommer praises in Bilingual Aesthetics. Sommers witty book argues in favour of the excitement and malaise of living with two languages. She praises the bifocal vision of those who grow up, as she did, in neighbourhoods where languages meet in the space of encounters and disencounters, far from any communitarian paradise and close to the messy ground of democratic coexistence (Sommer vii). She has special regard for
bilingual jokes, for the way they pinpoint the anxieties of contact. The incident of the L would conform nicely to her ideal especially the way that the L frontends the unsuspecting slogan, jarring its phonetic circuitry from French into English. But the turn from daring to losing plainly exposes the political tensions that lie behind language games. The fact that one English letter has the power to cancel out both the sound and the meaning of the French word has resonance in a city where languages jostle for symbolic dominance. Signage has always had much more than informational value in this city and those who study branding and lettering in public space have a field day in Montreal. They discover that language is never innocent and that every sign also sends a message pointing to its own language. Despite the official, legislated Francization of Montreal some thirty years ago, when English signs were replaced by French ones, English continues to surface in illicit and sometimes unintentional ways. And so they also learn that signage can turn into art, for instance, when the paint of the fresh French lettering peels away to reveal the undesirable but persistent English letters underneath. These accidental palimpsests, treasured by aficionados, are iconic representations of the history of language in the city. They mark English as a bygone language, one whose official right to represent the reality of the city no longer holds. They are graphic illustrations of the ways in which official regulations on signage, however, have only very limited authority. Protection of the French language is a justified and necessary measure in todays Quebec. However, the protection of the visual aspect of the city is only a small part of a complex linguistic situation. The visible marking of public space is therefore a simplified backdrop to language transactions that are varied and complex, that surge and ebb in unpredictable waves. There is a growing complexity to what we might call forms of public language in todays cities. Our cities offer us, increasingly, an auditory landscape of great diversity. In taxis and on street corners we hear conversations held, sometimes shouted (if theyre on cell phones), in all the languages of the world. Languages once confined to the home or to community venues like church basements are suddenly more apparent in the public sphere. The electronic map produced by the Modern Language Association for the United States counts more than 300 languages in use in the United States, and almost as many for
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the single city of New York.1 This multilingualism confirms the intensity of conversations and transactions across languages and nations, the intensity of an increasingly generalized diasporic culture. Cities are spaces of circulation in the world, maintains Alain Mdam, according to two dynamics a centripetal dynamic of convergence, which brings diversity into cities, but also a centrifugal dynamic of dispersion, which means that cities are nodes in an ever-enlarging network of diasporas (35). Babel and babble Multilingualism is often experienced as a random moment of encounter a cluster of conversations on the sidewalk or in the bus, in immigrant neighbourhoods or at sites like airports, markets, cafs, or parks. These are moments when the maelstrom of languages can be experienced as euphoria and communion (in the multilinguistic anonymity of the caf, in the bustling crowds of the market, in the early morning swirl of costume and colour in the airport) just as they can be understood as disorienting and alienating. Babble, according to Natasa Durovicova, carries this double valence, and the strands of languages weaving through cities remind us of this doubleness (72). But the multilingualism of the street, as well as the multilingualisms of the internet, or of community, is no guarantee of citizenship. For nonofficial languages to have a right to expression, they must be translated into the official tongue. Translation, then, is the key to citizenship. Translation is the index of accommodation and incorporation of languages into the public sphere. By performing functions of connectivity and incorporation, translation determines what enters a given cultural system and what remains outside. Citizenship is, first and foremost, engaged with other people in the creation of shared social spaces and in the discourse that such spaces make possible (Kingwell 189). There is a long history connecting the idea of public space in the city with the Greek agora, a space of conversation where citizenship, governance, and community were intertwined. Public space has come to stand for the combination of material and discursive conditions that make it possible for citizens to participate together in city life. While
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The map can be seen at the following address: <www.mla.org>.
the languages of foreigners, of what were known as barbarians, were excluded from the Greek agora, todays public spaces must include them. But how are these to be integrated into the sphere of citizenship? For such a connection to take place, we need, according to Mary Louise Pratt, a new public idea about language (112) a renewed recognition of the knowledges that languages carry. Translation can work to intensify the interactions of urban life, to turn city life away from what Richard Sennett calls non-interactive indifference (quoted by Cronin 68). For Cronin, this turn involves seeing multilingual, multiethnic urban space as first and foremost a translation space.
In other words, if translation is primarily about a form of interaction with another language and culture (which in turn modify ones own), then it is surely to translation that we must look if we want to think about how global neighbourhoods are to become something other than the site of non-interactive indifference... Everything, from small local theatres presenting translations of plays from different migrant languages to new voice recognition and speech synthesis technology producing discreet translations in wireless environments to systematic client education for community interpreting to translation workshops as part of diversity management courses in the workplace, could begin to contribute to a reformation of public space in migrant societies as primarily a translation space. Urbanists have not been known to talk to translation scholars and vice versa but in the context of the challenges posed by ongoing migration, neither party can afford to avoid a dialogue. (68)
Cronins idea of seeing city space as a translation space is crucial. Rather than collapsing language differences into the maelstrom of an undifferentiated multilingualism, understanding the interactions of the city as a complex, overlapping weave of translations is to identify a field of discreet practices each with differing stakes and outcomes. These practices can be studied as a key to the interactions among language communities and among forms of cultural expression. This perception of the city is enabled by recent developments in Translation Studies which have not only extended the array of objects and practices that fall under its purview but which also have sharpened the focus of analysis. Translation is no longer understood as an unequivocally peaceful and friendly activity, but seen to participate fully in the fraught politics of the moment. In response to an increasingly violent
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world, translation studies has recently been becoming ever more attentive to its sometimes complicitous, sometimes activist role of translation in international affairs turning attention to the role of translation in global news reporting, in situations of violent conflict, and in the political and cultural life of migrant and diasporic populations. These studies are broadly sustained by the understanding that mediation among languages, as among all cultural forms, necessarily involves displacement. [I]t is no longer viable to look at circulation as a singular or empty space in which things move [...], write Dilip Gaonkar and Elizabeth Povinelli. There is a material culture of circulation which organizes and shapes passage (392). This is to see translation as more than gatekeeping indeed, as an enhancement or a transfiguration. These interventions point to the ever-stronger role that translation is assuming in telling histories that go beyond individual texts, that sketch out larger frameworks and circulatory logics. Within these histories, the translator has been given new recognition. The emphasis on the materialities of circulation the places and circumstances of translation, the encounters between individuals, the anchoring of textual matters not only in the politics of book production but in the social life and cultural interactions of a society these are grounded in recognition of the singularity of the translation event. The city translated While there has been an explosion of writing on the city since the 1980s, by authors such as David Harvey, Saskia Sassen, Edward Soja, Allan Blum, and Ian Chambers writing activated in large part by the new importance given to space in the human sciences there has been a remarkable absence of attention to language. Despite the writings of a group of committed American scholars Emily Apter, Doris Sommer, Mary Louise Pratt, Domna Stanton, Werner Sollor, Marc Shell, Edwin Gentzler all drawing attention to the plurilingualism of the American literary past, this attention has not extended into the realm of cities. The important 2004 issue of the journal Public Culture devoted to Johannesburg a few years ago has barely a word on the question of multilingualism in this city (Nuttall). It is this absence which translation can address. Rather than relegating language issues to the realm of sociolinguists who count the numbers of language-
speakers or to policymakers in bilingual education, it is necessary to study language as a shaping presence in the city. To make sense of the brouhaha of language, of what seems like the shapeless and inchoate wanderings of languages through streets and neighbourhoods, it is necessary to hear these languages within a history of conversations. The city is not a background to language; rather language relations are part of the imaginative world that defines the city. For Alain Mdam, there are three types of tensions in the city: the forces of co (consensualities), of diss (antagonisms), and of trans that forge new paths through the city. Translation participates in all three of these dynamics creating consensus, expressing tension, and contributing to the formation of hybrid realities. These forms of translation are to be explored at different levels of the cultural life of the city informal transactions and practices of everyday life, official communications, and artistic practices (literature, theatre, cinema) that play with language. In what follows I will focus on the visual presence of language and in particular on forms of public art that play with visual language in two Canadian cities, Montreal and Vancouver. The intense visual landscape of the city comprises a wide variety of messages, including not only the expected array of advertisements, political slogans, and graffiti, but also increasingly the proliferating messages of public art. Both cities, Montreal and Vancouver, have embraced the idea of public art, both having a relatively high number of works on public view. Integrated into the city landscape, public art engages with both its visual and cultural fabric, offering messages that are more like a commentary on values and meanings. Those public art works that use language as part of their materiality function even more intensely as forms of public communication. Language is not only a visual marker of identity, but also a connection with cultural history. Bringing more than one language into interaction introduces practices of translation that are revealing of the tensions among them. Translation effects are most active in a language-conscious city like Montreal. Montreal The public art work of the sculptor Gilbert Boyer speaks directly to the loose fit between the constraints of formal language and the
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fluidity of personal communication in Montreal. He uses monumental forms and materials to convey the lightness of the spoken word. The mock plaques that he fixes to the faades of buildings, the marble disks that he lays on the ground in Mount Royal park these are an ironic response to the inflated self-importance of public language in Montreal. He gathers wisps of language, tentative and diaphanous, and gives them paradoxical permanence. Comme un poisson dans la ville [Like a fish in the city; 1988] was a project in which a dozen or so plaques similar to the ones saying that a famous person was born in this house or passed the night here were installed above the doors of residential homes. But instead of the expected official message, there is a poetic phrase describing the weather on one day, or the winds. The 1991 disks on Mount Royal are also covered with spirals of words, this time scraps of conversation. They are capsules of language, in French, bits of the ephemera of daily life: Let me show you something When I want to read the last pages of a good book, I come here There are tons of goldfish. There are even bits of conversation: Will you write to me often? Every day Not far from here Charles and I had an argument. I dont even remember why. Though Boyers works are a playful presence, making an aesthetic and not a political statement, it is also true to say that they function as an indication of the French cultural reconquest of the city. That Boyers messages are only in French marks the temper of the city at the time he produced them. In the 1990s, these inscriptions were part of the relabelling of the city which had begun in the late 1970s. And so, in addition to their casual and even flippant wit, Boyers disks carry a secondary message. They are a form of signage announcing that this is now a French city. It is hardly surprising that public art in Montreal refers in serious, humorous, or oblique ways to language issues. Several public sculptures use lettering as motifs or materials, as for example the multilingual sculptural installation by Rose-Marie Goulet in the atrium of Concordia Universitys library building.2 Goulet has relied extensively
Commissioned for the opening of the library pavilion in 1992, this extensive installation is spread over four locations, beginning in the square in front of the building, continuing in the entrance hall, above the main stairwell and in the reading rooms of the library. A spiral motif energizes and unifies the pieces. The central col2
on language for her work in public art. In one piece created for the Montreal subway system, Goulet collaborated with sound designer Chantal Dumas to enhance a photo exhibit with short clips of people speaking in seven different languages. Most spectacularly, her 1992 installation, called Monument pour L, uses letters in blue-painted steel to form three separate words, partirent, drivrent, and horizon, that are either emerging from or sinking into the land bordering the Saint Lawrence river. These words placed near the shoreline evoke the uncertain trajectory of the immigrant. They left, they drifted, horizon. The words gesture to other shores, from which immigrants to Quebec might have departed. The blue colour suggests the water and the sky, the only companions for a ships travelers for many months. While the works I have described so far make very explicit reference to language, other interventions evoke language issues in a more oblique way. In fact it could be argued that a great deal of nonverbal artistic activity is a negative reaction to the omnipresence of language issues a way of acknowledging the weight of language by attempting to flee it. And so Montreal has seen the emergence of very vibrant and innovative nonverbal art forms like dance and circus. And the invention of innovative ways of referring to language, as in the painter Genevive Cadieuxs use of braille in one of her paintings (Lamoureux). The art work in one public square in Montreal is called After Babel and evokes themes of nonverbal communication. The official description of the sculptures created in 1993 of a human face on a pedestal, a canine form on a pedestal, and another dog on the ground refers to the theme of nonverbal communication.3 The
umn located in the buildings entrance hall is covered in mirrors and looks like an endless screw of which we cannot tell the beginning or the end. Taking into account the venues particular nature, the work constantly highlights linguistic references by the inclusion of fragments of text in various languages, letters and signs set in the very materials of the building (Concordia University Public Art Collection). <http:// web2.concordia.ca/publicart/works/goulet.php> 3 The official description reads: Ensemble sculptural sur le thme de la communication non verbale qui se compose de deux colonnes et de divers lments figuratifs. Une colonne en bronze est surmonte dun masque aux traits humains sinclinant. Lautre, en acier, est surmonte dune silhouette canine. Une forme animale identique repose au sol, levant la tte en direction du masque. la base de lensemble, deux incrustations au sol reprsentent deux mains de bronze symbolisant
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mirroring of two unlike cutout figures, each perched on a pedestal the very human and oversized mask and the stylized dog initiate a surprising dialogue. While public art has inarguably contributed to what Annie Grin calls the spatial francization of Montreal, identitary politics is always coloured with irony, always undercut by an aesthetic intention. In calling attention to the many ways in which language is foregrounded in Quebec art, prominent critic Johanne Lamoureux insists that language is not a badge of identity but rather the source of multiple aesthetic effects. Her 1995 catalogue called Seeing in Tongues (Le bout de la langue) details the workings of language in the work of Gilbert Boyer, Robert Racine, Raymond Gervais, Barbara Steinman, Andr Martin, Louise Viger, Lyne Lapointe, Martha Fleming, and Genevive Cadieux. It soon becomes abundantly clear that the pieces of language deployed here appear to have nothing to do with identity, or at least with language as the emblematic vector of a monolithic cultural identity. Rather, the works assembled betray a fondness for translatability, not for the doubles, that translation authorizes but for the discrepancies and tifts that it makes possible and by means of which it produces meaning (Lamoureux 7). It is significant that Lamoureux explicitly distances this art from a politics of branding. The language, she says, is not an affirmation of identity, not a naive and simplistic declaration of affiliation, but rather part of an inquiry into the ways in which meaning is produced. Art is translational because it understands language as a problem which participates in the aesthetics of creation. Nevertheless, in contexts where language choice is significant, the very fact of French rather than English is necessarily meaningful. And so, for instance, when Montreal artist Michel Goulets group of ten chairs is installed along a beach in Vancouver (at the Vancouver Sculpture Biennale in 2006), the very fact that the messages on the seats are carved out in French and English will be significant.4 How
lamiti dans le langage des malentendants. (Artists: John McEwen and Marlene Hilton-More; site: Ville de Montral Art public Collection) 4 Official description: Echoes incorporates ten of Goulets trademark stainless steel chair sculptures. The chairs location in a public space invites interaction and conversation as a way of overcoming the typically urban alienation it alludes to. Meanwhile, the chairs are all set at different angles along the beach, suggesting the
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ever, the playfulness of the messages and their self-reflexivity undercut this aspect of language-identification and propose rather an interesting conversation among languages. The messages are snippets of poems and echoes of conversations, all open-ended and suggestive: Gographie de lusure grandeur nature Faire semblant de toujours faire semblant de (arranged in a circular pattern) Pretense, false, true, story with arrows pointing from one to the other Minor dreams weaved tight Pousser un cri plus loin dans la gorge An ivory tower echoes from before A common story of love and sorrow came to an end HERE All well taken care of differences Sauve-toi salvation you said. The last is most interesting in terms of dialogue, in that it proposes a false translation. The two languages finally find themselves on the same chair, yet sauve-toi (save yourself, get out of here, escape!) is a peculiar way to find salvation. The tentative and ephemeral nature of these messages makes Goulets piece very similar in temperament to Gilbert Boyers work.5
Vancouver One of the most significant uses of language in a public art sculpture is to be found not far from Michel Goulets installation in
multitude of perspectives and possibilities open to people in our privileged socioeconomic position. <http://www.waymarking.com/waymarks/WM201T> 5 Michel Goulet is a well-known Montreal artist. His project for the 400th anniversary of Quebec, involving 44 chairs, will have inscriptions from Quebec poets Octave Crmazie, Gaston Miron, Denise Desautels, Flix Leclerc, Gilles Vigneault, Irving Layton presumably mostly in French. Here, within the context of the city of Quebec, this poetry will be entirely at home and will hardly have the surprise value that they offer on the shores of the Pacific Ocean. Another aspect of language-consciousness has to do with the way that writing is integrated into visual language. Among the many artists associated with the conjunction of words and images, one of the most important in Quebec is Montreal painter Louise Robert. Her paintings have since 1975 integrated words and writing into the very substance of the canvas words dropped onto the surface of the paint in odd and playful configurations. The words themselves are comical, strange, disorienting. Genevive Cadieux, fleur de peau, 1987, uses braille as a form of language. A quote from St-Exupry in braille alludes to her research into portraiture, scars, the way models are engaged in imagining themselves, in inventing their own figure, even if it implies temporarily losing face... (Lamoureux).
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Vancouver along the sea wall at False Creek. Though Vancouver is not, like Montreal, a city of two languages, the increasing presence of Asian immigrants, as well as the growing power of Native groups, has created new consciousness of these languages. The work of Henry Tsang stands out in this context as an example of the way in which public art can contribute to the citys imagination and history. Embedded into the railing along the sea wall are inscriptions in two languages the trading language of Chinook on top, English below. This is Henry Tsangs Welcome to the Land of Light, installed in 1997. The English text is a kind of jargon, a translation from an already mixed language: Greetings good you arrive here where light be under land Future it be now Here you begin live like new Come to time where people talk different but good together If you heart mind open you receive new knowledge You have same like electric eye and heart mind and talk sound You live fast like light See talk be here there and everywhere at one time Us make this community good indeed You not afraid here Here you begin live like chief World same like in your hand. The official description of the artwork stresses its luminosity:
Aluminum letters spelling out phrases in Chinook (an early coastal trading language) and English are placed along the railing of the sea wall in two parallel lines. Coloured light pulses through an inset fibre-optic cable in the sidewalk directly below the letters. Welcome to the Land of Light is a [...] monument to the relationship between those who once lived on the False Creek waterfront and those who will arrive in the future to call this area their home. (City of Vancouver Cultural Services)
The artists statement describes the juxtaposition of English and Chinook Jargon
as a metaphor for the ongoing development of intercultural communications in this region. Chinook Jargon is a nineteenth-century lingua franca that resulted out of the need for cross-cultural trade. Most of the approximately 500-word vocabulary of this language can be traced to the dialect of the Columbia River Chinook Tribe in Oregon, with influences of English, French, and Nootkan (Nuu-chah-nulth). At its peak, one hundred thousand to one million people spoke the language from the Pacific coast to the Rocky Mountains, from Northern California to the Alaskan panhandle. Like any pidgin, Chinook Jargon was dynamic and flexible, absorbing different
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cultural systems of naming as more and more peoples from around the world came to settle on the West Coast. In the first half of the twentieth century, the jargon fell out of common use, replaced by the English language. (From the Artists proposal; City of Vancouver Cultural Services).
The impact of this text is striking on a number of levels. Tsang recalls the identity of this territory as a trading zone, where Chinook was the trading language, the lingua franca, from Alaska to California in the nineteenth century. As a mixture of native languages from Oregon and Vancouver Island, Chinook, along with English and French, gestures to the fusions of the early West Coast with its mix of railway workers, European settlers, and native peoples. The inadequate English of the translation points to the shortcuts of any vehicular language, grammar sacrificed to the imperatives of immediate communication. This inadequacy becomes a kind of nobility, however, when coupled with the generosity and graciousness of the words of welcome. The words create a literal space of contact, the improper use of English making evident the inaccessible source from which it comes. This is a paradoxical space of contact, as the trading zones of the past are brought into the jarring contemporaneity of the speculative spaces of the present reality of False Creek (where towers of glittering glass condos rise high into the sky, crowding the shoreline and competing with the snow-capped peaks of the Rockies behind). The barter of the past is now a highly sophisticated game of financial daring, taking place on a territory defined by the spiralling price of square metres. The mixing and interaction of languages is disorienting. But the sound of foreignized English is powerful in drawing the viewer back into an imagined past. A later version of this work was shown at the Vancouver Earth festival in 2006, this time with the Chinook under the English. A series of seven banners stretched along the top of the main performance venue, welcoming the participants. The text is in English, but under each section of text is the original Chinook language. The first banner reads: Good you arrive at city where mountain and building stand up to sky, and underneath, Kloshe maika ko kopa town ka mitlite la monti pe hyas house mitwhit saghalie. Successive banners read: Here, Water good. Yukwa, chuck kloshe Food, it truly good, like long ago. Mukamuk, yaka delate kloshe, kahkwa ahnkuttie Earth, it not carry bad chemicals. Illahie, Yaka halo lolo peshak la
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metsin Here, you find new home. It small, but green. Yukwa, Maika Klap Chee house. Yaka tenas, keschi pechugh Here, you not fight and begin live. Yukwa, Maika halo mamook puk puk pe elip mitlite Future, it now here. Alki, yaka alta yukwa. The translation into pidginized English seems particularly appropriate, when it is understood that the original is itself a mixture of languages, the Chinook trading jargon. The prominence of this broken English again offering words of greeting and welcome is remarkably effective as a combined historical claim (we were here first and can therefore welcome you) but also as a reminder of the very plural nature of that we (a combination of historical groups, not only the native Amerindian populations, but also the immigrant workers who, by the end of the nineteenth century, were also inhabitants of the territory).6 The fact that Tsangs greetings are not presented on their own, but in tandem with their originals is a powerful reminder of the translational nature of cultures in contact. While the messages of greeting speak of coming together, the art work accomplishes this gathering through the bringing together of the languages. The mode of imperfect translation (which results in imperfect, approximative English) recalls the ongoing nature of the transaction. Montreals language-conscious artists have also paid attention to the effects of translation, though they are no doubt more aware of the constraints of the exercise. An early piece by Gilbert Boyer called Translation (which may be a French or an English word) takes the form of an installation.
The installation is set up to resemble the electronic detection passageways found at airports. Viewers must walk one by one over a panel inscribed with a text taken from a federal government document; in doing so, they pass between a pair of suspended headphones that give off a bewildering mix of noises: mechanical, robotic voices are reduced to a sort of murmur that works against the principle of intelligibility which usually informs them.
6 The bold and very public banners created by Henry Tsang were in stark contrast to other language-centred art work at the same venue, where, for instance, Peter Morin created tentative, gestural encounters with his own Tahltan language. His drawings showed Tahltan words placed in sled-like enclosures. A map to the territory, in charcoal on canvas, was made up of images designed to create a living space for the Tahltan and Kaska languages... to create a safer space for the students to feel proud of themselves speaking their languages (2006 visit) .
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The sound track is made up of recorded telephone messages from Canadian airports, in conjunction with snatches of conversation that bespeak a twofold wandering or sense of loss: on the one hand, that of a subject who does not know where she is or his-her interlocutor is; on the other hand, that of the airport as an exemplary site of transit, as a generic standardized locus of transportation and surveillance that easily verges on the paranoid. (Lamoureux 11)
What is highlighted in this piece, as Johanne Lamoureux notes, is the way language is part of the grid of power and control. Languages, like individuals, are made to fit the Procrustean bed that has been predetermined. And so this piece could be considered to exhibit a sensibility in total contrast to that which Boyer will display in his disks. Here, it is the constraining and authoritarian aspect of language which is emphasized in combination with attributes of governmentality and surveillance. Branding and translation Every city has its specific pattern of translational interactions. As a relatively new city on the west coast, Vancouvers conversations have much to do with the Pacific Rim, with older and more recent immigrant populations, as well as the increasingly intense conversations with its native populations. But Vancouver like most large metropolitan cities has one strong language that dominates all contesting languages. It could be argued that public art has especially resonant meanings in a city like Montreal, where signage participates in the ongoing struggle for language dominance. The visual branding of the city, its Francization, however, is only one facet of the many kinds of translation that have marked the city over the years. Against the backdrop of this very visible marking of public space, a constant reminder of the real and justified need to protect French in Quebec, the city fosters other kinds of language transactions. Translation in fact provides a special perspective on the history of the city. Traditionally the story has been told from one side or the other, from the point of view of nationalism or resistance, majorities or minorities, but the cultural history of Montreal is to be explored through the circuits that have created links among them. In Montreal, to travel across town, between the francophone east and the anglophone west end, is to enact
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the double sense of translation to move across space and across language. The literary and cultural history of the city is full of crosstown voyages, voyages of forced or voluntary translation, which carry different kinds of lessons, depending on their origin and finality. Though the east-west, French-English divide has long been the main story in Montreal, there are other trajectories and other languages that contribute to this story immigrant languages, Native languages. As anglophones once crossed the city in search of political inspiration, in search of avant-garde modes of writing, today francophones have, to some extent, begun the contrary voyage. And translations take on new forms and meanings. To recall the example with which I started, can we call the passage from oser into loser a translation? If it is, it is a deviant translation, one of a proliferating category of unconventional translations that is flourishing across Montreal today.
Works Cited
Blum, Alan. The Imaginative Structure of the City. Montreal: McGillQueens, 2003. City of Vancouver Cultural Services. 11 May 2009. <http://vancouver.ca/ commsvcs/oca/publicart/>. Concordia University Public Art Collection. 10 Sept. 2008. <http:// web2.concordia.ca/publicart/works/goulet.php>. Cronin, Michael. Translation and Identity. London: Routledge, 2006. Durovicova, Natasa. Los Toquis, or Urban Babel. Global Cities. Cinema, Architecture, and Urbanism in a Digital Age. Ed. Linda Krause and Patrice Petro. New Directions in International Studies. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 2003. 71-86. Echoes by Michel Goulet. 10 Sept. 2008. <http://www.waymarking.com/ waymarks/WM201T>. Gaonkar, Dilip Parameshwar, and Elizabeth A. Povinelli. Technologies of Public Forms: Circulation, Transfiguration, Recognition. Public Culture 15.3 (2003): 385-97. Grin, Annie. Matres chez nous. Public Art and Linguistic Identity in Quebec. Canadian Cultural Poesis. Essays on Canadian Culture. Ed. Garry Sherbert, Annie Grin, and Sheila Petty. Waterloo: Wilfred Laurier Press, 2006. 323-41.
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_____, and James S. McLean, eds. Public Art in Canada: Critical Perspectives. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2008. Germain, Annick, and Damaris Rose. Montreal: The Quest for a Metropolis. Chichester: John Wiley & Sons, 2000. Kingwell, Mark. Building, Dwelling, Acting. Queens Quarterly 107.2 (2000): 177-99. Lamoureux, Johanne. Seeing in Tongues. A Narrative of Language and Visual Arts in Quebec. Vancouver: Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, 1995. Mdam, Alain. Labyrinthes des rencontres. Collection Mtissages. Montral: Fides, 2002. Nuttall, Sarah, and Achille Mbembe, eds. Johannesburg: The Elusive Metropolis. Public Culture 16.3 (2004). Pratt, Mary Louise. Building a New Public Idea about Language. Profession 2003. New York: MLA, 2003. 110-19. Sommer, Doris. Bilingual Aesthetics. A New Sentimental Education. Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2004. Ville de Montral. 11 May 2009. <http://ville.montreal.qc.ca/>. Path: La vie Montral > Arts et culture > Le patrimoine artistique Collection dart public. <www.mla.org>.
Translation
Marian Rothstein
Carthage College
Translation and the Triumph of French: the Case of the Decameron

In the course of the sixteenth century, the status of translation, especially from other vernaculars, changed dramatically. What had been understood as the state of servile rendering of a pre-existing text turned into the very real possibility of the creation of a French version that, based now on the strength and beauty of French, might claim as much aesthetic merit, as much glory, as the original, even when that original was an Italian classic.
________________________ In the first half of the sixteenth century, translations were often the battlefield in a struggle where the French language took on Latin and Italian in hand-to-hand combat. Latin, once neutral, simply the language of learning, was increasingly associated with the Church or with the successor to Rome the Empire both perceived as antagonists of Gallican traditions. The centuries-old model of a translatio imperii et studii was based on the recognition of the mutability of human affairs: things change, and as a consequence, the center of power, as of learning, shifts in the course of human history. This view, however, is founded on the assumption, inherited from the Roman Imperium, that at any given time there is a single center of power or learning or more clearly in the Roman model, a single center of power and learning. Another, competing paradigm, inherited from Italy, can be seen in France starting with the reign of Franois I (1515-47); it is henceforth clear that worldly power lies not in the hand of one but of several princes. Although the roots of this kind of challenge to the
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Ancients are clearly in Renaissance Italy, for Italians, the center was moving through time, not space, making it a family matter so to speak in a kind of implied continuum. From the Gallican worldview, the change to multiple centers carries an implicit challenge to the Roman/Italian hub, a challenge that takes on a nationalist charge, positing a potential locus of the triumph of French. Where the notion of translatio imperii went, so too did translatio studii, as by 1530, French learning rivaled that of contemporary Italy and was recognized as surpassing it in Greek studies. Franois Berriot notes that the perceived connection between learning and power can be seen a century or more before the period which concerns us here:
La translatio studii et la translation vont donc de pair, puisque cest par la traduction que les sciences antiques arrivent luniversit de Paris et dans lentourage du roi []. [E]n 1427 Bedford, qui gouverne la France au nom dHenri VI dAngleterre, fait trs symboliquement emporter outre-Manche le Tite-Live de Charles V. (132)
The spread of printed books changed the nature of learning, both quantitatively and qualitatively. While our modern vocabulary separates scholarship and literary works, the sixteenth-century terms, bonas litteras, belles lettres, do not make such a distinction and so would include both as objects of a translatio studii. Far from the modern dream that it be the transparent conveyance of ideas from one language to another, translation could be potentially an act of appropriation. Under these circumstances, the translation into French of an Ancient or an Italian classic may well be a declaration of intent to outdo, as it were, to conquer. It is in this light that I propose here to examine the case of Boccaccios Decameron crossing the Alps. Although a vernacular work, the Decameron was a recognized classic of Italian literature. The very idea that a vernacular literature might have classics is a step along the road of the change away from the view of literary history in which the first is axiomatically the best a view that had left Renaissance authors deep in the shadow of their Classical predecessors. Humanists understanding of the Ancients undercut this by placing them increasingly in a specific cultural context so that they were understood as writing in time, in their own time (even as Virgil, and certainly Homer, continued to be understood allegorically, out of time). Indeed, this attitude made translation more clearly a cultural conquest, since culture might be translated alongside
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language (and when the source text was a vernacular one, this often was the case: see Rothstein, Homer). This may account for the fact that lists of major contemporary French literary figures around midcentury regularly include people known mainly or only as translators. 1 The new plurality of excellence, as it appeared to Italians, placed Petrarch and Boccaccio, the authors of new Italian classics, alongside the canonical Greek and Roman masters of verse (Homer and Virgil) and prose (Demosthenes and Cicero). Boccaccios name and proper Tuscan usage were soon associated in much the same tone that Ciceronians applied to their masters Latin to be taken as an absolute model. Castiglione, in the dedicatory epistle prefaced to his Corteggiano, complains that in just that way some in early sixteenth-century Italy argued that a truly elegant work in the vernacular should use only constructions found in Boccaccios works written a century and a half earlier. 2 Even if Castiglione and
Thomas Sbillet, in his Art Potique, recommends in addition to Marot and Saint Gelais, his most frequent source of examples that one look for models of style among translators: Herberay des Essars, Macault, Jean Martin (61). Claude Chappuyss Discours de la court (1543) names Marot, Brodeau, Herot, Macault, la Borderie, Salel, Herberay a list including two translators. A bit later, in his discussion of the Grand uvre, the epic, French only in translations, we find the names of Marot (Metamorphoses), Salel (Iliade), Herot (Androgyne[!]), Des Masures (Aeneid), Peletier (Horaces Ars poetica). Looking back on the reign of Franois I, whoever is speaking in Rabelaiss voice in the prologue to the Cinq Livre lists six potes et orateurs Galliques; Je contemple un grand tas de Collinets, Marots, Drouets, Saingelais, Sallels, Masuels [] (270). Of the six, Jacques Collin, Salel, and Masuel [Des Masures], fully half, are translators. At the start of the uvres of Louis Des Masures is a poem cataloging the poets he has known, including Rabelais, Du Bellay, Peletier, and then Herberay, followed by Salel, Marot, Macrin, Carles, Colin, Jean Martin, all of whom were translators except the neo-Latin poet, Macrin (b2v). 2 [A]d alcuni chi mi biasimano perchio non ho imitato il Boccaccio, n mi sono obligato alla consuetudine del parlar toscano doggid, non restar di dire che, ancor che l Boccaccio fusse di gentil ingegno, secondo quei tempi, e che in alcuna parte scrivesse con discrezione ed industria, nientedimeno assai meglio scrisse quando si lass guidar solamente dallingegno ed instinto suo naturale, senzaltro studio o cura di limare i scritti suoi, che quando con diligenzia e fatica si sforz desser pi culto e castigato (Castiglione 72; the idea continues on 73 and 75). English translation: ...to those who blame me because I have not imitated Boccaccio or bound myself to the usage of Tuscan speech in our own day, I shall not refrain from saying that even though Boccaccio had a fine talent by the standards of his time, and wrote some things with discrimination and care, still he wrote much better when he let himself be guided solely by his natural genius and instinct, without care or concern to polish his
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others thrived while ignoring this dictum, translating the Decameron, moving the language of the Master to another idiom, was a task of no little moment. 3 The challenge was all the greater as French, despite its long literary history, could not claim to have authors who equaled the prestige of Petrarch and Boccaccio until the name of Ronsard is regularly suggested in the 1570s. In 1414, before Boccaccios Italian works had acquired their canonical status, at the request of Jean, Duke of Berry, Laurent de Premierfait the best-known translator of his time completed a French version of the Decameron, based on a Latin version made expressly for him by Antoine Arezzio, as Laurent explains in the preface:
Et pour ce que je suis Franoiz par naissance et conversacion, je ne scay plainement langaige florentin qui est le plus preciz et plus esleu qui soit en Italie, je ay convenu avec ung frere [...] Anthoine de Aresche, homme tresbien saichant vulgar florentin et langaige latin. [Anthoine...] pour condigne et juste salaire translata premierement ledit Livre des Cent Nouvelles de florentin en langaige latin et je Laurens assistent avec lui, ay secondement converty en franoiz le langage latin receu dudit frere Anthoine, ou au moins mal que jay peu ou en gardant la verit des paroles et sentences, mesmement selon les deux langages, forsque jay estendu le trop bref en plus long et le obscur en plus cler langaige afin de legierement entendre les matieres du livre (5). [Because I am French by birth and language, and I have only imperfect knowledge of the Florentine language which is the most precise and choice of all Italy, I made an arrangement with Brother Antoine dAresche, a man fluent in vernacular Florentine and Latin, who, for an appropriate sum, translated the aforesaid Book of One Hundred Tales from Florentine into Latin, and I, Laurent, working with him, then turned the Latin of Brother Antoine into French, as nearly as I could, keeping the sense of the words and the ideas according to the ways of the two lan-
writings, than when he attempted with diligence and labor to be more refined and correct (Singleton 3). 3 Years later, Montaigne still felt the pressure of the prestige of the Classics. He remarks that the Theologia Naturalis of Raymond Sebond presented no threats, mais ceux qui ont donn beaucoup la grace et lelegance du langage, ils sont dangereux entreprendre: nommment pour les rapporter un idiome plus foible (439-40). The words following the colon are a C addition; Montaigne, in 1588, still felt French was weak in comparison with Latin, although this view may be skewed by his exposure to Latin in infancy.
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guages, I made that which was too short longer, and the too obscure clearer so that the matter of the book could be easily understood.]
The distance between the humanist world of fourteenth-century Florence and Laurents contemporary Paris is revealed in the transformation of the title, at least in the printed versions, where Decameron (that is, the story of ten days, apparent to anyone with even a smattering of Greek), turns into the meaningless: Liure Cameron autrement surnomme Le prince Galliot, qui contient cent nouuelles racomptees en dix iours par sept femmes & trois iouuenceaulx [...]. Translate de 4 latin en francoys par maistre Laurens du Premierfaict. Boccaccios name, although evoked in the translators preface, is not included in the title material. Laurents preface makes it clear that his own sense of the title was Le Livre des Cent Nouvelles, a work intended to help humans deal with the blows of Fortune. 5 Overall, this is a translation at one remove from the vernacular original, a translation which (advisedly) made claims neither of accuracy nor for the elegance of its French. Without naming Laurent, the texts next translator, Antoine Le Maon, comments on this translation:
mesmes [surtout] ayans veu par cy devant quelque telle traduction daucuns qui se sont vouluz mesler de le traduire, qui y ont si tresmal besogn quil nest possible de plus. Et eulx [les Italiens] pensans que ceste traduction fust
Title as cited from the edition published in Paris by Veuve Michel Le Noir in 1521, which reproduces the colophon of the editio princeps, Paris: Verard, 1485. Di Stefano notes that Decameron and Cameron appear indifferently in the manuscript tradition. Our modern notion of title develops with printing. As manuscripts rarely have something corresponding to a title page, books took their names from the opening lines as is clear from Boccaccios terms below. The subtitle, Le prince Galliot, [ms reading: Galeot] is taken directly from Boccaccio, who calls it: il libro chiamato Decameron, cognominato Prencipe Galeotto. The reference is to the Arthurian Gallehault, as in Dante, Inferno V.137, who served as the go-between for the love of Guinevere and Lancelot, presenting the tales as performing a Gallehault-like function. See Hauvette. 5 Whether the French collection also known as Les Cent nouvelles nouvelles, written between 1456-67, owes anything to Laurents translation of the Decameron remains a matter of scholarly debate. Glyn P. Norton reminds us that the fifteenthcentury French reception of Boccaccio was foremost of the moralist, author of the De casibus virorum illustrium and other Latin works, only secondarily of the vernacular author of the Decameron.
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le mieulx quon eust sceu escripre en Francoys ont voulu aussi inferer, quon ne leust sceu mieulx rendre en nostre langue quil estoit en ladicte traduction (2r). [Especially those who had seen an earlier translation by some who wished to be involved with translation and who worked so badly that it is hard to imagine worse. And the Italians, thinking this translation to be the best that could be done in French also inferred that it was not possible to render it better in our language than was done in that translation.]
By that time (1545), Laurents language was well over a century old, during which time French had evolved considerably. However, even viewed in terms of early fifteenth-century French, Laurents language is ungraceful, in part due to his (probably intentional) servile relation to the source text, i.e., the intervening Latin. As Di Stefano remarks in his edition of the work: le calque lexical et syntaxique semble larme prfr du traducteur (Boccaccio 1998, xxvi). Still, it moved very early from manuscript to print in 1485, and was republished at least eight times in the half century to 1541. Five years later, however, it was replaced by something very different: Antoine Le Maons modern translation directly from Boccaccios Italian, a translation which declared itself to be accurate and furthermore, to be a triumph of French. This claim is supported pragmatically by the fact that it continued to be the basis of the standard French version of the Decameron for some 350 years. 6 The new translator, like many translators of his generation (and like Laurent a century earlier), was in the service of the king. The title page proclaims that he was conseiller du Roy et tresorier de lextraordinaire de ses guerres. He had also been secretary to the kings sister, Marguerite de Navarre. On the verso of the title page, the privilege brings the work still further into the circle of the royal family, as it is the voice of the king himself that speaks here: 7
It was reprinted, not entirely for its antiquarian interest, by Paul Lacroix (Paris: Flammarion, n.d.) in the early twentieth century. Other twentieth-century French versions declare that they are based on Le Maons translation, although in these the language has been modernized. Such exceptional longevity bespeaks the quality of his achievement. 7 It should be noted that a chatty privilege like this is most exceptional. Usually, they are relatively short and entirely formulaic. Amadis de Gaule is a comparable work in that it, too, was a translation from the vernacular, and Herberay was also attached to the court as extraodinary commissioner of the kings artillery. And yet there we read simply: Il est dfendu par lettres patentes du Roy nostre Sire, a tous impri6
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Puis naguere nostre treschere et tresamee seur unique la Royne de Navarre, luy avoit command traduyre de langaige Tuscan en langaige Francoys le decameron de Bocace, poete et orateur Florentin ce quil avait faict en la plus grande curiosit et imitation quil luy a est possible, et suyvant le commendement de nostredicte seur [...]. Affin que par la communication et lecture dudict livre les lecteurs dicelluy de bonne volont puissent y acqurir quelque fruit de bonne dification. [Then a short time ago our dear and beloved only sister, the Queen of Navarre, had ordered him to translate from Tuscan to French the Decameron of Boccaccio, Florentine poet and and man of eloquence, which he did with the greatest care and imitation possible to him, and following the orders of our above mentioned sister []. So that by the communication and reading of the aforesaid book its readers of goodwill may acquire some fruit of good edification.]
We are promised a work prepared for a great patron, Marguerite de Navarre, whose relation to the king is twice referred to in this short passage nostre treschere et tresamee seur unique and nostredicte seur; a noble lady, herself a published author, of whom it will strive to be worthy by being accurate and by providing its readers with edification. We are assured that the translator has worked with curiosit, that is, scrupulously (Cotgrave). Furthermore, Le Maon has done his part of the work en la plus grande imitation quil luy a est possible [the closest imitation he could]. The choice of the word imitation is a loaded one. Before continuing our examination of the paratexts of this translation of the Decameron, it will be useful to pause briefly to explore what it might have implied to contemporaries reading the privilege. Rhetorically, the distinction between translation and imitation is not always clear. While some mid-century arts of poetry, like those of Thomas Sbillet and Jacques Pelletier du Mans, rather encourage translation, in the Def
meurs Libraires & marchans dimprimer en ce royaume, ou exposer en vente les quatre premiers livres dAmadis de Gaule dedans six ans compter du jour quilz seront achevez dimprimer, sur les peines contenues audict privilge, sur ce depesch, sign. Par le Roy. De la Chesnay: Si nest par le cong et permission du seigneur des Essars. N. de Herberay qui les traduictz, et eu la charge de les faire imprimer par ledict Seigneur (Herberay, vol. 1 vii). Some privileges are longer, but no less impersonal and formulaic. See, for example, the edition of Seyssels translation of Apian, available on the extraordinary website Les Bibliothques virtuelles humanistes sponsored by the Universit de Tours.
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fence, Du Bellay thunders against the uselessness of translation:

O Apolon! O Muses! prophaner ainsi les sacres reliques de lAntiquit? [...] Celui donques qui voudra faire uvre digne de prix en son vulgaire, laisse ce labeur de traduyre [...] ceux qui de chose laborieuse et peu profitable, jose dire encor inutile, voyre pernicieuse laccroissement de leur langue, emportent bon droict plus de molestie que de gloyre (91). [O Apollo! O Muses! So to profane the sacred relics of antiquity? Let him who wishes to produce a prize-worthy work in his own vulgar tongue leave this work of translation [...] to those who by painstaking and nearly profitless things, I dare add, useless, even pernicious to the growth of their language, rightly take away more vexation than praise] [bk 1, chap. 6].
These harsh words are perhaps the more astounding from someone who himself did not hesitate to publish his own translation of book four of Virgils Aeneid three years later (1552). Judging by the practice of the period, it is hard to discern a sharp border clearly separating imitation and translation. In contradistinction to Du Bellay, by 1540 or so, some texts are proud to proclaim themselves translations. I am thinking here particularly of novels, texts that took considerable liberties with their source, something for which the modern term would be adaptation (which may be the modern rendition of imitation), like Amadis de Gaule, and occasionally texts that have no traceable source, like Grard dEuphrate. 8 The Deffence, in the chapter following the one decrying translation, recommends imitation as the most fertile ground for the enhancement of the French language and the French literary tradition. The distinction Du Bellay intends is that between a servile rendering, likely to denature French as was often the case with translations earlier 9 and a new class of texts that
This latitude is explored in Rothstein (Reading 45-60) and can be seen as well in the similarities of language applied to imitation and translation in the arts potiques of the period. 9 Claude de Seyssel, in the preface to his translation of Justins abbreviations of Trogus Pompeus (1509) a Latin text prized for its moral value rather than its rhetorical or aesthetic qualities understands grandeur to be embedded so firmly in the Latin of the text he is translating that only by contorting normal French usage could he do his source text justice: Si je vais imitant le style du latin, ne pensez point que cestoit par faute que ne leusse pu coucher en dautres termes plus usits, la faon des histoires franaises; mais soyez certain, Sire, que le langage latin de lauteur a si grande vnust et lgance, que dautant quon lensuit plus de prs, il en retient plus grande partie (Longeon 26).
8
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would be wholly French even as they were firmly founded on a preexisting text in another language. Beyond the familiar Classical recommendations to translate for res and not verba, imitations are aware of and mediate the differences between source and target cultures, differences of which humanist training made educated people increasingly conscious, rendering the nature of res itself subject to translation or appropriation by the target culture. Terence Cave proposes that: In imitation, the activities of reading and writing become virtually identified (35). Understanding imitation in this sense prepares the ground for victory via translation, that is, for a French version of the Decameron (or any other text) which will be the equal of its source (Cave, Ch. 2 Imitation). This is the sort of thing that the king likely has in mind when he praises Le Maon for having rendered the text en la plus grande imitation quil luy a est possible. The purpose of Le Maons translation was to give Boccaccios masterpiece a French voice and a French presence. Le Maon was successful, but in this undertaking he felt greater responsibility and greater constraint than did his contemporaries translating less imposing works. One can usefully contrast his cautious attitude with a distinctly different tone taken toward their source texts by two other French translations from Italian, both published just a year after Le Maons Decameron. Jean Martin, known for his translations of Sannazaros Acadia (1544) and Bembos Asolani (1545) in fact perhaps the best known, best respected translator of the era explains unapologetically that in translating Colonnas fifteenth-century Hypnerotomachia Poliphili (1546), he found it dune prolixit asiatique [] que je ne lai entirement restitu selon lItalien (Colonna 9); [an Asiatic excess [] that I have not entirely reproduced from the Italian]. 10 In the preface to his translation of Machia
10 Martin used similar freedom in his prose translation of Sannazaro (see Fontaine). Jean Maugin goes further in his declaration of independence: Je nay prins de loriginal que la matiere principal, sans massujetir aux propos du traducteur antique mal entenduz et pirement poursuyviz [...]. Et si en passant jay us de metaphores, similitudes, et comparaisons, allegu fables, posies, histoires et invent vers, excusez le desir que jay eu de monstrer quen cest endroit le Franois y est plus propre que lEspaignol (Weinberg 134, emphasis added). [I took only the main points from the original, without tying myself to the poorly understood and worse followed terms of the old translator []. And if, in passing, I used metaphors, similes
26
vellis Art de la Guerre (1546), Jean Charrier declares his freedom:

pour le soulagement de ceulx qui liront ceste traduction, que de marrester en ceste grande timidit de garder estroitement lordre de lautheur: lequel aussi je nay suivy de mot a mot pour la diverse facon de parler des langues, estimant quil vault beaucoup mieulx declarer fidelement lintention des autheurs que lon traduit que de samuser au langaige nu des paroles [for the relief of those who will read this translation, I did not keep too closely to the order of the author: whom also, I did not follow word for word because of the differences between the languages, considering that it was much better to declare the intentions of the authors one translates than to remain faithful to their words]. 11
These attitudes are far from the respectful tone in which Le Maon presents his French Decameron. Two epistles preface Le Maons 1545 translation, one from the translator to his patron, Marguerite de Navarre, a public letter intended in part to declare the status of the translator to readers, and one from 12 the printer addressing readers directly. Together the two epistles present the work to follow as something that has, in the etymological sense of traducere, brought an Italian work over the Alps, making it properly French. In his dedicatory epistle, Le Maon establishes his connection to the court where the Queen of Navarre, earlier, had asked
and comparisons, referred to tales, poems, stories, or added verses, excuse the desire I had to show that French is better suited than Spanish to such matters.] Herberays introduction to Amadis also proclaims its freedom: je ne me sois assubjecty le rendre mot mot (I, xiii), [I did not subject myself to translating word for word]. Several times he declares the undertaking to be associated with the verb traduire and the notion of exalter la Gaule (xiii), leading the reader to understand the verb in a Latin sense; Herberay intends to carry over the Spanish into a French setting. 11 Machiavelli, (a6v). Machiavellis text appears in the same volume with Onosander Platonique, ancien autheur Grec, a Quintus Verannius, De lestat et charge dun lieutenant general darme, also translated by Jehan Charrier, natif dApt en Provence. 12 The general practice in sixteenth-century printing is to treat paratexts as part of the package, so these letters (and sometimes text of the privilege as well, even when it is long expired) are included in successive editions of Le Maons translations. They still appear fifty years and five monarchs later in the 1597 Paris Veirat edition.
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him to read presumably to sight translate a tale from the Deca13 meron. He then reminds Marguerite (and readers) that he lived in Italy for a whole year, a fact likely intended to prove that he had spent enough time there to perfect his mastery of Italian. He took the further precaution of showing his translations of the first ten stories to native speakers of both French and Italian who, he tells us, declared, quelles estoient sinon bien, au moins fidelement traduictes (2v) [they were, if not well, at least faithfully translated], echoing the concern for accuracy already noted in the privilege. Le Maon writes that when the task was first proposed, he questioned whether the French language was a tool that was equal to it. He reminds Marguerite: javoye ouy dire plusieurs de sa nation [i.e. Italians], quilz ne pouvoient penser ne croire, quil fust possible quon le sceust bien traduire en Francoys, ne dire tout ce quil avoit dit (2r). [I had heard many of his countrymen say that they could neither think nor believe that it was possible to translate it well into French, or to say all that he had said.] Italians did in fact frequently declare France a backward and barbarous nation. But now, the reader is to understand, such accusations are properly a thing of the past. French has made progress: en ce temps l trop plus que ceste heure lopinion estoit, que nostre langue ne fust si riche de termes et vocables comme la leur. [In those days, more than at present, it was commonly held that our language was not as rich in terms and words as theirs.] We have no way of knowing how much earlier ce temps l was, when the project was first discussed. Perhaps it was stimulated by what was to be the last
Dedication to Marguerite de Navarre. Sil vous souvient, ma dame, du temps que vous feiste sejour de quatre ou cinq moys Paris, durant lequel vous me commandastes, me voyant venu nouvellement de Florence, ou javoye sejourn ung an entier, vous faire lecture daucunes nouvelles du Decameron de Bocace. Apres laquelle il vous pleut me commender de traduire tout le livre en nostre langue Francoyse, massurant quil seroit trouv beau et plaisant (2r). [If you recall, my lady, the time when you were in Paris for four or five months during which you ordered that I, newly returned from Florence where I had spent a whole year, should read you certain stories from Boccaccios Decameron. After which it pleased you to order me to translate the whole book into our French language, assuring me that it would be found fine and pleasing.] Annie Parent-Charon suggests that one of the purposes of a dedication was to place the text in a cultural milieu, in this case, in the highest quarters. Reading at the court was a way of reaching a large and influential audience; she estimates the core court in the reign of Henri II at over a thousand people, easily swelling to 6,0008,000. It would have been only slightly smaller in his fathers reign (129, 125).
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reprinting of the old Laurent de Premierfait translation a few years earlier, in 1541. Marguerites thinking about her own collection of nouvelles, the Heptameron, whose first tales were written at about the same time, would have added to the urgency of having access to a 14 more modern translation of the Italian masters work. Le Maons statement depends on readers having some degree of consciousness of a changing language, of changes taking place over a fairly short time, probably less than a decade. Evidence of this remains in other translations of the period, mostly of the Ancients, which not infrequently included glossaries of terms coined by the translator, who felt obligated by his task to provide meaningful equivalents for ancient terms. 15 During the last decade of the reign of Franois I, the lexicon of the French language expanded rapidly, incorporating more abstract and collective nouns, supporting the nascent independence of French as a language of abstract thought. Included were innocent words like plante, lgume, both
14 Marguerite de Navarre (33). The connection between Boccaccio and Marguerite is strengthened by the title now associated with the Queens unfinished collection of tales; sixteenth-century manuscripts refer to it as Histoires des Amants fortuns et infortuns de la Reine de Navarre (under which title it was first published in 1558) or Les Nouvelles de la Royne de Navarre. It was first called Heptameron in Claude Grugets 1559 edition. Salminen, based on her painstaking work with all extant manuscripts and other contemporary material, suggests that Marguerite began work seriously in 1542. The earliest (incomplete) manuscripts are datable to 1545-47. Salminen places the decision to produce a collection of a hundred tales divided into ten days (in effect the decision to follow Boccaccios model) to the period spent in Cauterets from September 1546 to March 1547 (35). See Michel Franoiss edition (Introduction vi). Barbara Stephenson, on the evidence of a letter from Marguerite to Chancelier Du Prat in 1526 about Boccaccio, suggests the earlier date, offering it as a correction to Jourda, who places the start of Marguerites thinking about the project in 1538 (67). 15 Jean Colin provides such a glossary with his 1541 translation of Herodian, repeating as appropriate, and adding to the glossary he had created to accompany his unsigned version of Ciceros De lAmiti (1539) and Plutarchs De la tranquilit et repos de lesperit (1538). Louis Meigret produced one in 1547 with his Sallust, as did Jehan Le Blond for his 1548 Valerius Maximus. Claude Gruget presents the one in his translation of the letters of Phalaris (1550) explicitly as a locus of vocabulary expansion. Although it was vernacular text, Jean Martin provided a similar apparatus for his translation of Jacopo Sannazzaros Arcadia (1544), pour relever de peine les lecteurs, [to make the readers task easier] in which he includes information from such sources as Dioscorides, Pliny, Ovid, Flavio Biondo, and others. These glossaries include terms like adolescent, prodige, panthre.
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new collectives, harmonie (in a figurative sense harmonie de la nature), globe, and perhaps less innocent ones like univers and patrie and enthusiasme. They all are part of a process allowing economical expression in French of ideas previously requiring clumsy periphrases. 16 Much of this lexical growth makes its first appearance in translations, as Sbillet notes in his Art potique (140). The Queen of Navarre herself had persuaded Le Maon to undertake the project by insisting, he tells us:
quil ne faloit point que les Tuscans fussent en telle erreur de croire, que leur Bocace ne peust estre represent en nostre langue aussi bien quil est en la leur, estant la nostre devenue si riche et copieuse, depuis ladvenement la couronne du Roy vostre frere, quon na jamais escript aucune chose en autres langues qui ne se puisse bien dire en ceste cy (2v). [The Tuscans must not erroneously think that their Boccaccio cannot be represented in our language as well as he is in theirs, our language having become so rich and copious since the start of the reign of the King your brother, that nothing has ever been written in other languages that cannot be well expressed in this one.]
This translation is presented as a staging field of the ongoing competition between leur Bocace and nostre langue, now capable of equaling the accomplishments of any other. 17 The choice of terms, Tuscans, and elsewhere la langue toscane, reminds us again how politically charged linguistic questions were: Florence is preferred to Rome, a cultural rather than a political challenger. Tuscan carried with it the prestige associated with Florence, and with Florentine political, visual, and verbal culture in the tradition of the great founding triad:
16 So, in the prologue to his fourteenth-century translation (from Latin) of Aristotles Ethics, Nicolas Oresme has to explain both ethique (livre de bonnes meurs/livre de vertus o il enseigne selon raison naturelle bien faire et estre) and politiques (lart et science de gouverner royaumes et cits et toutes communauts). He goes on to regret the lack of collectives that made it impossible to translate the Latin: Homo est animal. 17 This same competition is rendered more aggressively by the anonymous [attributed in the BnF Catalogue to George de la Forge?] translator of Les Triumphs of Petrarch (Paris: Janot, 1539), nouvellement redigez de son langage vulgaire Tascan [sic] en nostre diserte langue Francoyse [newly rendered from his vernacular Tuscan into our eloquent French language]. It can be seen as well in the antagonisms staged between the French translation of Orlando furioso and Amadis discussed in Rothstein (Reading 37).
30
Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio. For ancient Romans, Italians were those outside the center, a distinction which no doubt encouraged the humanists tendency to speak of Tuscan rather than Italian to designate the language at the heart of the Renaissances cultural expansion. Erasmus deals with this problem in Latin by avoiding the tinge of barbarism that, for him, still hangs over Italian, referring to the language of the peninsula quaintly as Etruscan. Etienne Roffet, the publisher of the new translation, echoes these sentiments in his own preface, Aux lecteurs, printed immediately after the epistle to Marguerite. 18
La nation Francoyse se peult bien vanter aujourdhuy, seigneurs lecteurs, que la presente traduction du Decameron de Bocace nous est une tres grande preuve et tesmoignaige certain de la richesse et abondance de nostre vulgaire Francoys. Car dautant que par lindustrie et vigilance des bons et doctes personnaiges de ce Royaume il a est, durant ce regne, traicte et mis en nostre langue plus grant nombre des hystoires Greques et des livres Latins que non pas des Italiens et Tuscans et que ceulx qui veulent rendre jugement sus cecy, tienent et confessent que nostre cothidien langaige se range plus facilement en traduction avecques le Grec, que avec le Latin. [The French nation can pride itself today, my lord readers, that the present translation of the Decameron of Boccaccio provides us with great proof and certain witness of the riches and abundance of our French language. For, although by great industry and circumspection good and learned people of this kingdom, during this reign, have put into our language a greater number of Greek and Latin works than Italian and Tuscan ones, and those who wish to judge these hold that our everyday language is easier to translate from Greek than from Latin.]
Roffet, appealing to a received hierarchy of languages, seeks to link French and Greek directly, as did others in the sixteenth century, bypassing and implicitly surpassing both Latin and Italian. This move, which has a long history leading to Henri Estiennes Conformit du langage franois avec le grec (1565), is always politically loaded, precisely to support French superiority to Italian, whose claim to glory is that it is the direct descendent of Latin. But, he reflects, le Toscan
The 1545 edition was in folio, intended for an aristocratic market, as Roffets use of the title seigneurs lecteurs for his readers further suggests. Subsequent printings were in octavo or other smaller formats to reach a broader audience which constituted another market for Boccaccios tales. Roffets epistle continues to appear, albeit anonymously, in new editions of Le Maons translation clear to the end of the century.
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filz aisn du Latin, nest moins difficile tourner en nostre commun parler, que le Latin mesmes. [Tuscan, oldest son of Latin, is no less difficult to render in our common speech than Latin itself.] French is found to be superior to a worthy opponent, Tuscan, the vernacular with a pedigree. And he continues:
Vous avez icy en Francoys le plus beau et plus estim livre Toscan [...]. Voire, et en Francoys si bon, si courtisan, et si bien present que les caches richesses et incongneuz ornements de nostre parler se peuvent non conferer seulement ains aussi preferer toutes les autres estrangieres (4r). [You have here in French the finest and most admired Tuscan book [...]. More, in such fine, courtly French, and so well presented that the hidden riches and unknown ornaments of our speech can not only be compared but preferred to all other foreign tongues.]
Roffet presents French as having overcome and outdone the Italian of the Decameron in this new and improved version. In these paratexts, the voices of Franois I, Le Maon, and Roffet and the reflected voice of Marguerite work in concert to insist that it equals or perhaps improves upon its source text. Arguably, the demonstration staged in the paratexts here of a victory of the target language over the source, prepared the way for the entry into the world scene of original French voices to follow. Certainly, for the moment, the claim is that, in this translation, the Italians have been bested on a terrain of their own making: the source text has been reworked, taken over, possibly even bested, proving to contemporaries that by 1545, French had become a literary medium equal to any.
32 Works Cited
Berriot, Franois. Langue, nation et pouvoir: les traducteurs du 14 s. prcurseurs des humanistes de la Renaissance. Langues et Nations au temps de la Renaissance. Ed. Marie-Thrse Jones-Davies. Paris: Klincksieck, 1991. 114-35. Boccaccio, Giovanni. Decameron. Traduction (1411-14) de Laurent de Premierfait. Ed. Giuseppe di Stefano. Montral: CERES, 1998. _____. Le Decameron de mesire Jehan Bocace Florentin. Trans. Anthoine Le Maon. Paris: Roffet, 1545. Castiglione, Baldesare. Il libro del Cortegiano. Ed. Bruno Maier. Turin: Uniono Tipografico, 1964. _____. The Book of the Courtier. Trans. Charles S. Singleton. New York: Doubleday, 1959. Cave, Terence. The Cornucopian Text. Oxford: Clarendon, 1979. Charon-Parent, Annie. Regards sur le livre la cour dHenri II. Le Livre et lhistorien. tudes offertes en lhonneur du Prof. Henri-Jean Martin. Ed. Frdric Barbier et al. Geneva: Droz, 1997. 125-32. Colonna, Francesco. Le Songe de Poliphile. Trans. Jean Martin. [Paris: Kerver, 1546]. Ed. Gilles Polizzi. Paris: Imprimerie Nationale, 1994. Cotgrave, Randall. A Dictionary of the French and English Tongues. [London: n.p., 1611]. Columbia SC: University of South Carolina Press, 1950. Dante Alighieri. The Divine Comedy. Inferno. Trans. and comm. Charles S. Singleton. 2 vols. London: Routledge, 1971. Des Masures, Louis. uvres Potiques. Lyon: Jean de Tournes, 1557. Du Bellay, Joachim. Deffence et illustration de la langue Francoyse. Ed. Jean-Charles Monferran. Geneva: Droz, 2001. Fontaine, Marie-Madeleine. Jean Martin, Traducteur. Prose et prosateurs, Mlanges Aulotte. Paris: SEDES, 1988. 109-22. Herberay des Essarts, Nicolas. Amadis de Gaule. Ed. Yves Giraud. 2 vols. Paris: Nizet, 1986. Hauvette, Henri. Principe Galeotto. Mlanges offerts M. mile Picot (orig. ed. 1913). Vol. I. Geneva: Slatkine, 1969. 505-10. Longeon, Claude. Premiers Combats pour la langue franaise. Paris: Livre de Poche, 1979. Machiavelli, Niccol. Lart de la guerre. [Copy consulted missing title page; colophon]. Paris: Jehan Barb, 1546. Marguerite de Navarre. Heptamron. Commentaire et apparat critique. Ed. Renja Salminen. Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Fennica, 1997.
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_____. LHeptamron. Ed. Michel Franois. Paris: Garnier, 1967. Montaigne, Michel de. Essais. Ed. Pierre Villey. Paris: PUF, 1965. Norton, Glyn P. Laurent de Premierfait and the Fifteenth-Century French Assimilation of the Decameron: A Study in Tonal Transformation. Comparative Literature Studies 9 (1972): 376-91. Peletier du Mans, Jacques. Art Potique. Ed. Andr Boulanger. Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1930. Preisig, Florian. Clment Marot et les mtamorphoses de lauteur laube de la Renaissance. Geneva: Droz, 2004. Rothstein, Marian. Reading in the Renaissance: Amadis de Gaule and the Lessons of Memory. Newark DE: University of Delaware Press, 1999. _____. Homer for the court of Franois I. Renaissance Quarterly 59.3 (Fall 2006): 732-67. Sbillet, Thomas. Art Potique franais. 1548. Traits de potique et de rhtorique de la Renaissance. Ed. Francis Goyet. Paris: Livre de poche classique, 1990. 37-174. Stephenson, Barbara. The Power and Patronage of Marguerite de Navarre. Aldershot, UK; Burlington VT: Ashgate, 2004. Weinberg, Bernard. Critical Prefaces of the French Renaissance. New York: AMS Press, 1950.
Translation
Luise von Flotow

University of Ottawa
This Time the Translation is Beautiful, Smooth, and True: Theorizing Retranslation with the Help of Beauvoir
Beauvoir is currently being retranslated into English, approximately fifty years after much of her work appeared. The claims made about these retranslations, undertaken after substantial feminist and other criticism of her texts in English, repeat the usual idea that this time, the translation is much improved and provides access to Beauvoir herself, who was long obscured by poor translations. Or that these versions of her work are beautiful, smooth and true. This study explores two current and gendered ideas about retranslation that may serve to relax such consistent claims about the higher quality of a retranslation. The figure of Pandora, discussed and adapted by Karin Littau (Pandoras Tongues) to theorize translation as an endless, serial activity is useful in this regard, as is the work of psychoanalyst Bracha Lichtenberg Ettinger (Matrix Halal(a), Que dirait Eurydice?) and her theorizing of the matrice as a locus of metramorphosis, encounter, and the non-rejection of the non-I.
________________________ Beauvoir in English The retranslation of Simone de Beauvoirs Le deuxime sexe is underway in France, in the hands of translators Connie Bordes and Sheila Malovany-Chevallier, and expected in late 2008. Philosophical Writings (2006), a collection of hitherto untranslated work by Beauvoir, collected and edited by Margaret Simons and translated by a team of American academics, has just appeared, as the first in the
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projected Beauvoir Series of eight books. The second book of the series, Diary of a Philosophy Student, translated by Barbara Klaw, appeared in 2006, and a long list of retranslations and new collections of Beauvoirs work has been announced. A strong resurgence of interest is apparent. It is due not only to the fact that 2008 marks the centenary of Beauvoirs birth, celebrated in France by various events and publications, among others the feted nude photo of Beauvoir on the cover of Le Nouvel observateur (January 2008). It is also due to the critical focus on the English translations of her work, a focus that dates from the 1980s. Both Simons and Klaw, now involved in the retranslations, published criticisms of existing Beauvoir translations, commenting insightfully on various aspects of the English texts. Simons was among the first to point to the extensive, and unmarked, cuts that had been made in the text of The Second Sex in the course of translation and publication in English, which removed large sections of Beauvoirs research on women in history, and misconstrued or annulled her philosophical thought. She writes, No English edition of Le deuxime sexe [...] contains everything she wrote, or accurately translates her most basic philosophical ideas (559). Klaw studied Beauvoirs thematics of sexuality in Les Mandarins, published in 1954, and emphasized the groundbreaking aspects of Beauvoirs writing in this area. However, Klaws comparison of the original version and the 1956 English translation reveals censorship of certain passages and a tendency to edit strong language in many others. Klaw writes,
The 1956 English translation evidently also judged the novel as too sexually explicit: [] the two scenes evoking oral sex are neatly omitted in the English text and several passages are changed either to attenuate the boldness of the sexual imagery or to strengthen the criticism of women who act upon their desires. (197)
Such discussions and evaluations of the English versions of Beauvoir texts 1 produced in the wake of 1970s feminism, with its keen interest in the most important forethinker of post-World War II feminism sharpened critics awareness of the power and influence of translation, largely coinciding with the development of a new discipline,
Other critiques of Beauvoir translations include those of Cordero, Moi, Alexander, and von Flotow.
1
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Translation Studies, one of whose interests is this often hidden influence of translation. The criticisms became so detailed that existing Beauvoir translations in English were no longer deemed acceptable as material to cite. In 2000, Melanie Hawthorne, editor of Beauvoir and Sexuality, made clear in her introduction that, due to the uncertain quality of the English translations, all quotations from Beauvoirs work in this book are given in both the original French and in English (8). In other words, the translations were considered too uneven, unsure, untrustworthy to serve as the sole version of Beauvoirs expression. In what follows, I would like to bring together ideas on translation criticism and the rereading and retranslation it generates, from a womanist/feminist perhaps matrixial/matricial point of view and posit translation criticism not so much as an attack on some earlier translator/translation but simply as a new understanding and representation of the source text, in another time and space and culture, and by another individual who chooses to, and is able to, read differently. But first, a brief reiteration of a typical aspect (viewed today as a failing) of the English translation of Le deuxime sexe published in 1953, by Howard Parshley, a retired professor of biology at Smith College. 2 In my work on his translation, I found that in general, Parshley attenuated and sanitized all references to sexuality, and in referring to the material available on Parshley, it became clear that the work had been rendered by a polite and scholarly elderly gentleman with a certain horizon, 3 an attitude about what was admissible in writing. In fact, it could be said that he practiced a particular version of aesthetic correctness. It is still not clear to what extent the publishing house Knopf was involved apart from demanding extensive cuts and slashes in the work, so that it could come out in one volume rather than two, and therefore sell better.
2 The coincidences which led to this man becoming Beauvoirs translator are just one example of the often random ways in which translators are selected. The selection of the new translators of Beauvoirs Le deuxime sexe has also been viewed critically in this respect. 3 Berman, in Pour une critique des traductions, explores various horizons that may explain the outcome of translation; one of these is the horizon du traducteur.
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Besides abridging and sanitizing Beauvoirs work, Parshley often used simple stylistic means to moderate Beauvoirs writing on sexuality, as these short excerpts from the chapter entitled Initiation la sexualit show. In this segment, Beauvoir discusses young womens often traumatic sexual experiences, and refers to the findings of Dr. Wilhelm Stekel, a German sexologist of the 1920s, who reported on his women patients. Beauvoir incorporates statements by women patients and descriptions of sexual encounters that she has culled from Stekel. These are often narratives, told in the first person, or accounts that include direct quotes from dialogue with the patient. Beauvoir argues, for example, that a womans anxiety about sex can be the result of her lack of knowledge about her own body, and she cites and paraphrases Stekels patients:
Toute jeune fille porte en elle toutes sortes de craintes ridicules quelle ose peine savouer dit Stekel... Une jeune fille par exemple croyait que son ouverture infrieure ntait pas sa place. Elle avait cru que le commerce sexuel se faisait travers le nombril. Elle tait malheureuse que son nombril soit ferm et quelle ne puisse y enfoncer son doigt. Une autre se croyait hermaphrodite. Une autre se croyait estropie et incapable davoir jamais de rapports sexuels. (142)
Parshleys translation, in turn, paraphrases Beauvoir, and abridges her text in very specific ways:
According to Stekel, all young girls are full of ridiculous fears, secretly believing they may be physically abnormal. One, for example, regarded the navel as the organ of copulation and was unhappy about its being closed. Another thought she was a hermaphrodite. (382)
Parshleys removal of the nave ouverture infrieure is noteworthy here, just as later in the text he censors more vulgar expressions such as tu as un grand trou. In fact, in these quotes from dialogues and patients accounts, he strikes the individual woman from the narrative, making the text a dryer academic treatise. In the passage above, the deletion of how the girl handles and explores her body her attempt to introduce a finger into her navel strikes the personal, helplessly exploratory, element from the text. This makes the text less descriptive, less nave, more detached, more scholarly. Subsequent narratives by Stekels patients are also abridged and changed, thus also eliminating their subjective aspects: for instance,
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hurtful comments and situations that have rendered these women sexually unresponsive, and that they recount verbatim, are turned into polite abstractions. Beauvoir cites womens memories of their unhappy wedding nights; they quote their husbands as follows:
tu mas tromp, tu nes plus vierge Comme tu as les jambes courtes et paisses Mon Dieu, que tu es maigre
which Parshley translates respectively as:

her husband accused her of deceiving him in regard to her virginity another husband made uncomplimentary remarks about how stubby and thick his brides legs were Her husband brutally deplored her too slender proportions. (382)
These politer, more literary formulations that turn the injured firstperson narrator into a silenced third person, with higher register verbs (deceive, deplore) and polite descriptives (uncomplimentary remarks, too slender proportions) and even inverted commas around stubby and thick, which the translator may have seen as vulgar terms, create a text that seems far removed from Beauvoirs more human and subjective source version. When the French and English versions are compared, the differences are apparent, and we may well ask about the effect of such differences multiplied throughout the entire text.
Translation Criticism: a Rare Event Translation criticism is not exactly a booming field of study in the humanities. Nor do professional reviewers, who regularly work with texts in English translation, indulge in such activity. Works translated into English are still generally treated as though they had been written in the language of the target culture, and terms such as a deft translation, a fluent rendering, or an awkward version are often the limit of the reviewers comments. Largely, these refer to the readability of the text in the language of translation. It is rare to find scholars or reviewers engaging with the act and the effects of translation. As Antoine Berman, an eminent translation theorist, has pointed out, le discours critique reste curieusement muet propos de [la traduction], sauf la juger bonne ou mauvaise partir de son savoir
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de ses uvres (Critique 92). Berman singles out three great critics [grandes figures de la critique] who have speculated or commented on translation: Novalis, Benjamin, and Blanchot. However, while Berman describes these great critics as respectively acknowledging translation as a rare and difficult skill, as an activity that leads toward the telos of pure language, and as an enigma produced by traducteurs, crivains de la sorte la plus rare, et vraiment incomparable (Critique 95-96), these writers were better at formulating abstractions about the valuable enigma that confronts them in the form of translation rather than actual translation events and effects. Berman comments again, cela ne change rien au fait quau-del de ces dclarations de principe, la critique semble indiffrente la traduction relle (96). Many others have begun examining this invisible space that translation occupies, and proposed more specific ways of filling it: Lawrence Venuti is perhaps the most voluble American critic on this topic. His article, The Translators Invisibility (expanded and published as a book in 1995), and other works, Rethinking Translation and The Scandals of Translation, as well as his efforts in editing and compiling the scholarly notes for The Translation Studies Reader, have very much increased contemporary anglophone interest in translation as a powerful engine of cultural transfer and cultural influence. While Venuti leans toward a Marxist critique of the hegemony of powerful translating cultures (often contemporary anglophone and/or postcolonial) that far too easily reduce the imported foreign text to the local thus effacing both the foreign and the entire process of translation Berman has more idealistic aims for translation criticism. These two approaches have been presented as examples of the two very different motivations in translation criticism, with Venuti taking an increasingly leftist and moralistic tone and Berman promoting an essentialist and teleological approach, where translation and especially retranslation progress in a linear movement and are investie dune mission qui consiste dlivrer la vrit (Brisset 41). Though different, both approaches strive to define good translation, thus also creating the category of bad translation. Yet we can also see things more in line with polysystem theories that refuse to judge translations as good, bad, or indifferent, and instead study the phenomenon of translation as a sociocultural and
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historical one; they place translation and retranslation into a precise context, a scne de communication (Brisset 47), where the artifacts produced represent another, earlier text, usually for a different language audience, and in that audiences own mix of contrasting or supportive theories, text genres, and writing styles. The translations may well be highly variable, affected by the cologie intellectuelle (Brisset 45, citing Stephen Toulmin) of their time and by la condition culturelle de la pense (Brisset 45, citing Judith Schlanger) in short, by their respective cultural and ideological contexts. Beauvoirs translation into English and its reception in the 1950s and 1960s were doubtless subject to exactly such an cologie intellectuelle. Feminist Translation Criticism and Retranslation Translation criticism, rare as it is, is one element that mobilizes retranslation; but retranslation also occurs when an older work is intertextually referred to in more recent writing. A piece of contemporary text that cites an older authority causes a look backward, a rereading, a reinterpretation of this predecessor. In the process of this rereading and rewriting, the source text is released from its existing translation, set free from the entanglements that have tied it down to a certain representation, and it goes on to live other lives, for other readers. The push to properly understand Beauvoir through new translations and retranslations was clearly triggered by the look back at Beauvoir by the burgeoning womens movement of the 1960s and 1970s, which, among other things, searched for and unearthed forethinkers of the movement, and set about re-presenting them. The criticisms of Beauvoir translations convinced readers and publishers alike of the need for or perhaps usefulness of new versions. In this, they are akin to work done on Bible translations at the time another example of a new intellectual ecology in the wake of the feminist movement (Simon). Since the 1980s, translation criticism with a feminist tinge has played some role in the move to reread and rewrite the work of earlier women writers, translators, and thinkers; from this, a view of translation as an ongoing labour of rereading and rewriting, as a work of seriality and generation rather than a work of finitude or final
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completion has developed, in both translation criticism and theory. The work of feminist critics who apply feminist/womanist psychoanalytic theory to help understand translation and especially retranslation provides a strong foundation for such thinking. In what follows, I will discuss two important works that apply feminist psychoanalytic thought to retranslation in an attempt to relativize and open up the notion of the final, the best, the truest translation. Over the 1990s, Karin Littau worked on various aspects of the Pandora figure, often in relation to her studies of Wedekind, the German expressionist playwright of the early twentieth century, and his Lulu/Pandora character. She immersed herself in the many mythic, literary and other artistic representations of this ostensibly Ur-female figure, and studied the story of Pandoras box and the linguistic chaos that was unleashed when she, according to the dominant version of the story, defied authority and opened it up. This is the chaos that translation has been seeking to temper and mediate ever since. Citing George Steiner, Littau argues that the story of Pandora is one of two major myths ruling translation; the other is the story of Babel. And yet, the story of Pandora is unclear, quite diffuse, contingent upon retellings by Hesiod (a farmer turned misogynist poet), debatable translations (by Erasmus, among others), and a multitude of different images in three dimensions, carved in stone, and in two dimensions. On the one hand, Pandora has been represented as Mother Earth with an enormous, overflowing cornucopeia, a deity that oversees fruitfulness and regeneration, as the kind of Ur-female associated with the Hawwa [Life, not Eve] of feminist Bible translations (see Korsak on this point.) The other, more dominant version, however, tells how linguistic chaos is the result of Pandoras female curiosity in defiance of male authority. By opening the jar, when she had been forbidden to do so, she is reputed to have unleashed all of the worlds evils upon mankind; only hope remained locked inside, inaccessible. This is the story that has prevailed and largely entered the public sphere, la condition culturelle de la pense, to repeat Schlangers formulation. Littau, like so many of her generation, rewrites mythology, here with reference to the traditional bane of translation; yet in Littaus version, the bane becomes a boon. Through a series of deft juxtapositions and questions, Littau argues that the Pandora figure presents and is presented as a multiplicity, and does not stay within the traditional
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duality (of woman/man, presence/lack of Phallus, right/wrong, good or bad translation). Contrary even to Derridas view of translation supplementing a source text, which Littau recognizes as a considerable and important move away from the usual condemnations of translation, she rejects the strict binarism that continues to rule discourses on translation. Instead, she links the multiplicity of Pandora to the multiplicity of womens psyche and sexuality, as theorized by Luce Irigaray, and comes to the following conclusion:
The many Pandora myths lend emphasis not to the impossibility of translation, but the impossibility of putting a stop to endless retranslation, in short, they show us the serial nature of translation; there are always more translations, retranslations. [] [W]hat pan-dora, her name, exposes is a seriality, not just that there never was one, but that there is always one more, and so on. To translate her name (in her name) is therefore not finally to translate her, to translate her at last, to approximate some original condition, but rather to translate again, to retranslate. (33)
This is a significant reworking, a reconceptualizing of the ongoing activities of rereading and rewriting that mark intercultural activity and exchange. They can work to posit translation and retranslation in terms of generous regenerative processes rather than in the usual terms of deficiencies. Carolyn Shread has applied the psychoanalytic and aesthetic theories of Bracha Lichtenberg Ettinger to translation and retranslation and shown how the traditional textual border (between original and translation) becomes a threshold rather than a frontier, if the encounter with the unknown/the foreign is posited as a matrixial relationship, or a metramorphic activity. This relationship moves beyond the idealist metaphoric approach to translation where the one text supposedly replaces the other, yet never does so wholly; it also eschews the more realist metonymic view of translation where a translation only ever presents a part of the original that then stands for the whole. Ettingers metramorphosis 4 applied to translation brings in the female/maternal
A neologism that brings together and resonates with the terms meta, mater, and morpheus: Ettingers neologism combines a play on meta and an evocation of mater, mother or womb, with morphe, Greek for form, linked also to Morpheus, the Greek God of sleep and dreams. The term refers to processes that do not involve single unities acting through the condensation of metaphor or the dis4
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element that is excised from Lacanian psychoanalytic thought. It uses this excision of the inexpressible feminine as a signifying space. Ettinger writes:
We are caught in an axiom of equivalence. The Phallus is the value inherited from one signifier to another, each, on top of that, anaphorical to the signifier of a lost unity. So the magic circle is complete. So the Phallus appropriates all. But the Symbolic is larger than the Phallus! Add metramorphoses to metaphors and metonymies. Open up a space between Symbol and Phallus (in a psychoanalytic sense). Matrix is in this space: Symbol minus (-) Phallus. (Matrix 5051).
In thinking beyond the domineering Phallus and incorporating the feminine matrix, Ettinger centres on the space of the late prenatal matrixial relations between mother and child/children where dependency is an ethical value. Shread comments that this focus on dependency and interrelatedness reveals our multiple dependencies and the connectedness underlying the fictions of absolute autonomy (Shread, Metramorphosis, citing Michael Cronin). The theorization and deployment of the matrixial and metramorphic paradigm evoke a feminine Symbolic that welcomes and accepts difference rather than replacing it. Ettinger insists:
Matrix gives meaning to the real which is otherwise unthinkable. [] Matrix. The non-rejection of unknown and unassimilated non-I(s) is an unconscious side of the feminine ab-ovo. Matrix: dynamic and temporary assemblage created by non-rejection, without absorption, repeal or fusion. (Matrix 45-46)
Critic Rosi Huhn summarizes:

In contrast to metamorphosis, each of the new forms and shapes of the metramorphosis does not send the nature of each of the preceding ones into oblivion or eliminate it, but lets it shine through the transparency, disar-
placement of metonymy; instead they provoke changes that mutually alter the meaning they create without supplanting or deferring the signifier (Shread, A Theory 8).
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ranges and leads to an existence of multitude rather than unity. (Huhn cited by Shread, Metramorphosis 224)
Here the emphasis on non-rejection of unknown non-I(s) and assemblages created without absorption, repeal or fusion, and Huhns comments on the nature of preceding forms shining through the new forms in which they are presented resonate with recent concerns of translation and translation studies: the problem of recognizing alterity, of validating and somehow incorporating and reflecting otherness in the translated text, all the while not eliminating or appropriating it. From this perspective, translation as a metramorphic activity enables signification within a relationship that transgresses the usual construction of subject boundaries. Here, several comes before the one, as in the late prenatal relationship of subjectivity-as-encounter, where a structure of severality precedes individual consciousness (Metramorphosis 221), and as Shread argues, the term matrix shifts the associations of the womb as a passive receptacle to that of an active border space, transformed by a co-emerging I and an unknown non-I (Metramorphosis 221). The applications to translation and retranslation are manifold, and obviously related to the seriality, indeed, the infinity, of translation already suggested by Pandora, and elaborated by Littau. First and foremost, the translational relation is seen as one of encounter, exchange, and mutual transformation rather than assimilation, displacement, or rejection. Then, there is a more nuanced approach to the Other, to the unknown, to difference, and the possibility of furthering changes in negotiating practices. Shread sums it up as follows: Ettingers project can be summarized as a theorization of how the matrix offers a locus where meaning is generated rather than foreclosed, transferred rather than buried (Metramorphosis 224). Ettingers thinking promotes a view of translation as generative; as a labour that, like all such work and contrary to any notions of solitary grandeur, is dependent upon and in conversation with its cultural environment, all the while exerting an influence on it as well. It is not in any way a labour that must end in the deterioration, dereliction, or final replacement of the original.
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Back to Beauvoir While criticism of translations and retranslations remains rare, the blurb on the back cover of many books has become one important way to encourage readers to read and engage with the new versions of texts in other words, a marketing tool that often evokes former translations. The new Beauvoir translations Barbara Klaws Diary of a Philosophy Student (2006) and Margaret Simonss edited collection Philosophical Writings (2006) are no exceptions. And their cologie culturelle is no secret either: both books were produced by a team of American women, and set out to present Beauvoirs thought before or beyond the influence Sartre may have had on it. They are group projects that place a woman before a man, an aspect that the blurb on the back of Philosophical Writings confirms, as it also calls upon the translation effect:
This volume aims at nothing less than the transformation of Simone de Beauvoirs place in the philosophical canon. Despite growing interest in her philosophy, Beauvoir remains widely misunderstood and is typically portrayed as a mere philosophical follower of her companion, Jean-Paul Sartre. In Philosophical Writings, Beauvoir herself shows that nothing could be further from the truth. One factor contributing to misunderstanding has been the lack of English translations of much of Beauvoirs philosophical work, or worse its mistranslation in heavily condensed, popular editions [...]. Philosophical Writings is a major contribution to the renaissance of interest in her work, and to a philosophical curriculum in which women remain underrepresented (my emphasis.)
The purpose of this collection of new translations is clear: it will resituate Beauvoir within twentieth-century philosophy, free her from the subjugation to Sartre imposed by lack of translations or mistranslations, and provide additional interpretations, explicitations, and annotations of her thought by a group of women scholars seeking to counter the under-representation of women in philosophy. The fact of retranslation is vital in this project and promises access to Beauvoir herself. The blurb for Diary of a Philosophy Student has a similar tone; critic Claudia Card writes:
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This is a magnificent piece of work. It is an engaging read and lets English readers to whom French is not accessible have first-hand access to some now much-discussed evidence regarding the independence of Beauvoirs thought. The translation is beautiful, smooth, and true. A real coup (my emphasis.)
This piece expresses two important ideas: the first is that readers will have first-hand access to evidence regarding Beauvoirs thought, and the second presents this particular translation as true. Such assertions imply that the new translation improves the text, indeed makes available the true original text, and are typical of much of the discourse around retranslation, a discourse that consistently undermines translation by proposing better or truer versions. Rather than seeing translation as an ongoing, ever-changing, and constantly evolving engagement with texts where the thresholds and not the frontiers are important this discourse implies a finality, the possibility of a final true version of a translated text. The idea that English language readers will have first-hand access to Beauvoirs work through these particular translations completely elides the work of the translators. In fact, the trace of the translator within the text is what makes the text readable for contemporary audiences. In preparing the text for a readership incapable of reading in French (and in context), the translators work is vital to this enterprise of allowing access to Beauvoir but it is never firsthand access. It is always access through the brain, the knowledge, and the words of the translator. Such discourse about first-hand access and true translation continues the strange assumption, the wishful thinking, that this translation, now, will render the authentic voice of the original, an assumption that has been shown again and again to be wrong. It is reminiscent of the preface to Traduire Freud (1989), a project to render coherent the many diverse versions of Freud in France and that claimed to translate le texte, rien que le texte. As translation criticism has repeatedly shown, the text is not separable from the ecologie intellectuelle. In the case of Beauvoir translated anew into English, the contextualizations and paratexts may go some way to make this cologie visible, or rather present the new text as a part of it. Critics of these translations and of the new Deuxime sexe will hopefully demonstrate
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an understanding and appreciation of the work of translation as well as its contingent, serial, multiple nature.
Works Cited
Alexander, Anna. The Eclipse of Gender: Simone de Beauvoir and the Diffrance of Translation. Philosophy Today 41.1 (1997): 112-22. Beauvoir, Simone de. Le deuxime sexe. Paris: Gallimard, 1949. 2 vols. _____. Diary of a Philosophy Student. Trans. Barbara Klaw. Ed. Barbara Klaw, Sylvie Le Bon de Beauvoir, Margaret A. Simons, and Marybeth Timmermann. Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 2006. _____. Les Mandarins. Paris: Gallimard, 1954. 2 vols. _____. The Mandarins. Trans. Leonard M. Friedman. Cleveland: World Publishing, 1956. _____. Philosophical Writings. Ed. Margaret A. Simons, Marybeth Timmermann, and Mary Beth Mader. Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 2004. Berman, Antoine. Critique, commentaire et traduction. Quelques rflexions partir de Benjamin et Blanchot. Po&sie 37 (1986): 88-106. _____. Pour une critique des traductions: John Donne. Paris: Gallimard, 1995. Bourguignon, Andr, Pierre Cotet, Jean Laplanche, and Franois Robert. Traduire Freud. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1989. Brisset, Annie. Retraduire ou le corps changeant de la connaissance. Sur lhistoricit de la traduction. Palimpsestes 15 (2004): 39-67. Cordero, Anne D. Simone de Beauvoir Twice Removed. Simone de Beauvoir Studies 7 (1990): 49-56. Ettinger, Bracha Lichtenberg. Matrix Halal(a) Lapsus. Notes on painting, 1985-1992. Trans. from French by Joseph Simas. Oxford: Museum of Modern Art, 1993. _____. Que dirait Eurydice? What would Eurydice say? Conversation with Emmanuel Levinas. Toulouse: Paragraphic, 1994. Flotow, Luise von. Translation Effects: How Beauvoir Talks About Sex in English. Contingent Loves. Simone de Beauvoir and Sexuality. Ed. Melanie Hawthorne. Richmond: University of Virginia Press, 2000. 1333. Hawthorne, Melanie, ed. Contingent Loves. Simone de Beauvoir and Sexuality. Richmond: University of Virginia Press, 2000.
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Klaw, Barbara. Sexuality in Les Mandarins. Feminist Interpretations of Simone de Beauvoir. Ed. Margaret Simons. University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1995. 193-221. Korsak, Mary Phil. At the Start, Genesis Made New. New York: Doubleday, 1993. Littau, Karin. Pandoras Tongues. TTR: Traduction, Terminologie, Rdaction 13.1 (2000): 21-35. _____. The Primal Scattering of Languages: Philosophies, Myths and Genders. Paideia Project. 22 March 2008. <www.bu.edu/wcp/Papers/ Lite/LiteLitt.htm> . Moi, Toril. Feminist Theory and Simone de Beauvoir. Oxford: Blackwell, 1990. Le Nouvel Observateur. No. 2252, 3-9 January 2008. Parshley, Howard, trans. and ed. The Second Sex. By Simone de Beauvoir. New York: Knopf, 1953. Patterson, Yolanda Astarita. Who Was This H. M. Parshley?: The Saga of Translating Simone de Beauvoirs The Second Sex. Simone de Beauvoir Studies 9 (1992): 41-47. Shread, Carolyn. Metamorphosis or Metramorphosis? Towards A Feminist Ethics of Difference in Translation. TTR: Traduction, Terminologie, Rdaction 20.2 (2007): 213-42. _____. A Theory of Matrixial Reading: Ethical Encounters in Ettinger, Laferrire, Duras, and Huston. Diss. University of Massachusetts, 2005. Simon, Sherry. Gender in Translation: Cultural Identity and the Politics of Transmission. London and New York: Routledge, 1996. Simons, Margaret A. The Silencing of Simone de Beauvoir: Guess Whats Missing from The Second Sex. Womens Studies International Forum 6.5 (1983): 559-64. Venuti, Lawrence, ed. Rethinking Translation: Discourse, Subjectivity, Ideology. London and New York: Routledge, 1992. _____. The Scandals of Translation: Toward an Ethics of Difference. London and New York: Routledge, 1998. _____. The Translators Invisibility. Criticism 28.2 (1986): 179-217. _____. The Translators Invisibility: a History of Translation. London and New York: Routledge, 1995. _____, ed. The Translation Studies Reader. London and New York: Routledge, 2000; 2nd ed. 2004.
Translation
Carolyn Shread
Mount Holyoke College
Redefining Translation through Self-Translation: The Case of Nancy Huston

Self-translation is generally viewed as a minor, borderline, eccentric practice within translation studies. Suggesting that self-translation is in fact both more pertinent and more widespread, this article argues for a reconceptualization of translation models, using the example of Nancy Hustons self-translating practice as a deconstructive lens. Taking selftranslation as a prototype for the ways in which translation may be viewed not as a degenerative process, but rather as creative expansion, this article sheds light on a theoretical aporia in the field of translation studies, while also forging a wider, more generous conception of the goals, art, and ethics of translation.
________________________
Nancy Hustons self-translation practice is an exemplary case for considering translation in the context of French and Francophone literature. In the field of translation studies, self-translation is generally viewed as an exceptional, minority practice and consequently is not widely discussed. However, I suggest that self-translation reveals something about the nature of all translation and that it is theoretically productive precisely because of its problematic status in relation to the binary categories by which translation is often defined: original/translation; author/translator; source text/target text. With reference to Hustons work and the controversies it has inspired, I propose we renegotiate many of these terms. Thus, instead of confining self-translation to a distinct and separate space, I emphasize the continuities between self-translation and translation, showing how self-translation
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provides us with a strategy for deconstructing monolithic models of translation. Self-translation, also called auto-translation, was included by G. C. Klmn in his survey of Some Borderline Cases of Translation, as one instance, along with other anomalies such as pseudotranslation and zero translation, warranting further analysis. While Klmn saw these extrinsic examples as simply overlooked and requiring inclusion within the field of translation, my purpose is somewhat different. I hope that by using self-translation to strategically disrupt standard definitions of translation, this article will contribute to Maria Tymoczkos call for a new disciplinary understanding: translation as a cross-cultural concept must be reconceptualized and enlarged beyond dominant Western notions that continue to circumscribe its definition (310). While my discussion of Hustons work remains within North-American and European models, it nevertheless serves to unsettle many of the assumptions Tymoczko invites us to question by considering non-Western instances of translation. Without seeking to define self-translation within a closed taxonomy la Genette, Roman Jakobsons distinction between the three types of intralingual, interlingual, and intersemiotic translation may be of use in manipulating the otherwise potentially unwieldy concept of self-translation for the purposes of this article. While I discuss both intralingual and interlingual forms of self-translation, I do not consider the many metaphorical uses of the term self-translation to describe, for instance, the experiences of women translating themselves into patriarchal culture, writers in postcolonial cultures destined to translate themselves as a part of the colonial heritage, or transnational migrants living as translated beings between multiple cultures, languages, and national identities. 1 These metaphorical uses of selftranslation are distinguished from the practice of self-translation I am
1 Sherry Simon discusses some of the ways translation is evoked as a metaphor in Gender in Translation (134-35). Joanne Akai focuses on the relevance of selftranslation to postcolonial contexts, proposing the argument that West Indian literature in English can be considered self-translation [] an intricately woven textile of Creole and English: a hybrid writing made possible through the translation of Creole experience into English; oral Creole culture into written English; the Creole language into the English language (195). Mary Besemeres edited a collection of essays that explore the issue of self-translation specifically with respect to auto-biography, Translating Ones Self: Language and Selfhood in Cross-Cultural Autobiography.
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concerned with here in that they do not result in two written texts, since at least one of the texts is unwritten. Furthermore, I avoid discussion of these metaphors because I sense that their suggestive power derives from an appeal to conventional notions of translation as a derivative, secondary, inferior, inauthentic state, and it is precisely these associations with translation that I wish to contest. Eventually, the redefinition of translation I propose via self-translation may prove to have wider metaphorical implications that are empowering to those groups commonly viewed as impoverished or secondary through their comparison with translation. Debates about self-translation are primarily concerned with literary translation, no doubt because this is where the stakes of authorship, authority, and originality are highest. 2 Despite the considerable impact of poststructuralist thought in the field of literary criticism, theoretical conceptions of translation remain constrained within traditional models in which the authors sovereignty and creative originality enshrined in the original text are never attainable by the secondary, subservient imitation, reflection, or refraction that is translation. The modesty of this attitude is strikingly different from the bold claims for textual interpretation made by readers emancipated from the authority of the author by poststructuralist thinking, for to paraphrase Roland Barthes, the death of the author has not (quite) yet heralded the birth of the translator. Although we are no longer in the situation that Brian Fitch described in 1983, when aucun thoricien de la traduction [...] ne sest adress jusquici directement au problme du statut de la traduction de soi (Lintra-intertextualit 86), more than twenty years later, selftranslation still represents a theoretical aporia in the field. Rainier Grutmans entry on Auto-translation in the 1998 Routledge Encyclopedia of Translation Studies suggests that translation scholars themselves have paid little attention to the phenomenon, perhaps because they thought it to be more akin to bilingualism than to translation proper (17). This explanation is very telling, implying that the reason why self-translation has been neglected is precisely because it challenges a predominant Western monolingual paradigm in which
2 Rainier Grutman comments, A fairly common practice in scholarly publishing, auto-translation is frowned upon in literary studies (17).
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translation compensates for a linguistic lack, while simultaneously erasing the multilingual nature of its task. As Raymond Federman points out, even critical responses to iconic self-translator Samuel Beckett fail to attend to the bilingual nature of his uvre, contenting themselves with just one of the two languages he wrote in, and giving no account of the multilingual nature of his texts:
in all the books I consulted, there are no chapters, no long sections, no index entries for bilingualism and/or self-translating. Even more interesting or perhaps one should say appalling the index of the Beckett biography (authorized or unauthorized as it may be) does not even contain the words bilingual or bilingualism, translating or self-translating. (8)
Responding to this erasure of the place of translation in writing, the main contention of this article is that by forcing us to reconsider some basic assumptions, a close analysis and bold reading of self-translation have the power to redefine our concepts of translation. One consequence of the marginalization of self-translation as a practice is that it reinforces Western models in which monolingualism, rather than multilingualism, are the norm. Yet in many places in the world, multilingualism is clearly the rule rather than the exception. Critics responding to self-translated texts are forced to acknowledge the extent to which multiple languages may be present, or leave traces, in any given text. Fitch discusses this in relation to Becketts writing, explaining textual activity [...] runs over, back and forth, between language systems, failing to respect the boundaries that normally contain the French and English languages (Investigation 134). In this reading, a self-translated text is more than the chance contiguity of two languages; instead, it involves degrees of reciprocal interference, which deviate from the assumption of a hermetic original confined to a single, pure language. However, within the framework of conventional models of translation, it is difficult to describe this writing/translating process. Elizabeth Beaujour considered this issue with reference to Jacques Derridas bid to renovate theorizations of translation: As Jacques Derrida has observed, one of the limits of theories of translation is that all too often they treat the passing from one language to another and do not sufficiently consider the possibility for languages to be implicated more than two in a text (723). This theoretical omission has become increasingly evident as the creative inter-
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facing of multiple languages has gained an expanded presence in the literary scene as a result of postcolonial and transnational cultural expression. In France, from 2002 to 2005, television literary celebrity Bernard Pivot aired a show entitled Double Je, which focused entirely on his interviews with authors bilingual in French and another language. The program reflected the beginning of an understanding of the dependency of French culture on its outsiders. Theorizing in the United States, English as the hegemonic language is extremely reluctant to acknowledge the place of Spanish-English bilingualism. In both instances there is clearly a powerful investment in keeping the model of self-translation carefully distinct from translation proper. Self-translation is further marginalized by its persistent association with a handful of authors chosen to represent the anomaly. In the field of French and Francophone studies, most criticism concerns Beckett, who is usually classed as a unique example of the rare art: Brian Fitch claims that Beckett offers sans doute le seul exemple dune uvre presque entirement bilingue (Lintra-intertextualit 86). One of the motives of this paper is to contest this restricted canon, arguing with Christopher Whyte that self-translation is a much more widespread phenomenon than one might think (64). 3 Interestingly, Hokenson and Munson, in The Bilingual Text: History and Theory of Literary Self-Translation, comment that within this time span of 1100 through 2000, writers adopt the French language for literary selftranslation with disproportionate frequency (15), although I venture that at least in the era of global English, English is even more common as one of the languages of self-translation. In any event, once the range of texts considered is extended from French texts to the wider Francophone field, with all its complex linguistic and cultural history, many more instances of self-translation, both practical and metaphorical, are evident. I argue here for the inclusion of Huston, who describes herself as une crivaine canadienne et franaise mais non pas canadienne-franaise (En franais dans le texte 232).
3 Whyte cites Joseph Brodsky (Russian/English), Josep Carner (Castilian/Catalan Spanish), and Sorley MacLean (Gaelic/English). In addition we might add Vladmir Nabokov (Russian/English), Joachim du Bellay (Latin/French), James Joyce (English/French/Italian), Milan Kundera (Czech/English), Elsa Triolet (Russian/English), Romain Gary (French/English), Julien Green (French/English), Andre Makine (Russian/French), Jorge Semprun (Spanish/French), Hector Bianciotti (Spanish/French), and Andr Brink (Afrikaans/English).
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Born in the Anglophone Canadian province of Alberta, Huston traveled to Paris for a year abroad, stayed, and made a name for herself as a French author, and later an English author. Huston has received many prestigious prizes in France and is not shy of entering into the media spotlight for debates about her work. Yet her work still suffers from exclusion in the field of self-translation: in 2001, Michael Oustinoff published one of the few books on the topic, Bilinguisme dcriture et auto-traduction: Julien Green, Samuel Beckett, Vladimir Nabokov, an analysis that does not include a single reference to Huston, even though her work was one of the most celebrated literary phenomena in France while the book was being written. Furthermore, surprisingly, Hustons name does not appear even once in Hokenson and Munsons The Bilingual Text, even though they are both researchers in the field of French and Comparative Literature. Yet, I go so far as to argue that Nancy Hustons bilingual corpus is commensurable with Becketts, given the number of her own works she has translated and the depth of her analysis into self-translation as both a linguistic and cultural phenomenon. Unlike Beckett, who started writing in his native English and later shifted to French, for the first ten years Huston wrote only in French, apparently turning her back on her mother tongue, English. However, since the early 1990s she has consistently composed her texts in French and English, and there are now at least ten novels available in both languages, in addition to a host of interviews and other nonfiction publications (see Ducker, for example). Much of Hustons nonfiction involves in-depth reflections on her own experience and that of other bilingual and bicultural writers such as Beckett and Romain Gary. Huston has written many perceptive essays on questions surrounding the cultural negotiations involved in her dual linguistic status, starting in 1986 with Lettres parisiennes: LAutopsie de lexil, an epistolary exchange with Franco-Algerian Lela Sebbar, and later in Nord perdu (1999), where she explores themes such as Le faux bilinguisme, La dtresse de ltranger, and Les autres soi. In these works, Huston displays a keen awareness of the factors that motivated the cultural turn in translation studies, showing how multiple cultures mark the selftranslating author. In arguing for Hustons place in an enlarged canon, I hope to foster greater recognition of self-translated texts not only between
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languages, or other sign systems, but also within a single language. As French Studies have come to encompass literature from the Francophone world, there has been too ready an assumption that Francophone literature is immediately accessible and consumable by speakers of metropolitan French. By considering the self-translation at work beneath many apparently original French texts, from the Maghreb or Antilles for instance, we may begin to understand the full extent of this practice and the stresses and creative effects it produces on a seemingly monolingual surface (see Shread). Conversely, we might also explore the limitations of metropolitan French in a wider context: writing on Les voix parallles de Nancy Huston, Christine Klein-Lataud points out that in Cantique des plaines, Hustons very Parisian French occasionally conflicts with a Canadian landscape:
Souvent, l o langlais est standard, le franais est familier ou argotique. [...] Cela pose un problme au lectorat francophone dAmrique parce que, comme on le sait, cest dans ce registre quil y a le plus dcart entre les varits rgionales, et que largot parisien dtonne parfois dans le contexte canadien qui est celui du livre. (224)
This question of intralingual translation is an important direction for future research into the process of self-translation in terms of the bilingual or multilingual subject and in terms of the larger theoretical implications of the metaphorical uses of self-translation; it challenges French studies to think through its embrace of Francophone literature more critically than it has done to date. While Huston observed that her birth as a writer in French began in 1980 with the death of her mentor Roland Barthes, she only began to self-translate in the 1990s following Plainsong, a novel in which she returned imaginatively to her childhood home in the Canadian Anglophone province of Alberta. In 1993, Cantique des plaines, her translation of the novel into French, threw her into the midst of debates over, and resistance to, the practice of self-translation when it was nominated for the Canadian Governor Generals Award for Fiction in French. Katherine Harrington commented on the controversy as follows: taking a protectionist stance, the Quebecois community claimed that Huston could not be considered for a Francophone literary prize since she is a native English speaker. They asserted that any French novel of hers had in fact to be a translation from English
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(71). What this argument fails to recognize is that Huston already had a considerable number of books written only in French; ironically, Cantique des plaines was the first to have an English counterpart. Hustons response to the controversy was a revolutionary claim: Je revendique le fait dtre lauteur des deux versions, cest tout (Une Canadienne Paris, or is she?). From the perspective of a traditional model of translation, Hustons response constitutes an almost unbearable challenge were it not for the possibility of sequestering her among the self-translators. In a letter to the Canadian Arts Council, Huston explained: Cantique des plaines nest pas quune simple traduction de Plainsong; cest une deuxime version originelle du mme livre (Une Canadienne Paris, or is she?), which is quite simply to propose the heresy of the dual-original. Hustons stance is not unlike the policy on official documents in the European Union, written in multiple languages, and yet of equal stature, or the Swiss constitution, which exists in both French and German, but which cannot be contested legally on the basis of linguistic differences between the two versions. However, by making this claim not in a bureaucratic or legal context, but rather on the hallowed ground of literary creation, Huston goes for the jugular. Hustons confrontations along the borders that seek to keep translation in place continued several years later. In 1998, her novel, LEmpreinte de lange, was nominated for the French-language Governor Generals Prize and for the translation prize, but the following year, the Canadian Arts Council refused to consider The Mark of the Angel for the English-language award, on the grounds that it was une version rcrite en anglais. Thus, the desperate attempt to retain a hierarchy of original and translation, author and translator, continues, despite the increasingly problematic interventions of writers like Huston, who blur boundaries and deconstruct the binaries that inform the predominant definition of translation. The controversies around Hustons work arose in bilingual Canada, where sensitivity to multilingualism is higher, rather than in monolingual countries such as France or the United States, where Hustons self-translations into another language are simply ignored. Typically, however, when self-translation is not ignored, it is kept under some form of quarantine. Those critics who discuss self-translation in relation to Huston or other self-translators usually propose
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supplementary models to talk about self-translation, rather than inferring that examination of this practice might modify conventional notions of translation. Fitch, for example, proposes intra-intertextuality to discuss the specificities of self-translated texts, 4 McGuire introduces the notion of self-translated texts as parallel texts, 5 and Nicola Danby subsumes self-translation under bilingual writing. 6 All these approaches leave intact the notion of the original text as a discrete, inalienable unit that is the defining feature of Western translation models. In contrast, I suggest that self-translation challenges this dominant definition by inviting our understanding of translation to move beyond a binary framework that does not allow for multiplicity, towards a notion of coauthorship. In the light of Hustons self-translation practice and that of others like her, it is becoming increasingly difficult to maintain the distinctions of a translation model that prioritizes one side of the binary by insisting that the original determines the translation. One of the distinctive characteristics of self-translation is its daring and ability to take liberties that would be unacceptable to anyone but the author of the work. These so-called infidelities are allowed so long as they are carefully delimited by the authorizations of self-translators. I advocate an alternative perspective in the tradition of feminist translation scholars such as Susan Bassnett, who reworked the tag of les belles infidles in the 1980s to expose the underlying gender bias and the ways in which, as Lori Chamberlain points out: such an attitude betrays real anxiety about the problem of paternity and translation; it mimics the patrilineal kinship system where paternity not maternity legitimizes an offspring (456). From this feminist perspective, the focus on the right to claim title to the original is replaced by an appreciation of the creative developments by which translations grant texts a genealogy. Furthermore, since
4 Cest donc dans le rapport entre texte-cible et texte-source que rsiderait la spcificit de la traduction de soi et non pas dans la structure interne du texte-cible. Cest le caractre de lintertextualit qui serait ici en jeu (Lintra-intertextualit 98). 5 Can one go so far as to re-conceptualize a translation as an extension or amplification of the original? The exploration of Beckett as self-translator, specifically of his poetry, serves to elucidate this notion of the translation as parallel text (260). 6 This kind of bilingual writing is only possible through self-translation (90).
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changes, choices, and developments are inherent to any translation, by abandoning the authorization of the author in favor of the play of the text, translation is able to reconnect with its excluded others imitation, paraphrase, and adaptation. This expansive, liberating vision of translation is one of the most important consequences of using selftranslation to redefine translation. To examine more fully the question of what has been called liberal or free translation, consider an example from one of Hustons most extreme experiments in self-translation: her 1998 bilingual text Limbes/Limbo: Un hommage Samuel Beckett. Here we have two texts, one French, one English, not in separate volumes, but face to face on the page, with all the gaps, elisions, leaps, additions, and extensions of the translation plain to see. Through this innovative publishing decision, Huston expressed the euphoria, liberties, and excitement of living and writing in two languages, along with a testimony of crisis, of tensions and angst, precipitated by linguistic complexity. The following quote demonstrates the asymmetries between the two texts, as well as the extent to which the languages interact at both semantic and phonetic levels:
Lets admit we have a head. (Grumble grumble grumble) Or at least that we want to get a head. Admettons donc quau premier chef... (Marmonne, bougonne, marmotte.) Ou que, du moins, derechef... (42-43)
Even given the French stylistic abhorrence for repetition, the use of a single word in English for three different words in French borders on a form of resistant parody that Huston explores to the limits in this text. The slight volume opens with a striking translation that precedes a terrifying linguistic diatribe, very reminiscent of Becketts nihilism:
Feeling (rotten word, feeling) so close to old Sam Beckett these days. Close the way Miss Muffet is close to the spider. Me sens (sale mot, sentir) si proche du vieux Sam ces jours-ci. Proche... comme le Petit Chaperon rouge est proche du loup. (8-9)
While this example might be acceptable within the strict confines of self-translation, as a translation it might be classed as paraphrase or adaptation, rather than translation proper. Yet this process is at work in all translation; I point this out to explode the current category of translation and thereby allow for greater movement in both the origi-
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nal and the translation. For, of course, Hustons greatest challenge to traditional models of translation is simply to refuse to identify one text as the original by presenting both simultaneously. The conventional strategy of subordinating self-translation to the dominant model of translation is based largely on the assumption of the self-identity of the author/self-translator. Indeed, self-translation is often viewed as privileged (Tanqueiro 59) precisely because of an assumed self-knowledge. Tanqueiro ascribes perfect self-transparency to the author of the creative act and thereby distinguishes self-translators from translators:
In terms of subjectivity there will be no gap between the author and translator; he will never unwittingly misinterpret his own work [...]. [H]e will know with utmost certainty when he is justified in departing from the original text and when he is not, since he knows perfectly just how he originally concretized his thoughts through words. (59)
Tanqueiros approach articulates the widespread notion of the author as autonomous creator, brushing aside collaborative approaches along with the unconscious and other non-rational processes involved in creativity. In stark contrast, in his article Against Self-Translation, Whyte expresses the poststructuralist view that: There is no such thing as the real meaning of a text. The author has no special authority [...]. [I]t is not certain that its constructor uses it better than the next man (68). Man or woman, the argument I am interested in making about the unruly practice of self-translation combines a poststructuralist approach with a complex understanding of subjectivity. Hustons writing is particularly conducive to this view of subjectivity, for as she has explained in interview, her fictional universe allows her to play out such multiplicity. For instance, in Les variations de Goldberg, the author speaks from the position of thirty different individuals, and in many of her subsequent novels, the narrative is based on a juxtaposition of perspectives. Taking Rimbauds formula Je est un autre seriously, then, I suggest that even in the instance of self-translation we are concerned with multiplicity in authorship. It is because both writing and translation enable the performance of alternate identities that they are compelling and necessary activities: our need to move beyond individual subjectivities into subjectivities-as-encounter is met in these ways, despite the dominant accounts of writing that posit the
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heroic, self-coinciding individual as the source of creative expression. A recurrent theme in many authors accounts of self-translation is an emphasis on the difficulty of the task. In her article on Nabokov, Beaujour observes that many writers who are bilinguals or polyglots find self-translation to be exquisitely painful (719). In his letters, Beckett described self-translation as a chore:
sick and tired I am of translation and what a losing battle it is always. Wish I had the courage to wash my hands of it all [...]. I have nothing but the wastes and wilds of self-translation before me for many miserable months to come. (9)
Whyte states that self-translation has in my case always been done under duress. It has never been done with either pleasure or satisfaction (67). Huston herself makes the wild claim that Lautotraduction, cest tout ce que je connais en matire de torture politique (En franais dans le texte 236). We might well ask, then, what is the source of this discomfort? And further, why do authors feel compelled to endure such an unpleasant task? Firstly, I believe that the difficulty is in part the result of the immense effort required to make space for multiple subjectivity in a culture in which considerable forces combine to constrain severality into discrete, individual, and isolated units. To forge connections among multiplicity: this is one of the tasks of the translator whether these bonds are within or without the self. Secondly, the fact that the task of translating is neither easy nor pleasant is an important point, particularly in the context of a reconceptualization of translation paradigms. In arguing for a generative view of translation a view that would replace the current paradigm based on degenerative models of inferior copies I do not wish to be accused of idealizing translation. Self-translation is painful in part because it also points to conflicts, to points of resistance within subjectivities-in-encounter. In Conflict in Translation, Mona Baker rightly criticized bridge models of translation as failing to take into account the inherent possibility for translation to promote conflict just as much as positively connoted conversations or communication. I support her argument that it is necessary to review disciplinary narratives that, in the attempt to assert an emerging field of enquiry, may not be entirely honest about the wide-ranging goals and consequences of translation. A generative model of translation should not
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be conflated with this idealized heuristic fiction which has come into being along with translation studies. Rather, the move from discourses premised on loss to an appreciation of the gains of translation also assumes the ethical responsibilities, conflictual encounters, and creative possibilities of growth through translation. Commenting on Huston, Klein-Lataud suggests that cest la distance, la non-concidence avec soi-mme, qui permet la cration (215). Citing the bilingual and bicultural Julian Green, who regularly used the translated form Julien in order to maintain a flexible identity, she concludes: JE est un autre, on le savait, mais la diffrence de langue favorise cette multiplication (219). These insights into multiplicity in writing and (self)-translating allow us to move from the singular original text, dominated by, and stubbornly rooted in, the conceit of individual creation, towards a larger conception of authorship, one that has room to allow for the possibility of collaboration and in which author, reader, and translator act as partners in the elaboration of a text that is always unstable, undetermined, open to extension, dissension, and interpretation. This conception of translation, redefined through self-translation, has affinities with Derridas view of translation. Derridas deconstructive approach shares a conception of translation similar to what I advocate through my rereading of self-translation, inasmuch as his focus on survival as the task of translation, over the traditional concern with the communication of meaning, necessitates a reconsideration of all of the binaries that self-translation contests. Yet, in laying claim to the generative possibilities of translation, the conception of self-translation that I have proposed goes beyond mere survival and plays an important role in drawing attention to the agency of translators. As Tymoczko points out, enlarging the concept of translation entails the empowerment of translators (313). In other words, in the decision to translate ones self lies the ground of a larger claim regarding the power of translators: taking self-translation to redefine translation serves not only to refine our understanding of the translation, but also the agency of those involved in the process. If, then, following the common practice in self-translation, the longtime fear of loss in translation is replaced by a conception of amplification in translation, and if this extension of the original is understood not as a lack of faithfulness, but instead as an indication of the indeterminate
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nature of the source text, then the process and goals of translation appear in a different light. My hope is that further research into the neglected area of self-translation will resolve a significant theoretical aporia in the field while simultaneously contributing to a new conception of the goals, strategies, and nature of translation.
Works Cited
Akai, Joanne. Creole... English: West Indian Writing as Translation. Traduction, terminologie, rdaction 10.1 (1997): 165-95. Baker, Mona. Translation and Conflict: A Narrative Account. London: Routledge, 2006. Beaujour, Elizabeth. Translation and Self-Translation. The Garland Companion to Vladimir Nabokov. Ed. Vladimir E. Alexandrov. New York: Garland Publishing, 1995. 714-24. Besemeres, Mary. Translating Ones Self: Language and Selfhood in CrossCultural Autobiography. Oxford: Peter Lang, 2002. Chamberlain, Lori. Gender and the Metaphorics of Translation. Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society 13.3 (1988): 454-72. Conrath, Robert. La vitre de lauto-traduction: Quelques remarques sur lentre-deux-langues. Europe 70 (1992): 125-32. Danby, Nicola. The Space Between: Self-Translator Nancy Hustons Limbes/Limbo. Linguistique 40.1 (2004): 83-96. Ducker, Carolyn. Nancy Huston: Son rpondeur dit hello bonjour tout comme les ntres. Sites: Contemporary French and Francophone Studies 2.2 (1998): 243-52. Federman, Raymond. The Writer as Self-Translator. Beckett Translating/Translating Beckett. Ed. Alan Warran Friedman et al. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1987. 7-16. Fitch, Brian. An Investigation into the Status of the Bilingual Work: Beckett and Babel. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1988. _____. Lintra-intertextualit interlinguistique de Beckett: La problmatique de la traduction de soi. Texte 2 (1983): 85-100.
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Green, Julian. An Experiment in English/Une exprience en anglais; My First Book in English/Mon premier livre en anglais. Le Langage et son double/The Language and its Shadow. Paris: Seuil, 1987. Grutman, Rainier. Auto-translation. Routledge Encyclopedia of Translation Studies. Ed. Mona Baker. New York: Routledge, 1998. 17-20. Harrington, Katherine. Linguistic and Cultural Nomadism: Nancy Huston and the Case of the Bilingual Subject. Romance Review 13 (2003): 6978. Hokenson, Jan Walsh, and Marcella Munson. The Bilingual Text: History and Theory of Literary Self-Translation. Manchester: St. Jerome, 2007. Huston, Nancy. Cantique des plaines. Arles: Actes Sud, 1993. _____. En franais dans le texte. Dsirs et ralits: Textes choisis 19781994. Montreal: Lemeac/Actes Sud, 1995. 231-36. _____. Nord perdu, suivi de Douze France. Arles: Actes Sud, 1999. Huston, Nancy, and Lela Sebbar. Lettres parisiennes: Autopsie de lexil. France: Barrault, 1986. Jakobson, Roman. On Linguistic Aspects of Translation. On Translation. Ed. Reuben Brower. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1959. 232-39. Klmn, G. C. Some Borderline Cases of Translation. New Comparison 1 (1986): 117-22. Kinginger, Celeste. Bilingualism and Emotion in the Autobiographical Works of Nancy Huston. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 25:2-3 (2004): 159-78. Klein-Lataud, Christine. Les voix parallles de Nancy Huston. Traduction, terminologie, rdaction 9.1 (1996): 211-31. McGuire, James. Beckett, the Translator and the Metapoem. World Literature Today: A Literary Quarterly of the University of Oklahoma 64.2 (1990): 258-63. Oustinoff, Michael. Bilinguisme dcriture et auto-traduction: Julien Green, Samuel Beckett, Vladimir Nabokov. Paris: LHarmattan, 2001. Shread, Carolyn. Translating Fatima Gallaires Les co-pouses: Lessons from a Francophone Text. Journal of Translating and Interpreting Studies 2.2 (2007): 127-46. Simon, Sherry. Gender in Translation: Cultural Identity and the Politics of Transmission. London and New York: Routledge, 1996. Tanqueiro, Helena. Self-Translation as an extreme Case of the AuthorTranslator-Dialectic. Investigating Translation. Ed. Allison Beeby et al. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publication Company, 2000. 55-63.
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Tymoczko, Maria. Enlarging Translation, Empowering Translators. Manchester: St. Jerome, 2007. Une Canadienne Paris, or is she? 27 May 2008 <http:// www.livresse.com/Auteurs/huston-nancy-010226.shtml>. Whyte, Christopher. Against Self-Translation. Translation and Literature 11 (2002): 64-71.
Translation
Louise Audet
Universit de Montral
Images et voix dans lespace potique de Saint-Denys Garneau: analyse du pome Le Jeu et dextraits de ses traductions en anglais et en hongrois
Cet article illustre lapplication de lapproche cognitive ltude du discours potique. Le modle des espaces mentaux labor par Fauconnier et Turner permet de prendre en compte les liens entre les lments formels-conceptuels du discours potique et leur intgration en une structure cohrente en fonction de lexprience personnelle du lecteur (monde rfrentiel). En rfrence ce modle, nous avons illustr la (re)construction des reprsentations cognitives (images et voix) dans les extraits de traductions du pome de Saint-Denys Garneau.
________________________ 1. Introduction Limage est sans doute ce qui caractrise le mieux la cration potique. Ds les premires rflexions sur la posie, celle-ci est envisage comme mimesis, comme reprsentation. Elle est de fait, au sens le plus gnral du terme, une image des choses. Ne dit-on pas que la posie fait image, au sens o elle tend smanciper des contraintes du droulement textuel? Les dispositifs sonores et graphiques, les figures de style, en particulier la mtaphore, sollicitent leffet imageant. Mais la posie est plus. Pour reprendre les termes de Barbara Folkart: Poetry is an attempt to get as close as possible to the real-in-theinstant and imagery is one of the more obvious ways in which poetry engages the real (62). Sachant, comme nous lapprennent les
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psychologues cognitifs (notamment S. M. Kosslyn et R. N. Shepard), que lesprit humain conserve des traces des vnements sensoriels qui viennent sa connaissance et quil peut les voquer sous formes dexpriences internes, nous assumons que le traducteur (re)construit des reprsentations internes qui prservent des aspects figuraux, les inscrit en mmoire et peut, la lecture du pome, leur redonner une actualit cognitive. Ce sont ces vnements privs que nous chercherons, entre autres, lucider. linstar de la communication russie, la traduction russie devrait donc prsenter une grande analogie des modles cognitifs idaliss, 1 qui sont la fondation ncessaire la construction despaces mentaux: plus les rfrents cognitifs (expriences personnelles, sensorielles, affect, connaissances extralinguistiques, attentes sur le texte, etc.) du traducteur se rapprochent de ceux de lauteur, tels quils se manifestent dans et par le pome, et tels quils sont (re)construits en interaction avec le pome, plus potique en sera la traduction. tant donn que nous navons pas accs aux processus dcriture et de traduction, cest dans les textes (texte source et traductions) que nous tenterons dinfrer les processus menant la construction des reprsentations internes suscites chez les traducteurs par les images (espaces et voix) potiques inscrites dans le pome. Les traductions finales nous fourniront les indices de ce travail potique, de lesthtique des traducteurs, dans la mesure o chaque traduction, considre comme laboutissement dun processus, devient son tour pome, cest--dire, combinatoire unique, singulire et cohrente. Nous analyserons dabord le texte source en rfrence au modle des espaces mentaux 2 (Fauconnier, Espaces mentaux; Fauconnier et Turner, Conceptual, The Way), avant de procder lanalyse comparative de quelques extraits des traductions en anglais (traduction de F. R. Scott, juriste et pote canadien [1899-1985], de John Glassco, pote et romancier canadien [1909-1981]), et en hongrois (traduction de Gyula Tallr). Cette approche nous permettra de prendre en compte 1)
1 ICMs au sens de Charles Fillmore et George Lakoff; voir par exemple louvrage de Lakoff, Women, Fire, and Dangerous Things. 2 Par ce terme, Fauconnier entend: des constructions mentales, distinctes des structures linguistiques, mais construites dans chaque discours en accord avec les indications fournies par les expressions linguistiques. Lespace mental se construit donc au fil du discours (Espaces 32).
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les liens entre les lments formels-conceptuels du discours potique et 2) leur intgration en une structure cohrente en fonction de lexprience personnelle du lecteur (monde rfrentiel). 2. Pote et peintre Dabord, qui tait Hector de Saint-Denys Garneau? N en 1912, Montral, rappelle Hlne Dorion dans sa prsentation des Pomes Choisis (1993), Hector de Saint-Denys Garneau hritera des qualits intellectuelles que lon retrouve tant du ct paternel que maternel. Trs tt, il montrera une prdilection pour la posie et sintressera la peinture. Il hsitera longtemps avant de suivre la voie de la posie et continuera dailleurs peindre toute sa vie, particulirement sensible aux beauts de la nature. partir de 1916, il passe ses ts SainteCatherine de Fossambault, prs de Qubec, o la famille possde un manoir. Ainsi a-t-il pu ds son enfance vivre en contact troit avec la nature. Si le pote cherche btir lunivers, il sagira entre autres pour Saint-Denys Garneau de tenter de retrouver la paix de lenfance. Selon Hlne Dorion, la parution de Regards et jeux dans lespace en 1937 marque une date importante dans lhistoire de la posie qubcoise, un pas vers son universalit par lexemplarit de laventure intrieure quincarne luvre de Saint-Denys Garneau dans son rapport la modernit potique:
Si son exprience existentielle et mtaphysique constitue le centre de sa posie, Saint-Denys Garneau transcende cette individualit en linscrivant travers un cheminement spirituel et une vision cosmique qui rejoignent lexprience humaine universelle. Tmoignant de la fragmentation, de linachvement, du dchirement, du vide et du repliement du je, cette posie incarne laventure mme de la modernit, son constat de rupture et sa lutte contre le malaise dtre au monde, la douleur et la solitude. (17)
Ces thmes courent comme une rivire sous-terraine dans le pome Le Jeu. Ainsi, au-del de lapparente lgret que suggre le titre, le monde de lenfance, au-del galement de lapparente simplicit de lcriture du pote, se glissent les indices de ce malaise dtre au monde. La lecture du pome Le Jeu nous confirme que cette criture est caractrise par sa lisibilit et son dpouillement, une criture sans
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artifice, en parfaite adquation avec son contenu. Privilgiant la transparence et lexpression directe, elle ne sacrifie jamais le sens au profit de la forme ou de leffet potique. Ainsi, souligne Dorion, limage estelle, non pas utilise comme un procd rhtorique proprement dit, mais intgre au pome lui-mme: Cest le texte dans son ensemble qui fait image et en constitue le fondement analogique (17). 3. Une approche cognitive: le modle de Fauconnier Issu de la linguistique cognitive, le modle des espaces mentaux dvelopp par Fauconnier est particulirement bien adapt ltude de la posie. Comme le suggre Teresa Caldern Quinds, 3 la notion despaces mentaux a beaucoup offrir lanalyse potique en raison de la nature non-rfrentielle 4 des reprsentations cognitives: les espaces mentaux peuvent donc reprsenter les choses, faits ou relations les plus incongrus, ou insolites, qui (comme dans les rves, les crations artistiques), ne pourraient exister dans la vie relle. 5 La facult de jouer avec cet aspect non-rfrentiel des concepts et notre habilet tablir de nouvelles relations entre ces concepts ne sontelles pas la base de notre imagination? Et la littrature est essentiellement imaginative: le texte littraire, et sans doute encore plus le texte potique, ne dfinit-il pas la capacit de lesprit humain inventer un univers qui nest pas celui de la perception immdiate? 4. Analyse du pome en rfrence au modle des espaces mentaux Nous procderons dabord ltude des voix et images dans le texte source en rfrence au modle des espaces mentaux. Cette analyse seffectue en deux tapes correspondant aux aspects (relis, mais
3 Nous nous inspirerons ici de la mthode propose par Caldern Quinds dans lapplication du modle des espaces mentaux lanalyse potique. 4 Fauconnier prcise que lanalyse linguistique en termes despaces mentaux nest pas une thorie de la rfrence. Il faut donc viter de tirer la conclusion que les expressions du discours rfrent aux constructions mentales. Si rfrence il y a, ajoute-t-il, elle va des lments abstraits dans les espaces vers des entits du monde rel ou peut-tre de mondes possibles [] (Espaces 12). 5 Cette caractristique du modle de Fauconnier nous semble trs proche du concept de la cration crative, dfini par Dancette comme la capacit dintgrer et de concilier des lments du sens [] disparates, voire incongrus et den faire une production concise, unique et cohrente (4).
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que nous cherchons ici dcomposer) du processus de la rception du discours littraire: 1) la perception des lments saillants du discours potique et 2) la construction progressive dune reprsentation cohrente. 4.1. Premire lecture: perception des lments saillants du pome (voir le texte du pome en appendice) La premire lecture que nous proposons illustre lactivation des modles cognitifs partir de la perception des lments saillants du pome. Le concept du jeu dans le pome active chez le lecteur un premier modle cognitif idalis, comprenant un actant (enfant) et un lieu (chambre): les enfants sont des tres humains qui possdent des particularits physiques et psychologiques identifiables; ils ont une conduite prototypique (ils peuvent tre impertinents, semer le dsordre, dsobir, etc.); ils font gnralement preuve dune grande imagination et de fantaisie; ils font galement partie densembles plus vastes (environnement familial, social, culturel, etc.). Le pome fournit des indices de la spatialit: un lieu ferm (chambre) lintrieur duquel un enfant joue seul, et lextrieur duquel gravitent dautres personnes (les adultes, lobservateur-narrateur). Les relations entre ces lments (enfants, adultes) sont introduites par le biais des images vocales (les voix) inscrites dans le discours potique: voix de lenfant, lintrieur de la chambre, voix intrieure de lenfant (monologue intrieur); voix de lobservateur-narrateur, des adultes, voix clichs universelles lextrieur de la chambre. Les mtaphores conceptuelles gnres au cours du processus de lecture structurent progressivement le contenu imag (introduit par les figures mtonymiques et mtaphoriques). Ainsi des jouets (objets concrets: cubes de bois, tapis, jeu de cartes, etc.) lon passe aux mots; de lenfant, au pote, puis, du ludique la gravit. Finalement, les relations qutablit le lecteur entre les lments conceptuels et la structure formelle du pome contribuent au processus dintgration des reprsentations cognitives. Ds la premire lecture, le lecteur peroit la disposition graphique, en vers libres, mais o quelques marques de ponctuation semblent dlimiter les espaces mentaux (4.2.1). Les vers stendent librement sur la page, offrant au lecteur limage spatiale dun talement ( limage dune route de
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cartes) o lenchanement vers une suite ininterrompue (absence de ponctuation, de rimes) qui se lit presque dun souffle, suggre une libert quasi arienne, en correspondance avec le concept du jeu. 4.2 Construction progressive du sens potique au fil de la perception des lments du discours Le discours potique ne se donne pas demble: la diffrence des textes de communication ou de spcialit, le texte littraire (et potique) prsente des particularits (idiosyncrasies, multiplicit des niveaux de signification [conceptuels et formels], intrarfrentialit, etc.) qui exigent du lecteur un plus grand effort cognitif afin de sen faire une reprsentation cohrente. Cette reprsentation seffectue progressivement (au fil des lectures et des relectures), partir des indices fournis par le texte, indices auxquels le lecteur associe son propre monde rfrentiel. Les espaces mentaux sont interrelis en un rseau dynamique, correspondant la nature gestaltienne de la pense. Ainsi linformation (sensorielle, conceptuelle, formelle, etc.) circule dun espace lautre jusqu lobtention (par intgration, surimpression, compression) dune reprsentation globale cohrente. Pour ce pome, nous avons pu dlimiter six espaces mentaux (E enfant, E pote) dont llaboration progressive et lintgration, dabord partielle, puis globale, offrent, selon nous, la cl du pome. 4.2.1 laboration des espaces mentaux (E1) Le pome souvre sur la voix de lenfant Ne me drangez pas (ligne 1, introducteur de lespace enfant). Ici lusage de la forme imprative du verbe ne me drangez pas place le lecteur dans une position dobissance, voire de soumission, ncessaire la cration dun premier espace mental. Alors que le vers liminaire (dlimit par le premier signe de ponctuation) dtermine la concentration intrieure de lenfant je suis profondment occup, lespace enfant (E1) souvre dabord par un lment suggrant un regard sur lenfant: le syntagme nominal un enfant (ligne 2) pour se refermer au deuxime signe de ponctuation (.) du pome (ligne 5). Les informations temporelles que reoit le lecteur (expression temporelle descriptive est en train de, des locutions qui sait,
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tantt) renforcent limage dun regard observant lactivit de lenfant. Ici, dans lespace de la chambre, la spatialit semble stendre par cercles concentriques et par procd mtonymique: village ville comt univers. Le jeu suggre la concentration et de lenfant et de lespace. (E2) Le changement dans la dure apport par le syntagme verbal Il joue (ligne 6) (du progressif au prsent presque intemporel de lindicatif) a pour effet de dterminer une progression vers un nouvel espace (E2), qui stend de la ligne 7 jusquau troisime signe de ponctuation (.) (ligne 19), reprenant, tout en llaborant, la description du jeu. Le vers il joue introduit lespace des possibilits cratrices du jeu et du monologue intrieur de lenfant: a nest pas mal voir (ligne 10); ce nest pas peu de savoir (ligne 11); cest facile davoir un grand arbre (ligne 17). Dans le lieu ferm de la chambre, un enfant joue seul (il se parle) et cre un monde imaginaire. Les lments physiques, concrets cubes de bois, planche, cartes, tapis, se transforment, au gr du jeu de lenfant, en lments imaginaires: chteaux, toits, rivire, arbre et montagne. Ces lments sont renforcs par les allitrations: phonmes: /s/, /k/, /b/, /p/; ces, cette, a, ce, etc.; cubes, qui, cartes, cours; bois, arbre; pont, planche, penche; pas, peu, etc. Dans cet espace ludique de cration, une lexie, mirage, (ligne 15) introduit cependant dans le concept du jeu un lment dincertitude, de possible dception. Le mirage, apparence la fois sduisante et trompeuse, nvoque-t-il pas une illusion, une chimre? (E3) Le vers Joie de jouer! paradis des liberts! (ligne 20), introduit un nouvel espace (E3) par le changement de ton: de lintimit du jeu lon passe une nouvelle voix (voix universelle, unanime, sur le paradis de lenfance? clich ironique?). Cet espace souvre ici aussi par la forme imprative: et surtout nallez pas mettre un pied dans la chambre (ligne 21), (voix de lenfant? de lobservateur?) qui sadresse au monde extrieur ce lieu (vous). On entend une mise en garde contre la menace destructrice du monde onirique de lenfance. La mtaphore fleur invisible, (ligne 24), vient renforcer cette notion. (Premire intgration) Progressivement, le lecteur aboutit une nouvelle reprsentation, un blend tempo-
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raire qui intgre les lments de ces espaces: du paradis de lenfance lon passe la vulnrabilit de ce monde. Le jeu est un paradis, certes, mais vulnrable. (E4) La ligne 25 souvre par un changement de la voix: Voil ma bote jouets o les lments voil (pronom anaphorique), le possessif ma dterminent la voix du pote. Ce nouvel espace (E4), Espace pote, qui stend des lignes 25 35, se referme sur un signe de ponctuation (.). Du domaine de lenfance, le lecteur passe au domaine du pote. Les indices en sont donns par la transposition des jouets aux mots. Et ces mots, que le pote a le pouvoir dallier, sparer, marier, au gr de son inspiration (dont les lments temporels tantt, et tout lheure constituent les indices), den faire de merveilleux enlacements suggrent presque une treinte amoureuse? Les lexies allier, sparer, marier orientent linterprtation vers lisotopie du mariage (alliance: engagement mutuel, anneau nuptial, et peuttre, par rfrence intertextuelle, lArche dalliance?) tout en suggrant un mouvement (verbes linfinitif), mouvement que vient renforcer limage de la danse (substantif droulement). Les mots du pote suggrent mme la possibilit de ramener les instants de bonheur le clair clat du rire quon croyait perdu. Ici les allitrations des phonmes: l / m / (liquides et bilabiales) viennent renforcer la sensualit des images: pleine, mots, merveilleux, enlacements, allier, marier, droulement, etc. Les sons d / kl (sonores) marquent le sentiment de vie et de joie: droulements, de danse, clair, clat, quon croyait etc. Aux vers suivants (lignes 31-35), le rapprochement inusit des lexies chiquenaude, toile, balancer, fil, lumire, tombe eau et ronds cre, chez le lecteur, une image nouvelle, dfamiliarisante qui, exigeant un plus grand effort cognitif pour recrer une reprsentation cohrente, loblige sans doute ralentir le rythme de sa lecture. Il y a ici mergence dune image tout fait singulire, dune mtaphore idiosyncrasique. Lon retrouve limage spatiale concentrique, mais rserve ltoile (qui) tombe dans leau et fait des ronds. (E5) Le discours entrane le lecteur vers un nouvel espace (lignes 36-49), referm par le signe de ponctuation (.) o, certes, lon entend encore la voix du pote mais intimement associe celle de lenfant. Llment introducteur de cet espace est constitu par une voix: qui
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donc oserait en douter (ligne 36). Lassociation pote/enfant est indique par les lments prototypiques de la conduite des enfants (et des potes): pas deux sous de respect pour lordre tabli (ligne 37); la politesse et cette chre discipline (o lon sent poindre lironie; ligne 38); des manires scandaliser les grandes personnes (ligne 40); il vous arrange les mots, (ligne 44; niveau familier); son espigle plaisir (ligne 43); il met la chambre lenvers (ligne 47); berner les gens (ligne 49). Ici, ce sont les verbes daction qui rendent la matrise du pote sur les mots: arranger, dplacer, agir, possder, transformer, berner. Mais les images acquirent une valeur nouvelle par surimpression: les lexies caractrisant le domaine de la nature (jeu imaginaire de lenfant, bois, rivire, arbre, montagne) se transforment en lments mtaphoriques, appartenant au domaine du pote. Sous les cubes de bois / sous les mots Mettre sous larbre une montagne (pouvoir du jeu de lenfant) / en agir avec les montagnes comme sil les possdait (allusion intertextuelle la Cration?) La chambre (lieu protg du domaine de lenfant) / il met la chambre lenvers (lieu de cration du domaine du pote) (E6) Llment et pourtant concessif (ligne 50) ouvre un nouvel espace (E6) qui va jusquau point final (ligne 56). On y retrouve: lments physiques propres au domaine humain: il gauche, il droit (ligne 50; dualit); traits psychologiques: rire (ligne 50); gravit (ligne 51); lments propres au domaine de la nature: feuille dun arbre (ligne 51-52); lments propres au domaine divin, transcendant: de lautre monde (ligne 51), renforcs par la lexie balance (allusion intertextuelle au jugement du Crateur?). Le rapprochement inusit des lexies: gravit, autre monde, feuille, balance et guerre plonge le lecteur dans une image nouvelle, singulire, do merge un sentiment dangoisse. La cration potique est une exprience intrieure empreinte de gravit et, peuttre, dchirante.
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(2e Intgration) Ici apparat une fissure (dans son il gauche quand le droit rit), lment qui napparaissait pas dans les espaces prcdents. Par lintgration des lments suggrs par le texte, et ltablissement des relations entre les espaces mentaux, le lecteur aboutit une reprsentation temporaire de cette portion du pome: du plaisir ludique, on passe la gravit, une gravit de lautre monde, comparable la guerre. Si le jeu voque les possibilits de lacte dcrire comme lieu dunification, moyen de crer des liens entre les mots, la tentative choue. Le pote est ramen sa douloureuse exprience intrieure. 4.2.2 Intgration en une reprsentation cohrente Finalement, par le recours au titre, le pome acquiert une richesse de sens grce aux multiples concepts et relations actives par la lecture et devient lexpression dune intgration conceptuelle complexe. Le pome semble crer une mtaphore cognitive par ltablissement dassociations reliant les mondes de lenfance et du pote. (Intgration globale) Cette relecture permet daccder une comprhension globale du pome: le jeu nest pas que ludique, lger, mais empreint de gravit. Cest, pour lenfant et pour le pote, un acte sacr. Alors que sur lenfance plane un pril, la menace de la destruction de sa vulnrabilit (le mirage connote dception), laccession la transcendance implique, pour le pote, la possibilit dun dchirement, dune dchance.
5. Analyse comparative dextraits des traductions en fonction des espaces mentaux Dans cette analyse nous chercherons dterminer dans quelle mesure les traducteurs ont pu redonner une actualit cognitive aux reprsentations figures (voix et des images de spatialit) voques par le pome. Comment, partir de leur propre monde rfrentiel, parviennent-ils produire un texte o lon puisse dceler une analogie des reprsentations cognitives, telles que suggrs par le pome et exprims dans leur propre traduction? Pour des raisons videntes despace, nous nous concentrerons sur lanalyse comparative des espaces 1 (E1) et 4 (E4).
Audet LE JEU St-Denys Garneau

Ne me drangez pas je suis profondment occup. Un enfant est en train de btir un village Cest une ville, un comt Et qui sait Tantt lunivers. Il joue
77 THE GAME F. R. Scott THE GAME John Glassco JTK Gyula Tallr
Dont bother me Im profoundly absorbed A child is busy building a village
Dont bother me Im terribly busy
Fontos dolgom van, hagyatok!
A child is busy building a village
Falut pt a gyerek
Its a city, a county And who knows Soon the universe. Hes playing
Its a town, a country And who knows By and by the universe. He is playing
Vagy vrost, megyt St: vilgegyetemet.
Jtszik.
Espace 1 Le vers liminaire du pome o sentend la voix de lenfant prsente une grande correspondance dans les traductions quelques diffrences prs (par exemple, les traducteurs ont omis le signe de ponctuation [.] qui dlimitait ce vers introducteur). Si lon peut lire que la traduction de Scott respecte de faon tout fait mimtique le pome source (disposition des vers, choix des lexies), la traduction de Tallr se dmarque. Il inverse les syntagmes, laissant le verbe la forme imprative hagyatok! laissez-moi tranquille en fin de phrase, soulign par un point dexclamation. Ce choix trahit davantage limpatience de lenfant absorb dans son jeu que ne le suggre le texte source: la voix de lenfant y est moins teinte dagressivit (il ne crie pas) en raison de la concentration que rclame le jeu. La traduction de Tallr rend sans doute compte dun schma prototypique dun enfant plus imprieux que ne le font le texte source et les autres traductions tout en accentuant limage spatiale de la chambre que les voix viennent illustrer: lintrieur do sadresse lenfant aux adultes, lextrieur. Tallr introduit galement un point (.) aprs le syntagme verbal Jtszik (il joue), ce qui donne au vers un caractre plus dfinitif, moins intemporel.
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Si la traduction de Glassco, sans tre aussi mimtique que celle de Scott, est en correspondance avec le texte source, le traducteur se dmarque par un choix de lexies, terribly busy, plus prs sans doute du niveau de langue de lenfant, by and by the universe. Dj, dans ce premier extrait, lon peut observer lune des marques de sa traduction: il attache la plus grande importance rendre la matrialit du syntagme, produisant de nombreuses allitrations: terribly busy, by and by (the universe). Cest par ce choix quil donne vie aux reprsentations figures du pome. Espace 4 Cet espace est introduit par une voix, celle du pote. Lutilisation du pronom anaphorique renvoie ce qui prcde, le jeu de lenfant. Ds les premiers vers de cet espace lauteur choisit de dcrire lactivit cratrice et potique en termes denlacements, lexie quil associe aux verbes allier, sparer, marier, suggrant presque une treinte amoureuse, une alliance engagement mutuel, anneau nuptial et, peut-tre, par rfrence intertextuelle, lArche dalliance, pacte entre les Hbreux et Yahv. Lacte de crer est pour le pote un acte amoureux et sacr. Les mouvements fluides de lamour et de la danse sont leur tour rendus par les allitrations de liquides: Voil ma [] Pleine de mots pour faire de merveilleux enlacements [] Les allier sparer marier, Droulements tantt de danse Et tout lheure le clair clat du rire []. Scott retient limage de weaving marvellous patterns (tisser de merveilleux motifs), sans doute plus concrte, moins charge en ce qui concerne les connotations et les rfrences intertextuelles. Lentrelacement de fils textiles ou de fibres vgtales suggre certes une laboration, une transformation dont laboutissement peut crer de merveilleux motifs, mais ces motifs tisss rfrent des motifs visuels ou, la rigueur, des dessins mlodiques ou rythmiques). Les trois verbes du vers suivant uniting separating matching, encore une fois plus concrets, sils rendent laspect dnotatif, ne traduisent pas, selon nous, la charge conceptuelle et image du texte source. John Glassco reprend limage des merveilleux motifs, mais ces motifs seront unis, diviss, maris. Ce choix de lexies rend la charge connotative mariage, alliance, treinte que lon trouvait dans le texte source. Les mots qui, pour le pote Saint-Denys Garneau,
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revtaient le caractre presque sacr dune fcondit cratrice, avaient le pouvoir de ramener les instants de bonheur, trouvent, dans la traduction de Glassco, une libert de mouvement: now they are evolutions of a dance, and the next moment, comme si le pote merveill observait de petits tres sortis de sa bote. Le traducteur rend la magie de la cration potique. LE JEU St-Denys Garneau
Voil ma bote jouets Pleine de mots pour faire de merveilleux enlacements Les allier sparer marier,
THE GAME F. R. Scott
THE GAME John Glassco
JTK Gyula Tallr

me jtkos dobozom Tele szavakkal melyekbl csodlatos brkot rakhatok ki sszeillesztem sztszedem egybefzm ket S akad itt tnc is olykor Hirtelen feltr tiszta nevets
This is my box of toys Full of words for weaving marvellous patterns For uniting separating matching Now the unfolding of the dance And soon a clear burst of the laughter That one thought had been lost A gentle flip of the finger And the star Which hung without a care At the end of too flimsy a thread of light Falls and makes rings in the water
Here is my box of toys Full of words to make wonderful patterns To be matched divided married
Droulements tantt de danse Et tout lheure le clair clat du rire
Now they are evolutions of a dance And the next moment a bright burst of the laughter You thought was lost A light flick of the finger And the star That was hanging carelessly At the end of a flimsy thread of light Falls in the water and makes circles.
Quon croyait perdu Une tendre chiquenaude Et ltoile Qui se balanait sans prendre garde Au bout dun fil trop tnu de lumire Tombe dans leau et fait des ronds.
Melyrl azt hittem oda mr Egy gyengd csiklandozs s a cillag Mely vatlanul egyen slyozott Egy tl vkony fnysugr hegyn
A vzbe pottyan s gyrket vet
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Tallr retient limage de llaboration de merveilleuses formes, csodlatos brkot rakhatok ki, quil assemble, dmonte, lie. Dans ce cas, galement, limage, plus concrte, perd la charge connotative et intertextuelle du texte source, et est rduite au seul plan dnotatif. Le traducteur hongrois se dmarque en choisissant dutiliser des verbes conjugus la premire personne, l o le texte source, par lusage de substantifs (enlacements [ligne 26], droulements [ligne 28], et de verbes linfinitif (allier, sparer, marier [ligne 27]), donne lensemble une valeur plus intemporelle, plus prs dune transcendance, dun caractre sacr. Tallr rintroduit la voix du pote, une voix beaucoup plus directe, plus affirme. Si, dans son ensemble, ce choix rend la lgret du jeu en mme temps que lautorit de lenfance, la traduction ne parvient pas rendre lintensit de lexprience potique et spirituelle qui traverse le pome source. Dans quelle mesure les allitrations soutiennent-elles ces images? Bien sr, comme nous le rappelle Meschonnic, on changera ncessairement de phonologie en changeant de langue, cest une dperdition et non une trahison (88). Il faudrait faire une analyse systmatique des textes entiers pour valuer dans quelle mesure cet important aspect du discours potique fait systme. Mais, la lecture des traductions vers langlais, nous pouvons affirmer que Glassco a un souci de rendre les jeux phoniques et le rythme, mme sil sloigne parfois du texte source. Par exemple, il choisit des lexies de niveau plus familier, plus prs du langage de lenfant, mais plus sonores que chez Scott. Cette stratgie lui permet de compenser les pertes inluctables quentrine la traduction potique. Si, dans lensemble, Scott produit une traduction trs fidle au texte source, une traduction mimtique, il reste sur le plan dnotatif, perdant les valeurs connotatives et intertextuelles du texte source. 6. Conclusion Si la posie (et le texte littraire en gnral) nest pas constitue dun langage spcifique, il nen demeure pas moins que la traduction littraire constitue une problmatique particulire: l o, par exemple, le texte de spcialit et le texte ordinaire rfrent au monde extralinguistique (limportant pour le traducteur est de connatre ces rfrents), le texte littraire est intra-rfrentiel, et tout, des rseaux conceptuels, formels, des images aux textures, y fait sens.
Audet
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Nous avons privilgi le modle des espaces mentaux (Fauconnier) en raison du caractre dynamique de la construction de sens quil permet dillustrer. Partant des lments du discours, le lecteur construit progressivement des reprsentations cognitives (des espaces mentaux) en activant linformation conceptuelle (connaissances extralinguistiques, littraires, intertextuelles, expriences sensorielles, affectives, etc.) contenue dans sa mmoire long terme jusqu lobtention dune reprsentation cohrente. Il y a donc un processus dappropriation du texte, de construction du sens qui explique linfinie variabilit des lectures et des traductions. Cest ce dont rend compte lapproche cognitive du discours littraire et potique. Nous avons tent de dceler, dans les traductions, dans quelle mesure il y avait analogie des reprsentations en ce qui concerne les images et les voix dans lespace potique du texte de Saint-Denys Garneau. Nous avons pralablement dtermin pour ce pome six espaces mentaux pour fonder notre tude comparative. Il est vident qu partir dun si petit chantillon nous ne pouvons dterminer quelle est la traduction russie. Tous les aspects du texte potique mriteraient dtre tudis et seule ltude du pome intgral et des traductions permettrait den rvler la systmaticit et la cohrence. De mme, dans quelle mesure les motions, les expriences sensorielles, des sensibilits particulires des traducteurs, influent-elles sur le rendu de leurs traductions? Ces questions restent ouvertes. Nous avons voulu illustrer la spcificit de la problmatique de la traduction potique, ainsi que lapport dun modle cognitif ltude de la traduction. Appendice texte du pome Le Jeu de Saint-Denys Garneau Ne me drangez pas je suis profondment occup Un enfant est en train de btir un village Cest une ville, un comt Et qui sait Tantt lunivers. Il joue
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Ces cubes de bois sont des maisons quil dplace et des chteaux Cette planche fait signe dun toit qui penche a nest pas mal voir Ce nest pas peu de savoir o va tourner la route de cartes Ce pourrait changer compltement le cours de la rivire cause du pont qui fait un si beau mirage dans leau du tapis Cest facile davoir un grand arbre Et de mettre au-dessous une montagne pour quil soit en haut. Joie de jouer! paradis des liberts! Et surtout nallez pas mettre un pied dans la chambre On ne sait jamais ce qui peut tre dans ce coin Et si vous nallez pas craser la plus chre des fleurs invisibles Voil ma bote jouets Pleine de mots pour faire de merveilleux enlacements Les allier sparer marier Droulements tantt de danse Et tout lheure le clair clat du rire Quon croyait perdu Une tendre chiquenaude Et ltoile Qui se balanait sans prendre garde Au bout dun fil trop tnu de lumire Tombe dans leau et fait des ronds. De lamour de la tendresse qui donc oserait en douter Mais pas deux sous de respect pour lordre tabli Et la politesse et cette chre discipline Une lgret et des manires scandaliser les grandes personnes Il vous arrange les mots comme si ctaient de simples chansons
Audet Et dans ses yeux on peut lire son espigle plaisir voir que sous les mots il dplace toutes choses Et quil en agit avec les montagnes Comme sil les possdait en propre. Il met la chambre lenvers et vraiment lon ne sy reconnat plus Comme si ctait un plaisir de berner les gens. Et pourtant dans son il gauche quand le droit rit Une gravit de lautre monde sattache la feuille dun arbre Comme si cela pouvait avoir une grande importance Avait autant de poids dans sa balance Que la guerre dthiopie Dans celle de lAngleterre. Rfrence: GARNEAU, Hector de Saint-Denys, Posies. Regards et jeux dans lespace. Les Solitudes, Montral, Fides, 1972, p. 33-34. <http://www.saintdenysgarneau.com/>
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84 Ouvrages cits
Audet, L. Dancette, J. Dancette, et L. Jay-Rayon. Axes et critres de la crativit. Meta 52.1 (2007): 108-23. Calderon Quindos, T. Blending as a Theoretical Tool for Poetic Analysis. Annual Review of Cognitive Linguistics 3 (2005): 269-99. Dancette, J. Llaboration de la cohrence en traduction; le rle des rfrents cognitifs. TTR: Traduction, Terminologie, Rdaction 16.1 (2003): 14159. Fauconnier, G. Espaces mentaux. Aspects de la construction du sens dans les langues naturelles. Paris: Les ditions de Minuit, 1984. _____, et M. Turner. Conceptual Integration Networks. Cognitive Science 22 (1998): 133-87. _____, et M. Turner. The Way We Think: Conceptual Blending and the Minds Hidden Complexities. New York: Basic Books, 2002. Folkart, Barbara. Second Finding. A Poetics of Translation. Ottawa: University of Ottawa Press, 2007.
Hector de Saint-Denys Garneau. www.saintdenysgarneau.com/>.
25
Aug.
2008.
<http://
Lakoff, George. Women, Fire, and Dangerous Things: What Categories Reveal about the Mind. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987. Meschonnic, H. Potique du traduire. Verdier: Lagrasse, Fr., 1999. Saint-Denys Garneau, Hector de. Pomes choisis. Choix et prsentation de Hlne Dorion. Montral: ditions du Norot, 1993.
Translation
Marjolijn de Jager
New York University
Translation as Revelation
The following essay presents a very personal notion of what it means to be a literary translator. My observations are based on the analyses of experts in the field linguists, authors, translators , on my own experiences as a translator, and on some non-analytic but intuitive insights that I have gained over the course of the past twenty years. In addition, I hope to show that literature and all cultural and artistic forms of expression are political, each in their own way. Thus, translation is for me also an act of political activism.
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A poem by Robert Frost: REVELATION We make ourselves a place apart Behind light words that tease and flout, But oh, the agitated heart Till someone find us really out. Tis pity if the case require (Or so we say) that in the end We speak the literal to inspire The understanding of a friend. But so with all, from babes that play At hide-and-seek to God afar, So all who hide too well away Must speak and tell us where they are.
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Revelation a word that opens many doors, a word that is itself open to an infinite number of interpretations. In this essay I discuss three facets of translation and the revelations it aspires to disclose. The first of these, of course, are the familiar linguistic discoveries that we make during the working process. Secondly, there are the cultural differences and similarities revealed by the texts through which, as this translator hopes, we come to know one another better. Finally, there are the revelations that my work has brought me on a personal level. Human language is the one specific characteristic that sets us apart from other living creatures and should thus, logically, offer our species a great chain of solidarity. Sadly enough, however, the spoken word is all too often (perhaps even more often than not?) the great divider among people even when they speak the same language. We only have to think of Roland Barthess statement that language is a form of communication intended to avoid communicating; we only have to think of the political doublespeak we hear every day of our lives, where friendly fire and collateral damage hide the truth of violent death. We get in trouble over language and people kill each other over words. How often do we find ourselves saying: That is not what I meant, You dont get it, do you? What is that supposed to mean? So what youre saying is... followed by having to translate into our own language that which was just said. These are but a few of the infinite ways that prove we are not communicating well, or at all. This comes down to the anecdotal: I know you think you understood what you thought I said, but I think what you thought you understood is not what I said. And this happens when we are speaking the same language presumably, although there are, of course, countless forms of English, including several officially known today as the New Englishes (Crystal). Any thorough reading of a text out of the past of ones own language and literature is a manifold act of interpretation, wrote George Steiner in After Babel. He continued, In the great majority of cases, this act is hardly performed or even consciously recognized (17). How complex, then, is the interchange and subsequent attempt at really grasping what is being said or written in a language that is not our own. The significance of the Old Testament story of the construction of the Tower of Babel and its dire consequences hasnt changed
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much over the millennia. Translation has played a central (though often unrecognized) role in human interaction for thousands of years, writes David Crystal (11). Tis pity if the case require / (...) that in the end / We speak the literal to inspire / The understanding of a friend, says Frost. How well this pertains to the double task that we as translators must fulfill, no matter what the literary text or poem, which is to be literally faithful both to the authors words and intent as well as to good writing in the new language, which in my case is (American) English. Gregory Rabassa, the eminent translator of Latin American literature, wrote years ago: Ear is important in translation because it really lies at the base of all good writing. Writing is not truly a substitute for thought, it is a substitute for sound. [...] [W]hen a person writes, he is speaking, and when a person reads, he is listening (82). If this is true, as I believe it is, then translators are listeners first and speakers second. This, too, imposes a double duty on us, and in the re-writing that is the re-speaking of what Ive heard I rely heavily on instinct, on the memory, and on both the intellectual and musical comprehension of what I have heard. Human interaction and mutual understanding, the final purposes of translation, after all, are based first on hearing and listening. At the newly opened Quai Branly Museum in Paris, where some of the floors and hallway walls are covered with one- or two-line aphorisms, I discovered one that in five simple words applies marvelously to the translators task: Entendre avec loreille de lautre. Once I have heard my text with the ear of the other, I must then hear it again in my own language, which happens almost unconsciously at first. Only then can I embark on turning my source text into English first, into fine writing second. This is always a balancing act, a balancing act that time and experience never render any easier, as my students used to ask with hope in their voice. Each author in any language has a different voice; each text is a new text that poses different problems, even when a same author has created it. A supposedly and often deceptively easy text still holds pitfalls of one sort or another, nothing can ever be taken for granted, the one misplaced preposition will obscure meaning, and the one erroneous verb tense will alter the established order of action. Every word, then, must be heard, understood, interpreted and, finally, rewritten. Contrary to the perception of too many readers, translators are writers, not verbally clever secretaries. Writers create
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national literatures with their language, but world literature is written by translators, said the winner of the 1998 Nobel Prize for literature, Jos Saramago, at a gathering in May of 2003 (Appel 40). The obvious imperatives are first the purely technical aspects, that is to say a thorough knowledge of source language and target language. Included but more playful and more difficult, too, is working with idioms, word play, double entendres, and proverbs, the latter being a particularly common facet of African literature, which forms much of the body of my translation work, where the literal almost never works and the search for an appropriate equivalent becomes one of the many great challenges. Ideally, the translator should translate into his or her mother tongue, as I always stressed to my students at NYU. Just to prove that we dont always practice what we preach, I myself set a bad example, since I translate from my third language, French, and from my mother tongue, Dutch, into English, which is actually my second language. Since of these two source languages one is Romance and the other Germanic, I discover time and again how different are the difficulties that arise when dealing with either one or the other. At the same time, because the roots of English are approximately 50% Romance (25% Latin and 25% French) and 40% Germanic, there is an extremely interesting double exposure that takes place, constantly increasing the awareness of the intricacies of the English language and its connections to both of its ancestors. One quickly realizes why, counting the dictionarys main entries only, the English vocabulary is almost triple that of French 600,000 words in English versus 200,000 in French, although depending on the researchers, their approaches, and their conclusions, these are extremely rough estimates and continually under debate. There are two problems here: too often the choice of English synonyms for a French or Dutch word is enormous and the effort lies in finding the closest one, and inevitably it is never exactly what the original means. We may find solace in the words of Peter Roget, of Rogets Thesaurus fame, who [n]ever quite intended [it] as a book of synonyms, thinking there really was no such thing given the unique meaning of every word (Mallon). It is an unalterable fact that certain words cannot ever be translated, even when the source vocabulary is far smaller than the English. There is an exact word for everything but not always for the same thing in every language. One very
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common word, for instance, and a favorite example of mine is the Dutch word gezellig, which means as much as cozy, at ease, warm, friendly, comfortable, used for an evening with friends, a dinner in a restaurant, the description of someones living room, a specific atmosphere, but absolutely untranslatable by one single English word. How can this be? Are we as humans not more alike than different and dont we all know that feeling of gezelligheid? Why, then, does English not have a word for it? But so it is and we must find a way around it, time and again. Titles often pose a major problem. Publishers almost always prefer something that will sell, that is to say, something catchy. The translator prefers something beautiful. The first two novels by African writers that I translated were Le Bel Immonde by V. Y. Mudimbe and Le Baobab fou by Ken Bugul. I always make an effort to get to know personally the authors I translate, if only to be able to go to the very source for answers to whatever queries I will undoubtedly have, and more often than not I have been fortunate enough to succeed. With the Mudimbe book, I put together list after list of possible translations of the word bel and the word immonde. Nothing worked. The results were either quite plebeian, a bit sleazy, or downright boring. I consulted with Mudimbe, we toyed with various titles, and neither of us liked what we came up with. He advised me to keep going with the novel and perhaps I would find something in the text itself. Halfway through I came upon the phrase avant la naissance de la lune, and by the light of that moon came the revelation. I contacted Mudimbe and suggested Before the Birth of the Moon. He was as enthusiastic as I, and it did become the title of the published translation. With Ken Buguls novel, the baobab tree in the title obviously had to be maintained, as it is such an important character in her book and, having gone mad and then died, is the primary participant in the final pages. However, in English the tree simply cannot be crazy, insane, or mad. It died because the protagonist had left and deserted it: she had abandoned the great tree. And so The Abandoned Baobab was born. Yet this very same abandoned baobab that went mad and died during Kens absence is also the one that allows her to find her own voice as it brings her the renewed birth of herself. Irne dAlmeida observes the following:
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In the process of self-discovery that she goes through she uncovers things that are too potent, too serious, too enormous, too sharply against the grain, too taboo; they are not things meant to be disclosed [read: revealed MdJ]. That is why [...] Buguls publishers demanded that she abandon her real name Maritou MBaye, and choose a pseudonym. MBaye at first resisted this form of silencing, but without success; she then decided to take the name Ken Bugul, which in literal translation from the Wolof means nobody wants. (44-45)
Nobody wants what? This, it, me, her? In fact, the added pronoun matters little, for it is all about the rejection that the little girl, Ken, suffers: at the age of five, she is abandoned by the mother (always the mother, only exceptionally my mother), a void that she later attempts to fill in a variety of ill-fated ways when she goes to Belgium to study. DAlmeida again:
She finds in her culture a means to symbolically escape the silencing imposed on her, for by naming herself Ken Bugul she insures her survival as a writer born into a new name [...] and continues to unmask the working of sexual politics in revealing through an interview [...] that the demand she take a pseudonym was predicated on her being a Muslim woman whose autobiographical revelations might constitute a scandal. (45)
After she comes back to her village and discovers that her baobab is dead, she enters upon a long and often painful journey of self-analysis, which she brings to a close with insight and wisdom gained in Riwan ou le chemin de sable, the third volume of her autobiographical trilogy. Returning now for a moment to the challenge of finding the, or a, good title, the two I mentioned above do work in English, I believe. I will always regret, however, that there seemed to be no good solution for the wonderful wordplay in Werewere Likings title, LAmour-centvies, in which cent vies means a hundred lives, yet also sounds like sans vie, meaning without life. In the end I had to settle for LoveAcross-a-Hundred-Lives, whereby the poetic aural sound of the sans vie was lost completely. It is the translators sad but inexorable fate that their work is never, can never be, perfect. A writer creates, refines, and publishes a book, then moves on to the next one. When interviewed, many authors say that once their book is published, they dont look back but are al-
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ready thinking of their next creation. How many translators are able to say the same? Each time I look at a supposedly finished and now printed translation which I try not to do too often I see things I would do differently today. And even if I were given the chance to revise again, I know that at my next reading I would in all likelihood find other things Id want to change. However, this is not only a striving for perfection but also because, to quote George Steiner once more:
Language is in perpetual change. [...] [T]here are instances of arrested or sharply diminished mobility: certain sacred and magical tongues can be preserved in a condition of artificial stasis. But ordinary language is, literally at every moment, subject to mutation. This takes many forms. New words enter as old words lapse. Grammatical conventions are changed under pressure of idiomatic use or by cultural ordinance. The spectrum of permissible expression as against that which is taboo shifts perpetually. At a deeper level, the relative dimensions and intensities of the spoken and the unspoken alter. This is an absolutely central but little-understood topic. Different civilizations, different epochs do not necessarily produce the same speech mass; certain cultures speak less than others; some modes of sensibility prize taciturnity and elision, others reward prolixity and semantic ornamentation. Inward discourse has its complex, probably unrecapturable history [...]. So far as language is mirror or counterstatement to the world, or most plausibly an interpenetration of the reflective with the creative along an interface of which we have no adequate formal model, it changes as rapidly and in as many ways as human experience itself. (18-19, italics mine)
The original work stands unalterably; the very best we as translators can do is do our very best, and make peace with the fact that, in contrast to the creators of the original work, we are only, but marvelously, too, its re-creators and can be nothing else. Potes manqus. Yes, but if we do it well, potes nevertheless. Id like to move on to the second aspect, that of cultural revelations. Inevitably and a priori every translation encounters the question of cultural differences, expressed not only in descriptions of foods, dress, religious and social customs, for example, but in the very language and style of the work, even within the framework of a same continent such as Europe. When the divide between the two cultures of source and target languages is wider, the ear needs to be even more finely tuned, research becomes more unmistakably urgent, and cul-
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tural sensitivity is a prerequisite. In their art, many African writers by necessity use not their mother tongue but the official language of their country a seemingly permanent remnant of colonialism, even when in their daily life they speak Wolof, Haussa, Swahili, Lingala, Bambara, Bassa, or any other of the hundreds of African tongues. Those authors who do write in their mother tongue cannot escape having a much smaller readership and will most likely remain relatively unknown outside their own culture. Others use the former colonial language but by their own admission sometimes with resentment, reluctance, but more often by making a conscious effort to subvert that European language through the invention of new forms and vocabulary, as Werewere Liking does, for instance, with her chant-romans, her novel-songs. Still others began in English or French but have gone back to and now write in their mother tongue, of which Ngugi wa Thiongo is the best-known example today. Initially writing in English, he writes in Kikuyu now, then translates his books himself or has them translated into English. I recently read that Boubacar Boris Diop is doing the same thing in Senegal, writing in Wolof these days. Assia Djebar reads and speaks Arabic fluently, but writes in French only, yet not only the subject matter of her books but the lyricism of her French, too, reflects a decidedly non-French background. And she is heavily preoccupied with the sound of her voice and her characters voices. Listen to the first stanza of her poem Ras, Benthala... Un an aprs:
1 crire, ce serait tuer la voix, lpuiser, lui faire rendre souffle, la dpouiller de son ton, de son accent, de son cho, de son dplacement dair crire, ce serait la coucher elle, la voix premire , ce serait ltrangler, ou la tordre comme linge mouill sur une corde au soleil, la pitiner sinon, lensevelir dans la boue, le pus, la pourriture crire, ce serait lexposer, la brler pour atteindre ses os invisibles, ses nerfs arachnens, son acier tincelant, ce serait... crire crire ma voix, celle dautrefois qui fourmille encore aujourdhui dans mes orteils, sous mes pieds nus qui, chaque nuit, saffolent jusqu la rive de laube
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crire la voix de chaque fillette, sa voix tapie dans ses cheveux que masque le foulard noir luisant, la voix de la jouvencelle au crne ras alors que ses yeux dpouvante slargissent face vous face toi qui, si longtemps aprs, cris. [To write, would be to kill the voice, to wear it out, force its last breath, strip it of its tone, its accent, its echo, its shifting air To write, would be to lay it to rest it, the original voice would be to strangle it, or wring it like wet laundry on a line in the sun, or else to trample it, bury it in mud, pus, rot To write, would be to bare it, burn it to get its invisible bones, its spidery nerves, its shimmering steel, would be... To write... To write my voice, the one that I once had and still today is tingling in my toes, beneath my naked feet that spin in panic every night until they reach the shore of dawn To write the voice of every little girl, that voice of hers as it lies nestled in her hair concealed beneath the scarf of shining black, the voice of the maiden with the shaven skull while her eyes of terror widen as she faces all of you, faces only you who, so much later, write.]
And then the final lines of the same long poem:

Jcris la langue des morts ou la mienne quimporte Jcris une langue offense fusille une langue dorangeraie Jcris franais langue vivante sons corchs Jcris vos voix pour ne pas touffer vos voix dans ma paume dresses Ras, Bentalha, jcris laprs. [I write the language of the dead or my own no matter I write a wounded language shot in execution a language of the orange grove I write French
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living language flayed sounds I write your voices so as not to suffocate your voices upright, inside my palm Ras, Bentalha, I write the aftermath]. (Djebar 7-14)
It stands to reason that colonialism has left its imprint on much of the content of African literature, especially in the work of the older generation. Innumerable are the novels and volumes of poetry dealing with colonialism, its repercussions, the personal and communal suffering during, and subsequent to, the occupation of the European rulers. In more recent work by a younger generation, we find a growing concern with life in Africa today unrelated to anything European. Though frequently disturbing in its preoccupation with todays politics as reflected in the various forms of neocolonialism and as practiced by current and often corrupt dictators, of which Ken Buguls La Folie et la mort is a prime example, it focuses nevertheless on the present and future possibilities of a renewed, hopeful, and authentically African life in all its aspects. These are primary and recurring themes in both Ken Bugul and Werewere Liking, in whose worlds there is an everpresent emphasis on the position of and attitude toward women, which we find in much African fiction, but particularly and certainly not surprisingly in the work of female authors. Assia Djebar wrote the stories that comprise her Femmes dAlger dans leur appartement between the years 1958 and 1978. In her Ouverture she writes:
Conversations fragmentes, remmores, reconstitues... Rcits fictifs, visages et murmures dun imaginaire proche, dun pass-prsent se cabrant sous lintrusion dun nouveau informel. [...] Je pourrais dire: nouvelles traduites de..., mais de quelle langue? De larabe? Dun arabe populaire, ou dun arabe fminin; autant dire dun arabe souterrain. Jaurais pu couter ces voix dans nimporte quelle langue non crite, non enregistre, transmise seulement par chanes dchos et de soupirs. (7) [Fragmented, remembered, reconstituted conversations... Fictitious accounts, faces and murmurings of a nearby imaginary, of a past-present that rebels against the intrusion of a new abstraction. [...] I could say: stories translated from..., but from which language? From the Arabic? From collo-
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quial Arabic or from feminine Arabic; one might just as well call it underground Arabic. I could have listened to these voices in no matter what language, nonwritten, nonrecorded, transmitted only by chains of echoes and sighs.] (1)
Djebar is a master at making you hear the unspoken voice of the women in Regard interdit, son coup, the forbidden gaze and the severed sound as she titles her essay on Delacroix that closes the book. When describing the process of translating Djebars Femmes dAlger I once wrote that:
Not only is woman neither to be seen nor heard, to be appropriated in every way, to move around ghostlike, fully veiled when outside, sequestered when inside, but she is to be silent everywhere. It leaves women with nothing but one another, and other women are then the only ones with whom and upon whom she can begin to experiment with the sound of her own voice. Among Djebars characters this will be done falteringly for some, passionately for others. It is this that becomes the ultimate challenge for the translator of her work: the silences between the lines, the pauses between the notes, the downcast eye between the open gazes, the quiet that follows the death of a woman of earlier generations and lies between it and the birth of her greatgranddaughter who will water and tend the centuries-old memory of woman. (15)
Memory is a duty, Boubacar Boris Diop said in an interview after the publication of his Murambi, The Book of Bones on the Rwandan genocide. Werewere Liking lives up to that in La Mmoire ampute, just published by The Feminist Press as The Amputated Memory. The amputation of memory also leads to silence, for how can you speak of what you do not remember? And who are we, who can we be, if we do not have the memory of where we came from, what our culture is, who we are individually and collectively as people? We must then become what we are told we should be, because we have no other information on which to rely and base our growth. Liking consciously and with great pain excavates her memory, digging like an archeologist for the experiences she had lived without at the time, comprehending their significance, and by doing so she constructs her life as an adult woman, finding deeper wisdom with every exhumed piece, a wisdom she then relays to her own children and grandchildren. In this she follows in her own grandmothers footsteps.
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Indeed, the great treasure trove in much of Likings fiction is the figure of the grandmother. Known by some variation of the name Madjo or Madja, she is mother-mentor-sage and the ultimate example to be emulated by Likings female protagonists. In La Mmoire ampute, however, Grand Madja presides over an additional three aunts, all named Roz. It is a lovely collection of women who form a trinity of marvelous, stern but compassionate, smart, courageous, and humorous models, although certainly not without flaws of their own. The question of female subjugation whose permanent companion is silence is ever-present in many literatures. The themes of expected obedience, submission, and resulting silence are everywhere in the work of Djebar, Liking, and Ken Bugul. And when the female character resists, whether she does so quietly or revolts openly, she enters a dangerous world, colliding with established mores and patriarchal domination, risking rebuke, banishment from the family, or exile. You who understand the dehumanization of forced removalrelocation-reeducation-redefinition, the humiliation of having to falsify your own reality, your voice you know. And often cannot say it. You try and keep on trying to unsay it, for if you dont, they will not fail to fill in the blanks, and you will be said, wrote Trinh Minhha almost twenty years ago (80). Some years ago, in an article in Cahiers de la Villa Gillet, Chantal Thomas discussed the Breton housemaid Bcassine protagonist of a comic strip that presumably portrayed the first female heroine in any comic strip who made her debut on February 2nd, 1905. Thomas wrote:
Il y a un dsir de servir, et son personnage emblmatique, son hrone par excellence, cest Bcassine. Bcassine qui adore ses matres, et en particulier sa matresse, Mme Grand-Air, Bcassine qui nest rien dautre quempressement obir, soumission aux ordres. Bcassine qui son crateur na pas dessin de bouche puisquelle na jamais rien rpondre, puisquelle ne sait pas dire non. (68) [There is a wish to serve and its emblematic character, its heroine par excellence, is Bcassine. Bcassine who loves her masters, especially her mistress, Madame Grand-Air, Bcassine whose existence is nothing but eagerness to obey, submissiveness to the given commands. Bcassine whose creator drew her without a mouth (italics mine) since she has nothing to say in response, since she doesnt know how to say no.]
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Woman may seek refuge inside herself as often in Djebar, she may pursue a formal education as Ken does in Le baobab fou though at what price? she strives to understand herself with the help of women guides as in Likings novels, or she returns from her many meanderings both literal and figurative as does the narrator of Buguls Riwan ou le chemin de sable, who has gained insight into herself and the surrounding world and is now able to structure an adult life rich in experience and understanding, where she can both admire and be critical of the men around her, without being either threatening to them or threatened by them. ...So all who hide too well away / Must speak and tell us where they are, are the last lines of Robert Frosts Revelation, with which I began. That, too, is the mission of the literary translator: to tell the reader of a different language and culture what the author of the original text hides away, what she must say, and where she is. In conclusion, a few words about what I have learned, and what has, indeed, been revealed to me on a personal level through the act and art of translation. Almost twenty-six years ago, on our first date, my husband and I attended a political meeting. As he drove me home he asked what sort of work I did; I told him I taught French language and literature, and that I was involved in the beginnings of translation, so nothing political like your work, I said. He answered quite emphatically: Everything is political! At the time I heartily disagreed. Not until I began to translate African literature did I realize how right he had been. Coming from three generations of Dutch colonialists in Indonesia, where I was born and spent my first decade, reading the work of African authors was truly a revelation for me. On some level I had always known the evils colonialism had wrought, but hearing the personal voices of these writers and the characters they had created, the pain before, during, and after colonialism became brightly illuminated, a burning torch in what was until then mostly a fog of my own childhood memories, and I felt compelled, feel compelled, to bring those voices to a wider audience through the also-political act of translation. The decades Ive spent protesting in the streets, joining demonstrations, and being an activist on behalf of any number of issues I believe to be of greatest urgency, are dwindling, though certainly not over. My translation work, however, will go on as long as
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my head and hands keep functioning, bringing both the voices and their silences to a different and broader audience, being a link in the chain. I have also learned a great deal about what it means to be a woman and for that feel deeply indebted to the work of Bugul, Djebar, and Liking. If we are lucky, perhaps between all the spoken and written words, as Pablo Neruda wrote in one of his poems, Keeping Quiet, we will be able to interpret the huge silence [that] might interrupt this sadness / of never understanding ourselves. Since I began with Robert Frost, Id like to end with a few lines from Song of Myself (Stanza 6) by Walt Whitman, another great perhaps the greatest? American poet:
A child said What is the grass? Fetching it to me with full hands; How could I answer the child? I do not know what it is any more than he. [...] ...I guess it is a uniform hieroglyphic, And it means, Sprouting alike in broad zones and narrow zones, Growing among black folks as among white...
Sprouting alike many poets, writers, artists, and musicians already know that we are all one. The rest of humanity can and must learn from these writers words, written in any language in which it is able to perceive both sound and silence. It is the translators responsibility to smooth the progress of that perception.
de Jager Works Cited
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Appel, Anne Milano. Out of the Shadows: Unionizing in Rome. The ATA Chronicle October 2007. Bugul, Ken. Le Baobab fou. Dakar: Nouvelles ditions Africaines, 1984. Trans. Marjolijn de Jager. The Abandoned Baobab: the Autobiography of a Senegalese Woman. Chicago: Lawrence Hill Books, 1991. Rev. ed. Afterword by Jeanne Garane. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2008. _____. La Folie et la mort. Paris and Dakar: Prsence Africaine, 2000. _____. Riwan ou le chemin de sable. Paris and Dakar: Prsence Africaine, 1999. Crystal, David. English as a Global Language. 1997. 2nd edition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003. dAlmeida, Irne. Francophone African Women Writers: Destroying the Emptiness of Silence. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 1994. de Jager, Marjolijn. Translating Assia Djebars Femmes dAlger dans leur appartement: Listening for the Silence. World Literature Today 70.4 (1996): 856-58. Diop, Boubacar Boris. Murambi, le livre des ossements. Paris: Stock, 2000. Trans. Fiona McLaughlin. Murambi, The Book of Bones. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2006. Djebar, Assia. Femmes dAlger dans leur appartement. Paris: Des femmes, 1980. Trans. Marjolijn de Jager. Women of Algiers in Their Apartment. Afterword by Clarisse Zimra. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 1992. Paperback ed. 1999. _____. Ras, Bentalha... Un an aprs. Research in African Literatures 30.3 (1999): 7-14. Frost, Robert. Revelation. A Boys Will. London: D. Nutt, 1913. Liking, Werewere. LAmour-cent-vies. Paris: Publisud, 1988. _____. La Mmoire ampute. Abidjan: Nouvelles ditions Ivoiriennes, 2004. Trans. Marjolijn de Jager. The Amputated Memory. New York: The Feminist Press: 2007. Mallon, Thomas. Review of The Man Who Made Lists Love, Death, Madness, and the Creation of Rogets Thesaurus. The New York Times Book Review 16 March 2008. <http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/16/books/ review/Mallon-t.html>. Minh-ha, Trinh T. Woman, Native, Other: Writing Postcoloniality and Feminism. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1989.
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Mudimbe, V. Y. Le Bel Immonde. Paris: Prsence Africaine, 1976. Trans. Marjolijn de Jager. Before the Birth of the Moon. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1989. Neruda, Pablo. Keeping Quiet. 1958. Extravagaria: A Bilingual Edition. Trans. Alastair Reid. London: Cape, 1972. 27-29. Rabassa, Gregory. The Ear in Translation. The World of Translation. New York: P.E.N. American Center, 1971. Steiner, George. After Babel Aspects of Language and Translation. London: Oxford University Press, 1975. Thomas, Chantal. Ne pas rpondre: lenfance, lcriture, le tlphone mobile. Cahiers de la Villa Gillet 12 (2000): 63-71.
Translation
Cheryl Toman
Case Western Reserve University
Werewere Liking as Translator and Translated

The texts of Cameroonian playwright and novelist, Werewere Liking, are known for the linguistic creativity and overall difficulty resulting from Likings self-translation from her native Bassa language. As Likings works may also be considered translations of African oralities, those who translate these same texts into English encounter additional challenges. This study analyzes how the self-translator and translator alike deal with various linguistic and cultural realities presented by African languages upon translating them into French and then into English. Four of Likings texts will serve as models.
________________________ One rarely speaks of the African Francophone writers ownership of the French language. Most critics have claimed that the opposite is true that French as a language of the colonizer is one that the African writer has been forced to accept. As Kwaku Gyasi claims,
the early African writers started to write in the languages of the colonizers without considering all the implications involved in the use of such languages. In the zeal to destroy the stereotypical images of Africa and to project their African world view, these writers may have considered the colonial languages as mere tools or means to achieve their objectives. (Writing 75)
This progression of the language owning the writer is thought to begin at a relatively young age, as children acquire French and refine their expression through schooling in the French system, either in the home country most likely a former colony of France or else in
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France proper. One writer who clearly challenges all of these assumptions, however, is Cameroonian novelist and playwright, Werewere Liking, whose works in French resemble no Western forms of fiction and whose language and registers are highly distinctive. Self-taught in French as an adult, Liking had been immersed during her youth exclusively in the language, rituals, traditions, and teachings of her native Bassa culture of Southwestern Cameroon. It must be said that this schooling was largely from a feminine perspective, either transmitted to her by her grandmother or as the result of Likings own membership in female secret societies. Although relatively well known for three decades, Likings work in theater, oral performance, and the novel is notoriously difficult, with Franco-Bassa neologisms being just one aspect of its complexity. Likings travels and research have also inspired her to infuse into her texts and performance art cultural and linguistic elements from Mali as well as from Cte dIvoire, the country where she has resided since 1977. Thus, Likings works, whether translated into French by her or into English by others, can be considered what Gyasi calls a cultural production for which he sees translation as a crucial dimension (The African Writer 144). Gyasi further claims:
[...] if it is true that there was a time when the Europeans imposed their language on their colonized subjects, it is now clear that the imposed language is being enriched by local vernacular lexical traditions. According to each individual writer, the European language in Africa is given different hues and shades. (Ahmadou 150)
Although many of Likings writings in French have been translated into English, the linguistic challenges presented by her works appear to have limited her readership. As Africanist John ContehMorgan explains in his book, Theatre and Drama in Francophone Africa, The lack of [Likings] wide appeal can be attributed to her works extensive use of an esoteric and highly ritualized language: of dream, trance, and spirit-possession techniques [...] (212). However, the linguistic complexity of Likings work is not considered by everyone to be a detriment. In a more positive light, fellow Cameroonian writer and scholar Juliana Makuchi Nfah-Abbenyi hails Likings approach to writing as a new African literary esthetic (95). Indeed, with her intricate style of language, Likings goal is to prove that merely knowing French is insufficient if one hopes to truly understand
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her writing, and this can be interpreted as an act of resistance that qualifies her as having earned ownership of the language. Gyasi further explains, In certain instances, comprehension is denied the monolingual reader who is then forced to recognize the importance of the other language in the narrative reconstruction of history and reality (The African Writer 157). Likings style is therefore what Gyasi describes as an experiment of blending African models with European [ones] while subverting or violating them at the same time, by using techniques that interrupt the narration in French and force the reader to reconstruct the text (The Francophone African Text 119). Through her writing and self-translation, Liking essentially engages in the act of redefining African orality. As both the author and the translator of her own works, Liking actually assigns a foreign language to Bassa oral tradition in defiance of critics such as Joseph KiZerbo, who warns, [...] taken out of context, the oral literary text is like a fish out of water: it dies and decomposes. [...] Do not therefore uproot oral testimony (quoted by Conteh-Morgan 8). Ironically, Liking chooses to take her work out of context in various ways, and this, she feels, has had a greater impact on her diverse audience. In fact, Liking found audiences in her native Cameroon not diverse enough, and thus she considers herself more successful because of her move to Abidjan, the vibrant arts capital of Cte dIvoire and French West Africa. Liking may have found less creative freedom in Cameroon because she was indeed too close to home that is, translation as cultural production simply could not be as widely appreciated for several reasons. A play such as Likings La Puissance de Um, for example, is indeed a contemporary version of a Bassa funeral ritual of confession, reconciliation, and purification. Conteh-Morgan claims that although the work aims at provoking the spectator into serious thought and even creating something of the healing ecstasy of the model, her work is entertainment all the same, with non-Bassa Cameroonians watching with no social obligations. He points out that Likings theatrical production uses paid actors and not priests, and that non-Bassa spectators are not worshippers, as would be the case in the actual ritual. According to Conteh-Morgan then, we can say at the very least that all Cameroonian spectators are not sharing in the same experience and understanding of the play, and to another extreme, some may even find the aestheticization of a sacred ritual offensive
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(19). In Abidjan, however, Likings reception has been overwhelmingly positive. Her performance art has less readily been labeled sacrilegious; indeed, it has been praised for being highly innovative. Gyasi offers an explanation as to what contributes to this success:
Even though the African writer uses symbols and metaphors that touch on a real African situation to reflect or express an idea, he or she also goes beyond a particular time and place because, by writing in a foreign language, the final product is invested with meanings that apply in varying degrees to different people and societies. (Writing 82)
Likings written works almost always originate as oral performance. Therefore, not only does Liking successfully transform her work into written form, but she translates it, for the most part, into Bassainfused French. The thought of yet another person tackling an English translation that remains faithful to these already intricate linguistic and cultural nuances is seemingly a daunting task for even the most experienced translator. Thus, the purpose of this particular study is twofold; it will look at Liking not only as writer/translator herself, but it will also take a look at those who translate her works into English. The translations that will serve as references include Marjolijn de Jagers translation of Elle sera de jaspe et de corail and LAmourcent-vies (It Shall be of Jasper and Coral and Love-Across-A-Hundred-Lives), and also Jeanne Dingomes translation of The Power of Um and A New Earth, which are Likings works, La Puissance de Um and Une Nouvelle Terre, respectively. If Likings texts are already complex for some in their Bassainfused French, what additional problems need to be addressed when this work is translated a second time, into English? Obviously, the translator of English is using as reference a text that has been translated initially into French by Liking. Similar to what Liking has done in French, the translator of English must also convey all the cultural nuances of the African text within the limitations of what is possible in English, which in turn may differ from what is feasible in French. Linguists Vinay and Darbelnet identify some of the potential problems in translating from French to English alone; namely, taking into account differences in the two languages regarding metalinguistic information of message (29), situational equivalence (39), and cultural lacunae (65). Gyasi also posits that translators of African texts have a
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tendency to adhere too closely to the tenets of translation theories developed in the West, which may result in a translation that gives primacy to the European languages that the African writer has so fiercely sought to subvert in the act of writing (The Francophone African Text 111). Furthermore, as both writer and translator, Liking obviously has an advantage over the translator of English, who, as an outsider to the initial work, has less linguistic freedom. The goal of the English translation is first and foremost to preserve Likings self-translated text in Bassa-infused French, and while translation is undoubtedly a creative process, there are limits to how creative the translator of English can be, if he or she hopes to maintain the integrity of the translated work. Interestingly, the translator of Likings play, Une Nouvelle Terre, is Jeanne Dingome a Cameroonian herself, but one from the Anglophone region of the country. In this excerpt, Likings work is followed by Dingomes English translation from A New Earth, a play in which Liking combines and rewrites two Bassa myths, using both French and Bassa:
Mourir pour mourir, le cri la bouche. Et je vois rouge de la souffrance, rouge de la fureur qui libre le Cri. Heym pour la libert, la puret Heym pour lamour qui surlve Heym pour la Vie!!!... (21-22) If I must die, I will die screaming. And I see blatant suffering, redhot rage crying: Heym for liberty, for purity Heym for ennobling love Heym for life!!!... (66) 1
Only in Dingomes English translation do we find an endnote added to the text, explaining that the ideophone, heym, is a traditional Bassa victory cry only imperfectly translated by hurrah in English (89). According to linguist Philip Noss, Dingome as translator is left with only three choices as to how to handle the ideophone in her English translation: she could seek a formal equivalent in English, re
1 All references in English from Une Nouvelle Terre or La Puissance de Um are from Jeanne Dingomes published translations.
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create the discourse in a form and structure familiar to the reader of English, or alternatively, as she has done, she can simply explain the accepted meaning of the ideophone (The Ideophone 269). Ideophones exist in every language, but as Noss proves in his article, Translating the Ideophone, there tends to be a higher ratio of them in African languages (41). 2 Noss further explains that ideophones combine perception and concept in a cultural linguistic relationship between sound and semantics (42). Even Liking does not find a suitable translation in French for the term heym, but it remains in her original text without explanation, leaving her readers to gather its meaning from context. Noss claims that one of the reasons why the ideophone poses such a dilemma for the translator is precisely because of its incredible adaptability to creative rhetoric (53). In her written texts as well as in her oral performance, Liking uses a familiar combination of Bassa and French, but she seems to use less Bassa in the written form with the exception of ideophones and proverbs. In the published version of the play, La Puissance de Um, for example, Liking herself removes a chorus that she had originally performed in Bassa and replaces it with its French translation, Cest la faute lOccident (14), or It is the fault of the West (32). It is unclear as to why Liking decided on this change in the published play; perhaps it is because the oral performance relies more heavily on a musicality that is achieved through the retention of certain words in Bassa. It may, however, be a message that Liking intended for a Western audience to understand, and the context in which the phrase is found in the written text, as opposed to the oral performance, would not allow the reader to know its true meaning had it remained in Bassa. Since one of the goals of oral performance is to engage its spectators, Liking must at times find alternative but equally successful ways of soliciting the readers attention, if she wishes her written text to have an effect similar to that of the oral production. This explains why Dingome, as translator, feels the need at times to provide
Noss observes, for example, that in a dictionary of Zulu (a language of South Africa), there are at least three to four ideophones on every page. In Izon (a language spoken in Nigeria), approximately 9% of recorded words are ideophones. In his last example, ideophones comprise one in every four entries in the Ghaya-French dictionary (Ghaya is spoken in the border region of Cameroon and the Central African Republic [41]).
2
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additional information on how Likings written text is distinct from her oral performance (60). In all of her works and performance art, it is clear that Liking is translating both culture and language. Her texts classified as ritual theater, according to Richard Bjornson, are modern plays that are intended to fulfill the same healing, community-reinforcing function that rituals performed in traditional society do (448). Indeed, we see this in a text such as the aforementioned La Puissance de Um, in which the retelling of a funeral rite of the Bassa serves two purposes: to pay respects to someone the community has lost, while at the same time having each member, including the deceased, reflect upon his or her own personal responsibility (or lack thereof) within the community and towards others. Liking often uses such a technique in her writing, ultimately allowing her readers to question their own accountability concerning societal problems. It is helpful for Likings readers to understand the cultural nuances embedded in the plays title. Um is the second most important deity for the Bassa people, and she is frequently Likings goddess of choice because of her ability to ward off misfortunes while at the same time being dissociated from any destructive forces, unlike other examples from Bassa mythology. 3 Likings contemporary model of the traditional funeral ritual ends with the village returning to a period of prosperity through the invoking of Um and a symbolic resurrection of the deceased (59), true to the actual Bassa tradition. However, one of the liberties taken by Liking as cultural translator was to change certain elements of the ritual in an attempt to render Bassa women more powerful, as she believed them to be in precolonial times. For example, Likings character, Ngond Libii, refuses the stigma assigned to Bassa widows, which requires that they be silent and endure having their ears plugged after the death of a husband. Likings main characters are given Bassa names Ntep Iliga and Ngond Libii, his wife. The latter, as explained in Dingomes translation, literally means daughter of a slave, with the term libii carrying the most derogatory connotations that is, the status of a slave of the lowest class
The most important deity for the Bassa people is Ngu, but unlike Um, Ngus power manifests itself as both destructive and constructive forces. See Dingome 10 (comments of Siga Asanga).
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(19). However, it is the normally voiceless and supposedly, ritually silenced Ngond Libii who in fact brings the mourners to the realization of their faults, which have led in part to the death of their leader and to the symbolic death of their rich culture. Likings translation of tradition, culture, and power in her texts is not restricted to rewriting the Bassa rituals of her own people. As a woman writer, Liking espouses feminist ideals typical of African matriarchal social structures that differ from Western feminisms, in the sense that Liking advocates the idea of women and men being equally different, as opposed to their being considered equal. The belief that is exemplified in many African cultures is that man and woman are each others complement, and therefore interdependent. Thus, through language and her references to various myths and rituals, Liking provides a translation of these concepts into French. Many French feminist theorists, such as Simone de Beauvoir, Hlne Cixous, and Luce Irigaray, among others, have all spoken about the patriarchal nature of language, a debate quite certainly drawing from their own experiences with Western languages. For example, in her analysis of the sexualization of language in To Speak is Never Neutral, Irigaray claims: The female has not yet created her language, her word, her style (4). This assertion poses an interesting challenge for Liking as her own translator, as she seeks a way of transmitting these cultural nuances of African matriarchy from Bassa to a seemingly more patriarchaloriented language, French. To further complicate matters, various African languages, unlike French, are genderless. Liking thus approaches her texts as compilations of symbols and a craftsmanship of words, as Anny-Claire Jaccard has said, where the word rediscovers its primordial importance and is considered like a raw material to be shaped (159). 4 In her novel, LAmour-cent-vies (the story of an African village in despair, which is to be taken as an allegory for the entire continent), Liking herself makes a link between motherhood and a painful birth of a new language. Liking uses the image of a birth by cesarean, the more violent, medicalized form of birth, as a reminder of how patriarchy is embedded in language and also as a symbol of the urgent necessity for a new language to emerge one in which women have
4
Translation mine.
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a more rightful status. Thus, Likings perceived appropriation of male discourse should be considered, according to Gyasi, as a weapon of resistance against male domination a strategy that is parallel to the African male writers appropriation of the colonizers language (The Francophone African Text 96). It is indeed intriguing to hear Likings narrator state: Je voulais oprer une csarienne sur les mots et leur arracher un enfant vivant, capable de transmettre un secret, le sens de la parole (85). [I wanted to do a cesarean on words and pull out a living child from them, capable of relaying a secret, the meaning of words (185).] 5 This very concept of using aspects of the female body and of the birthing process to illustrate the as-of-yet unattainable reality of a truly feminine language has also been considered by Irigaray:
The female remains within an amorphous maternal matrix, source of creation, of procreation, as yet unformed, however, as subject of the autonomous word. The coming, or the subjective anastrophe (rather than the catastrophe), of the female has not yet taken place. And her movements often remain stuck in mimetic tendencies: whether its a defensive or offensive strategy, the female behaves like the other, the one, the unique. As of yet, she neither affirms nor develops her own forms. She lacks some kind of growth, between the within of an intention and the without of a thing created by the other [...]. (4)
In LAmour-cent-vies, Liking challenges restrictions imposed by the French language on the African oral narrative by confusing the reader as to the true gender of the narrator. 6 Is this voice representing a brother/uncle or a sister/aunt? 7 In the beginning of the text, all nouns and corresponding adjectives indicate that the narrator is male. Bien
Translated passages from Lamour-cent-vies and Elle sera de jaspe et de corail are those of Marjolijn de Jager. 6 In fact, it is interesting to find that even authors of critical analyses of LAmour-cent-vies often take no notice of the gender ambiguity in the text. For example, Kathryn Wrights article in Research in African Literatures refers to the narrator only as Lems sister/aunt (49). 7 I say brother/uncle and sister/aunt because the narrator begins by saying Lem is his brother, with Lem being the older of the two. However, Lem is the son of the narrators brother, and thus Lem is the narrators nephew, biologically speaking. The narrator later explains that this relationship with Lem has always been brotherly and not one of an uncle/nephew or perhaps, depending on how the gender of the characters are perceived later, sister/aunt. See French version, page 17, and the English translation, page 126.
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sr, je ne suis pas conteur aussi talentueux que mon frre (10). [Of course, I am not as talented a storyteller as my brother (120).] In French, of course, the noun conteur and the adjective talentueux unmistakably refer to a male subject. At the very end of the work, however, the narrator questions his own identity, shifting between possible selves modeled on those of males and females whose origins are found in African oral tradition. This is also Likings way of emphasizing how African indigenous languages do not necessarily have equivalents for Western gendered kinship terms. Marjolijn de Jagers English translation of the following excerpt skillfully conveys the Western readers frustration at not knowing the sex of the narrator, a sign of inability to conceive of human beings outside a strict gendered classification:
Cependant, jen suis toujours me demander: qui suis-je ? [...] tais-je le pre, Maghan Kon Fata ou Nyob-Nyum? tais-je le demi-frre, effac mais ami fidle, Manding Bori? tais-je la mchante martre Sassouma Brt? Ou lune des sorcires? [...] En tout cas, je ne crois pas que jtais une femme, car mon pre ne maurait pas affubl dun nom dhomme cette vie-ci simplement parce quun marabout avait prdit la naissance dun garon... Alors que fais-je ici dans ces jupons qui membarrassent toujours comme une camisole de force embarrasse les pieds dun fou? (155) And yet, I am still wondering: me, who am I? [...] Was I the father, Maghan Kon Fata or Nyob-Nyum? Was I the half-brother, in the background, but faithful friend Manding Bori? Was I the wicked stepmother Sassouma Brt? Or one of the sorceresses? [...] In any case, I dont believe I was a woman, for my father would not have attached a mans name to me in this life, simply because a marabou had predicted the birth of a boy... So what am I doing here in these skirts that always bother me the way a straightjacket bothers a madmans feet? (245)
Likings allusion to a madman in a straight jacket is very telling. While the West clings to a binary categorization of gender, there is evidence that African languages and traditional cultures are less rigid by comparison. Using the Igbo language as a prime example, Nigerian feminist scholar Ifi Amadiume explains in books such as Afrikan Matriarchal Foundations and Male Daughters, Female Husbands that
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the fact that various African languages have fewer gender distinctions makes it possible to see certain social roles as separate from sex and gender, making it plausible for either sex to fill the roles (Afrikan 30). Amadiume attributes this to the influence of African matriarchal heritage on language, thereby differentiating African languages from those in the West, which carry rigid sex and gender association (Afrikan 29). What Amadiume is thus saying is that gender is essentially a construct of ones society. However, Likings narrator is caught in a world somewhere between Africa and the West, and this conflict is symbolized in such manifestations of madness, further illustrated by the adept use of language in the text. As Irigaray explains, classifications such as he, she, and I are still the reservoir of the meaning, and the madness, of discourse (4). In another of Likings novels, Elle sera de jaspe et de corail: journal dune misovire, we find similar linguistic intrigue and interplay, beginning with Likings neologism, misovire. Although in the novel, Liking pairs up the misovire with a misogynist, the misovire is not to be understood as a man-hater or the antithesis of the misogynist, but rather someone who is thus far unsatisfied with the men she has encountered. Nos hros nous laisseront sur notre faim (8) [Our heroes will leave us unsatisfied (4)]. Elle sera de jaspe et de corail is focused on the building of a New Race one made of jasper and coral materials that suggest a spectrum of color that stands in direct contrast to the historically hegemonic and prejudice-laden Western classification that sorts the human race into White and nonWhite. Liking writes:
Il natra une Nouvelle Race dhommes [...] Et la misovire que je suis rencontrera un misogyne Et nous vivrons heureux (9) There shall be born a New Race of men [...] And the misovire I am now shall encounter a misogynist And we shall live happily ever after (5)
If we take this New Race to be rooted in African feminist ideals, and if we consider that Africas present condition worsened because of patriarchal systems, it is interesting to analyze why the misovire and the misogynist would meet. If we consider the misovire as a product of an African matriarchal world, then the misovire would
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still expect that man is potentially her complement as opposed to the hierarchized patriarchal world in which woman is of a status inferior to man. Thus, the misovire is analogous to the misogynist in their respective matriarchal and patriarchal realms. Since the misovire is analyzing patriarchal Africa through the representative village of Luna, a land where men and women have allowed themselves to become tsetse flies (11), there can be no suitable complement for the misovire; just as in the patriarchal world of the misogynist, the belief is that no woman can be at a mans level. With the creation of the New Race one that will free Africa from its current misery and oppression the social conditions that create the misovire and the misogynist would simply disappear into a world apart. By constructing the word misovire, Liking has essentially done in French what Chinua Achebe deemed in his own texts as examples of new English. Achebe explained in his celebrated essay, The African Writer and the English Language, that what he considered to be new English was a language still in full communion with its ancestral home but altered to suit its new African surroundings (446). With her numerous demonstrations of language inadequacies and their subsequent reconstructions, along with her call for the building of a New Race, Liking most definitely heeds Achebes call for the African writer to dominate the colonial language as he or she deems appropriate. Jeanne Dingome tells us in the introduction to her English translation that Liking revels in verbal artistry (19), which explains why this author is so difficult to translate. However, Likings self-translations of her culture into a Bassa-infused French is in many ways a completely different exercise in translation, since Dingome considers that Liking generally lets her imagination meander, culling the images and the words from a rich web of free associations (18). Thus, the task of translators of English, such as Jeanne Dingome and Marjolijn de Jager, is to conceive of the translation of Likings texts as what Gyasi calls a strategy of literary decolonization, whereby the European language is pushed and forced to the position of minor language and in that sense ceases to be an instrument of domination (The African Writer 156). Even as a self-translator, Liking, in her quest for ownership of the French language, essentially shares with Dingome and de Jager some of these same goals.
Toman Works cited
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Achebe, Chinua. The African Writer and the English Language. Moderna Sprak 58 (1964): 438-46. Rpt. in Morning Yet on Creation Day. Ed. Chinua Achebe. London: Heinemann, 1975. 55-62. Amadiume, Ifi. Afrikan Matriarchal Foundations: The Igbo Case. Surrey: Karnak House, 1987. _____. Male Daughters, Female Husbands: Gender and Sex in an African Society. London: Zed Books, 1987. Asanga, Siga, Jeanne Dingome, Innocent Futcha, and Nalova Lyonga. Introduction. African Ritual Theatre: The Power of Um and A New Earth. By Werewere Liking. San Francisco: International Scholars Publications, 1996. 7-24. Bjornson, Richard. The African Quest for Freedom and Identity: Cameroonian Writing and the National Experience. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1991. Conteh-Morgan, John. Theater and Drama in Francophone Africa: A Critical Introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994. Dingome, Jeanne, et al., ed. and trans. African Ritual Theatre: The Power of Um and a New Earth. By Werewere Liking. San Francisco: International Scholars Publications, 1996. Gyasi, Kwaku. The African Writer as Translator: Writing African Languages through French. Journal of African Cultural Studies 16.2 (2003): 143-59. _____. Ahmadou Kourouma: Translation and Interpretation as Narrative Configurations in the African Text. Overvold et al. 150-64. _____. The Francophone African Text: Translation and the Postcolonial Experience. New York: Peter Lang, 2006. _____. Writing as Translation: African Literature and the Challenges of Translation. Research in African Literatures 30.2 (1999): 75-87. Irigaray, Luce. To Speak is Never Neutral. New York: Routledge, 2002. Jaccard, Anny-Claire. Des textes novateurs: la littrature fminine. Notre Librairie 99 (1989): 153-61. Kotey, Paul, ed. New Dimensions in African Linguistics and Languages. Trenton: Africa World Press, 1999. Liking, Werewere. LAmour-cent-vies. Paris: Publisud, 1988. _____. Elle sera de jaspe et de corail. Paris: LHarmattan, 1983. _____. It Shall be of Jasper and Coral and Love-Across-A-Hundred-Lives. Trans. Marjolijn de Jager. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2000.
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_____. Une Nouvelle terre. Abidjan: Nouvelles Editions Africaines, 1980. _____. La Puissance de Um. Abidjan: CEDA, 1979. Makuchi Nfah-Abbenyi, Juliana. Gender in African Womens Writing: Identity, Sexuality, and Difference. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997. Noss, Philip. The Ideophone: A Dilemma for Translation and Translation Theory. New Dimensions in African Linguistics and Languages. Trenton: Africa World Press, 1999. 261-72. _____. Translating the Ideophone: Perspectives and Strategies of Translators and Artists. Overvold et al. 40-58. Overvold, Angelina, Richard Priebe, and Louis Tremaine, eds. The Creative Circle: Artist, Critic, and Translator in African Literature. Trenton: Africa World Press, 2003. Vinay, Jean-Paul, and Jean Darbelnet. Comparative Stylistics of French and English: A Methodology for Translation. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Co., 1995. Wright, Kathryn. Extending Generic Boundaries: Werewere Likings Lamour-cent-vies. Research in African Literatures 33.2 (2002): 4660.
Translation
Anny Dominique Curtius

University of Iowa
The Great White Man of Lambarn by Bassek ba Kobhio: When Translating a Colonial Mentality Loses its Meaning
This article focuses on a specific scene of Bassek ba Kobhios 1994 film Le grand Blanc de Lambarn/The Great White Man of Lambarn, where Albert Schweitzer preaches Christian principles in French to a group of Gabonese people in Lambarn. His sermon is translated into Fang by an interpreter. Because of English subtitles during this sermon scene in the California Newsreel version of the film, and the absence of subtitles in the original version distributed by La Mdiathque des Trois Mondes, several types of audiences are constituted, and several layers of interpretations and innuendos interweave. This article proposes to explore how a dynamics of mistranslation or missed translation locks this particular scene into a dead end and raises two kinds of questions: those concerning the distribution of African cinema beyond African borders, the translation of African languages in African cinema, and the script in African cinema; and others concerning matters of mobility, authenticity, and inaccuracy that subvert Albert Schweitzers authority while enriching Bassek ba Kobhios discourse on colonial and postcolonial mentalities.
________________________ Racouti [...] avait eu une peur bleue de Wangrin, parce que celui-ci savait parler au commandant non pas en forofifon naspa, mais en franais couleur vin de Bordeaux []. (Ltrange destin de Wangrin ou les roueries dun interprte africain 39)
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The central point of this study is a short scene from Cameroonian director Bassek ba Kobhios 1994 feature film, The Great White Man of Lambarn. I would like to explore how the original French version distributed by M3M (Mdiathque des Trois Mondes) and the version distributed by California Newsreel with subtitles in English articulate two contradictory discourses about the Christianization of Gabonese people in Lambarn. In the original version, Albert Schweitzer, whose nickname in the film is Le Grand Blanc, The Great White Man, preaches the Gospel to the people of Lambarn and focuses particularly on the necessity of hard work as the only form of redemption for them as colonized people. However, in the English version, the confrontation of the written text the English subtitles and the oral text, that of the film script itself, manifests another type of discourse. Viewers who are able to understand both English and French constitute a specific audience. Indeed, in the California Newsreel version, when listening to the French while reading the English subtitles, these privileged viewers realize that an interpreter wisely conceals and manipulates the Great White Mans sermon. In this scene, the interpreter is the one who reveals the Great White Mans accusation of laziness leveled at his colonized people, but the viewer with knowledge of French realizes that the doctor never uses belittling terms in his sermon. It is also this same interpreter who, through his biased translation, admonishes the people of Lambarn to embrace fully the stereotypes he attributes to the Great White Man as a way to articulate new strategies of identity. Before delving into the analysis of this particular scene, I find it useful to recall what Ba Kobhios film communicates to its audience. Bassek ba Kobhio looks critically at Albert Schweitzer (18751965) the physician, the missionary, the philosopher, the theologian, the musicologist, the organist, and also the 1952 Nobel Peace Prize winner. Schweitzer created a hospital in Lambarn in 1913 and lived there from 1924 until his death; his mission in Gabon established him as one of the most important spokespersons for colonial projects in Central Africa. In this film, focusing on the last twenty-one years of his life in Lambarn, Ba Kobhio examines Schweitzers reinvention of a colonial Africa fossilized in its dependence on the French Empire.
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Ba Kobhio draws attention to Schweitzers cultural arrogance and paternalism toward the Gabonese people, whom he usually calls his primitives, and the filmmaker also points to Schweitzers ambiguous love/disdain relationship with the Gabonese people. Thus, picturing him as both racist and philanthropist, selfish but generous, arrogant yet humble, Ba Kobhio explores this intrinsic ambiguity of the colonizer as analyzed by Albert Memmi in Portrait du colonis, to the extent that, by the end of the film, one is at a loss to say whether Ba Kobhio makes Schweitzer a hard-core colonialist who must be condemned, or a sort of humanist in disguise. In order to build up the ambiguity, Ba Kobhio creates six key characters whose roles are to destabilize and challenge Schweitzers power by questioning his international reputation in five fields of expertise: medicine, theology, philosophy, musicology, and philanthropy. In the field of medicine, a young Gabonese physician, Koumba, challenges the Great White Man. As a boy protected by Schweitzer, Koumba was told that he should become a male nurse, not a doctor, because Africa, Schweitzer says, needs carpenters and farmers, not doctors. Years later, when Koumba returns from Europe, where he studied medicine and law, he openly criticizes Schweitzers ethnocentric vision of medicine, his insensitive treatment of Gabonese patients, and his dubious administration of the hospital. In the field of medicine linked to tradition and philosophy, the traditional healer who does not share the Great White Mans philosophy of healing, suffering, and medication reinforces Koumbas position. The healer questions Schweitzers expertise since, from a traditional perspective, the Great White Mans medical knowledge is fossilized in books, whereas his own is alive. In turn, two women a French journalist and Bissa, the Gabonese wife 1 who was given to the Great White Man by the village
At a ceremony that the Great White Man attends for the first time and that follows his visit to the traditional healer, the village chief accepts to unveil to the doctor the secret of a powerful medicinal plant, the iboga. Then the chief allows Bissa to play a key role during this ceremony and offers him Bissa as a sign of friendship. As a Christian and Westerner, the Great White Man does not take Bissa as his second wife.
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chief question respectively his Nobel Peace Prize and the sense of his mission in Lambarn. Whereas the journalist fiercely attacks him for his brutality against the natives, his ethnocentrism, his use of African patients for medical experiments, his doubtful administration of the hospital, Bissa makes the Great White Man face his own ambiguities about his perceived mission of saving the people of Lambarn as a doctor and a missionary. Similarly, a young Gabonese drummer, whom Schweitzer calls le fou du tam tam (the crazy drummer or the tom-tom geek), 2 challenges the Great White Mans expertise as a musicologist and organist, and skillfully tries to compel him to reconsider his dislike for African music by playing the drum at night every time the doctor plays the organ. It is not obvious that the drummer succeeds in making him revise his ethnocentric discourse on the purity and universality of classical European music, however. Because the Great White Man is deeply irritated by the unrefined sound of the drum, he will eventually give the drummer a trumpet as a Christmas present, urging him then to barter his African instrument for a more acceptable European substitute. By doing so, the Great White Man states his conditions for accepting to pursue this musical dialogue initiated by the drummer. The latter accepts to be taught how to play the trumpet, and in a revealing teaching scene, a bridge is somehow built between the Great White Man and the young drummer of Lambarn, between Africa and Europe. In this scene, even though the doctor seems to be the conductor, the composer, and the primary performer (Higginson 214) while the trumpet player is in a subaltern position it is important to point out that the ensuing musical scenes of the film represent the young African man using his trumpet to play Indpendance chacha 3 for the people of Lambarn celebrating independence, blues for
It is only on the eve of his death that he allows her to lie in his bed by his side. At this point in the film, we learn that she would sleep on the floor when he would occasionally let her enter his room after the death of his wife. 2 Francis Higginson accurately points out the various ways of interpreting what the doctor means by le fou du tam tam. From Schweitzers perspective this could insinuate someone who is nuts about the tom-tom, someone who is nuts and who plays the tom-tom, someone who is crazy because he plays the tom-tom, or crazed by this irrational instrument (213-14). 3 In 1960, the Congolese singer Joseph Kabasele, alias Grand Kall, who founded the famous orchestra African Jazz, composed Indpendance Cha Cha. This
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the Great White Man and Bissa, and finally the Gabonese national anthem for the doctor on the day of his grandiose funeral. 4 Master of his new instrument, the trumpet player is able to display publicly his identity politics, first to the new independent nation, then to the Great White Man. Indeed, by choosing not to play a Bach symphony but blues, and then the Gabonese national anthem, he proudly asserts his agency to Schweitzer and subverts the feeling of inferiority that the doctor wanted to instill into the consciousness of the people of Lambarn. With the gist of these five lines of reading the film in mind, let us look at the specific scene, earlier described, where the interpreter questions the Great White Mans expertise in theology and mocks his ability to speak several languages. Because it uses a faulty translation in the subtitles provided by the California Newsreel English version, the scene can be read from two significant angles: 1) from an African perspective of spirituality, and 2) from a European perspective. The differential status between an African and a European spirituality results in a clash between a colonial and postcolonial mentality. Schweitzer himself was a polyglot but, as Bissa clearly states later on in the film, he never bothered to learn the languages spoken in Lambarn. Hence, in the scene where he preaches the Gospel to the people, he needs to rely on a Gabonese interpreter to communicate his message to the villagers, who do not seem to understand the original French. It is significant that the original version of the film is entirely in French except for this particular scene of the sermon, which is in French on the doctors side, and in Fang on the interpreters side.
song became a song of freedom for several newly independent West African countries. 4 Koumba had obtained permission from the village chief to organize a grandiose funeral for the doctor, and to grant him the title of Prince Panther after his death.
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California Newsreel Version 5
1. Great White Man: Le message de Dieu est dune extrme simplicit et dune divine complexit la fois. (Gods message is at the same time ex6 tremely simple and divinely complex.) Interpreter/subtitles: Me I understand, but the Bible is too complicated for you natives. 2. Great White Man: Ce quil faut retenir dans toute la Bible est parfois facile. Cest le travail seul qui sauve. (What should be learned from the Bible is sometimes easy. Its work alone that saves.) Interpreter/subtitles: Illiterates, just get on with your work, the rest will follow. 3. Great White Man: Ce nest pas le sacrifice de Jsus sur la croix qui sauve, mais le fait de le suivre par un engagement actif. Dans ce sens, le travail dans toutes les conditions est un acte de salut. (It isnt just Jesuss sacrifice on the cross that saves, but one must follow an active engagement. In this sense, work in all conditions is an act of salvation.) Interpreter/subtitles: Fornicator or drunk. You are sure to have a place in heaven if you work. 4. Great White Man: Amen Interpreter/subtitles: What has been said is final.
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Authorization to reproduce this picture was granted by California Newsreel. Translations from French into English of the Great White Mans sermon are
mine.
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This scene clearly shows that one needs to analyze it from the perspective of four different viewers: a bilingual audience fluent in French and English, an English-speaking audience, a French-speaking audience, and a trilingual audience fluent in French, English, and Fang. 1. The French- and English-speaking audience From the perspective of a bilingual audience, able to consider both the original and the English subtitles, the analysis I propose is that of a privileged viewer-reader. In his sermon in French, Schweitzer is perceived as the theologian on a mission to Christianize and civilize, and he is apparently convinced that his message reaches his audience through the translation, something we know is not true, when we consider the subtitles. This reading of his symbolic power is indeed reinforced by the presence of his wife and two nurses all dressed in white, and sitting on stools higher than those used by the Gabonese people. However, when one considers the empty gaze of the audience their obvious lack of interest for the doctors homily and, most significantly, one woman smirking and somehow nodding in agreement, or perhaps in disagreement, with either the Great White Man or the interpreter it becomes clear that Schweitzers power is being reconsidered. At this point the doctor fails to understand that the interpreter transforms his words, that he is being mocked, and that it is actually the interpreter who is in command of the message, not Schweitzer. Let us remember that according to Amadou Hampat B in Ltrange destin de Wangrin, the African interpreter never loses face in front of the colonizer. Most importantly and this is the postcolonial twist as Schweitzer does not show any interest in learning Fang and therefore fails to become a true translator-missionary, 7 he himself maps out a dynamics that contributes to the failure of his Christianizing mission, since the interpreter cannily subverts it. Moreover, the posture and physical appearance of the interpreter, who wears western clothes, a colonial helmet, and holds a Bible in his hand, confer authority upon him for the Western viewer.
As Robert Wechsler shows, translation into colloquial language that can be understood by all is something [Protestant Bible translators] have considered absolutely necessary to the spread of Christianity.
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The scene can be interpreted as follows. In the sentence, Me I understand, but the Bible is too complicated for you natives, the me most certainly refers to the doctor, but the interpreter, by not translating the sentence properly, steals the position originally occupied by the Great White Man. By stealing his voice and therefore his colonial power, he substitutes himself for the voice and position of the Great White Man. In so doing, he establishes a social, religious, and cultural distance between himself, as the talking subject, and the silent audience. In this scene, the interpreter can certainly be identified as a subject mystified by colonization who adopts the ideology of the colonizer for himself or for others in order to escape his political and social conditions, to cite Albert Memmi in Portrait du colonis (14950). In this case, since the interpreter refuses to be associated with the vision imposed on him by colonialism, he subverts the Great White Mans discourse by reinventing it, and uses to his own advantage the stereotypes often put forward to identify the colonized, with the words illiterates, fornicators, drunks. Thus, he dissociates himself from the people of Lambarn to become the Great White Mans mimic man, and even to associate himself with the civilizing mission. In this position, the interpreter is what Frantz Fanon calls lvolu, the sophisticated subject (Peau noire masques blancs 11). Consequently, the me in Me I understand could easily be the interpreter, who lies to the people of Lambarn since, as the scene seems to suggest, they are not fluent (enough) in French to understand the sermon and to realize that the interpreter misleads them. So, borrowing the notion of subalternity elaborated by Gayatri Spivak in her seminal article Can the Subaltern Speak, I see the interpreter as a subaltern who speaks to other subalterns, but departs from his subaltern position by misleading both the Great White Man and the Gabonese, because he understands the power of language and therefore chooses to speak in tongues, as a way to manipulate and reinvent the power of language. 2. The English-speaking audience Viewers who understand only English may not be in a position to make such an analysis, since they have access only to the subverted translation provided by the subtitles, which they incorrectly assume to be the Great White mans words. As a result, they may not be able to identify the ideological impact such a complex game played by the
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interpreter can have on the audience. Moreover, they may not be equipped to grasp how, in this complex linguistic game, the interpreter, the Great White Man, and the people of Lambarn find themselves in a triangle of miscommunication that undermines relations between colonizer and colonized. On another level, the translation the interpreter provides, made available through the subtitles, does not allow the audience who understands only English to read this scene from a perspective in which the interpreter is not a subject mystified by colonization, but is only interested in mimicking the Great White Mans ideology and becoming his accomplice. The audience targeted by the English subtitles may be seen as unable to perceive the interpreter as a postcolonial parasite 8 who occupies a border zone that allows him to manipulate and reinvent two realities: the Great White Mans authority and the subaltern position of the Gabonese. In this case, the audience may not grasp that the interpreter associates himself with the people of Lambarn by distorting the doctors sermon, and lets them appreciate the extent of the Great White Mans disdain and condescendence. More is missed by the audience who is unaware of the fact that the words illiterates, fornicators, drunks are not used in his sermon. This audience will not likely understand that, according to the interpreter, beneath the doctors well-articulated hermeneutics of the necessity of hard work for the colonized, there lies a subtext that refers to their laziness, stupidity, and immaturity. So, as a postcolonial parasite, the interpreter has the mission to unveil skillfully a theological subtext and to reveal its true intent: to reinforce a colonial mentality by using negative stereotypes. In this position, the interpreter is a threat to the authority, credibility, and respect that the doctor has gained in the community. I would like to suggest that both the Great White Man and the interpreter articulate distorted colonial and postcolonial discourses.
For a further analysis of the intricacy of the concept of parasite in postcolonial situations, see Mireille Rosellos Declining the Stereotype (1998) and Postcolonial Hospitality (2001) as well as Michel Larondes Postcolonialiser la Haute Culture lEcole de la Rpublique (2008). Throughout this article, I use the term postcolonial in instances as postcolonial trickster or postcolonial parasite to refer to an oppositional strategy that is at play in the colonial setting of the film. Therefore, postcolonial is not used in the chronological sense of the term, (conquest-colonization-decolonization) but to describe the deconstructive strategies that characterize a postcolonial mentality.
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For the missionary/doctor, to strengthen his hermeneutics of the place of the colonized within Christianity, he would need to rely on negative stereotypes such as laziness, lack of intellectual sophistication, and lechery all constitutive of the essence of the colonized, according to an ethnocentric colonial mentality. But Schweitzer does not rely on such a vocabulary. As for the interpreter, it is through an exegesis of the doctors sermon that he suggests that the people of Lambarn should live the stereotypes to their fullest, as a postcolonial strategy of displacement and demarginalization. In other words, the interpreter supposedly tells the Gabonese that since the Great White Man is telling them they are illiterate, fornicators, and drunks, then they should choose to be so, and live the plenitude of the stereotypes. As a parasite, the interpreter chooses a discursive strategy that allows him to confuse the issues and to acquire authority as a disruptive go-between. Like all parasites in the biological sense of the word, he only exists if he inscribes himself into the power dynamics in which the Great White Man is immersed. His translation is detrimental to the doctors power and provides the community with tools aimed at dismantling his mission and colonial project. As a trickster, the interpreter cleverly steals the stereotypes of laziness, stupidity, and lechery, reappropriates them, and, Bible in hand, wearing his colonial helmet, he gives the illusion of sharing the Great White Mans ideology, yet he cleverly subverts the colonizers discourse. Since his behavior is a form of smuggling as well as a legitimate positioning of border crossing, he is actively speaking from a third space at the junction of a colonial and a postcolonial mentality. In that situation, he wears a mask that serves to unveil the innuendos in the Great White Mans sermon and the very depths of his colonial mentality. Moreover, as a trickster, he reserves the right to interpret what he believes to be left unsaid and concealed in the doctors sermon, and he uses the most offensive stereotypes to destabilize the Great White Man in public. If I wanted to bring to an end my analysis of the various discursive strategies used in this scene at this stage, I realize that the French original version alone does not allow me to do so, since it does not allow for a duplicitous discourse of reinterpretation to be present in the words of the interpreter until the English subtitles appear in the film.
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3. The French-speaking audience Originally in French, the film is primarily intended for a Frenchspeaking audience, and Fang is only used by the interpreter to translate the doctors homily. Therefore, when privileged French and English-speaking viewers watch the M3M original version and try to understand why the Fang is not translated into French at this particular moment in the film, they conclude that the French distributor took for granted that the interpreters translation is accurate. On the other hand, bilingual viewers who believe that the English subtitles in the sermon scene in the California Newsreel version are correct would tend to think that the French distributor subverted Ba Kobhios supposedly strategic position and adopted a particular ideological stand by not providing the French audience with the subtitles that make Schweitzer look ridiculous. Thus, the French-speaking audience is not given the opportunity to articulate a critical discourse as the other audiences are. Consequently, this is how an ideological discourse evolves from an allegedly technical mistake, or how a technical mistake gives rise to the construction of an ideological discourse. At this point only, the subtitles missing in the French version drastically change the ideological meaning. As is the case with the monolingual English audience,
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Authorization to reproduce this picture was granted by Bassek ba Kobhio.
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the French-speaking audience is not in a position to encode the colonial-postcolonial dialectics that comes into play in the scene. 4. The Fang, French, and English-speaking audience The interpretation by a fourth audience fluent in Fang, French, and English adds a powerful twist to the three analyses proposed so far. At this stage, reflecting upon the interrelation between languages in the film, it seemed logical to verify whether the English subtitles correspond to what the interpreter was saying in Fang in the sermon scene. And my investigation led to the question of the reception of such a film by an African audience, a consideration often ignored in studies of African Cinema. I then looked for Fang speakers who could provide me with a thorough translation of the different ways the interpreter, according to my analyses, allows himself to bypass the Great White Mans sermon and challenge his authority. Two Fang speakers from Gabon and Equatorial Guinea reported the subtitles in the California Newsreel version to be inaccurate and to depart significantly from the original text, the doctors sermon in French.
1. Great White Man: Le message de Dieu est dune extrme simplicit et dune divine complexit la fois. Interpreter: Medzu mese Nzame a nga dzo ne mi ke bo mia bo dzia me, ve mia yia ne wokh medzu mese a ke mine ekanege. 10 (Tout ce que Dieu vous recommande de faire, vous devez le faire. Vous devez couter ce que je vous transmets.) (You must do everything that God tells you to do. You must listen to what Im telling you.) 11 2. Great White Man: Ce quil faut retenir dans toute la Bible est parfois facile. Cest le travail seul qui sauve. Interpreter: Edzam mia yia ne sile ezango, eti e ne foghe, ve ise, ise ete ede eke mine vole. (Ce que vous devez attendre de Dieu, est que seul le travail va vous aider.) (What you can expect from God is that work alone will help you.) 3. Great White Man: Ce nest pas le sacrifice de Jsus sur la croix qui sauve, mais le fait de le suivre par un engagement actif. Dans ce sens, le travail dans toutes les conditions est un acte de salut.
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Jeannette Ekomie Cinnamon provided me with the transcriptions in Fang. Fang informants translation into French are followed by my translation into
English.
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Interpreter: Mia yia ne yem na, adzu Nzame ede mia yia neb o etam, et mia yia ne yem fen a abwi mam asese me ne eti, Nzame enye a ve me. (Vous devez savoir que tout ce que vous avez, cest Dieu qui vous la donn.) (You must know that God has given you all that you have.) 4. Great White Man: Amen. Interpreter: Medzu mese a ndokh man kobe mi, mia yia ne yen na. (Tout ce quil vient de dire, cest ce que vous devez faire.) (Everything he has just said, thats what you have to do.)
Indeed, the Fang as spoken in the film does not translate the Great White Mans detailed theological rhetoric, with respect to the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross and the utmost meaning of work as an act of redemption. However, it has nothing of the sardonic and insulting thrust of the English subtitles available in the California Newsreel version. The perspectives of the three audiences analyzed above reveal that they are oppositional receptors, since each group is limited by its ignorance of one or two of the other languages and partially knows a single discourse, which is believed to be the only truth. However, the Fang, French, and English-speaking audience appears to stand beyond the dynamics of oppositionality that characterizes the three audiences, since it has the tools to browse through the innuendos of a discourse that is henceforth articulated from the opposition of inaccuracy and authenticity. Interestingly, the crucial sermon scene, which relies on translation in order to allow Ba Kobhios postcolonial revision of Albert Schweitzer to come full circle, is deconstructed by another dynamics of translation, that of another translator who, using inaccurate subtitles, hijacks both Schweitzer and Ba Kobhio. Lost in translation, Schweitzer is ridiculed, Ba Kobhios script is transformed, and a mysterious 12 translator, performing within the film and beyond the screen, takes the place of the interpreter whom I identified previously as a postcolonial trickster to become the real trickster. But does knowing the truth make my previous analyses inappropriate? Are interpretations by viewers of the California Newsreel version also faulty, inasmuch as they are based on wrong English subtitles? My earlier analyses need not be discarded, since both versions of the film
Neither California Newsreel nor Bassek ba Kobhio was able to identify the translator. Ba Kobhio informed me that the translation was negotiated between California Newsreel and the producer.
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will continue to circulate, and multiple layers of interpretation will continue to be intertwined because of the missing (the M3M original version) or existing (the California Newsreel version) subtitles, and because of the geographical, linguistic, and ideological boundaries that the film has crossed. Moreover, is the omniscient Fang, French, and English-speaking audience in an ideal position to elaborate a definitive interpretation of the Bible teaching scene? The following observations of the director of The Great White Man of Lambarn speak to the contrary. In September 2007, I finally communicated with Bassek ba Kobhio, and here are his written remarks about the sermon scene:
En effet, linterprte nest pas fidle aux propos du docteur. Il choisit dinterprter dans le sens qui larrange et cest a qui est intressant. Je crois quil y a une erreur que je nai pas releve lorsquon faisait la premire version vido, parce que je constate que mme sur le DVD produit par lOrganisation de la Francophonie que je viens de consulter, il ny a pas de soustitres franais cet endroit, alors que la traduction anglaise part des textes que jai d valider en franais.
A greater confusion thus derives from knowing all three languages. Even if one is now convinced that the California Newsreel translation is false and that the translator henceforth plays a fundamental role in the appreciation of the sermon scene, Ba Kobhios remarks bring us back to a reality, that of a script which uses an interpreter to convey a postcolonial critical discourse about Schweitzers Christianizing mission. But if one takes into account that cinematic creation in West Africa allows space for collaboration among actors, directors, and producers, and that the script is often negotiated, transformed, reinterpreted by everyone, then, inevitably, improvisation and diffrance in the Derridian sense of the term become the norm. From this perspective, one is able to guess the interaction that may have been mapped out between the actor who played the role of the interpreter in the film and Ba Kobhio. It is true, as Ba Kobhio observes, that in this scene the interpreter is not faithful to what the doctor says, and yet his lack of fidelity in Fang does not really generate a postcolonial criticism of Schweitzers Christianizing mission. Consequently, despite the importance of the traditional healer, Bissa, Koumba, the drummer/trumpet player, and the journalist, it
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is the interpreters translation in Fang that short-circuits Ba Kobhios postcolonial gaze on Albert Schweitzer in Lambarn in the 1940s. Might this be the reason why the California Newsreel translator, dissatisfied with the translation 13 in Fang, decided not to remain subservient to the original text? As a performer, at this specific moment of the film, the translator barters the position of faithful translator for that of a cultural agent who produces meaning for a North American audience and requires that his reinvented English subtitles stand in their own right. Thus, the postcolonial detour of Bassek ba Kobhios film is not articulated through Fang but through English. In this scene that generates a weave of polysemic subtexts, each participant makes innuendos, wears a mask, subverts individual languages. This is how a postcolonial translation of a colonial mentality loses its meaning. I can only wish that one day, the California Newsreel trickster-translator will identify himself or herself and reveal to us the secret of his or her performance. My deepest gratitude goes to two informants, Donato Ndongo-Bidyogo from Equatorial Guinea and Jeannette Ekomie Cinnamon from Gabon, who provided me with the translation from Fang. Thank you to Mamadou Badiane, John M. Cinnamon and Shelly Jarrett-Bromberg for their precious help in facilitating the translation process with these two informants.
One could assume that this translator shrewdly manipulates and controls the meaning of the doctor and the interpreters words because he understands French and Fang.
13
130 Works Cited
Ba Kobhio, Bassek, dir. Le grand Blanc de Lambarn. France/Cameroon. Mdiathque des Trois Mondes (M3M), 1994. _____. The Great White Man of Lambarn. France/Cameroon. California Newsreel, 1994. Fanon, Frantz. Peau noire masques blancs. Paris: Seuil, 1952. Hampat B, Amadou. Ltrange destin de Wangrin ou les roueries dun interprte africain. Paris: 10/18, 1973. Higginson, Francis. The Well-Tempered Savage: Albert Schweitzer, Music, and Imperial Deafness. Research in African Literatures 36.4 (2005): 205-22. Laronde, Michel. Postcolonialiser la Haute Culture lcole de la Rpublique. Paris: LHarmattan, 2008. Memmi, Albert. Portrait du colonis. Paris: Payot, 1973. Rosello, Mireille. Declining the Stereotype: Ethnicity and Representation in French Cultures. Hanover, N.H.: University Press of New England, 1998. _____. Postcolonial Hospitality. The Immigrant as Guest. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001. Spivak, Gayatri Chakravorty. Can the Subaltern Speak. Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture. Ed. Cary Nelson and Lawrence Grossberg. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1988. 271-313. Wechsler, Robert. Performing Without A Stage: The Art of Literary Translation. New Haven: Catbird Press, 1998.
Translation
Sarah Davies Cordova

Marquette University
Traduire la reine Pokou: fidlit ou trahison?

Avec sa traduction de la lgende de la Reine Pokou, Vronique Tadjo prsente une double critique de la version mimtiquement limite de lHistoire originaire de la Cte dIvoire retrouve aujourdhui sur la page du texte des coliers ivoiriens. Rendant vidente la violence faite au texte et aux lecteurs de la lgende de la Reine Pokou par une telle version historicisante qui la trahit en y effaant toute explication du sacrifice de son fils unique par la mre, Tadjo enregistre dans Reine Pokou: Concerto pour un sacrifice une multitude de faons possibles dapprhender et ainsi de traduire une telle histoire.
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Le mythe est sorti trop tt de sa cachette. On la dshabill la hte. On la dfigur, dnatur, nous laissant jamais pauvre dun savoir tellement plus riche. (Reine 85)
Dans leur fiction rcente, de nombreuses crivaines contemporaines de lAfrique subsaharienne refltent leur socit travers la thmatique de la violence et de ses effets sur la jeunesse daujourdhui, se situant ainsi du ct de lengagement de la littrature.1 Comme pour les quarante-quatre signataires du Manifeste pour une littrature-monde en franais, leurs uvres elles participent aussi au retour du monde dans la littrature (Barbery et al.). Les signa
1 Odile Cazenave dans Francophone Women Writers souligne lcriture engage des femmes africaines depuis les annes 1990.
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taires du manifeste explicitent une littrature-monde en franais, qui en 2006, a prim aux listes des grands prix. Ils crivent, Le monde, le sujet, le sens, lhistoire, le rfrent [...] mis entre parenthses par les matres-penseurs, inventeurs dune littrature sans autre objet quelle-mme, [...] f[ont] retour sur la scne du monde (Barbery et al.).2 De mme, renvoyant souvent la question de fidlit et de trahison avec un trac explicite ou implicite des pires moments de violence historiques qui remonte lesclavage et qui descend jusquau gnocide rwandais parmi tant dautres vnements marquants, sans cependant expliquer le monde meurtrier, les crivaines insistent sur la rsilience de lamour et offrent des notes despoir pour un avenir reconstruire3 avec leurs scnarios qui crent dautres mondes, ou dautres structures pour une socit potentielle (Femmes rebelles 336). Lcrivaine franco-ivoirienne, Vronique Tadjo, interroge travers ses textes le souvenir et les rsonances du pass dans le prsent car elle conoit lcriture comme pouvant servir de gardienne du savoir et jouer le rle de mdiatrice. Selon elle, mme si toute littrature est construction de limaginaire, elle affecte la ralit tumultueuse et sert encore comme outil de critique sociale4 dans le but dinfluencer le monde venir.5 Par le biais dune re-naissance ou
Les signataires du Manifeste pour une littrature-monde en franais sont majoritairement du sexe masculin (Barbery et al.). Voir aussi Dossier pour la problmatique de la littrature francophone. 3 Ma paraphrase dOdile Cazenave, Writing the Child, Youth, and Violence into the Francophone Novel from Sub-Saharan Africa: The Impact of Age and Gender (66, 67). Cazenave largit le champ dcrit par Jean-Marie Volet dans Francophone Women Writing in 1998-99 and Beyond: A Literary Feast in a Violent World o il parle du rle de la violence dans la littrature des femmes dAfrique au tournant du millnaire en tant quexpression de la ralit quotidienne en Afrique et en France mais aussi comme arrire-fond leurs stratgies de survie, de comprendre comment elles se retrouvent impuissantes face limplosion de leur monde et de penser aux possibilits de lavenir, comme dans un autre texte de Tadjo, Champs de bataille et damour (1999). Voir aussi larticle de Thrse Migraine-George qui relve comment lespoir, la clbration de la beaut, de lamour, de la tendresse et de la simplicit patiente des gestes quotidiens constituent un impratif thique, une prise de responsabilit et une forme dengagement [...] (81). 4 Jai repris de langlais un passage au sujet d Vol doiseau dans African Writers series. 5 Pour cette notion dinfluencer lavenir, voir le concept de Scenario planning de Kahane et le Mont Fleur Scenario Planning organis par Pieter le Roux en 1992
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dune co[n]-naissance, que ce soit dans sa littrature pour la jeunesse o par exemple le masque, seigneur de la danse, aprs avoir t abandonn et vendu avec la venue de lurbanisme, revit et soffre en guide lenfant;6 dans sa posie, dont les vers rsonnent de voyages damour; ou encore dans LOmbre dImana: Voyages jusquau bout du Rwanda o tant de passages nous interpellent raisonner autrement, Tadjo ramne le pass dans le prsent pour souligner combien il faut bien couter, bien se rappeler pour mieux apprhender lentente et la transmission du savoir, pour bien traduire, pour ne pas trahir: Oui, se souvenir. Tmoigner. Cest ce qui nous reste pour combattre le pass et restaurer notre humanit (LOmbre 95) crit-elle. Ou encore pour fermer LOmbre dImana:
La violence des hommes a fait la mort cruelle, hideuse. Monstre tout jamais dans la mmoire du temps. Comprendre. Dissquer les mcanismes de la haine. Les paroles qui divisent. Les actes qui scellent les trahisons. Les gestes qui enclenchent la terreur. Comprendre. Notre humanit en danger. (LOmbre 133)
Quil sagisse du masque dans Le Seigneur de la danse, reprsentation symbolique et incorpore de lesprit en question qui permet de faire passer et de traduire la nature des choses; ou dImana, dieu du Kenya et du Rwanda, en tant quombre rconciliante dans le texte manant du projet collectif: Rwanda: crire par devoir de mmoire; ou encore de la Reine Pokou, luvre de Tadjo sinsinue jusquau cur de la problmatique de la fidlit dans le passage dune voix lautre et de la violence issue de la trahison de la traduction.7 Comme dautres crivaines travaillant en plusieurs langues, telle la sud-africaine Antjie Krog, Tadjo problmatise la traduction. Puisque ltymologie du verbe traduire renvoie au sens de faire passer, la traduction implique la transformation, et le fait de masquer. Inscrire une forme de traduc
qui a t la base du programme conomique de lAfrique du Sud au sortir de lapartheid. 6 Enfant, laisse-moi te dire/un secret:/ne moublie pas./Si tu te perds/dans la ville/ou si tu te sens triste,/appelle-moi/et je guiderai tes pas.// Tam-tam-tam-tam-tam (20), Vronique Tadjo, Le Seigneur de la Danse (1993). 7 Bien que Tadjo ne fasse pas allusion Radio Mille Collines dans LOmbre dImana, le rle de la voix, des messages mis par les mdias au Rwanda apparaissent sous-jacents tout au long de ce travail.
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tion trahit les langues orales, les lgendes dantan comme lexplique un griot de Tombouctou dans le texte de Krog, Change of Tongue: We are the source of memory. All you have is the voice of the memory and the imagery thereof. Memory comes to you only in hearing. If we write the memory, we burn the memory (323).8 Dans un autre texte o il sagit aussi de tribulations et de langues Mother Tongues Barbara Johnson souligne la trahison prsente dans la traduction: to translate is to traduce the betrayal of the original in the process of transmitting it is inherent in translation.9 Cest peut-tre dans Reine Pokou: Concerto pour un sacrifice, publi chez Actes Sud en 2004, que Tadjo runit le plus videmment la violence historique la violence faite au lectorat par les livres dHistoire pour rendre implicitement le constat de la situation mimtique en Cte dIvoire pendant les premires annes de ce millnaire. Daprs le sous-titre de luvre il est clair que lauteure voudrait jouer ce concerto pour problmatiser le sacrifice ainsi que pour linsrer dans le contexte actuel de la Cte dIvoire. Par le biais du questionnement, lcrivaine, dont le pre est Akan, remonte aux traditions matriarcales des Ashanti et des Baoul en revenant sur les personnages et les histoires qui grent une partie de la (re)connaissance nationale ivoirienne en se demandant comment prter fidlit la fluidit de la lgende lors du passage de loral lcrit, du mythe lHistoire.10 En cernant limpact des interprtes sur lhistoire ellemme et sur des gnrations dcoliers, Tadjo dissque le mythe fondateur du peuple baoul trahi par lhistoricit et le rduit la glorification du sacrifice dun enfant innocent par sa propre mre. Dnature par labandon de sa complexit, cette page de lHistoire ivoirienne
Antjie Krog: (je traduis) Nous sommes la source de la mmoire. Vous navez que la voix de la mmoire et son image. La mmoire ne vous parvient quen coutant. Si nous crivons la mmoire nous brlons la mmoire (Change 323). 9 Cit par Judith Butler dans Betrayals Felicity, 82. 10 la diffrence dauteurs tels Sony Labou Tansi (et peut-tre peut-on diffrencier selon les lignes dmarquant les sexes) Tadjo ne dcrit pas la violence physique corporelle. Mme dans LOmbre dImana la violence y apparat dans son normit, dans son lment dimmensurabilit et combien il est difficile de comprendre la monstruosit de lhomme qui a su rendre la mort cruelle et hideuse. Voir Pascale Perraudin, From a large morsel of meat to passwords-in-flesh: Resistance through Representation of the Tortured Body in Labou Tansis La vie et demie pour la visibilit de la chaire torture comme moyen de se trouver une subjectivit, une faon de ne pas tre efface par lintimit mme de cet espace intime de la chair.
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ninvoque que la justification de la violence. Comme avec toute calomnie, la rduction rend ses failles nanmoins perceptibles. Les versions de Tadjo de la lgende laborent son aspect cathartique et traduisent les lecteurs en un autre espace, o il y a lieu dimaginer la rconciliation. En cooptant la rumeur telle quelle circule dans un espace dentente et de connaissance, ses versions mnent le doute, interrogent le savoir traditionnel de lHistoire, et cherchent un sens au monde actuel.11 Exemplum pour la traduction par ses transformations12 et vritable hymne la littrature en tant quessai, Reine Pokou Concerto pour un sacrifice dlivre la lgende de son cadre sur la page des livres dHistoire ivoiriens [...] dans le chapitre sur le royaume ashanti au XVIIIe sicle qui explique la naissance du royaume baoul (Reine 7). En effet, Tadjo rcrit la lgende de la reine baoul et son avnement au dix-huitime sicle et imagine dautres versions pour contrecarrer la simple figure hroque dAbraha Pokou, qui aurait sauv son peuple en sacrifiant son fils unique.13 Dans un entretien en janvier
11 Sonia Lee trouve que les essais-rcits des crivaines dAfrique parlent dun savoir qui va a lencontre dun savoir traditionnel par le fait mme quil est instruit par le doute, le questionnement, la subjectivit, et la sagesse qui nait de lexprience [...] la diversit, le concret et lactualit de la pense fminine constituent un nouveau savoir pour lAfrique et pour le monde (Lee 29). 12 Mary Ann Caws, dans Surprised in Translation, explique que les traductions les plus fortuites avec leurs reformulations et ajustements rendent lenregistrement de loralit plus potique lorsque la mimsis est vite. 13 Dans Les interviews dAmina lire les Femmes crivains et les littratures africaines, Tadjo explique que la lgende de la Reine Pokou existe en dautres versions dans dautres pays dAfrique (Atakpama). Plus rcemment, elle se retrouve aussi dans Humus de Fabienne Kanor (2006), un roman construit partir dun chur de douze femmes qui racontent comment elles se sont retrouves bord du ngrier Le Soleil et pourquoi elles faisaient partie dun groupe de quatorze femmes qui se sont jetes par-dessus bord en 1774. La Vieille raconte: Mon peuple, les Baouls, ne sest pas toujours appel ainsi. En temps longtemps, ils se disaient ashanti, habitants dun royaume fabuleusement riche, situ loin, lest du fleuve, l o renat le soleil. la suite de conflits familiaux, ils ont fui leur royaume, transportant btail, or et enfants. [...] En tte, il y a cette mre. Reine, assurment [...] lorsquun fleuve leur apparat, si tortueux, si large, qu moins dun miracle nul homme ne peut le traverser. reine, les dieux exigent que tu fasses un sacrifice. [...] Mre Abla, tu dois leur offrir ton fils. Cest ce que les dieux veulent. [...] Les dieux ont parl et la reine sexcute. Jette lenfant dans le fleuve tandis quun pied-bois sincline, reliant les deux berges. Peuple baoul, encore quelques heures de marche et nous serons arrivs
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2006, lauteure souligne que cette histoire est devenue Histoire pour les jeunes lycens ivoiriens; et combien elle justifie les actions de leur gouvernement:
[...] il y a aussi le fait que cette histoire se trouve dans les livres scolaires. Je lai redcouverte dans le livre dHistoire. Quel message est-ce quon donne cette jeunesse avec cette lgende comme elle leur est prsente? Quest-ce quon lui signifie quand on rpte quon a jet cet enfant dans le fleuve pour le bien du peuple? Quon peut la balancer aussi dans le fleuve? Je voulais revoir cette lgende dans le contexte actuel. (Entretien)14
Elle relve comment la traduction de la lgende en Histoire a marginalis et fait disparatre lambigut relaye oralement de gnration en gnration selon le contexte et leur poque; comment linscription de lhistoire originelle du peuple ivoirien et de cette mre prte jeter le fils quelle a attendu si longtemps dans le fleuve Como a arrt ses possibilits:
La lgende telle quon la couche sur le papier est une lgende dnature. Dans la tradition orale africaine, il y a plusieurs tapes de comprhension pour lenfant, ladulte, et le vnrable vieillard. lge mr, on comprend les cls de cette lgende. Or cette lgende, on nous la donne telle quelle en lui enlevant toutes ses subtilits. Il ne reste donc que ce sacrifice de lenfant que lon doit accepter. On na plus les cls. (Entretien)
Ces trois ges de la comprhension, lors desquels le cumul des connaissances au rythme du souvenir et de lexprience aboutit au raisonnement contextuel, hantent limaginaire de Tadjo, qui construit lensemble de Reine Pokou: Concerto pour un sacrifice en trois temps. Comme le sous-titre lannonce, le texte de Tadjo se rvle tre aussi un concerto dont les trois mouvements sintitulent: Le temps de la lgende; Le temps du questionnement; et Le temps de lenfantoiseau. Lcrivaine suggre de nouvelles cls travers le supplment de rsonances de son concerto qui se compose sur deux registres:
chez nous! dclare-t-elle enfin dune voix sourde avant douvrir la marche (Kanor 35-36). 14 Entretien de Dsir K. Wa Kabwe-Segatti et Sarah Davies Cordova avec Vronique Tadjo Johannesburg, le mercredi 18 janvier 2006. Voir la postface Du Bambara au ngropolitain ( sortir) et lEntretien avec Vronique Tadjo, Lianes.
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partir de la violence du sacrifice et de lautodestruction, le rcit; et de la violence de la fracture textuelle de la lgende, cest--dire la traduction vers lcrit. Le prlude anticipe aussi la structure tripartite de Reine Pokou en avanant les trois tons du concerto de par sa propre mise en abme des trois moments lors desquels cette histoire a interpell Tadjo. sa premire rencontre avec la lgende, lcrivaine navait que dix ans et se reprsentait Pokou sous les traits dune Madone noire (Reine 7). Ensuite, au lyce, la reine prenait ainsi la stature dune figure historique, hrone-amazone conduisant son peuple vers la libert (7). Tadjo dit lui avoir donn un visage, une vie, des sentiments (7) jusquau jour o la guerre recommena en Cte-dIvoire et quelle lui apparut alors sous un jour beaucoup plus funeste, celui dune reine assoiffe de pouvoir, coutant des voix occultes et prte tout pour asseoir son rgne (8). Le Temps de la lgende qui constitue la premire partie une vritable cantate reprend, en suivant le genre de la lgende, aussi bien que le style et le ton de loraliture, les vnements qui auraient engendr la fondation du peuple baoul. Dun trait, il y est cont comment ce peuple vint se sparer du royaume ashanti lorsquil devait faire face un monde dsuni et dornavant htrogne, marqu par la fragmentation, la mutilation et les diffrences irrconciliables promus par ceux voulant asseoir leur droit au pouvoir lencontre de la volont du roi mourant. cause de leur propre exil, suite leur fuite afin dchapper aux assassinats commandits par ce nouveau roi, ces fugitifs sunissent sous un nouveau nom car les sages, entendant Pokou rpter inlassablement Ba-ou-li: lenfant est mort! (31) dclarent quen mmoire du sacrifice dAbraha Pokou ce peuple de lexode sappellerait Baoul. La deuxime partie Le Temps du questionnement se divise en six chapitres, chacun avec son propre titre, mis part le deuxime: Abraha Pokou, reine dchue; La traverse de lAtlantique; La reine sauve des eaux; Dans les griffes du pouvoir; Les paroles du pote. Partie centrale de Reine Pokou, elle se conjugue sur le mode dune srie de questions ayant trait au droulement possible et linterprtation de cette lgende baoul fondatrice transforme en fait historique au sein des livres dHistoire scolaires de la Cte dIvoire. Au cur du concerto les six chapitres du Temps du questionnement rsonnent entre eux et se rpondent rouvrant la fixit rendue par la
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traduction en Histoire au mouvement implicite de toute lgende reprise au fil du passage des gnrations successives. Il y est souvent question deau et dautres sacrifices lis leau. Dans Abraha Pokou, reine dchue, la question pose face cette reine exile, dite orpheline de son enfant (35), qui revient comme un refrain Les eaux se sont-elles vraiment fendues pour laisser passer le peuple? (38) interroge la vracit de la lgende. Ds la mise en doute, lenfant sacrifi devient lenfant au trait dunion enfant-prince; enfant-roi comme pour indiquer tout le potentiel de lenfant noninterrog qui se transforme la fin dans limaginaire de lapothose en enfant-oiseau, enfant des airs de lavenir. Mais avant, un autre scnario est inscrit parmi les cls possibles de cette lgende: Abraha Pokou folle de son acte, plonge dans les flots du fleuve, rejoint son fils dans locan o elle conquiert un royaume plus beau encore que celui quon lui avait promis: prsent, mi-femme, mi-poisson, desse inconteste de lunivers sous-marin, reine des ocans (46). Amante puissante aux cts de son fils lenfant-ocan elle cherche le prserver du mal. Invit des dieux, cet enfant voyagerait entre deux mondes, le monde des eaux et celui des airs alors que Pokou apparat sous des traits mythiques qui rappellent Mamy Wata, amenant de la sorte la convergence de deux histoires deau et avec cette interdpendance et intertextualit, une co-(n)naisance pntrante (insight) de la lgende qui manque au degr zro du rcit historique dnatur.15 La section suivante intitule La Traverse de lAtlantique dbute sur le mode du Et si hypothtique pour imaginer ce qui se serait pass si Pokou avait refus de donner son fils au Gnie du fleuve. Une srie tout autre dvnements vient laborer un dnouement selon lequel un village offre lhospitalit Pokou et ses partisans pour quils reprennent leurs forces afin de pouvoir continuer leur route avec des indications dun chemin plus sr pour contourner le fleuve. Mais larme royale qui les a suivis, incendie le village et prend les survivants ashanti en otages pour les vendre en esclavage. Transports au nouveau monde, esclaves assujettis, ils rvent au voyage du retour et complotent une insurrection au cours de laquelle le premier enfant et le fils de sang ml de Pokou quelle aurait eu sont capturs et pen
15 LHistoire telle que Tadjo la dfinit ici ressemble au degr zro de lcriture prsent par Roland Barthes, Le degr zro de lcriture.
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dus alors que quelques-uns arrivent schapper et fonder une colonie de marrons. Dans ce scnario, le refus de Pokou de sacrifier son fils remet ventuellement le choix de mourir entre les mains de ses fils, qui assument cette responsabilit eux-mmes avec leurs actes de rbellion. Dans La Reine sauve des eaux, Pokou accepte la volont des autres et suit la destine qui lui est rserve. Tenace, elle avance sans rpit, narrivant pas se reposer la nuit, et sombrant dans la folie alors que lesprit de son fils la harcle pour quelle le rejoigne. Afin de les rconcilier, un sculpteur est charg de raliser une effigie du prince sacrifi qui par sa ressemblance ouvre un chemin entre le monde des hommes et celui des esprits (70). Comble, revoyant son fils dans ses rves, Pokou retrouve la srnit. Une fois leur reine apaise, le peuple reprend sa route et se trouve un matin dans une clairire propice la vie o, les esprits des lieux ayant accept leurs offrandes, Pokou fonda le royaume baoul dont le rayonnement stendit bien au-del de ses frontires naturelles (73). Par la coercition de son peuple et de ses fidles, Pokou suit aveuglment un destin dtermin par une acceptation des traditions et des substitutions une statue pour un fils, le symbole dun peuple pour un fils mtonymie prestigieuse, o le bois sculpt se substitue lenfant pour la mre, o lartifice de la figurine traduit symboliquement lesprit de lenfant. Dans les griffes du pouvoir revient la question du droit de succession en sattelant la question de livoirit, ce qui donne droit de cit ou de citer les lois du pays en tant que citoyen, et aborde donc la question brlante, selon Tadjo, de lactualit ivoirienne:
Reine Pokou est un texte difficile puisquil aborde le thme de livoirit. Ctait fantastique davoir cette lgende qui montrait quun peuple fondamentalement ivoirien comme celui des Baoul venait en fait du Ghana, pays limitrophe, mais quand mme pays hors des frontires. Elle ma permis de rappeler quil faut relativiser les choses, cest--dire que nous sommes tous un peuple de migrants. Il y a dautres raisons pour lesquelles jai crit le texte, bien sr. Mais cest surtout par rapport livoirit, source des graves problmes de la Cte-dIvoire. (Lianes)
En effet Karim, le pre dont lexistence dans cette version nest ni avou ni mme admis publiquement par Pokou, bien quil soit le seul lui avoir donn un enfant, est musulman et vient du dsert. Nan-
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moins lorsque le roi cherche annihiler Pokou et ses partisans, cest vers Karim quelle va pour quil leur serve de guide. Mais ce sera lui qui sera accus ensuite de les avoir trahis lorsque le fleuve Como parat impraticable. Karim plaide contre un tel acte denfanticide en soulignant combien daprs sa loi, la vie est sacre. Mais elle lui rpond quelle ne lui doit rien puisque lenfant appartient au peuple, et quelle doit se plier la volont de ses dieux afin dasseoir sa souverainet. Dans ce scnario, le peuple attise le dsir de Pokou pour le pouvoir qui dpasse son bonheur maternel et sexaspre en crise sacrificielle. La convergence de colre et de rage collective dclenche le mcanisme du bouc missaire qui, daprs Ren Girard et Xavier Garnier, repose sur un revirement qui permet toutes les alliances contre la victime unanimement dsigne comme la cause unique du dsordre.16 Ce nest plus Pokou qui est responsable, mais Karim, qui les a mens leur mort. Victime innocente, pre dun fils tellement voulu, Karim, ltranger la scne lexclus de la cne est excut afin de ramener la paix une communaut frustre.17 Cette m-connaissance (le non reconnu) qui ressemble au meurtre traduit Karim en bouc missaire des Baoul venir et suggre comment lAutre se retrouve dans la position de victime pour des questions didentit et dassise de pouvoir. Finalement Les paroles du pote interrogent la part de vrit de la dimension mythique de cette lgende. En soulevant les questions que cache limmobilisation de la lgende, le griot se penche sur laspect symbolique de la personne sacrifie, pour essayer de comprendre comment un tel acte a pu tre glorifi.18 Personnage positif dans luvre de Tadjo, le griot ne correspond pas lhistorien de la geste officielle mais au serviteur de la collectivit communale. Il se
16 Voir Usages littraires de la rumeur en Afrique de Xavier Garnier: On leur reproche [aux rumeurs] de vhiculer des strotypes rtrogrades et archaques, de mettre en jeu la logique du bouc missaire, de jouer sur des pulsions racistes, bref dtre irrationnelles et immorales (14). 17 Le fait quil est vu comme un homme justement condamn et non pas comme la victime et le bouc missaire souligne la relation mtonymique de la victime au bouc missaire. Pour le mcanisme du bouc missaire voir Ren Girard, Les Origines de la culture. 18 Vronique Tadjo: Interview sur PlaneteAfrique (2003).
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demande si ce ne serait quune srie de positions symboliques qui chercherait asseoir un pacte de paix, un partage du pouvoir. Allgorie du sacrifice actuel des jeunes Ivoiriens, les paroles du pote donnent lalerte au danger de ce mythe qui suit son chemin dans la tte des enfants-soldats daujourdhui pauvrement forms par cette histoire lcole, des enfants devenus les pions et le butin de guerre des luttes de leurs ans. Lenseignement de cette lgende ltat rduit et brutal tel que les livres scolaires la livrent aux jeunes Ivoiriens leur fait vivre et accepter le sacrifice non consultatif et passif comme acte normal. Ces manuels glorifient la violence par leur rduction du sacrifice un acte hroque, et cartent par le silence toute trace de la violence faite aux mres. Tandis que le rituel de la rptition des actes simplifis par lcriture engage lapprentissage de la violence, la trahison textuelle commise par la reproduction infidle effectue la mutilation de la jeunesse. De lordre dune violence symbolique, cette fracture historicisante rduit la signification de la figure de lenfant sacrifi une synecdoque alors que la lgende raconte dans toute sa complexit serait allgorique et permettrait louverture sur diffrentes paraboles tirer de loriginal, sur diffrentes interprtations selon les contextes socio-historiques auxquels le peuple ferait face. Le rexamen de cette Histoire sert de prtexte de pr-texte (davant-texte) pour revoir le pass et les valeurs transmises par une historicit slective qui structure le rapport actuel au pass. Aucune fidlit lesprit de la lgende semblerait possible si celle-ci devait rester une partie prise des livres dHistoire de la Cte dIvoire, o le manque dopacit de la version crite la fidlise autrement: par rapport sa reproduction. La strotypie la rend identique elle-mme et lidentifie la vrit. Pokou est dornavant si bien connue que son acte est pass dans le savoir de tout un its common knowledge.19 Comme avec tout simulacre, le geste ainsi fig sur la page de cette hrone a perdu son ambigut. Ainsi la transposition de la lgende en fait historique opre en tant que calomnie. La perte des lments-cls de son oralit originelle engendre la trahison de la transmission du savoir, car lHistoire nglige la mmoire collective, fait dfaut et manque la jeunesse. Sans
19 Pour ces notions de fidlit et de trahison dans la traduction voir Betrayals Felicity de Judith Butler (82-87; surtout 82).
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forclore, les versions analogiques du concerto pour un sacrifice font de la place aux connotations et souvrent la multiplicit et loptimisme. En librant le rcit de lHistoire et de larbitraire du langage, avec lincorporation dautres dtails repris au fil des sicles, Tadjo fait de sorte que son texte va dans le sens oppos de lHistoire en amplifiant au lieu de simplifier. Reine Pokou concerto pour un sacrifice plaide pour la reconnaissance dautres niveaux interprtatifs qui raisonnent diffremment. Alors que le rcit du sacrifice sert de volet de dpart, les pages du Temps du questionnement rcrivent le rcit selon diffrentes logiques historiques. Les alternatives qui y sont proposes reprennent les lments-cls et chers Tadjo de la culture ivoirienne tels Mamy Wata, la sculpture, lart, et la musique. tour de rle, ces chapitres improvisent dautres suites et imaginent dautres scnarios cette lgende sacrificielle avant de proposer le merveilleux de la figure de lapocalypse dans Le Temps de lenfant-oiseau. Une cantate par le rythme de sa posie et de sa prose aux qualits oniriques de lapocalypse,20 cette dernire partie de Reine Pokou rutilise la technique des aperus et des descentes des airs du deuxime roman de Tadjo, Vol doiseau, et rappelle le rle du Masque si prsent dans limaginaire de lcrivaine ainsi que dans le cycle des saisons en Cte dIvoire. Ce volet redonne sa complexit la lgende avec limage dun enfant qui, comme loiseau-lyre, senvole jusquau soleil. Il sen prend au serpent qui rampe et frappe sans raison. Agent symbolique de violence lui-mme, il vainc la bte pour aller de lavant avec lavenir o le sacrifice du serpent remplace celui de lenfant. Cette renonciation du sacrifice humain voque la possibilit qua lhomme de rsister au mcanisme mimtique, la logique du bouc missaire. Personnage sans ge, sans genre, humain et oiseau, tout et un, cet enfant-oiseau runit la force de ltonnement et le pouvoir de se renouveler (Reine 90). Dpassant le pass dans le prsent, lenfant sacrifi revit. En effet, Le temps de lenfant-oiseau finit avec lenfant qui rit et lve les bras au ciel. Rvlation dvnements venir, cette coda renvoie avec lapothose non pas lHistoire, mais au transcendant surrel de la lgende. Lenfant-oiseau, en opposition lenfant-ocan, devient llu de la progniture dun avenir autre, et
20 Selon le Gradus, le thme de lapocalypse est la rvlation dvnements venir (60).
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signale la possibilit dun redmarrage partir dune page dHistoire tche quil faut tourner. Afin de sortir de limpasse de la logique de la violence contre les enfants, lcrivaine applique la lentille narrative la mdiation du conflit social. Elle y explore plusieurs tats motionnels humains et les relie aux structures profondes qui soutiennent les genres de textes en jeu: lHistoire, la lgende, le mythe, ainsi que leur registre de la langue orale ou crite, de prose ou de posie. En rapportant lHistoire la dimension romanesque du rel, elle rappelle que le rcit na pas besoin dtre rfrentiel pour tre vrai,21 et que la fidlit la lgende est un renouvellement continu des formes traditionnelles qui comprend, parmi ses codes narratifs, le merveilleux. Ainsi pour ne plus livrer les jeunes au leurre de lHistoire sans ambages, Vronique Tadjo donne le change la trahison textuelle de la traduction historicisante en rhabillant le mythe avec les ailes lgendaires dun autre savoir fidle la vie et lespoir.22
Si lon adaptait la linguistique de Chomsky, o il sagit de la transformation qui relie les deux niveaux de la structure syntactique deep structure (information syntactique) et surface structure (ce qui permet de convertir loral lcrit) pour lappliquer aux difficults de la traduction que ce soit dune langue une autre, ou dun genre de texte un autre, ce serait bien le passage, la transformation qui relie la version loriginal. Ce que Tadjo nous propose alors serait un thme, la traduction de lHistoire vers ltrange, lopaque, et donc linverse du parcours de la version (en traduction de lautre langue vers sa propre langue). Antjie Krog ajoute une explication de ces rgles de Chomsky en exergue A Change of Tongue, 5. 22 Daprs Lee, dans Lessai au fminin le savoir des crivaines dAfrique est [u]n savoir qui nexplique pas le monde mais interroge et lucide le rel partir dune thique tourne vers la vie et lespoir (27).
21
144 Ouvrages cits
Atakpama, Gnimdwa. Vronique Tadjo, auteure de Reine Pokou, Concerto pour un sacrifice. Amina 420 (avril 2005): 41. Les interviews dAmina lire les Femmes crivains et les littratures africaines. 20 mai 2009 <http://www/arts.uwa.edu.au/AFLIT/AMINATadjo05.html>. Barbery, Muriel, Tahar Ben Jelloun, et al. Pour une littrature-monde en franais: le Manifeste. Le Monde des Livres (16 mars 2007): 1. Barthes, Roland. Le degr zro de lcriture. Paris: Seuil, 1953. Butler, Judith. Betrayals Felicity. Diacritics 34.1 (2004): 82-87. Caws, Mary Ann. Surprised in Translation. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006. Cazenave, Odile. Femmes rebelles: naissance dun nouveau roman africain contemporain. Paris: LHarmattan, 1996. _____. Francophone Women Writers in France in the nineties. Beyond French Feminisms: Debates on Women, Politics, and Culture in France, 1981-2001. d. Roger Celestin, liane Dalmolin, et Isabelle de Courtivron. New York: Palgrave, McMillan, 2003. _____. Writing the Child, Youth, and Violence into the Francophone Novel from Sub-Saharan Africa: The Impact of Age and Gender. Research in African Literatures 36.2 (2005): 59-71. Davies Cordova, Sarah, et Dsir Wa Kabwe-Segatti. Entretien avec Vronique Tadjo. Lianes 1 (2006). 20 mai 2009 <http://www.lianes.org>. Dossier. 2006: anne des francophonies. Dfense et illustration des langues franaises. Le Magazine littraire 451 (mars 2006): 28-65. Dupriez, Bernard. Gradus, les procds littraires (Dictionnaire). Paris: 10/18, 1995. Garnier, Xavier. Lclat de la figure: tude sur lantipersonnage du roman. Bruxelles: P.I.E. Peter Lang, 2000. _____. La Magie dans le roman africain. Paris: PUF, 1999. _____. Usages littraires de la rumeur en Afrique. Notre Librairie: Revue des littratures du Sud 144 (avril-juin 2001): 14-19. Girard, Ren. Les Origines de la culture. Paris: Descle de Brouwer, 2004. Johnson, Barbara. Mother Tongues: Sexuality, Trials, Motherhood, Translation. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003. Kahane, Adam. Solving Tough Problems: An Open Way of Talking, Listening, and Creating New Realities. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler, 2004. Kanor, Fabienne. Humus. Continents noirs. Paris: Gallimard, 2006. King, Adle. Vronique Tadjo. Reine Pokou. World Literature Today 80.2 (Mar-Apr 2006): 63.
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Krog, Antjie. A Change of Tongue. Johannesburg: Random House, 2003. Lederach, John Paul. The Moral Imagination: the Art and Soul of Peacemaking. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005. Lee, Sonia. Lessai au fminin. Notre Librairie: Revue des littratures du Sud 144 (avril-juin 2001): 26-29. Mbembe, Achille. Francophonie et Politique du Monde. Le Nouvel Observateur 24 mars 2007. <www. nouvelobs.com>. Migraine-George, Thrse. LAutre dans Champs de bataille et damour de Vronique Tadjo. Women in French 15 (2007): 67-83. Perraudin, Pascale. From a large morsel of meat to passwords-in-flesh: Resistance through Representation of the Tortured Body in Labou Tansis La vie et demie. Research in African Literatures 36.2 (2005): 72-85. Tadjo, Vronique. mi-chemin. 20 mai 2009 <http://aflit.arts.uwa.edu.au/ IneditTadjo2.html>. _____. vol doiseau. Paris: Nathan, 1986. Paris: LHarmattan, 1992. Trad. anglaise As the Crow Flies. African Writers Series. Oxford: Heinemann, 2001. _____. Champs de bataille et damour. Abidjan/Paris: Nouvelles ditions Ivoiriennes/Prsence africaine, 1999. _____. LOmbre dImana: voyages jusquau bout du Rwanda. Arles: Actes Sud, 2000. _____. Reine Pokou: Concerto pour un sacrifice. Arles: Actes Sud, 2004. _____. Le Seigneur de la danse. Abidjan: Nouvelles ditions Ivoiriennes, 2001. _____. Sonder lHistoire. Le Magazine littraire 451 (mars 2006): 55. Vronique Tadjo: Interview sur PlaneteAfrique. 2003. 1er dc. 2006 <http://www.planeteafrique.com/Amis/InterviewVeroniqueTadjo.asp>. Volet, Jean-Marie. Francophone Women Writing in 1998-99 and Beyond: A Literary Feast in a Violent World. Research in African Literatures 32.4 (2001): 187-200.
Translation
Rose-Myriam Rjouis
Eugene Lang College The New School for Liberal Arts
Object Lessons: Metaphors of Agency in Walter Benjamins The Task of the Translator and Patrick Chamoiseaus Solibo Magnifique
The German-Jewish critic Walter Benjamin and the French Martinican writer Patrick Chamoiseau both reach for object-centered disciplines archaeology and ethnography, respectively as metaphors for the restoration of their literary objects. For Benjamin, translation is good archaeology: the translator must recover the way of meaning in the original text and use it to glue the original to its translation. For Chamoiseau, an ethical ethnography is a dialogic translation that gives agency to both speaker and object. The essay concludes that both writers articulate parallel forms of artistic agency that can make cultural anxiety both visible and productive.
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In Solibo Magnifique, the second novel of the French Martinican writer Patrick Chamoiseau, the hero is an ethnographer. Writing about translation, the German-Jewish critic Walter Benjamin evokes archaeology. Out of their rather different contexts, the two authors emerge as anxious and playful cultural insider-outsiders, who turn, respectively, to the shapeliness of material or figural objects and, consequently, to object-centered disciplines archaeology and ethnography as metaphors. This common strategy is the point of departure for my
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discussion of Benjamins The Task of the Translator (1926) and Chamoiseaus Solibo Magnifique (1988). 1 In The Task of The Translator, Benjamin singles out translation as a distinctive process. To make his point, he likens it to a disciplined reconstruction of something like the integral shape of an original artifact:
Fragments of a vessel that are to be glued together must match one another in the smallest details, although they need not be like one another. In the same way a translation, instead of resembling the meaning of the original, must lovingly and in detail incorporate the originals way of meaning, thus making both the original and the translation recognizable as fragments of a greater language, just as fragments are part of a vessel. (260)
Benjamin uses an objects passage from fragments to wholeness to clarify translations passage from one language to another. A translation must give voice to the intentio of the original not as reproduction but as harmony, as a supplement to the language in which it expresses itself, as its own kind of intentio (260). In other words, a translation forges a path from the original text to its way of meaning. What it offers to the language in which it expresses itself is a new way of meaning. Fifty-two years after Benjamins death, his image of fragments of a vessel which are to be glued together surfaces in an unexpected place, the 1992 Nobel address by the Saint-Lucian poet Derek Walcott. Walcott reworks Benjamins vessel as follows:
Break a vase, and the love that reassembles the fragment is stronger than that love which took its symmetry for granted when it was whole. [...] It is such a love that reassembles our African and Asiatic fragments, the cracked
1 The Task of the Translator was written in 1921 and published in 1923 in Charles Baudelaire, Tableaux parisiens: Deutsche bertragung mit einem Vorword ber die Aufgabe des bersetzers, von Walter Benjamin [Charles Baudelaire, Tableaux Parisiens: German Translation, with a Foreword on the Task of the Translator, by Walter Benjamin]. I am grateful to Michael Jennings, who commented on an early draft of this essay and whose work on Benjamin frames my reading here just as my treatment of Chamoiseau in these pages has been shaped by my experience translating Solibo Magnificent and Texaco, with Val Vinokur, more than ten years ago. I also wish to thank Jeanne Garane and James Day for their suggestions.
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heirlooms whose restoration shows its white scars. This gathering of broken pieces is the care and pain of the Antilles, and if the pieces are disparate, illfitting, they contain more pain than their original sculpture, those icons and sacred vessels taken for granted in their ancestral places. Antillean art is this restoration of our shattered histories, our shards of vocabulary, our archipelago becoming a synonym for pieces broken off from the original continent. (8-9)
Paula Burnett sees in Walcotts use of Benjamins figure his interest in an image of a whole composed of different but congruent parts, that is, a metaphor for a distinctively Caribbean cultural synthesis (Burnett 26). By way of Walcott, Benjamins archaeological artifact a trope steeped in European Classicism and Romanticism becomes a metaphor for writing inscribed in a culturally insecure zone, that of the New World descendants of slaves. Walcotts poetics of cultural synthesis means to transform cultural insecurities (slaves were objects, after all) into cultural agency. Chamoiseau, in his fiction and his poetics of Crolit, extends Walcotts project of literary restoration by formulating a Caribbean cultural synthesis and by crafting a literary language that integrates Creole, the language of slaves. But this is not the only reason I turn to Chamoiseau. I do so because, unlike Benjamin and Walcott, whose metaphor relies on a literal object (a vessel or vase to be repaired), Chamoiseau turns to more slippery and figurative objects, for he seeks his metaliterary model in ethnography a discipline Michel de Certeau has called a heterologie, the study of others, a discipline that George Bataille (who hid the manuscript of Benjamins The Paris Arcades when its author fled Paris before the advancing German armies in 1940), Michel Leiris, and Roger Caillois sought to transform in founding their Collge de Sociologie. 2 In Chamoiseaus case, these others have themselves been declared objects and lack the antique artifacts with which to display cultural heft and historicity. Furthermore, Chamoiseau strategically chooses a discipline whose object of study is the animate shards of broken cultural traditions.
For more on the intersections between avant-garde ethnography and the Caribbean, particularly the work of Michel Leiris in Martinique, see Michael Dash.
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Lydie Moudilenos study of Chamoiseaus Solibo in her book, Lcrivain antillais au miroir de sa littrature: Mises en scne et mise en abyme du roman antillais, draws attention to the fact that Caribbean writers are, like their European peers, concerned with literariness, with figures such as mise-en-abyme, and not just with race, gender, history, and politics. But her focus on metanarratives leads her to emphasize the detective narrative in Solibo Magnifique and discount the significance of Chamoiseaus use of ethnography. She writes: Une telle approche permet de ne pas trop privilgier laspect ethnographique (84). The reward of taking into account both the detective and the ethnographic narratives in Solibo is to be able to describe Chamoiseaus text on its own terms. The detective narrative tells the following story: One evening, in the main public park of Fort-de-France, capital of the Overseas French Department of Martinique, Solibo the storyteller suddenly and mysteriously dies of an gorgette de la parole (25) snickt by the word (8) while speaking to an audience that includes the novels narrator, Patrick Chamoiseau. The police conduct an investigation in French, not Creole, which the dark-skinned Martinican police sergeant refers to as Black Negro gibberish (67) and rules Solibos natural death suspicious. The police seize and autopsy Solibos body and arrest all those who had gathered to listen to him. Violent interrogation results in the death of two witnesses. The police understand the reality of the island as consisting of one main question: What do you do for the bk? [colonial master] (96) the question they ask of each of the witnesses. Solibo-asdetective-narrative privileges the argument between dark-skinned and contemptuous Sergeant Bouafesse and the nerdy and genteel Inspector Pilon about how to conduct the investigation. 3 While the civil and civilized Pilon attempts to restrain his colleagues violence against the late Solibos listeners, the earthy sergeant knows far more about Solibos world than the inspector does. A focus on the detective narrative reveals that in Martinique, one can either play along and reap the benefits of sociocultural assimilation or resist and be the victims of those who do. The detective novel here is a farce and a tragedy.
3 I want to thank Val Vinokur for this acute insight and for reading every draft of this article.
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Parallel to the detective genre, Chamoiseau also uses the framework of an ethnographic narrative to relate the lethal and misguided investigation and to present an alternative response to Solibos life and death. In Solibo-the-ethnographic-novel, so to speak, the heroes are not Bouafesse and Pilon, but rather Solibo the storyteller and his hapless disciple Patrick Chamoiseau, the authors alter ego, a struggling amateur ethnographer who calls himself a word scratcher (marqueur de paroles) in a self-deprecating euphemism for writer. He signals his ambiguity towards his own discipline near the beginning of the novel by inscribing his narrative in the framework of mourning: These words are spoken only after the hour of [Solibos] death (8). In doing so, he distances himself from his earlier half-hearted project, wherein Solibos stories were ethnographic material discovered during a study of the odd-jobbers of the Fort-de-France market, and instead presents his account as a personal legacy, the record of an impromptu wake. 4 On the one hand, ethnography allows the narrator to give a certain legitimacy to the objects of slave descendants oral culture and such vortices of behavior as the Creole wake. On the other hand, he is aware of the nationalism, paternalism, and racism that mark the history of ethnographic discourse. He is also aware of the duplicity of a discipline that usually edits certain objects (the ethnographers tent, tape recorders, planes, cars, hotels, cities, national borders) out of the frame (Clifford 23). For these reasons, his ethnography is to be neither a classic narrative that celebrates the (white) anthropologist as hero, to borrow Susan Sontags phrase, nor a counter-narrative, such as Claude McKays 1929 novel, Banjo: A
Commenting on the wake, Chamoiseau writes: The wake is for us a melting pot of Creole culture, of its speech, of its orality, and it gave the extraordinary pretext that would allow plantation slaves to gather without spreading the fear that they were plotting to revolt or to burn down a plantation. I even have the feeling that the Creole language, in its whispers, that the Creole culture in its ruses and detours, and that the Creole philosophy, in its underground, clandestine, and fatalist character, all were shaped in the wakes contours; there, too, was shaped our most painful subjectivity. The wake also is the space of the story teller, our first literary figure, the one who, in the silence, gave us his voice, and who, facing death in the night, laughed, sang, challenged, as if to teach us how to resist our collective death and night (Reflections 391). For more on the significance of the heros death and the Creole wake in Caribbean literature, see my monograph Veilles pour les mots: Aim Csaire, Patrick Chamoiseau et Maryse Cond.
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novel without a plot, which imagines a primitive practicing a hysterical reverse anthropology in France while posing in the nude for white female art students. Chamoiseaus ethnographer does not strut about as a hero. He is an insider-outsider who is an amateur ethnographer of his native country. He suffers from asthma and seems to be suffocating from self-doubt. Specifically, he doubts his methodology. Asthma, that delicate respiratory condition of first world countries, has become his Homeric attribute. Even his tape recorder seems to have respiratory problems:
Who knows what would have become of me if Solibo Magnificents personality had not awakened my old curiosity, thus allowing me (through him) again to find sense in writing, though I was still unable to repair this bitch of a tape recorder which since my arrival was interested only in its own bronchitic gasps. One morning, Solibo addressed me with the exhausted insteadof-hello question: Chamzibi-ho? Whats the use of writing?..., then he chatted with me about everything and nothing, the word and the rest, without taking another breath he told me the origin of the market, seventeen undecipherable tales, gave me news (unasked for) of the senile merchants financial health, then he spoke to me of charcoal, of yams, of love, of forgotten songs, and memory, of memory. This verbal energy seduced me even then. Especially since Solibo used four facets of our diglossia: The Creole basilect and acrolect, the French basilect and acrolect, quivering, vibrating, rooted in an interlectal space that I thought to be our most exact sociolinguistic reality. (22)
The narrators text becomes an alternative ethnography when he does not do what he sets out to do, when instead of presenting the reader a scientific report on the respective basilect and acrolect of French and Creole, he repeatedly interrupts and undermines his narrative to cite Solibos words:
(Solibo Magnificent used to tell me: Oiseau de Cham, you write. Very nice. I, Solibo, I speak. You see the distance? In your book on the Watermama, you want to capture the word in your writing, I see the rhythm you try to put into it, how you want to grab words so they ring in the mouth. You say to me: Am I doing the right thing, Papa? Me, I say: One writes but words, not the word, you should have spoken. To write is to take the conch out of the sea to shout: heres the conch! The word replies: wheres
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the sea? But thats not the most important thing. Im going and youre staying. I spoke but you, youre writing, announcing that you come from the word. You give me your hand over the distance. Its all very nice, but you just touch the distance...). (27-28)
Here, the ethnographer presents the storyteller as a reader and a theorist. Solibo has read the ethnographers (and Chamoiseaus) earlier book, Maman Dlo, and he offers his critique of the authors methodology (recording stories traditionally told orally) and his project as a whole. The storyteller views the ethnographers attempt to foreignize (Venuti 4) written French with the oral playfulness of Creole and Creolisms with skepticism, and he locates the problem of untranslatability within the frame of intergenerational transmission: the ethnographer cannot translate orality into writing. Critics such as Pierre Pinalie-Dracius and Marie Jos NZengouTayo, however, tend to focus on Chamoiseaus systematic linguistic strategies. They argue that Chamoiseau does not write in Martinican Creole and that his writing is merely a mechanical montage (Pinalie-Dracius 22) of a lot of French and a little Creole that produces an effet-de-crole (NZengou-Tayo 165). 5 Ironically, the shortsighted
Ultimately, the readings of Pinalie-Dracius and NZengou-Tayo dismiss the authors creative agency. Pinalie-Dracius argues that Chamoiseau uses both conscious and unconscious strategies to creolize his text which, comically, implies that Pinalies scientific analysis must rely on his access to the authors unconscious. Echoing him, NZengou-Tayo argues that paradoxically, that is, malgr lui, Chamoiseau is a victim of the tensions between orality and writing and between Creole and French, since he creates a different and personal (171) language to express himself. I believe, on the contrary, that Chamoiseaus conscious commitment to literal and metaphorical creolisms is his own (different and personal, to be sure) productive way of creating meaning in his work. In her comments on my translation (with Val Vinokur) of Texaco, Moya Jones, following NZengou-Tayos reading of the novel, is critical of the fact that we did not translate his every single literary deviation tit-for-tat (65). She does not recognize that if literary works could be translated so mechanically, we would not need human beings to translate for us. Val and I had to work not only with the fact that English accommodates word play and signifyin more than metropolitan and colonial French ever will, but also with the accidents of idiom across languages. For instance, Chamoiseaus Creole substitution of bte feu (fire animal/creature) for the French luciole doesnt really take off in English because the English is already firefly or lightning bug; since the fact of creolization could not be conveyed in this case, we felt a responsibility to convey it elsewhere. Our translation of Chamoiseau is Benjaminian inasmuch as we tried to translate his modes of signification and avoid a mechanical reading of his works.
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ness of such word counting is most clearly exposed in Chamoiseaus own reading of Maryse Conds Traverse de la Mangrove. He reproaches her in much the same way Pinalie-Dracius and NZengouTayo reproach him:
Other words of your vocabulary, still numerous, fail to invoke in me anything besides the flavor of other places and other cultures. For instance, saying le, a word we never say or think. Saying village instead of bourg since there are no villages here. This vocabulary reminds me of the time when we used to say colline for fear of writing morne. (Reflections 394)
Here Chamoiseau is guilty of the kind of limited criticism that has been leveled at his own writing. He does not pause on the fact that Conds novel about Guadeloupe is an anxious return to the native land. The returnees language is inherently inadequate. He also contradicts his own commitment to idiolects by trying to prescribe what the language of another writer in this case, one whose sensibility was shaped by an earlier generation and by years in exile should be like. A statistical approach to Chamoiseaus use of Creole occludes one of his key achievements: his inflection of the discipline of ethnography as he puts it to new uses. Through the exchange between Solibo and Chamoiseau, a dialogue that takes place in the field, Chamoiseau is experimenting with a more ethical mode of ethnographic representation: mutual cultural critiques. In a way, he has imagined what Talal Asad, in his reading of Walter Benjamins essay on translation, calls a good translation or an internal critique that is, one based on some shared understanding, on a joint life, which it aims to enlarge and make more coherent (157). For Asad, an ideal ethnography is a dialogic translation that leads to reciprocal agency. The exchange between the storyteller and the ethnographer is one between two marginal actors who escape the fate of the detective and policemen who harass them. Hesitating between French and Creole, in Chamoiseaus novel these latter self-hating insider-outsiders commit tragicomic linguistic acts of violence against others by making them speak French and punishing their Creolisms and by speaking either a distancing Parisian French or a hypercorrect Martinican French. As I
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indicated above, the low/high cultural pairing of Solibo and Chamoiseau is parodied in the dynamics between the earthy, brutal Chief Sergeant Bouaffesse and the uptight, French-educated Inspector Pilon. By representing both mutual cultural critiques as well as disputes, Chamoiseau describes local scenes of action in a local language, 6 in what Karin Barber has called (in speaking of African literature) an act of linguistic confidence (19-20). 7 Chamoiseaus commitment is to a specific local issue: the sociocultural terrorism of colonial institutions in Martinique. If Chamoiseau does not do justice to Martinican Creole, it is because Chamoiseaus commitment is not to Martinican Creole; it is to idiolects, to individual self-expression, as M. C. Hazal-Massieux would concur. Echoing Milan Kundera, who described Chamoiseau as writing in a chamoisis French (58), Linda Coverdale, translator of Chamoiseaus memoir of colonial schooling, School Days, declared to my students that Chamoiseau writes in Chamoiseau. Where Walcott borrowed Benjamins image of a material archaeology to claim cultural agency for the New World descendants of slaves, Chamoiseau turned to ethnography, imagining exchanges between a Martinican ethnographer and the Martinican storyteller he studies in order to give agency to the ethnographic object (the native) and to lay claim to others (pen, paper, tape recorder, books on ethnography). If Benjamin serves to draw attention to the agency latent in the formulation of cultural synthesis for such insider-outsiders as Walcott and Chamoiseau, then these Caribbean authors underscore the insideroutsiderness in Benjamins work. To explore the latter, I will conclude with Benjamins description of a dream in One Way Street (1928), a collection of short prose pieces Michael Jennings has described as
Interestingly, Chamoiseau extends this local scene most effectively by giving this postcolonial self-policing a transnational dimension: Bouaffesse, who at some point literally hits an old man unable to speak French with a French dictionary, is a veteran of Frances war in Algeria, where he was trained to torture. The history of colonial torture haunts diglossia: Speak French or perish. 7 Although Chamoiseau writes in a place that has no indigenous language since both French and Creole are colonial languages despite the fact that one is stronger than the other his various uses of Creole language and culture embody local forms of resourcefulness.
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both a montage and as a summa of Benjamins work in the decade after 1924 (20). In a fragment entitled No. 113, Benjamin writes:
[Dining Hall.] In a dream I saw myself in Goethes study. It bore no resemblance to the one in Weimar. Above all, it was very small and had only one window. The side of the writing desk abutted on the wall opposite the window. Sitting and writing at it was the poet, in extreme old age. I was standing to one side when he broke off to give me a small vase, an urn from antiquity, as a present. I turned it between my hands. An immense heat filled the room. Goethe rose to his feet and accompanied me to an adjoining chamber, where a table was set for my relatives. It seemed prepared, however, for many more than their number. Doubtless there were places for my ancestors, too. At the end, on the right, I sat down beside Goethe. When the meal was over, he rose with difficulty and by gesturing I sought leave to support him. Touching his elbow, I began to weep with emotion. (OneWay Street and Other Writings 47)
In the dream, Benjamin is not merely the cultural insideroutsider that is, not simply the German outsider critic and writer he is also the racial or ethnic other, the Jew with his defining, inextricable, storied tribe. As such, he is caught between two embodiments of history: the handmade urn, an embodiment of secular high culture (ancient and modern), and his Jewish body, tied to the Jewish relatives and ancestors that have produced it, an embodiment of an archaic (tribal and religious) culture. As a secular Jew, he belongs to both realms to a certain extent without belonging entirely to either. He is therefore an insider-outsider to both. This double identity, which requires a formal acknowledgment (the banquet), is a source of anxiety. It becomes necessary to imagine a site of reconciliation, a task Benjamin extends into his writing with the recording of the dream. Of course, the Holocaust revealed the fragility of this dream of a final reconciliation between Germans and German Jews, as modeled on the complementariness between an exemplary German writer (Goethe) and an exemplary German-Jewish critic (Benjamin). Benjamin died in 1940 while fleeing from the Nazis. As the classicist Page Dubois writes, for the post-Holocaust reader, this dream is a premonitory condensation of the precious legacy of European poetry, of ancient objects, and the horror of slave camps and death camps awaiting Benjamins fellow German Jews (35). In Benjamins dream, the urn is triumphantly transmitted whole. It is his identity that is coming
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apart at the seams and forces the critics body to speak with tears and dreams in the hope of patching it together. While Chamoiseau is experimenting with a more ethical mode of ethnographic representation, the form of representation exemplified by this passage problematizes any direct transfer of German high culture to a group of insider-outsiders. If this is so, is the Creole wake perhaps more vital and playful than Benjamins anxious and tearful banquet? 8 Walter Benjamins essay, The Task of the Translator, foreshadows his interest in avant-garde intervention, a mode that explores the political dimension of art as event. Chamoiseau, in his experimentation with writing as cultural translation, as ethnography, argues that the writer-ethnographer, much like Benjamins translator, must intervene and incorporate the others ways of meaning into his work: only then can that work aspire to the sublime while allowing itself to be marked by fingerprints. Whereas Chamoiseau writes against a history of colonial terror that has evolved into Martinicans self-policing their own sociocultural assimilation into France, Benjamin experienced a cultural assimilation, that of the German Jews, full of shadows of its own. In their respective zones of insider-outsiderness, these two writers signal their commitment to forms of artistic agency modeled on disciplines that underwrite passionate contact with their objects, material or figural. In so doing, they offer literary modes of activism that can make cultural anxiety both visible and productive.
I want to thank Dale Peterson for a patient and generous reading of this essay and for inspiring this question.
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158 Works Cited
Asad, Talal. The Concept of Cultural Translation in British Social Anthropology. Writing Culture: The Poetics and Politics of Ethnography. Ed. James Clifford and George Marcus. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986. 141-64. Barber, Karin. African-Language Literature and Postcolonial Criticism. Research in African Literatures 26.4 (1995): 3-30. Benjamin, Walter. One-Way Street and Other Writings. Trans. E. Jephcott and K. Shorter. London: New Left Books, 1979. _____. The Task of the Translator. Trans. Harry Zohn. Selected Writings Volume 1, 1913-1926. Ed. Marcus Bullock and Michael Jennings. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1996. 253-63. Bernab, Jean, Patrick Chamoiseau, and Raphal Confiant. loge de la Crolit. Paris: Gallimard, 1989. _____. In Praise of Creoleness. Trans. Mohamed B. Taleb Khyar. Callaloo 13 (1990): 886-909. Burnett, Paula. Derek Walcott: Politics and Poetics. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2000. Certeau, Michel de. Heterologies: Discourse on the Other. Trans. Brian Massumi. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1986. Chamoiseau, Patrick. School Days. Trans. Linda Coverdale. Lincoln: University of Nebraska, 1997. _____. Solibo Magnificent. Trans. Rose-Myriam Rjouis and Val Vinokurov. New York: Pantheon Books, 1997. _____. Solibo Magnifique. Paris: Gallimard, 1988. _____. Reflections on Maryse Conds Traverse de la Mangrove. Callaloo 14.2 (1991): 389-95. _____. Texaco. Trans. Rose-Myriam Rjouis and Val Vinokurov. New York: Pantheon Books, 1997. Trans. of Texaco. Paris: Gallimard, 1992. Clifford, James. Routes: Travel and Translation in the Late Twentieth Century. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1997. Dash, J. Michael. Le Je de lautre: Surrealist Ethnographers and the Francophone Caribbean. LEsprit Crateur 47.1 (2007) 84-95. Dubois, Page. Slaves and Other Objects. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2003. Hazal-Massieux, M. C. Chamoiseau crit-il en crole ou en franais? tudes Croles 21.2 (1998): 111-26.
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Jennings, Michael. Walter Benjamin and the European Avant-Garde. The Cambridge Companion to Walter Benjamin. Ed. David S. Ferris. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004. Jones, Moya. Chamoiseau and Matura: Translators and Translations. Palimpsestes 12 (2000): 61-70. McKay, Claude. Banjo: A Novel Without a Plot. 1929. New York: Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, 1970. Moudileno, Lydie. Lcrivain antillais au miroir de sa littrature: Mises en scne et mise en abyme du roman antillais. Paris: Karthala, 1997. Pinalie-Dracius, Pierre. Les Stratgies langagires dans Chronique des sept misres de Patrick Chamoiseau. Antilla Kryol 9 (1987): 17-24. Rjouis, Rose-Myriam. Veilles pour les mots: Aim Csaire, Patrick Chamoiseau et Maryse Cond. Paris: Karthala, 2004. Roach, Joseph. Cities of the Dead: Circum-Atlantic Performance. New York: Columbia University Press, 1996. Venuti, Lawrence. Introduction. Rethinking Translation: Discourse, Subjectivity, Ideology. Ed. Lawrence Venuti. London: Routledge, 1992. 1-17. Walcott, Derek. The Antilles: Fragments of Epic Memory. New York: Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 1992.
Translation
Rachelle Okawa
University of California, Los Angeles
Translating Maryse Conds Clanire cou-coup: Dislocations of the Caribbean Self in Richard Philcoxs Who Slashed Celanires Throat? A Fantastical Tale
As the professional translator of many of his wifes novels, Richard Philcox routinely faces the challenge of translating Maryse Conds opaque poetics. Through close readings of elements both in and outside of the actual translation, this study examines how Philcoxs interpretation of Conds Clanire cou-coup is ultimately attuned to both the difficulty of translating her writings complexity and to the linguistic and cultural aspects that often mark a Caribbean text. Read together, Conds Clanire cou-coup and Philcoxs Who Slashed Celanires Throat? A Fantastical Tale, exemplify how the trope of dislocation regarding the representation of Caribbean cultural identities evokes a parallel or mirroring discourse in the act of translation itself.
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When considering translations potential for committing violence against the original text, Gayatri Spivak, in The Politics of Translation, informs readers of the ethical necessity of translating well and with difficulty (181): that is, she emphasizes the translators need to be attuned to the specificity of the language he/she is translating. If, for example, a translator fails to account for untranslatable proverbs or concepts, or if he/she does not consider the particularities of the historical moment and language in which the author is writing, then the possibility for the misfiring of meaning abounds. Spivaks warnings are particularly relevant to the challenges that Richard Philcox
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undoubtedly encounters when translating Maryse Conds novels. As the now-established professional translator of his wifes work, 1 Philcox would have to keep in mind the opaque poetics that characterizes Conds writing, the recent translation debates and trends occurring in Caribbean literature, Translation Studies, and the publishing market at large, and most importantly, the double bind embedded in the task of translation itself: both to remain faithful to the original and to make the translation accessible to its intended readership. In this article, I examine Philcoxs difficult task of translating well Clanire cou-coup from the framework of Conds opaque poetics: 2 a poetics that asks the reader to labor at understanding her texts due to the intentional opacity that characterizes both her writing style and her characters identities. In Conds fantastic tale, Clanire Pinceaus opaque or unreadable identity emerges from her many geographical displacements, as well as her bodily dismemberment. Clanire wanders from one geographical location to another, moving to, from, and between Guadeloupe, France, Ivory Coast, and Peru. A part of her also resides in the hazy division between the natural and the supernatural, the known and the unknown, with the beginning of her life overshadowed by the presence of her own near-death. As a newborn infant, Clanire had her throat sliced open in the name of a local political figure in a government election in Guadeloupe. Miraculously, she was stitched back together by Dr. Jean Pinceau, the Caribbean counterpart to Mary Shelleys Dr. Frankenstein (Fulton
Philcox has translated almost all of Conds novels except for Sgou I (translated by Barbara Bray), Sgou II (translated by Linda Coverdale), and La vie sclrate (translated by Victoria Reiter). When Conds work was first being translated into English, Philcox had not yet established himself in the field of literary translation. Since then, however, his personal experiences of living in West Africa, and also his in-depth knowledge of the region, have helped him to understand and thus to translate better his wifes work (Traduire Maryse Cond 750). 2 What Philcox finds most difficult in translating his wifes novels is their lack of transparency. In an interview with Kadish and Massardier-Kenney, Philcox comments on why Conds writing is so complex: [Cond] demande beaucoup au lecteur. Enormment. Elle pense que le lecteur devrait tre assez intelligent pour lire entre les lignes. Que ce nest pas la peine de tout lui expliquer, noir sur blanc. Pour elle, le lecteur est un homme ou une femme extrmement intelligent. Il y a donc beaucoup de choses caches dans le texte et aussi une intertextualit norme. Elle est constamment en train de faire rfrence dautres livres, du cinma, des films (759).
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201). The complicated formation of Clanires patchwork (Clanire cou-coup 322) identity thus bases itself on two different types of dislocation: a geographical and a bodily translation or displacement. Framing Clanires fragmented sense of self in light of Stuart Halls notion of cultural identity as an enigma, a problem, or an always-open question for the Caribbean people allows for a clearer understanding of Conds representation of Clanires ultimately unfulfilled search for a sense of home and self (Hall 30). If, as Hall suggests, Caribbean identity is based on a series of past dislocations (of conquest, colonization, and slavery, for example), then one can figuratively begin to read Clanires cou-coup or dislocated neck as signifying the historical and political violence upon which her fractured identity is founded. A similar dislocation occurs in the act of translation itself between the inevitable violence that marks the original text and the endless possibilities for its many readings and interpretations. Philcoxs Who Slashed Celanires Throat? magnifies these linguistic and cultural tensions by highlighting the complexity of Conds novel, even as it aims to make the work more accessible to an English-speaking audience. The Challenges of Translating Maryse Cond Both Richard Philcox and Maryse Cond have written about and/or given extensive interviews regarding their views on the unique situation of author/translator collaboration in which they find themselves. What first makes Philcoxs and Conds situation particularly interesting is their contrasting opinions regarding the practice or even the possibility of translation itself. While Philcox views translation as a way of communicating his wifes writing into another language and culture (Traduire Maryse Cond 751), Cond, on several occasions, has remarked upon the fact that to translate is to write and create an entirely different work of art altogether. In an interview with Emily Apter, Cond responds to the question of How translatable is your work? with the following comments:
I never read any of my books in translation. Writing is not just the creation of content, it is in the sounds, the rhythms. In translation, the play of languages is destroyed. Of course, I recognize that my works have to be translated, but they are really not me. Only the original counts for me. Some
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people say that translation adds to the original. For me, it is another work, perhaps an interesting one, but very distant from the original. (2)
Philcox and Cond also diverge on their conception of the reader, on how hard they believe the reader needs to work at understanding a text. While Cond likes to faire travailler le lecteur (Traduire Maryse Cond 751), her husbands approach to translation and his audience could generally be described as more market-driven: he aims to make his translations of what he often feels are his wifes overly esoteric novels more transparent or clearer for his Englishspeaking readership (751). Of course, it is important to note that Philcox does not support the idea that transparency or clarity should come at the cost of linguistic and geographical displacements within a translated text (Traduire Maryse Cond 752). This principle figures prominently in ongoing translation debates and trends in Caribbean Literature. In terms of Translation Studies, the Caribbean region emerges as a particularly apt terrain of investigation for several reasons: for its multilingualism and cultural diversity, for Caribbean writers in general who are aware that they are writing predominantly for an audience outside of the region itself, and for a writer in particular like Maryse Cond, whose work is invested in re-writing English and American texts. In fact, I would argue that within the field of Caribbean Studies, a consensus exists about the importance of remaining sensitive to the regions linguistic and cultural differences. In Translators on a Tightrope: The Challenges of Translating Edwidge Danticats Breath, Eyes, Memory and Patrick Chamoiseaus Texaco, Marie-Jos NZengou-Tayo and Elizabeth Wilson reiterate the central concerns that translators of Caribbean literature would especially need to be attuned to, such as the regions complex and varied language register, as well as how a translators gender, ideological bent, and knowledge of the region will inevitably influence his/her translation (76-77). In Crossing the Bridge of Beyond: Translating the Mangroves of French Caribbean Identities, Pascale De Souza echoes similar linguistic concerns with respect to the challenges of translating French Creolisms into English, while also addressing the translation of paratextual elements, which,
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more often than not, cater to market demands. Examples of paratexts could include jackets, illustrations for the front cover, quotes for the back cover, forewords, introductions, appendices, and afterwords (4243); all of these can distort a translations relation to the original. To be a discerning translator, then, is to be conscious of the history and language of the regions literature and writers. An awareness of translating these important differences is what Lawrence Venuti would refer to as resisting the trap of transparency. As a translator of French into English, Philcox finds himself in an invisible position where his translation practices cannot easily escape from the influences of the prevailing ideological demands and concerns of an Anglo-American market and audience. In his book, The Translators Invisibility: A History of Translation, Venuti explains that a translator becomes invisible when his/her translation lacks any linguistic or stylistic markers linking it back to the original. The translated text would thus read so fluently as to give the illusion of transparency. The potential for committing violence against the original in the act of translation also extends beyond the translators control because of the readers demand for a fluent or transparent discourse. This demand is a characteristic Anglo-American tendency, and it contrasts with both the French and German models of translation. The danger lies precisely in the rendering of easy reads by fixing an exact meaning on or interpretation of the original text. For Venuti, the response to this trend, and the ethical task of the translator, is first to recognize the ideological constraints in which the translator has been immersed and trained, and secondly to locate strategies of resistance to overcome them. One possible strategy is to choose foreign texts that are less conducive to fluent translating. Conds Clanire cou-coup, to which I now turn, is one such example of a text that resists a facile translation. Paratextual Influences: Reading Who Slashed Celanires Throat? What lies outside the text often determines its reception to a far greater degree than the actual reading and interpretation of the trans
See Germina Nadge Veldwachters dissertation, Politiques littraires: jeux de miroir, paratextes, et traductions du discours antillais en France et aux tats-Unis, for an in-depth study about the publication, translation, and reception of Caribbean literature in France and the United States.
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lation itself. In the case of Philcoxs translation of Conds Clanire cou-coup, paratexts such as publishing advertisements, editorial additions in the form of glossaries, and translator prefaces underscore the multiple ways in which the Anglophone or North American publishing market ultimately influences the reception of Conds novel. In the September-December 2004 issue of World Literature Today, Atria Books provides a half-page advertisement for Philcoxs then-recent translation of Conds novel. According to Simon and Schusters advertisement, Atria Books, one of its many publishing units, has recently started to promote itself as plac[ing] a strategic emphasis on publishing for diverse audiences, through the acquisition of Strebor Books, the launch of a Hispanic/Latino line, and a copublishing agreement with Beyond Words. The announcement by Atria Books for their publication of the first hardbound edition of Who Slashed Celanires Throat? includes two titles from Conds past award-winning novels (Segu and Tales from the Heart), a brief summary of the plot, as well as literary praise by both Edwidge Danticat and The New York Times Book Review. Given the noticeable omission of Clanires darker side as a femme fatale seeking to right all past wrongs at any cost, the Atria Books advertisement raises immediate concerns about the publishing houses power to distort the representation of her character. Of problematic interest to me here are both the editors brief summary of the novel and the praise given by the New York Times Book Review:
Inspired by a true story of an infant found with her throat slashed in Guadeloupe in 1995, Maryse Conds indelible story blends magical realism and fantasy as the seductive and haunting Clanire solves the mystery of her past. It is impossible to read Maryse Conds novels and not come away from them with both a sadder and more exhilarating understanding of the human heart, in all its secret intricacies, its contradictions and marvels. (19)
First and foremost, the editors synopsis of Conds novel misleads readers by giving the impression that it is Clanire herself who actively pursues and discovers the truth about her birth parents. It is, however, only through the perspective of a secondary character that this information is finally revealed: Yang Ting, a destitute Chinese immigrant to Guadeloupe, informs readers that he is Clanires bio-
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logical father. Throughout the novel, Clanire never once acknowledges her awareness of Yang Ting or of this discovery. Like the editors summary, The New York Times Book Review also misleads readers when it helps to package and sell Who Slashed Celanires Throat? by highlighting the translations universal appeal. While Conds novel is indeed preoccupied with the relationships and tensions that can cause friction between men and women friction in the context of la permanence du racisme, la difficult de vivre ensemble, [et] la perception du mariage mixte dans les socits (Moi, Maryse Cond 125) Clanires mindset prevents her from embracing these universal concerns. As a Caribbean woman born in Guadeloupe, raised and educated in France, who also finds herself associated with the French civilizing mission in Africa, before finally returning to Guadeloupe with her French husband and stepdaughter, Clanire harbors internal contradictions in terms of the human heart that leave her to struggle against her inner desire to create havoc and seek revenge. By providing a universal framework from which to read Clanires mysterious past, Atria Books obscures the historical and racial conditions of exile that have always haunted the Caribbean region. To make certain expressions clear, the French version includes at the end of Clanire cou-coup a glossary of terms of African, Creole, and Spanish origin. As a rule, glossaries are unusual in works of fiction, and for Cond in this instance, the glossary is something of a departure from her opaque poetics. On the other hand, a glossary, as a paratextual element, would be useful to clarify all of Conds intertextual references, with no intrusions into the narrative. In the light of these issues, it is troubling that Conds glossary was ultimately omitted from Philcoxs English translation; a ready-made guide for a reader-oriented text almost presupposes that the glossary was a necessary convenience. A passing remark by Cond during an interview with Kadish and Massardier-Kenney helps to clarify this dilemma when she explains how the appearance of footnotes in both Tituba and Traverse de la mangrove were included at the request of the French editor, rather than by the author herself (756). If Cond would prefer to refrain from integrating explanatory notes into the publication of her novels, then it would logically follow that the French publishing house and the respective editor for Clanire cou-coup were the ones
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most likely responsible for the added glossary in the French edition. In contrast, American publishing houses tend to dislike editorial comments that might disrupt the aesthetics of a novels layout (756), which Philcoxs translation then compensates for by highlighting (i.e., italicizing) all of the texts foreign words and expressions. These kinds of editorial policies work to further conceal what was or was not originally a part of Conds initial creative process. Her desire to retain the local specificities of the geographical places that she is writing about, as well as her overall refusal to simplify the text for the reader, is lost on two levels: in the French original and in the English translation. Working against what often seems like the whims of editorial decisions informed by the commercial policies of various publishing houses, translator prefaces have the power to offer insight into the inner workings of the translated text. Philcox has written prefaces for two of Conds translated novels: Crossing the Mangrove and The Last of the African Kings. His Translators Preface to Crossing the Mangrove exemplifies the aforementioned tension between the desire to respect linguistic and cultural differences found in Caribbean literature and the universal undertones that would render it a more transparent translation. For this particular project, Philcoxs biggest challenge lay in finding the appropriate equivalents to Guadeloupean creolisms. In the end, he decided against using Jamaican, Barbadian, and Trinidadian expressions because he felt that the linguistic and geographical displacements inherent in them would have ultimately changed the entire tone of the novel (Traduire Maryse Cond 752). He writes in his preface: What was I going to do with all those Creole expressions? How was I going to render this most Guadeloupean of Maryse Conds novels into English? How was I going to translate those distortions of the French language that Creole is so fond of making and at the same time poke fun at standard, academic French? (vii-viii). The questions that Philcox poses to both himself and the reader evoke the very core of his dilemma. Just how was he going to convey accurately the intimate quibbles between two languages (French and Creole) into a third one (English)? The dilemma resisted easy resolution. After rejecting English-based West Indian equivalents, and also inventing a word or two of his own in English, Philcox eventually decided to displace this linguistic issue altogether
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by finding an equivalent to the tone and register of Conds character voices in the work of another writer: Virginia Woolfs To the Lighthouse. Woolfs stream-of-consciousness technique spoke to Philcox as a way to capture both the chatty tone and the inner, psychological drama embedded in each of Conds character voices (xiii). The similarities between Woolfs and Conds writing in terms of their sound and conviction provided a translation strategy that, he argues, reflects the novels overall purpose and style in filling the characters and the reader with renewed hope and energy (ix). As Philcox himself already acknowledges in his preface to Crossing the Mangrove, the underlying reason for finding a shared tone in another writers work and voice for one of Conds most Guadeloupean of novels, has to do with the importance of intertextuality in regard to his wifes writing. In his preface to The Last of the African Kings, Philcoxs concern with narrative tone once again comes to the forefront when he expands upon his previous translation choices. For The Last of the African Kings, Philcox chooses Bruce Chatwins The Viceroy of Ouidah as his working translation model for its matching narrative structure and tone (i.e., its terrible irony). For Philcox, the irony in Chatwins depiction of the fortunes of the dynasty of an African kingdom is comparable to the sense of derision that pervades his wifes work: Conds The Last of the African Kings is likewise characterized by a distinctly iconoclastic and unorthodox tone (x-xi). Finding an equivalent model for the novels terrible irony plays just as significant a role in the notion of intertextuality as pinpointing the inspirational and creative sources that Cond surrounds herself with at the time of writing. As her husband, Philcox is privy to the various influences on Conds artistic psyche at the moment of creation: what novels she reads, what movies she sees, and what music she listens to (ix). In the case of The Last of the African Kings, it is the influence of African-American music, especially the blues and jazz, that clues him into a possible translation strategy: Just as jazz is a reworking of African rhythms, so the structure of the book reworks the links between Africa, the place of origin, and its Diaspora of Guadeloupe and South Carolina (ix). All of the historical and cultural displacements of time, place, and texts that Cond is so fond of reworking become key intertextual sources for better understanding
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her novels in both French and English. 4 Whatever displacements the resulting translations might present, translator prefaces offer informed interpretations based on intimate readings of the original text. Philcoxs prefaces work against the translators invisibility by allowing his creative and interpretive voice to emerge. His prefaces also bring to light the creative sources and influences unique to each work of art, in turn reinforcing the need to adapt ones translation practices to each new project. Dislocations in Translation The presence of paratexts, or for this next example, the marked absence of them, points to other translation rifts in Philcoxs Who Slashed Celanires Throat? In the translated text, the pull towards a fluent or transparent discourse emerges from the very beginning of the novel, when readers are first introduced to Clanire and her missionary life as an oblate in Ivory Coast. Clanires status as an oblate is an important element for understanding her unreadability, for by its very definition, the term oblate designates only a partial identification or 5 belonging to a social group. According to Websters, an oblate is a person dedicated to the religious life, especially a person living in or associated with a religious community, but who at the same time is not bound by any formal vows. In the French, Cond complicates Clanires gender identity by referring to her with the masculine form of the noun oblat instead of the feminine one, oblate. In Philcoxs translation, however, no such gender modification of the noun is possible in English, and yet, no note of the discrepancy is ever given. Conds reference to Clanire as an oblat occurs seven times within the first thirty pages of the novel and is often juxtaposed to comments about how much she differs from her missionary companions: her silence, her isolation when writing in her journal, and her overall lack of
As a re-write of Emily Bronts Victorian novel Wuthering Heights, Conds La migration des curs is a notable example of all three displacements of time, place, and text. In order to adapt Bronts story to a Caribbean context and chronology, Conds novel instead opens in Cuba at the very end of the 19th century. 5 Keja Valens argues that Clanires many partial identifications (e.g., national, racial, sexual orientation, etc.) prevent readers from pigeonholing her identity and origins. Furthermore, Conds representation of Clanire as une oblat (40) also troubles her gender status.
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excitement, curiosity, and eagerness to begin the work, are just a few ways in which she stands out. What thus becomes blurred in translation here are the purposeful partial identifications that mark Clanires identity in the context of a seemingly minor grammar discrepancy that diminishes the impact of the English version. The disjunctions of translation continue to emerge in the opening lines of the novel in a telling self-interruption of the story by the thirdperson omniscient narrative voice. By questioning the storys own true beginnings, the narrating voice foreshadows the fragmented narrative to follow, in which the bits and pieces of information revealed by the various secondary characters further complicate how Clanires identity will be read. The French text reads: Au moment o dbute cette histoire (mais est-ce le dbut? O en est le dbut? Mystre et boule de gomme!), on avait peine fini denterrer les morts Grand-Bassam (15). The following is Philcoxs translation of this narrative interruption: At the time when this story begins (but is it the beginning? Where in fact does it begin? Thats anyones guess!) they had barely finished burying the dead at Grand-Bassam (3). The narrators selfreflection on beginnings or origins highlights the novels thematic development of Clanires search for her birth parents while demonstrating, at the beginning of Philcoxs version, the rigors and choices of translating. As opposed to Conds novel, which opens with a description of Ivory Coast, Philcoxs translation starts off by describing the leader of the African Missionary Society in Lyons, Reverend Father Huchard, and his slanted perception of Clanire. Philcoxs deferral of Conds description of Ivory Coast until two full paragraphs later a depiction of its landscape, climate, and people does not just ask us to question whether the very definition of translation is exceeded altogether by taking liberties with basic elements of narrative order. It also asks us to consider how this narrative shift once again directs our attention to the heart of the novels intrigue. Just like the translated title, Who Slashed Celanires Throat?, the change in the novels opening lines promises the reader an answer to this very question. We will no doubt find out who slashed Clanires throat by the end of the story. Philcoxs re-writing of Conds novel underscores the degree to which the English version both mirrors and departs from the French. On the one hand, this instance of guided reading highlights, because of its contrast, how Clanire is most often represented
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through the eyes of others, which heightens her ambiguity. On the other hand, it undercuts all of the novels references to the movement between Africa and the New World, initiated by the slave trade. Philcoxs delayed description of the coast of Africa a place of contact between land and sea; a site of transition and travel displaces the history of diasporic wanderings common to Caribbean writers and intellectuals such as Cond and her character, Clanire. The initial site of dislocation on Clanires body, represented by the scar on her neck, and Philcoxs translation of Conds description of it, emphasizes Clanires opacity: the fantastic powers that she 6 possesses as a cheval. While Clanire is entertaining Hakim, one of the Foyers guests, she cannot hide her excitement when explaining to him the cultural relevance behind the Guadeloupean costume she is wearing, a matador gown. For personal reasons, she made some modifications to the traditional garb: she added a collaret and omitted the customary madras head tie, gold-bead choker, and earrings. These details reveal the great lengths to which she will go to hide her scar from others. Once revealed, however, the scars monstrosity (96) conjures up images of Frankensteins creation, especially because of the way Clanires neck has been stitched up and patched together. Cond writes:
Un garrot de caoutchouc violac, pais comme un bourrelet, repouss, ravaud, tavel, enserrait le cou. On aurait dit que celui-ci avait t coup en deux parties gales, puis rafistol tant bien que mal, les chairs rapprochs par force et bourgeonnant dans tous les sens comme elles le voulaient. (9697) Philcox translates: A purplish, rubberlike tourniquet, thick as a roll of flesh, repouss, stitched and pockmarked, wound around her neck. It was as if her neck had been slashed on both sides, then patched up and the flesh pulled together by force, oozing lumps all the way around. (61)
6 In Conds novel, the African characters believe that Clanires body is the vehicle or means by which evil spirits have been able to cross over from the other side of the ocean. The person whose body enables this crossing over is referred to as a cheval or a horse. Every horse can be potentially recognized by finding the appropriate sign or mark on its body, a task that is not easy to accomplish (33).
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Philcoxs translation tones down the inexplicable power and force that Clanire oftentimes exudes. The choice to translate bourgeonnant dans tous les sens comme elles le voulaient as oozing lumps all the way around diminishes both her scar and its uncontrollable nature; the omitted words, comme elles le voulaient, could have been translated as [oozing lumps] in whatever direction the flesh chose to go. Furthermore, Philcoxs translation of the word un garrot in the medical sense of tourniquet can in no way allude to its two other definitions in Le Robert & Collins: 1) the punishment and/or torture of shackling a prisoner and 2) the withers of a horse or the ridge between the animals shoulder bones. The hideous premise upon which Clanires throat is initially slashed, the scar on her neck thus translated and read by Hakim as the mark of a cheval, and all of the anguish caused by the subsequent destruction and deaths left in her wake are here replaced by the tourniquets primary mission of saving a persons life and healing wounds. The description of the scar reinforces Clanires fractured relationship to herself and others. Her constant state of turmoil and unrest is captured by Philcoxs translation, and it reaches its peak when Clanires husband takes her to Peru for a vacation at the end of the novel. During the trip, Clanires behavior could again be described as odd for a number of reasons: her loss of appetite, her disengagement from prior intellectual interests and humanitarian causes, her nocturnal wanderings and isolation, and most strikingly, her decline in physical health and appearance. She is incapable of speaking or even uttering a sound, and not one medical doctor is able to diagnose her illness. In the French, Cond describes her strange behavior with: Clanire semblait dsarticule (325), which Philcox translates as: Celanire seemed dislocated (221). In contrast to the translation of un garrot as a tourniquet, Philcoxs choice of dislocated, rather than disarticulated or disjointed, here departs from the medical definition of dsarticule. While dislocated can still refer to the physical displacement of a bone in the human body, it also has a less scientific definition in Websters: to put out of place or to force a change in the usual status, relationship, or order of; to disarrange or to disrupt. In this particular example, Philcoxs choice of words helps to create a certain kind of unintelligibility or chaos that parallels his wifes writing, which Cond herself has characterized as un tas dinfluences
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dans tous les sens [] une sorte de bouillabaisse (Moi, Maryse Cond 124). In this light, the word dislocated brings forth several possible contexts from which to frame and read Conds representation of Clanires patchwork identity: 1) her relationship to Frankensteins creation and the stitching of the body back together; 2) her ability to disrupt or unsettle hierarchical relationships of power and dominance; and 3) her inability to find a permanent home. To describe Clanire as dislocated, then, demonstrates the degree to which one word in translation, as Cond mentions in her interview with Apter, has the power to disrupt or unsettle (but here not necessarily for the worse), the play of languages in the original. Conclusion What constitutes the Caribbeanness of a text? (xi). Philcox poses this question in his preface to The Last of the African Kings and states that critics would have little reason to call African Kings a Guadeloupean novel, whereas Crossing the Mangrove would be exemplary of such a text. His response to this question echoes the senti7 ments of his wife: that what makes a text Caribbean cannot solely be defined by either the writers choice of language (French or Creole) or by elements such as landscape, forms of entertainment, or magical and religious practices (xii). Instead, he argues, it is very much the inner relationship of the individual to his or her environment, culture, or self (xii) that plays one of the determining factors in translating Caribbean literature. If, as I have argued throughout this article, Clanires relationship to her environment, culture, and self is always one of rupture and disconnect, then Philcoxs translation succeeds in bringing out Conds distinctive poetics. It is only by immersing oneself in the dislocations of translation from French into English that one can uncover how concepts of tone and intertextuality reveal what constitutes Conds Clanire cou
In response to Bernab, Chamoiseau, and Confiants loge de la crolit, and their positing of the Creole language as the sole means of achieving an authentic Caribbean poetics, Cond writes in her essay Crolit without the Creole Language?: I maintain that all writers must choose whatever linguistic strategies, narrative techniques, they deem appropriate to express their identity. No exclusions, no dictates (107).
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coup as a Caribbean text: the permanent feeling of exile that haunts Clanire. It is likewise only by engaging in close readings of the two novels together that one can begin to visualize how neither originals nor translations are ever created in isolation. Furthermore, a translators preface can figure as an important bridge between the original and the translation, underscoring the linguistic and cultural differences between the two texts, and also pointing to the new, creative work that has emerged. Attempts to establish aesthetic norms can end up constraining the artists creative process, not to mention the reading, interpretation, and translation of the work of art. In his essay, Translating Maryse Cond: A Personal Itinerary, Philcox explains how translating his wifes novels has helped to transform him into an Other (for as he puts it, his work has often forced him into a world not of his own), and also into an author in his own right:
I thus become Maryse Cond Maryse Cond, cest moi and perform the greatest ventriloquists act there is, taking over from the author and playing to the gallery. There she sits on the stage beside me, silent and composed, while I can reach an English-speaking audience with a translation she does not recognize of a text she once wrote in another language. And yet she should know what its like, taking an author and adapting her to ones own voice. After all, she did it to Emily Bront and Wuthering Heights, and I did it to Maryse Cond and Windward Heights. (33-34)
What Philcox refers to here is the way in which the process of translation, the movement or transfer of meaning from one language and culture to another, has the potential to add something new to the original. For what does it mean to be an original anyway? When read together, Conds novel and Philcoxs translation become a testament to the intertextual nature of the creative process for both authors and translators alike. With the ongoing dialogues, re-writings, and collaborative efforts occurring among writers, translators, originals, translations, paratexts, and readers, perhaps the limits of translation could best be viewed as the possibilities for new texts and new interpretative meanings.
176 Works Cited
Bernab, Jean, Patrick Chamoiseau, and Raphal Confiant. loge de la crolit. Paris: Gallimard, 1989. Cond, Maryse. Clanire cou-coup. Paris: Robert Laffont, 2000. _____. Crolit without the Creole Language? Caribbean Creolization: Reflections on the Cultural Dynamics of Language, Literature, and Identity. Ed. Kathleen M. Balutansky and Marie-Agns Sourieau. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 1998. _____. Interview with Emily Apter. Crossover Texts/Creole Tongues: A Conversation with Maryse Cond. Public Culture 13.1 (2001): 89-96. _____. Interview with Lydie Moudileno. Moi, Maryse Cond, libre dtre moi-mme Women in French Studies 10 (2002): 121-26. _____. Who Slashed Celanires Throat? A Fantastical Tale. Trans. Richard Philcox. New York: Atria Books, 2004. De Souza, Pascale. Crossing the Bridge of Beyond: Translating the Mangroves of French Caribbean Identities. Emerging Perspectives on Maryse Cond: A Writer of Her Own. Trenton: Africa World Press, 2006. Dislocate. Websters New World College Dictionary. 3rd ed. 1996. Fulton, Dawn. Monstrous Readings: Transgression and the Fantastic in Clanire cou-coup. Emerging Perspectives on Maryse Cond: A Writer of Her Own. Trenton: Africa World Press, 2006. Garrot. Le Robert & Collins. 6th ed. 2002. Hall, Stuart. Negotiating Caribbean Identities. New Caribbean Thought: A Reader. Ed. Brian Meeks and Folke Lindahl. Jamaica: The University of the West Indies Press, 2001. Kadish, Doris Y., and Franoise Massardier-Kenney. Traduire Maryse Cond: entretien avec Richard Philcox. The French Review 69.5 (1996): 749-61. NZengou-Tayo, Marie-Jos, and Elizabeth Wilson. Translators on a Tight Rope: The Challenges of Translating Edwidge Danticats Breath, Eyes, Memory and Patrick Chamoiseaus Texaco. TTR: Traduction, Terminologie, Rdaction 13.2 (2000): 75-105. Oblate. Websters New World College Dictionary. 3rd ed. 1996. Philcox, Richard. Preface. Crossing the Mangrove. By Maryse Cond. Trans. Richard Philcox. New York: Anchor Books, 1995. _____. Preface. The Last of the African Kings. By Maryse Cond. Trans. Richard Philcox. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1997.
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_____. Translating Maryse Cond: A Personal Itinerary. Emerging Perspectives on Maryse Cond: A Writer of Her Own. Ed. Sarah Barbour and Gerise Herndon. Trenton: Africa World Press, 2006. SimonSays.Com: The Website of Simon & Schuster, Inc. <http:// www.simonsays.com>. Path: Divisions and Imprints. Spivak, Gayatri Chakravorty. The Politics of Translation. Outside in the Teaching Machine. New York: Routledge, 1993. 179-200. Valens, Keja. Desire between Women in and as Parodic Mtissage: Maryse Conds Clanire cou-coup. Journal of Commonwealth and Postcolonial Studies 10.1 (2003): 67-93. Veldwachter, Germina Nadge. Politiques littraires: jeux de miroir, paratextes, et traductions du discours antillais en France et aux tats-Unis. Diss. University of California, Los Angeles, 2005. Venuti, Lawrence. The Translators Invisibility: A History of Translation. London: Routledge, 1995. World Literature Today 78.3 (2004): 19.
Translation
Christophe Ippolito
Ivan Allen College, Georgia Institute of Technology
Intercultural Politics: Translating Postcolonial Lebanese Literature in the United States

As the editor of a recently published bilingual edition of poems by Nadia Tuni, a Lebanese author, I had to prepare a scholarly edition of translated poems for a cross-cultural audience, negotiating meaning between linguistically and culturally different audiences in both Lebanon and the United States. In the process of editing this translation there were facilitating factors, but the editing and translating also presented challenges that point to issues concerning the relations between translation, on the one hand, and culture, postcolonial studies, and more generally, politics and globalization, on the other hand.
________________________ As Sherry Simon has noted, translations are based on theories of the given cultures that surround them and delineate the markers of identity and difference. The primary issue this study will focus on is the translation of culture. This general issue leads to many others. Based on practical experience with the challenges of editing and translating, this study will address the intercultural operations inherent to such an undertaking, as well as the facilitating factors that allowed this edition to be completed. After providing background on the publishing aspects of this enterprise, on its environment, on the author translated, and on the edited translation, this study will focus on what became the central issue in the editing/translating process, i.e., how is one to negotiate translation of culture in a copublication between a Western, dominant press and a local press (with special attention given here to politics)? Finally, the study will suggest practical solutions to the challenges that arose from this close contact between cultures.
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Some background is necessary here to understand the modus operandi of this translating/editing enterprise. The book contract was negotiated between Syracuse University Press, which had accepted my manuscript (poems and accompanying essays), and a Lebanese publishing company, Dar An-Nahar, owned by the husband of the writer whose work I was editing, Ghassan Tuni. Through a foundation, he also owned the rights to Nadia Tunis works in French. I was truly a go-between, placed in between two publishers and two cultures. It is also necessary to briefly describe the final product as published. The setting of the poems translated is the Lebanese war. The poems included in Lebanon: Poems of Love and War / Liban: Pomes damour et de guerre are selected from two collections published by Nadia Tuni (1935-1983), a Francophone poet, in 1979 and 1982, during the civil war in Lebanon. She stands as an example of multicultural identity: she was born to a French Catholic mother and a Druze father from a very old, influential, and prestigious Druze family. She was fluent in Arabic, Greek, French, and English, lived in Lebanon, Greece, France, and the United States, and married the Greek Orthodox Ghassan Tuni, who was a Beirut representative to the Lebanese Parliament, a newspaper mogul, future cabinet minister, and ambassador to the United Nations. Most of Nadia Tunis works were published in France, by Pierre Seghers and others (Flammarion, Belfond). One of the collections translated was published by Jean-Jacques Pauvert. The two collections selected are very different: the first one, Liban: Vingt Pomes pour un amour (Lebanon: Twenty Poems for One Love), has nationalist accents and celebrates twenty famous Lebanese locales as being symbolic of an eternal Lebanon; it is translated in its entirety. The second, Archives sentimentales dune guerre au Liban (Sentimental Archives of a War in Lebanon) deals with the daily reality of war; translation of only twenty poems from this collection has been authorized (they were selected by me as the editor). The volume includes an introduction and forty poems, followed by two essays meant to help the reader understand and contextualize the poems, and a short bibliography. After these preliminary remarks, I would like to address the central issue itself, translation of culture. Susan Bassnett and Andr Lefevere have identified in a founding essay how culture rather than the text itself has finally become the most important reality that a
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translator has to deal with: neither the word, nor the text, but the culture becomes the operational unit of translation (8). What was often previously considered as secondary became the main factor in the translators work. Bassnett and Lefevere have opened up a wealth of questions, many of which are relevant to the practice of editing and translation as analyzed here. Can one translate context and outlook? How is this relevant for the editors and translators choices, and what role does the experience of the translator play, since most of the time s/he is foreign to at least one of the cultures considered? Can what is taken from a culture be given back to this culture in some way, in the form of responsible, sustainable translation? What is not transmissible? Is translating merely stealing a culture by fragments? I cannot address all these questions in the limited space I have, so I will focus on reception and try to analyze whether the process of translating (involving the publishers understandable constraints as well as the translators and editors limitations) allows for a sound understanding of a foreign culture. It is extremely difficult to translate the tensions of the Lebanese civil war the jokes and terror inspired by the bombs, the dangers on the Green Line that then divided Beirut, the gaze of the victims, evenings on the Corniche or Moinot Street, the fortresses and cemeteries of the Druze mountains, the destroyed mosques and churches, torture, feelings, memories, all things that Lebanese readers would share and understand. Thus, while one should be aware of the trap of what George Steiner has famously called the fidelity-betrayal syndrome, how is one to be faithful to the spirit of the work, the nuances, and the cultural context rather than just the written word? How can another culture understand what is sometimes understated or even invisible in the translation? In some cases, the difficulties begin with the prejudices against a region of the world. Especially in the current domestic context with regard to the Middle East, it was not an easy proposition to have this translation published in the United States. The response of an American university press was the following (and I quote, but will not give the source here, as this was a private letter): the press is reluctant to try poetry translation or criticism of Middle Eastern Literature. Obviously, the fact that these poems addressed the civil war in Lebanon made it necessary to be extremely careful with the political aspects of
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the edition. Especially in a post-9/11 context, the political dimension posed the most delicate problems for the negotiation of meaning. Of course, in my experience as a translator and editor (and the editors job is also to supervise and harmonize translation), I have encountered what I would call nonpolitical examples of cultural differences. I could not review here all the issues that arose from minor differences concerning the translated poems themselves. I can give an example, though, and I will let the reader be the judge. This is an example of foreignization of the text (I will return to this concept in the paragraph below). In French, one of the poems begins with this line: Je suis ou ne suis pas, selon la loi du rve. The initial translation was I am or am not, depending on the laws of dreams. The excellent inhouse editor rightly suggested the following change: according to the laws of dreams. I agreed with the translator here, for I thought that the French selon was much stronger than according to in this poem. Selon implies a sense of emergency: the very existence of this voice saying I depends on the laws of dreams. And I should say that on all sides, most of the corrections were clearly made with the intention of respecting the author (blanks, spaces, etc.). There has to be some transparency in the translating process when it comes to the body of the text itself, if only to allow for a constructive dialogue between the different actors in the process. But the environment, in my view, lends itself more easily to foreignization. One politically marked occurrence of misunderstandings concerned the article of a Palestinian contributor. She speaks of national disasters constituted by the creation of Israel in 1948 and the Six Day War of June 1967 (Tuni, Lebanon: Poems of Love and War / Liban: Pomes damour et de guerre 99). The in-house editor suggested that, while no background on the Six-Day War was needed for the American public, an account of the disasters of 1948 should be supplied. I wrote back that I did not see a need for a gloss on 1948 (or for that matter on the Emergency Land Requisition Law of 1949, or the Absentee Property Law of 1950, etc.), as the information on what happened in 1948 (780,000 uprooted Palestinians became refugees) could be found in numerous reference books. I submitted the suggestion to my collaborator, who agreed with me, adding that the phrase national disaster in the context of a reference to 1948 was common in Arab countries in the seventies and is still common now, and that it is found
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everywhere, including in official government treaties. As an editor, I was aware I had a choice between two kinds of attitudes delineated by the translation scholar Lawrence Venuti: foreignizing or domesticating translation (see especially Invisibility 148 ff.). I chose to avoid simply rewriting the text of my collaborator and thus to foreignize. Should I have domesticated, I would not have been faithful to my collaborators point of view and would have indeed efface[d] the linguistic and cultural difference of the foreign text, which would have been rewritten in the transparent discourse dominating the target language culture (Venuti, Rethinking 5). Clearly, this was a marker of cultural difference I felt I had to reproduce. Some have suggested that Venutis distinction is a naive, modernist, and especially elitist division, 1 but I would submit that in this case, it was a sound one, particularly in the postcolonial context and on the global market. In the same vein, I chose to retain some words and expressions that may sound somewhat foreign in English. There was also a minor debate about the actual date of the invasion of South Lebanon by Israel under Ariel Sharon a military operation also termed Operation Peace for Galilee. While the bombing of PLO (Palestine Liberation Organization) targets began June 4, 1982, and was immediately followed by PLO mortar attacks, Israeli forces entered South Lebanon on June 6. June 4 is considered by many specialists in Middle Eastern Studies as the beginning of military operations. The contributor mentioned above had selected June 6 as the date of the Israeli invasion, a very symbolic date indeed in the Middle East, especially for Palestinians (June 6 also marks the beginning of the invasion of the West Bank and Jerusalem during the 1967 Six-Day War), and this date is usually the one that is recorded in the history books of Arab countries. I have to add here that one of the two collections, Archives sentimentales, appeared exactly at the time of the Israeli invasion. As is clear, both cultural differences have to do with the international context of the poems. In both instances, I supported my contributor and used the June 6th date in my introduction. A third occurrence of cultural difference had to do with the marketing of the book. The press wanted to have the words A revolution
Robinson, among others, has described Venutis theory as elitist in What is Translation?
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of poetic language on the books cover, and they were already in the publishers catalog. A revolution of poetic language is the title of a book by Julia Kristeva that I quoted in my introduction, although in a specific context (see Kristeva). This quote, I thought, was too heavily coded to appear on the cover, for a variety of a reasons, some nonpolitical. Chiefly, however, this phrase would have wrongly associated Tuni with Mallarm (the author studied in Kristevas book), or with Kristevas feminist stance. Moreover, these words were completely inappropriate in the case of the first collection, Liban: Vingt pomes pour un amour, as this is a very traditional volume, with nothing revolutionary in it. Above all I suggested that the word revolution is a very negative one in Lebanon (again, this was a coedition between a Lebanese and an American company). 2 Clearly, the above political issues have to do with the reception of the foreign text or culture, but some political issues also concern the production of the text, i.e., how it should be presented. Collaborating on production, on the whole a necessary aspect of the work, also presents challenges as well as facilitating factors. The challenges listed below concern mainly my introduction. I of course had to be careful with this introduction, and had the historical and religious aspects of it checked by several specialists in both Lebanon and the United States. Some background is necessary here. Ghassan Tuni, Nadia Tunis husband, is an important political figure in the Middle East and had an interest in being rather careful with the political and religious aspects of the edition, especially since the book was also intended for the Lebanese public, at a time when two of his collaborators were assassinated in Beirut. Among the facilitating factors, paramount was my good personal relation with Ghassan Tuni, and the fact that we were constantly in contact to negotiate aspects of this bilingual edition. I should mention that I worked at his publishing company over the summer of 2005. Ghassan Tuni provided useful suggestions and made minor corrections and additions to the volume. For example, I had spoken of a Lebanese poet, Fouad Gabriel Naffah, who I thought might have influenced Nadia Tuni, and indeed, Ghassan Tuni revealed to me that
2 I went on to suggest other marketing strategies for the cover, such as a short verse from Tuni in English. I suggested lines such as I survive my own ashes or a sob keeps vigil.
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Naffah was a close friend of the couple, confirming here that mentioning Naffah was justified. In addition, Ghassan Tuni translated the last text Nadia Tuni published before her death her testament piece and suggested it be added to the volume, which was done, and it was an excellent addition at that. Some negotiation of meaning occurred in the area of religion. He insisted that, while his former wife was brought up as a Druze, and while her Druze belief in immortality and reincarnation was important, it was essential to emphasize other familial aspects of her multicultural identity (she was married to an Orthodox Christian and had a Christian mother). I was sometimes under the impression that Ghassan Tuni wanted to minimize her Druze background. I added some Christian-marked words under his influence, on catharsis and the drama of forgiveness. He was my main source, of course, for biographical information on Nadia Tuni. But Ghassan Tuni also invited me to modify some minor political aspects of my text. As an example, I had written a sentence back in 2005 saying that the Taef agreements which ended the civil war in 1989 had not resolved all constitutional issues, far from it. Ghassan Tuni has had and still has a very important role in Lebanons political, domestic, and international life (particularly as a former Lebanese ambassador to the United Nations), and took part in the work that led to the Taef agreements. He suggested writing that the Taef agreements put an end to violence and constitutional crises, and I corrected this sentence, with his consent, changing it into put an end to violence and severe constitutional crises (as there are other kinds of constitutional crises in Lebanon, these days, the recent delay in electing a new president being the latest example). There was also a debate on the 1982 Israeli invasion, and how it should be emphasized that the Israeli Army did not stay in Beirut but returned to the South relatively quickly. I have spoken thus far of my interactions as an editor/translator with both presses. I now want to give an example of collaborative work between the presses. This has to do with both production and reception, as it concerns the insertion of an image and how to translate it from one culture to another. Some preliminary information about a technical aspect of this edition might be useful here. The 2004 contract between Dar An-Nahar and Syracuse University Press that was signed after lengthy negotiations established a copublication in which
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production in toto would be done in Syracuse. The contract added that both parties should maintain a close exchange of ideas, suggestions, and information all through the period of production and distribution. This no doubt facilitated the processing of this collaborative edition and alleviated the challenges that would inevitably arise. There are two photographs on the books cover, one of Nadia Tuni, and an AFP (Agence France-Presse) photograph of the civil war taken in 1976 and describing the aftermath of a bombing in Beirut, with one woman running away in tears among the debris and corpses. Ghassan Tuni wanted a photograph of Nadia Tuni, and Syracuse University Press went along with this suggestion and chose from a selection of Nadia Tunis photographs assembled by Dar An-Nahar. This was not an issue. However, the photograph on the cover representing the scene of the bombing stems from an e-mail from Ghassan Tuni, who remarked that instead of an idealized panoramic view of Lebanon as suggested by Syracuse University Press a war scene inspired by Lebanon as represented in Nadia Tunis poetry would probably work best. Under his direction, Dar An-Nahar finally selected a photograph of a realistic scene from the war which, according to Ghassan Tuni, corresponded perfectly to images that have inspired Nadia Tunis Archives sentimentales. What the collaboration between the two presses indicates here, I think, is the way in which a texts meaning, image, and identity may be adapted for the consumer in different cultures and markets. The expectations of a poetry reader may push the publisher to place material on the cover that is not necessarily consistent with the general meaning of a text as perceived by people belonging to the source culture. In what follows, I would like to address questions that also have to do with representation, although on a larger scale. In a time of globalization, how can one effectively keep a balance between what is specific to a given culture and what is part of the acceptable lingua franca of globalization? This will be analyzed through examples linked to problems posed by the representation of culture and religion. First, concerning the role of religion that I briefly alluded to earlier, how is one to explain the Druze religion in the limited space of an introduction, given that it plays such an important role in the poems? The Druze religion is all but unknown to the American public. For assistance with my concise account, I relied on the literary director from
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Dar An-Nahar, Fars Sassine, who emphasized a few central points beyond the fact that the Druze are heterodox Shiites. One important point I could never stress enough for the reader was the way this religion really a way of life permeates the existence of the people among whom Nadia Tuni was born. A few words, however accurate they may be, cannot replace the experience of visiting the close universe of the Druze mountains, its medieval castles, its social and political climate, its cemeteries in which different modes of reincarnation are represented by water, sculptures, and the placement of the tombs around them: all things that helped me to understand Druze practices and Nadia Tunis texts. Perhaps this type of information lies beyond the linguistic. It is part, I would submit, of what Maria Pinto calls the documentary competence of the translator. This concept, according to Pinto, includes the use of adequate information about the source culture, the translation process itself, and the ability to create new documents (for instance to accompany the translation). But it is also a technical competence that makes it possible to plan and handle the translation process effectively. 3 Further, and here I will only touch on a problem that has been widely studied, 4 how can one represent Lebanese culture, especially during the civil war? Specifically, are elements of a mythical Lebanon, according to Nadia Tuni, recognizable, or at least perceivable, in the edited book? For instance, many of the places described by Nadia Tuni are in Druze country, which is overrepresented compared to places sacred to Muslims or Christians. Here, Nadia Tuni expresses her difference as a member of a minority, given that Lebanon is sometimes wrongly seen in the United States as a uniform country in a unified Arab world. But while one would expect Nadia Tuni to defend (as many did during the war) the point of view of the extended families, minorities, and social groups to which she belonged as an upper-class Druze woman married to a Greek Orthodox Christian, in fact, it seems she is trying to reach out to the other sides of the conflict and express a sense of national unity in a country devastated by war. At the time, she was dying from cancer and succumbed one year after publishing the 1982 collection. It is difficult to translate her sense of
3 4
See Pinto, especially 106-10. See, for instance, the works by Ahmad Beydoun and Fadia Nassif Tar Kovacs.
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urgency and particular motivations in the complex context of Lebanese culture, politics, religion, society, or history at the time of the civil war. Also, some of the poems include words describing elements that are essential to Lebanese culture in general or to the context of the civil war in particular. However, one cannot always point to all of these words and their significance in each context. There is nothing like translation to give a feeling of incompleteness and imperfection. One can only hope that this effort in translation will be continued by readers, scholars, and other translators, since only a fraction of Nadia Tunis works have been translated into English. I would like to end by reviewing some of the facilitating factors. The most important challenge was the translation issue itself. What helped here was a kind of diversity that some would probably call a form of hybridity. There were two different translators, one LebaneseAmerican poet and academic, and one American academic for the two collections of poems selected in the book, and this produced two very different cultural approaches to the poems. Of course, the challenge here for the editor was to harmonize their different styles and word choices so as to have a coherent volume. My intent at first was to translate only the 1982 collection of poems, and I had chosen a scholar who had experience with translations but who was not well known. The press introduced an author who had published a translation of the previous 1979 collection of poems, but this translation had not met a wide readership. The press first suggested that since this translator was relatively well known, the book would be more marketable if he were to produce a second set of translations of the 1982 collection. A negotiation ensued. Finally, I retained the translator chosen for the 1982 collection, and the translation of the previous 1979 collection was included in the book, because these two sets of collections the last two written by the poet shared the same focus on the Lebanese war. Combining two very different collections (one more traditional, the other more avant-gardist) made sense in this instance. The first one also served as a kind of introduction to the second, but this process, while I agreed to it, was not my first idea. I think the fact that this became a very collaborative enterprise between different points of view helped. I would concur here with Barbara Godard, who thinks that a collective (of) translator(s) works better when it comes to translating postcolonial literatures (see Godard).
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In the same fashion, from the beginning of this project, I was aware that a cross-cultural approach to the edition was the best way to proceed. To alleviate the difficulty presented by this approach, for the two essays published with the poems I retained two very different contributors, which I think allowed for different voices (poetic, academic), different approaches (comparatist, philosophic), different points of view (Muslim, Christian, Palestinian, Lebanese) and different cultures (Francophone, Anglophone, Arabophone) to be better heard in the book. This choice of translators and contributors, and the fact that I worked with both presses, allowed me to maintain a balance. I find myself here in line with what Gayatri Spivak has proposed, regarding the environment of translations that should be, according to her, attentive to the local specificities and differences of the source text and culture (Spivak). I also concur with her that the best way of doing this, and to resolve the challenges posed to the translator/editor by the dominant Western target market, is to include a critical apparatus that is as developed as possible. In the end, and to conclude with a remark on this practice of in-betweeness that some have seen as central to the translation and publication of postcolonial works, I would submit that negotiating meaning between linguistically and culturally different audiences was in the case of the edition/translation studied here an ongoing intercultural affair that was best resolved by working with a team in which very different points of view appeared. I understand that each edition and translation is unique, and my aim was not to present a model to be followed. This imperfect edition was also an experience that allowed me to learn hands-on about the problems faced by translators and editors of postcolonial texts originating from multilingual cultures. It is true that politics was at the heart of this enterprise, because politics, including international politics, was essential to the translated text. Other poems may not be so deeply involved with politics. It is also very probable that as an editor and a translator I may lack the necessary distance for analysis. It remains in my view that the role of a conscientious editor of a bilingual edition is not so much to make the different perspectives come together, but to remain attentive in presenting material that is diverse enough to accommodate the different members of the team who themselves represent different audiences.
190 Works Cited
Bassnett, Susan, and Andr Lefevere, eds. Translation, History and Culture. London and New York: Pinter, 1990. Beydoun, Ahmad. Le Liban: Itinraires dans une guerre incivile. Paris and Amman: Karthala & CERMOC, 1993. Godard, Barbara. Translation as Culture. Translation and Multilingualism: Post-Colonial Contexts. Ed. Shanta Ramakrishna. New Delhi: Pencraft International, 1997. 157-82. Kristeva, Julia. La Rvolution du langage potique. Paris: Seuil, 1974. Pinto, Mara. Competencias del traductor de textos literarios desde la perspectiva documental. Terminologie et traduction 3 (1999): 99-111. Robinson, Douglas. What is Translation? Centrifugal Theories, Critical Interventions. Kent, OH: Kent State University Press, 1997. Simon, Sherry. Translation and Cultural Politics in Canada. Translation and Multilingualism: Post-Colonial Contexts. Ed. Shanta Ramakrishna. New Delhi: Pencraft International, 1997. 192-204. Spivak, Gayatri Chakravorty. Death of a Discipline. New York: Columbia University Press, 2003. Tar Kovacs, Fadia Nassif. Les rumeurs dans la guerre du Liban. Les mots de la violence. Paris: CNRS ditions, 1998. Tuni, Nadia. Archives sentimentales dune guerre au Liban. Paris: ditions Jean-Jacques Pauvert, 1982. _____. Lebanon: Poems of Love and War / Liban: Pomes damour et de guerre. Ed. Christophe Ippolito. Syracuse: Syracuse University Press and Beirut: Dar An-Nahar, 2006. _____. Liban: Vingt pomes pour un amour. Beirut: Dar An-Nahar, 1979. Trans. Samuel Hazo as Lebanon: Twenty Poems for One Love. New York: Byblos Press, 1990. _____. uvres compltes. Vol. I: Posies; Vol. II: La Prose. Ed. Jad Hatem. Collection Patrimoine. Beirut: Dar An-Nahar, 1986. Venuti, Lawrence, ed. Rethinking Translation. Discourse, Subjectivity, Ideology. London and New York: Routledge, 1992. _____. The Translators Invisibility. A History of Translation. London and New York: Routledge, 1995.
Translation
Cindy Merlin
University of Colorado at Boulder
Vu dici et l-bas: Le roman contemporain franais publi en traduction aux tats-Unis

Dans le monde de la traduction littraire aux tats-Unis, les critiques, les universitaires, les traducteurs et les diteurs modlent limage de la littrature trangre. En examinant la rception de luvre dAnnie Ernaux, Jean Echenoz, Jean-Philippe Toussaint et Lydie Salvayre par les critiques et diteurs amricains, cette tude explore brivement les facteurs qui influencent la slection des titres traduits et le rle de ceux qui faonnent, soutiennent ou infirment une certaine reprsentation du roman franais outre-Atlantique.
________________________ Dans La Distinction, Pierre Bourdieu dfinit la culture comme une entit construite par une lite, ce quil appelle les producteurs de la culture. De mme, aux tats-Unis, la culture et la littrature trangres sont faonnes par une autorit. Franois Cusset remarquait ainsi alors quil tait directeur de la French Publishers Agency que ce qui permet souvent des livres franais de traverser lAtlantique, cest une distorsion ou une rception un peu en diagonale des textes, rcuprs dans une problmatique spcifique (Vantroys 31). Cet article propose donc dexaminer le rle de ceux qui construisent, confirment ou infirment ces perceptions, de mettre jour les facteurs qui influencent la slection des titres traduits et de comprendre les raisons pour lesquelles seuls quelques-uns sont retenus linstar de beaucoup dautres. Le public amricain ne sintresse pas la littrature trangre, du moins est-ce le consensus dans le monde de ldition europenne.
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Ainsi, lorsque occurrence rare cette littrature est disponible en traduction, elle passe dans la majorit des cas inaperue. Cest ce tableau affligeant qui pousse un certain nombre dditeurs, traducteurs et critiques en Europe et outre-Atlantique dnoncer une crise de la littrature en traduction. Incontestablement, il existe un profond dsquilibre entre lEurope et les tats-Unis: entre 10 et 25% des livres publis sur le march europen sont traduits de ltranger; aux tatsUnis, ce chiffre est infrieur 3% (Venuti). John OBrien, diteur amricain, nhsite pas parler dune crise de la traduction littraire. En France, Pierre Lepape note lchange de plus en plus ingal entre les tats-Unis [] et les autres nations (24) tandis que Lawrence Venuti remarque: American publishers reap huge profits from the sale of their books overseas, but they invest appallingly little in the translation of foreign books. [] The implications are potentially far-reaching and deeply troubling. La littrature trangre aux tats-Unis doit faire face une ralit doublement svre. La premire difficult consiste trouver un diteur qui accepte dinvestir largent et leffort ncessaires la traduction dun livre; la seconde difficult rside dans le fait que les traductions se vendent trs mal. Malgr ce contexte exigeant, la langue franaise se situe remarquablement bien puisquelle se trouve en premire place parmi les langues traduites vers langlais aux tats-Unis. Si Knopf, Pantheon et Norton continuent aujourdhui publier pisodiquement quelques titres traduits du franais, Farrar, Straus & Giroux, Grove et Braziller pourtant trs investis dans la littrature trangre pendant les annes daprs-guerre ont de leur ct cd la place aux petits diteurs, tels Dalkey Archive Press, New Press, University of Nebraska Press et Seven Stories Press. Malgr des moyens et une influence limits, ces maisons sefforcent de maintenir un catalogue cohrent et de suivre la production littraire trangre contemporaine, notamment la production franaise. Toutefois ces petits diteurs dpendent souvent dun cercle limit de conseillers et nont pas toujours accs ltendue de la production littraire trangre. Ces conseillers, avec leurs prfrences et motivations personnelles, dcident ainsi du sort de la fiction franaise contemporaine aux tats-Unis et lui ouvrent les portes des maisons ddition, ce qui pourrait expliquer la traduction de textes dune si grande varit. Du reste, la publication dun texte ne garantit en aucun
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cas son succs commercial, et les petits diteurs ceux-l mme qui proposent le plus de traductions ont rarement les moyens de promouvoir leurs livres auprs dun public non-universitaire. La vritable promotion se fait, essentiellement, par lintermdiaire de la presse. Cest elle qui approuve et soutient les titres qui, au final, reprsenteront aux yeux du public amricain lensemble de la scne littraire franaise actuelle. Cependant, ce que les critiques choisissent de mettre en avant dans leurs articles ne recoupe pas ncessairement les intrts des diteurs. Le cadre de cette tude se limitant aux romans parus en France aprs 1980 et dont les auteurs sont franais ou originaires de pays francophones, les auteurs trangers de langue franaise tels Andre Makine et Julia Kristeva, tous deux par ailleurs largement traduits aux tats-Unis, se trouvent exclus. Selon ces critres, il apparat que Maryse Cond est la plus traduite aux tats-Unis. Elle est suivie de prs par Annie Ernaux et Jean Echenoz, qui comptent respectivement huit et sept traductions leur actif. Viennent ensuite Lydie Salvayre, Claude Simon, Patrick Chamoiseau, Marie Redonnet et Jean-Philippe Toussaint qui ont tous t traduits cinq reprises; puis Paule Constant, Marguerite Duras, Tahar Ben Jelloun et Herv Guibert qui comptent chacun quatre traductions leur actif. 1 Une vingtaine dcrivains compltent ce tableau. Se partageant la cinquime place, avec trois livres traduits, se trouvent ric Chevillard, Marie Darrieussecq, Assia Djebar, Christian Gailly, Michel Houellebecq, Jean-Marie G. Le Clzio (rcipiendaire du prix Nobel de littrature 2008), 2 Malika Mokeddem, Amlie Nothomb, Christian Oster, Gisle Pineau, Jean Rouaud et Jean-Christophe Ruffin, 3 tandis quon retrouve au bas de la liste, avec deux traductions leur actif, Marcel Bnabou, Anna Gavalda, Sylvie Germain, Roger Grenier, Jacqueline Harpman, Amin Maalouf, Patrick Modiano, Marie Nimier, Erik Orsenna, Olivier
Voir lannexe 1 les titres des auteurs dont quatre romans ou plus ont t traduits aux tats-Unis. 2 Au sujet de Jean-Marie G. Le Clzio, il faut signaler que bien que seuls trois de ses romans parus en France aprs 1980 aient t traduits, nombre de ses prcdents romans lont aussi t: Le Procs-verbal (The Interrogation, 1964), Le Dluge (The Flood, 1967), Terra Amata (Terra Amata, 1969), Le Livre des fuites (The Book of Flights, 1972), La Guerre (War, 1973) et Les Gants (The Giants, 1975). 3 Voir lannexe 2 les titres des auteurs dont trois romans ont t traduits aux tats-Unis.
1
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Rolin, Jacques Roubaud, Didier Van Cauwelaert, Tanguy Viel et Antoine Volodine. 4 Des crivains trs diffrents se partagent donc lexclusivit des trois premires places du palmars: Ernaux, Echenoz et Cond. Ils constituent une liste pour le moins clectique, du roman despionnage revisit lautofiction et la francophonie. Par ailleurs, les tendances que lon peut observer en France ne se confirment pas ncessairement outre-Atlantique. Ainsi, Oster, Toussaint et Echenoz, tous publis aux ditions de Minuit, ne rencontrent pas le mme engouement aux tats-Unis et Marie Redonnet, dont on parle trs peu en France, semble tre parvenue pntrer le march amricain pourtant rput difficile. Parmi les romanciers traduits aux tats-Unis, quatre mont sembl mettre en vidence des traits distinctifs et reprsentatifs des tendances observes. Je me pencherai de la sorte sur luvre dAnnie Ernaux, Jean Echenoz, Jean-Philippe Toussaint et Lydie Salvayre. Chacun dentre eux interpelle le lecteur amricain sa manire , Ernaux pour ses rcits autobiographiques, Echenoz pour ses parodies policires, Toussaint pour son humour et Salvayre pour son engagement social et politique. Ltude de la rception de ces auteurs aux tats-Unis me permettra desquisser un rapide tat des lieux du roman contemporain franais outre-Atlantique et de voir comment celui-ci est peru et prsent par les critiques et diteurs amricains. Pour promouvoir Annie Ernaux, Seven Stories Press, qui a publi ou rdit la plupart de ses traductions aux tats-Unis, met en avant le genre autobiographique, les motifs typiquement fminins, lcriture rude et dpouille et le courage de lcrivain qui nhsite pas dire linterdit. loppos, Dalkey Archive Press vante loriginalit dune uvre en rupture avec la tradition littraire franaise et minimise limportance de la matire dramatique fminine au profit de questions sociales plus vastes dans lesquelles une plus grande gamme de lecteurs pourra se retrouver. La presse amricaine admet parfois que les romans dErnaux ctoient le mlodrame ou dautres motifs trop connus, nanmoins elle sempresse de relever dautres caractristiques qui
4 Voir lannexe 3 les titres des auteurs dont deux romans ont t traduits aux tats-Unis.
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font, ses yeux, leur originalit et qui rachtent leurs faiblesses. 5 Pour complter ce portrait de la romancire, les critiques ne manquent pas de faire quelques rapprochements avec dautres valeurs sres de la littrature franaise, Simone de Beauvoir et Albert Camus. 6 Seconde au palmars, luvre dEchenoz plat outre-Atlantique pour ses aventures typiquement parisiennes, parodies intelligentes du roman despionnage satures dhumour, de rfrences la culture pop, denlvements et de poursuites main arme. Loriginalit et la valeur littraire des romans dEchenoz nchappent pourtant pas aux critiques qui soulignent la manipulation des traditions du genre romanesque et la prcision de lcriture, 7 mais au final, comme le remarque Caryn James, le lecteur amricain retiendra certainement le nom du romancier pour ses personnages dtectives amateurs et ses intrigues, chafaudes autour de deux des thmes favoris de la culture pop, la
5 Citons quelques critiques titre dexemples: Simple Passion [] is part semiotic treatise and part Harlequin romance, and all the better for the combination of high and low. [] [I]t embraces the crazed adolescent behavior that can crop up at any age, yet is intelligent enough to wrap those details in a taut literary shape and defiantly unemotional language (James, Who Can); With a spare, almost coded prose style [] Ms. Ernaux makes of her generic topics infinitely original books (Danto, When Mother); What makes Happening more than a clichd tale of youthful misadventure and botched abortion is [the characters] reaction to her pregnancy (Press, Vagina Monologues); I Remain in Darkness is a small, powerful, and overwritten memoir []. Too often, [] poignant scenes are dampened by the memoirists insistence on spelling things out (I Remain in Darkness, Kirkus). 6 Ginger Danto crit ainsi: Like de Beauvoir, with whom she has been compared, Ms. Ernaux all but relinquishes any pretense of fiction (When Mother); tandis que Miranda Seymour remarque: Some critics have compared [Ernaux] to Simone de Beauvoir, but the reasonable, balanced voice I hear echoing behind her is that of Albert Camus (6). 7 Au sujet de lcriture de Jean Echenoz, citons en particulier Warren Motte: The principal hallmarks of Echenozs style are his laconism, his dry wit, and the precision with which he chooses words and images (Reading Jean Echenoz 6); ainsi que Susan Ireland qui crit dans sa critique de Big Blondes: Mark Polizzottis fine translation does an excellent job of capturing Echenozs hallmark style: his clever wordplay, unexpected turns of phrase, and idiosyncratic humor. Concernant la manipulation des conventions romanesques, citons Izzy Grinspan: [Chopins Move] is a nod to the espionage genre; ainsi que Paul Kafka-Gibbons: Im Gone combines the policier, the cultural essay and the urban sex novel to create a vivid, entertaining hybrid. Warren Motte crit galement: In his early novels Echenoz often borrowed basic plot structure from a variety of tried-and-tested genres, recasting it dramatically to his own purposes, and exploiting its potential for parody along the way (Reading Jean Echenoz 6).
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clbrit et le crime (Guy Noir). Dalkey Archive Press et New Press vantent le sens de lhumour et du dtail du romancier et mettent en avant son Prix Goncourt. Toute comparaison ou toute vignette susceptible de provoquer lintrt du lecteur est consciencieusement tudie et exploite par les diteurs et critiques amricains au risque den arriver des rapprochements parfois incongrus. Ainsi selon la critique amricaine, luvre dEchenoz se situerait quelque part entre Dashiell Hammett, Gustave Flaubert, James Joyce, John-Patrick Donleavy, Raymond Queneau, Joseph Conrad, Dick Tracy, lexistentialisme et le Nouveau Roman. 8 Auteurs, titres et genres deviennent ce que Pierre Bourdieu appelle des uvres-tmoins, des rfrences consciemment ou inconsciemment retenues parce quelles prsentent un degr particulirement lev les qualits reconnues, de manire plus ou moins explicite, comme pertinentes dans un systme de classement dtermin (54). Grce ces rapprochements, le critique signifie que le livre nouvellement paru partage des traits avec des uvres tablies au patrimoine littraire international. Il importe peu que ces rapprochements soient surprenants ou discutables, leur rle se limite crer des associations dans lesprit du lecteur, de lier une uvre nouvelle une uvre dart, un genre nouveau un genre tabli. Jean-Philippe Toussaint, lui aussi comme Jean Echenoz publi aux ditions de Minuit depuis son premier roman, ne connat pas autant de succs outre-Atlantique. La presse amricaine loue principalement le sens de lhumour de Toussaint; les mmes adjectifs reviennent invariablement: charming, humorous, comical, amusing, agreeable, delightful, funny, hilarious, entertaining. 9 Pour la critique
Citons quelques critiques titre dexemples: [In Im Gone] Ferrers solitude is vaguely reminiscent of the lonely characters of Joyces Dubliners or even Donleavys The Ginger Man (Paddock 160); Double Jeopardy [] is a zany adventure story reminiscent of both Conrad and Dick Tracy (Ireland, Double Jeopardy); The precision of [Echenozs] prose is part Flaubert, part nouveau roman, and his sardonic take on Hammetts hard-boiled detective fiction is pure art (James, Guy Noir); [Double Jeopardy is] full of little twists and crackles of linguistic static []. Raymond Queneau, meet Gilbert and Sullivan (Double Jeopardy, Kirkus); Im Gone cooks up a very French mlange of existential self-making, Queneauvian trickery, and nouveau roman-ish preoccupation with surfaces (Berrett 82). 9 Citons ici titre dexemples: Television [is] a charming, meandering sliver of fiction (Press, Le Boob); In this delightful short novel [Television], [] Toussaint has a wonderfully wry, tart sense of humor that permeates the comical social satire
8
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amricaine, toujours la recherche dune caractristique, dun genre, dune cole, chaque auteur a sa marque propre. Celle de Toussaint est dcrire des livres courts, amusants et divertissants qui mettent en scne des personnages simples et humains, dsolants de banalit et dinertie; et ce sont incidemment les mmes caractristiques que les diteurs amricains de Jean-Philippe Toussaint mettent en avant dans leurs catalogues. Aprs les confidences dErnaux, les pripties dEchenoz et lhumour de Toussaint, luvre de Lydie Salvayre apparat plus dure, plus critique. Cest une uvre aux accents clairement sociopolitiques dont lhumour perant et lironie divertissent en mme temps quils dfient et interpellent le lecteur. Selon la presse amricaine, lironie, la colre et lindignation de lauteur mettent mal laise, confrontent, dstabilisent et accusent. Toutefois, les deux diteurs amricains de Salvayre, Four Walls Eight Windows et Dalkey Archive Press, vont beaucoup moins loin dans leurs catalogues. Selon eux, luvre de Salvayre serait plus impertinente quelle ne serait ironique; elle inviterait le lecteur plus quelle ne le provoquerait; elle dnoncerait plus quelle ne sengagerait rellement. 10 On pourrait aisment parler de littrature engage (Motte, Reading Lydie Salvayre), nanmoins les diteurs amricains de Salvayre ne misent pas sur cette caractristique et refusent de contraindre ses livres cette catgorisation.
(Trachtenberg); [In Television] Toussaint gradually paints an endearingly funny portrait of a mildly obsessive introvert [], most readers will be charmed []. Very entertaining indeed (Television, Kirkus); [In Monsieur] one soon finds Monsieurs unflappable style amusing and is seduced by his deadpan sense of the absurd (Danto, No Zeal); From its opening sentence, [] [The Bathroom] carries its deadpan voice like an expert waiter balancing platters. The choreography that follows is elegant and entertaining (Mendelsohn). 10 Tandis quAdam Klein remarque au sujet de Everyday Life, [The novel] is a wise and caustic take on the corporate office, one that confronts us with the dangers that come with the craving from constancy and job security, Dalkey Archive Press se contente dcrire, Sabotage, alcohol, and kindness become the arsenal in a conflict fought across copy rooms and office parties. Par ailleurs, Rachel Kushner note au sujet de The Company of Ghosts, It seems more likely that [Salvayre] resorts to the testimonial because it comes naturally to her as the form in which story, character and biting sociopolitical irony most effectively dwell, alors que Dalkey Archive Press crit simplement, Lydie Salvayre picks at the sores of recent French history, impertinently exposing continuities of authoritarianism.
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Il ressort de ce rapide tat des lieux que les tendances sont plutt encourageantes: sept romanciers contemporains ont vu au moins cinq de leurs livres traduits tandis que de nombreux autres ont t traduits trois ou quatre reprises. Lucinda Karter la French Publishers Agency remarque ainsi depuis quelques annes un renouveau du livre franais aux tats-Unis. Elle crivait dans La Lettre en septembre 2003 que la littrature franaise traduite en anglais ne se port[ait] pas si mal; en janvier 2005 elle constatait que le public amricain montrait un nouvel intrt pour la fiction franaise, et en aot 2005 elle remarquait que le livre franais continu[ait] sa marche en avant, entamant les bastions de la fiction anglo-saxonne avec rgularit. Enfin, elle notait en janvier 2006 un changement positif dans lintrt des diteurs amricains en particulier pour la fiction franaise, qui [avait] connu un essor aux tats-Unis dernirement. Plus encore, elle remarquait en janvier 2008 que les tats-Unis souvrent la production littraire internationale.
Nous entrons aux tats-Unis [] dans une nouvelle re dapprciation des livres venant dailleurs. Ces dernires annes, plusieurs initiatives tels le Pen Literary Festival, Words Without Borders et World in Translation Month ont dj annonc un plus grand intrt pour la traduction. En 2007, de nouveaux vnements nont fait que confirmer cette tendance: BookExpo America, Miami Dade College, Pen American Center, Publishers Weekly, Library Journal, WWB et Crticas ont prsent lors de la Miami International BookFair une journe ddie au sujet. Cest le signe vident dun changement: la mise en valeur des crivains dailleurs et des diteurs qui les publient. (21)
O est donc la crise que tant dnoncent? Selon Pierre Lepape, il ne sagirait pas tant dune crise de la traduction que dune crise globale de ldition. Dans le monde entier, ldition et la lecture ont pris une nouvelle direction et se retrouvent aujourdhui partages entre deux idaux. Dun ct, le modle classique de la libre circulation des affects des ides et de leur universelle confrontation, de lautre, le modle nocapitaliste dune conomie de march selon laquelle le travail ditorial consiste analyser, interprter et satisfaire les attentes du public en sajustant constamment ses dsirs, et carter ce qui ne sy conforme pas (25). Ce serait donc lindustrie du livre lchelle internationale qui serait en pril et les
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inquitudes des professionnels de la traduction se perdraient dans le fond dun constat plus alarmant. La responsable des droits trangers dune grande maison ddition parisienne dont je ne suis pas libre de rvler le nom rappelle en effet limportance du rle des diteurs, en Europe et aux tats-Unis. Cest eux que revient la dcision de suivre ou de prcder le march, de prendre des risques et publier des titres novateurs, ou de se plier aux tendances et rpondre une demande prexistante. Elle explique galement que, en slectionnant leurs titres daprs les recommandations dun universitaire ou dun critique plutt que celles dun professionnel de la traduction littraire, les maisons amricaines font souvent des choix ditoriaux regrettables. Ces choix devraient revenir, selon elle, au responsable des droits trangers qui remplit le rle du passeur; cest lui que doit incomber la responsabilit de concilier les besoins dune maison ddition, les attributs dun auteur, la demande du public et les particularits dun march. Nanmoins la ralit amricaine veut que le concept et le poste dditeur (publisher en anglais) nexistent plus que dans les petites maisons et la littrature trangre sen trouve considrablement dsavantage. Les valeurs incarnes dans les annes daprs-guerre par Alfred et Blanche Knopf, Kurt Wolff (qui a fond Pantheon en 1942) et Barney Rosset (qui a rachet Grove Press en 1952) ne commandent plus le march de la traduction; Franois Cusset remarque ainsi:
Dans les grandes maisons, le pouvoir de dcision a rcemment bascul de lditorial au marketing. Or, les responsables du marketing sont souvent des gens qui ne viennent pas de ldition. Ils sont chargs avant tout de garantir les ventes dun livre, et considrent avec une espce de prjug trs amricain quune traduction est forcment litiste. Quant aux quelques diteurs de qualit qui ont russi survivre dans lindustrie du livre, ils sont peu nombreux, ont peu de pouvoir et beaucoup moins de marge de manuvre quil y a dix ans. (Vantroys 31)
Par ailleurs, le public amricain semble ne stre jamais dfait de limage de la littrature franaise des annes 1950 et 1960, image paradoxalement ngative si lon considre le succs que le livre franais connaissait outre-Atlantique lpoque. Jacqueline Favero, prsidente de la commission des droits trangers au Syndicat national de
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ldition, remarque ainsi que le livre franais a longtemps souffert de limage ngative du nouveau roman (Vantroys 31). Franois Cusset explique galement quaux yeux du public amricain la littrature franaise est faite de nombrilisme et de formalisme et quelle est perue comme une littrature qui sautodtruit, qui ne veut pas avoir de lecteurs et qui a annul toute histoire (Vantroys 31). Quelques diteurs amricains considrent au contraire que la fiction franaise contemporaine a depuis longtemps dpass cette tradition. Dan Simon chez Seven Stories Press explique: la fiction franaise [] est plus ouverte, plus internationale quil y a quinze ans []. Elle est moins crbrale, moins formaliste, dtermine davantage par les personnages et le souci de la vraie vie (Cusset 58). Il reste nanmoins au roman franais prouver aux grandes maisons ddition quil peut de nouveau intresser le public amricain; en attendant, cest sur les petites maisons que repose lespoir de la littrature franaise outre-Atlantique. Annexe 1
Ben Jelloun, Tahar. Corruption. Trad. Carol Volk. New York: New Press, 1995. _____. The Last Friend. Trad. Kevin Michel Cape. New York: New Press, 2006. _____. This Blinding Absence of Light. Trad. Linda Coverdale. New York: New Press, 2002. _____. With Downcast Eyes. Trad. Joachim Neugroschel. New York: Bulfinch Press, 1993. Chamoiseau, Patrick. Childhood. Trad. Carol Volk. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1999. _____. Chronicle of the Seven Sorrows. Trad. Linda Coverdale. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1999. _____. School Days. Trad. Linda Coverdale. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1997. _____. Solibo Magnificent. Trad. Rose-Myriam Rjouis et Val Vinokurov. New York: Pantheon, 1997. _____. Texaco. Trad. Rose-Myriam Rjouis et Val Vinokurov. New York: Pantheon, 1997. Cond, Maryse. The Children of Segu. Trad. Linda Coverdale. New York: Viking, 1989.
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_____. Crossing the mangrove. Trad. Richard Philcox. New York: AnchorDoubleday, 1995. _____. Desirada. Trad. Richard Philcox. New York: Soho Press, 2000. _____. I, Tituba, Black Witch of Salem. Trad. Richard Philcox. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 1992. _____. The Last of the African Kings. Trad. Richard Philcox. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1997. _____. A Season in Rihata. Trad. Richard Philcox. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 1988. _____. Segu. Trad. Barbara Bray. New York: Viking, 1987. _____. The Story of the Cannibal Woman. Trad. Richard Philcox. New York: Atria Books, 2007. _____. Tree of Life. Trad. Victoria Reiter. New York: Ballantine, 1992. _____. Who Slashed Clanires Throat? Trad. Richard Philcox. New York: Washington Square Press, 2004. _____. Windward Heights. Trad. Richard Philcox. New York: Soho Press, 1999. Constant, Paule. The Governors Daughter. Trad. Betsy Wing. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1998. _____. Ouregano. Trad. Margaret Miller. Lanham, MD: Lexington, 2005. _____. Trading Secrets. Trad. Betsy Wing. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2001. _____. White Spirit. Trad. Betsy Wing. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2005. Duras, Marguerite. No More. Trad. Richard Howard. New York: Seven Stories Press, 1998. _____. The North China Lover. Trad. Leigh Hafrey. New York: New Press, 1992. _____. The War. Trad. Barbara Bray. New York: New Press, 1994. _____. Yann Andrea Steiner. Trad. Mark Polizzotti. New York: Archipelago Books, 2006. Echenoz, Jean. Big Blondes. Trad. Mark Polizzotti. New York: New Press, 1998. _____. Cherokee. Trad. Mark Polizzotti. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1994. _____. Chopins Move. Trad. Mark Polizzotti. Normal, Ill: Dalkey Archive Press, 2004. _____. Double Jeopardy. Trad. Mark Polizzotti. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1994.
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_____. Im Gone. Trad. Mark Polizzotti. New York: New Press, 2001. _____. Piano. Trad. Mark Polizzotti. New York: New Press, 2004. _____. Ravel. Trad. Linda Coverdale. New York: New Press, 2007. Ernaux, Annie. Exteriors. Trad. Tanya Leslie. New York: Seven Stories Press, 1996. _____. A Frozen Woman. Trad. Linda Coverdale. New York: Four Walls Eight Windows, 1995. _____. Happening. Trad. Tanya Leslie. New York: Seven Stories Press, 2001. _____. I Remain in Darkness. Trad. Tanya Leslie. New York: Seven Stories Press, 1999. _____. A Mans Place. Trad. Tanya Leslie. New York: Four Walls Eight Windows, 1992. _____. Shame. Trad. Tanya Leslie. New York: Seven Stories Press, 1998. _____. Simple Passion. Trad. Tanya Leslie. New York: Four Walls Eight Windows, 1993. _____. A Womans Story. Trad. Tanya Leslie. New York: Four Walls Eight Windows, 1991. Guibert, Herv. Blindsight. Trad. James Kirkup. New York: Braziller, 1996. _____. The Compassionate Protocol. Trad. James Kirkup. New York: Braziller, 1993. _____. My Parents. Trad. Liz Heron. New York: Serpents Tail, 1993. _____. To The Friend Who Did Not Save My Life. Trad. Linda Coverdale. New York: Atheneum/MacMillan, 1991. Redonnet, Marie. Candy Story. Trad. Alexandra Quinn. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1995. _____. Forever Valley. Trad. Jordan Stump. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1994. _____. Nevermore. Trad. Jordan Stump. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1996. _____. Rose Mellie Rose. Trad. Jordan Stump. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1994. _____. Splendid Hotel. Trad. Jordan Stump. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1994. Salvayre, Lydie. The Award. Trad. Jane Davey. New York: Four Walls Eight Windows, 1997. _____. The Company of Ghosts. Trad. Christopher Woodall. Normal, IL: Dalkey Archive Press, 2006.
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_____. Everyday Life. Trad. Jane Kuntz. Normal, IL: Dalkey Archive Press, 2006. _____. The Lecture. Trad. Linda Coverdale. Normal, IL: Dalkey Archive Press, 2005. _____. The Power of Flies. Trad. Jane Kuntz. Champaign, IL: Dalkey Archive Press, 2007. Simon, Claude. The Acacia. Trad. Richard Howard. New York: Pantheon, 1990. _____. The Georgics. Trad. Beryl et John Fletcher. New York: Riverrun Press, 1989. _____. The Invitation. Trad. Jim Cross. Elmwood Park, IL: Dalkey Archive Press, 1991. _____. The Jardin des Plantes. Trad. Jordan Stump. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 2001. _____. The Trolley. Trad. Richard Howard. New York: New Press, 2002. Toussaint, Jean-Philippe. The Bathroom. Trad. Nancy Amphoux et Paul De Angelis. Champaign, IL: Dalkey Archive Press, 2008. _____. Camera. Trad. Matthew B. Smith. Champaign, IL: Dalkey Archive Press, 2008. _____. Making Love. Trad. Linda Coverdale. New York: New Press, 2004. _____. Monsieur. Trad. John Lambert. Champaign, IL: Dalkey Archive Press, 2008. _____. Television. Trad. Jordan Stump. Normal, IL: Dalkey Archive Press, 2004.
Annexe 2
Chevillard, Eric. The Crab Nebula. Trad. Jordan Stump et Eleanor Hardin. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1997. _____. On the Ceiling. Trad. Jordan Stump. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1997. _____. Palafox. Trad. Wyatt Mason. New York: Archipelago Books, 2004. Darrieussecq, Marie. My Phantom Husband. Trad. Esther Allen. New York: New Press, 1999. _____. Pig Tales. Trad. Linda Coverdale. New York: New Press, 1997. _____. Undercurrents. Trad. Linda Coverdale. New York: New Press, 2000. Djebar, Assia. Fantasia, An Algerian Cavalcade. Trad. Dorothy Blair. London, New York: Quartet, 1985. _____. A Sister to Sheherazade. Trad. Dorothy Blair. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 1993.
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_____. So Vast the Prison. Trad. Betsy Wing. New York: Seven Stories Press, 1999. Gailly, Christian. An Evening at the Club. Trad. Susan Fairfield. New York: Other Press, 2003. _____. The Passion of Martin Fissel-Brandt. Trad. Melanie Kemp. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2002. _____. Red Haze. Trad. Brian Evenson. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2005. Houellebecq, Michel. The Elementary Particles. Trad. Frank Wynne. New York: Knopf, 2000. _____. Platform. Trad. Frank Wynne. New York: Knopf, 2003. _____. The Possibility of an Island. Trad. Gavin Bowd. New York: Knopf, 2006. Le Clzio, G. Jean-Marie. Onitsha. Trad. Alison Anderson. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1997. _____. The Prospector. Trad. Carol Marks. Boston: David Godine, 1993. _____. Wandering Star. Trad. C. Dickson. Willimantic, CT: Curbstone, 2004. Mokeddem, Malika. Century of Locusts. Trad. Laura Rice. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2006. _____. The Forbidden Woman. Trad. K. Melissa Marcus. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1998. _____. Of Dreams and Assassins. Trad. K. Melissa Marcus. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2000. Nothomb, Amlie. The Book of Proper Names. Trad. Shaun Whiteside. New York: Martins Press, 2004. _____. The Character of Rain. Trad. Timothy Bent. New York: St. Martins Press, 2003. _____. Fear and Trembling. Trad. Adriana Hunter. New York: St. Martins Press, 2002. Oster, Christian. My Big Apartment. Trad. Jordan Stump. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2003. _____. A Cleaning Woman. Trad. Mark Polizzotti. New York: Other Press, 2003. _____. The Unforeseen. Trad. Adriana Hunter. New York: Other Press, 2007. Pineau, Gisle. Devils Dance. Trad. C. Dickson. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2006. _____. Exile according to Julia. Trad. Betty Wilson. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2003.
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_____. Macadam Dreams. Trad. C. Dickson. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2003. Rouaud, Jean. Fields of Glory. Trad. Ralph Manheim. New York: Arcade, 1992. _____. Of Illustrious Men. Trad. Barbara Wright. New York: Arcade, 1994. _____. The World More or Less. Trad. Barbara Wright. New York: Arcade, 1998. Ruffin, Jean-Christophe. The Abyssinian. Trad. Willard Wood. New York: Norton, 2000. _____. Brazil Red. Trad. Willard Wood. New York: Norton, 2004. _____. The Siege of Isfahan. Trad. Willard Wood. New York: Norton, 2001.
Annexe 3
Bnabou, Marcel. Jacob, Mehahem, and Mimoun. Trad. Steven Rendall. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1998. _____. To Write on Tamara? Trad. Steven Rendall. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2004. Gavalda, Anna. Hunting and Gathering. Trad. Alison Anderson. New York: Riverhead Books, 2007. _____. Someone I Loved. Trad. Euan Cameron. New York: Riverhead Books, 2005. Germain, Sylvie. The Book of Nights. Trad. Christine Donougher. Boston: David Godine, 1993. _____. Night of Amber. Trad. Christine Donougher. Boston: David Godine, 2000. Grenier, Roger. Another November. Trad. Alice Kaplan. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1998. _____. Piano Music for Four Hands. Trad. Alice Kaplan. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2001. Harpman, Jacqueline. I Who Have Never Known Men. Trad. Ros Schwartz. New York: Seven Stories Press, 1997. _____. Orlanda. Trad. Ros Schwartz. New York : Seven Stories Press, 1999. Maalouf, Amin. Balthasars Odyssey. Trad. Barbara Bray. New York: Arcade, 2002. _____. Origins. Trad. Catherine Temerson. New York: Farrar Straus & Giroux, 2008. Modiano, Patrick. Honeymoon. Trad. Barbara Wright. Boston: David Godine, 1995.
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_____. Out of The Dark. Trad. Jordan Stump. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1998. Nimier, Marie. The Giraffe. Trad. Mary Feeney. New York: Four Walls Eight Windows, 1995. _____. Hypnotism Made Easy. Trad. Sophie Hawke. New York: Four Walls Eight Windows, 1996. Orsenna, Erik. Grammar Is a Sweet, Gentle Song. Trad. Moishe Black. New York: George Braziller, 2004. _____. Love and Empire. Trad. Jeremy Leggatt. New York: Harpercollins, 1991. Rolin, Olivier. Hotel Crystal. Trad. Jane Kuntz. Champaign, IL: Dalkey Archive Press, 2008. _____. Paper Tiger. Trad. William Cloonan. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2007. Roubaud, Jacques. Hortense in Exile. Trad. Dominic Di Bernardi. Normal, IL: Dalkey Archive Press, 1992. _____. Hortense is Abducted. Trad. Dominic Di Bernardi. Normal, IL: Dalkey Archive Press, 2000. Van Cauwelaert, Didier. One-Way. Trad. Mark Polizzotti. New York: Other Press, 2003. _____. Out of My Head. Trad. Mark Polizzotti. New York: Other Press, 2005. Viel, Tanguy. The Absolute Perfection of Crime. Trad. Linda Coverdale. New York: New Press, 2002. _____. Beyond Suspicion. Trad. Linda Coverdale. New York: New Press, 2008. Volodine, Antoine. Minor Angels. Trad. Jordan Stump. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2004. _____. Naming the Jungle. Trad. Linda Coverdale. New York: New Press, 1995.
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Berrett, Jesse. Crit. de Im Gone, de Jean Echenoz. Village Voice mars 2001: 81-82. Bourdieu, Pierre. La Distinction: Critique sociale du jugement. Paris: Minuit, 1979. Crit. de I Remain in Darkness, de Annie Ernaux. Kirkus Reviews 67 (1999): 1540. Crit. de Lac, de Jean Echenoz. Kirkus Reviews 63 (1995): 1367-68. Crit. de The Power of Flies, de Lydie Salvayre. Kirkus Reviews 81 (2007): 657. Crit. de Television, de Jean-Philippe Toussaint. Kirkus Reviews 72 (2004): 937. Cusset, Franois. Les Amricains jugent la production franaise. Livres Hebdo 11 fv. 2000: 55-60. Danto, Ginger. No Zeal, Please. New York Times Book Review 6 oct. 1991: 13. _____. When Mother Became History. New York Times Book Review 19 mai 1991: 13. Grinspan, Izzy. Hell Always Have Paris: Sometimes Its All about Location. Village Voice 3 mars 2004: C53. Ireland, Susan. Crit. de Big Blondes, de Jean Echenoz. Review of Contemporary Fiction 18.1 (1998): 232. James, Caryn. Guy Noir. New York Times Book Review 25 avr. 2004: 15. _____. Who Can Explain It? Who Can Tell You Why? New York Times Book Review 24 oct. 1993: 9. Karter, Lucinda. 2004 sera peut-tre lanne de lebook. La Lettre 65 (dc. 2004-janv. 2005): 21. _____. Le Bureau de New York a vingt ans: Une petite histoire du livre franais aux tats-Unis. La Lettre 42 (sept. 2003): 18. _____. Comment se porte la fiction en traduction aux tats-Unis, et plus prcisment la fiction franaise? La Lettre 74 (dc. 2007-janv. 2008): 20-21. _____. Les Dernires tendances ditoriales. La Lettre 60 (aot 2005): 17. _____. En cette fin danne 2005, le livre franais fait parler de lui et de ses enjeux. La Lettre 68 (dc. 2005-janv. 2006): 20. Klein, Adam. Crit. de Everyday Life, de Lydie Salvayre. Time Out New York 7-13 dc. 2006: 21.
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Kushner, Rachel. Crit. de The Company of Ghosts, de Lydie Salvayre. Time Out New York 9-15 mars 2006: 15. Lepape, Pierre. La Dictature de la world literature. Le Monde Diplomatique mars 2004: 24-25. Mendelsohn, Jane. Crit. de The Bathroom, de Jean-Philippe Toussaint. Voice Literary Supplement 35 (1990): S5. Motte, Warren. Reading Jean Echenoz. Context 16 (2004): 6-7. _____. Reading Lydie Salvayre. Context 13 (2003): 7. _____. Reading Jean-Philippe Toussaint. Context 12 (2002): 9-10. OBrien, John. Translation, Part 5. Context 19 (2006): 16. Paddock, Christopher. Crit. de Im Gone, de Jean Echenoz. Review of Contemporary Fiction 21. 2 (2001): 159-60. Press, Joy. Le Boob Tube. New York Times Book Review 2 janv. 2005: 11. _____. Vagina Monologues. Village Voice 2 nov. 2001: 65. Seymour, Miranda. Leaving Father Behind. New York Times Book Review 10 mai 1992: 5-6. Trachtenberg, Jay. Crit. de Television, de Jean-Philippe Toussaint. Austin Chronicle 12 nov. 2004: S5. Vantroys, Carole. Inaccessible Amrique. Lire mai 1998: 31. Venuti, Lawrence. The Cracked Glass. The Times Literary Supplement 30 juin 2006: 15. <http://tls.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,253382247640.html>.

Translation in French and Franc Op Hone Literature and Film

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FRENCH LITERATURE SERIES

Future Volumes and Conference Topics

FRENCH LITERATURE SERIES

(French Literature Series, Volume XXXVI, 2009)

in French and Francophone Literature and Film

Amsterdam New York, NY 2009

FLS, Volume XXXVI, 2009

Translation in/and French and Francophone Literature and Film: An Introduction

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See A Call to Action in The Translators Invisibility, 311-13.

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Introduction Works Cited

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Public Language and the Aesthetics of the Translating City

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The map can be seen at the following address: <www.mla.org>.

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Translation and the Triumph of French: the Case of the Decameron

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fence, Du Bellay thunders against the uselessness of translation:

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vellis Art de la Guerre (1546), Jean Charrier declares his freedom:

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Luise von Flotow

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which Parshley translates respectively as:

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Critic Rosi Huhn summarizes:

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Redefining Translation through Self-Translation: The Case of Nancy Huston

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