Translation Review Number Sixty-Four ¥ 2002 The University of Texas at Dallas Translation Review The University of Texas at Dallas Editors Rainer Schulte Dennis Kratz Managing Editor Eileen Rice Tollett Copy Editor Sandra Smith Art Director Ann Broadaway Production Staff Jessie Dickey International Editorial Board John Biguenet Ronald Christ Samuel Hazo Edmund Keeley Elizabeth Gamble Miller Margaret Sayers Peden Marilyn Gaddis Rose James P. White Miller Williams A. Leslie Willson All correspondence and inquiries should be directed to Translation Review The University of Texas at Dallas Box 830688 - MC35 Richardson, TX 75083-0688 Telephone: (972) 883-2092 or 883-2093 Fax: (972) 883-6303, email: [email protected] Translation Review is published by the Center for Translation Studies and the American Literary Translators Association (ALTA). The journal is published twice yearly and is supported in part by The University of Texas at Dallas. Articles in Translation Review are refereed. Subscriptions and Back Issues Subscriptions to individuals are included with membership in ALTA. Special institutional and library subscrip- tions are available. Back issues may be ordered. ISSN 0737-4836 Copyright© 2002 by Translation Review The University of Texas at Dallas is an equal opportunity/affirmative action employer. TRANSLATION REVIEW No. 64, 2002 TABLE OF CONTENTS Editorial: The Translator as Scholar . .1 Rainer Schulte Rendering Modern English-Language Drama into Living Japanese: An Interview with Koshi Odashima . .3 Daniel J. Webster Challenging Hierarchies: Aphra Behn’s Authentication Through Classical Translation . .12 Tracy Walters An ABC of Translation . .27 Justin Bland, Sylvia Mello, and Tia Rabine On Translating Le Cimeti re des Elephants by Jean-Paul Daumas . .31 Phyllis Zatlin Modern Arabic Poetry and International Anthologies: A Partial but Positive Representation . .36 Salih J. Altoma Language and Politics on Stage: Strategies for Translating Dialect and Slang . .45 with References to Shaw’s Pygmalion and Bond’s Saved Manuela Perteghella Metaphor, Image, and Music in a Line by Nizar Qabbani . .54 Zalfa Rihani Translation Course in Film Subtitling . .59 Tatusya Fukushima and David L. Major BOOK REVIEWS Under the North Star by Vin Linna, tr. Richard Impola . .83 Ritva Leppihalme, Reviewer Beyond The Walls – Selected Poems by Nazım Hikmet, trs. Ruth Christie, Richard McKane, . .86 and Talat Sait Halman George Messo, Reviewer The Hermitage by Marie Bronsard, tr. Sonia Alland (with Marie Bronsard) . .88 Katherine A. Burgess, Reviewer Tamura Ryuichi Poems 1946-1998 by Samuel Grolmes and Tsumura Yumiko . .90 Ikuko Tomita, Reviewer EDITORIAL: THE TRANSLATOR AS SCHOLAR By Rainer Schulte urs has become an age of critics rather than an age Let me add another idiosyncratic feature of my read- Oof poets and writers. The critic surpasses the visibil- ing habits that will not meet the approval of professors in ity of the writer, and the academic world cherishes the modern language departments. Whenever I know the criticism of criticism of criticism. Whether the jargon- original language of a literary text quite well, I prefer to ridden articles derived from the Derridian tradition make reread this text in translation, especially if the work is sense and are accessible to the intelligent reader is not of available in multiple translations. What I watch for are great concern for the editors of many scholarly journals. the translations of the difficult passages. How has the The Alan Sokel episode bears witness to this dilemma. translator dealt with the ambiguities, what kind of solu- The invisibility of the translator continues to be a tions has the translator found, and how does the transla- subject of great concern to all translators, whether inde- tion reflect the overall interpretive perspective of the pendent or academic. The latter are still fighting to have translator? An excitement has been added to the reading their work as practicing translators or as scholars of of the text that would not necessary surface to the same translation theory recognized as a viable contribution to degree if I were to reread the work in its original lan- the field of literature and letters. Many assistant and guage. I compare this attitude toward the reading of a associate professors are denied promotions because text with the interpretation of musical pieces. From a translation activities don t fall into the realm of performer s point of view, I look forward with great respectable scholarly work. anticipation to hearing a pianist who plays a piece with Yet, the meticulous research that a translator has to which I am very familiar. I am curious and perhaps often undertake in order to do justice to the intricate complexi- somewhat nervous to find out how the pianist will inter- ty of literary texts by far transcends the scholarly intensi- pret a particularly difficult passage, both from the techni- ty that scholars and critics display in their interpretations cal and from the interpretive points of view. It is the of works of literature. For many years, one of my own translator who ultimately creates a similar excitement idiosyncrasies has been to identify difficult passages in through the art of translation. literary and philosophical works to see how scholars and It is clear that in the future many academicians in lit- critics have illuminated these passages for me. The erature and humanities programs will have to be educat- results of my investigations in that direction are rather ed to understand that the methodologies derived from the amazing. Many of the critical approaches do not com- art and craft of translation will revitalize the reading and ment on these particularly inaccessible moments in a interpretation of literary texts. If these methods were text, and the authors of these articles seem to create the then to be transferred to the field of criticism, they could impression that the reader will have no difficulties in become a major force in counteracting the jargon-ridden understanding what is going on in the text under consid- language of contemporary scholarly writing in literature eration. I have come to realize that the critic or scholar and the humanities. The translator s contribution would probably had not taken the time to enter into the deeper be not only the transplantation of works from foreign layers of meanings of a poetic or fictional work to clarify languages into English but also the meaningful transla- them for the reader. tion of the interpretive insights into an accessible critical A translator cannot engage in such a luxury. Every language. word has to be seen under the umbrella of its etymologi- Much has been said about the invisibility of the cal origin and its philological development, which translator. Now might be the time to reflect on how the applies especially to texts written in past centuries. The invisibility of the translator could be turned into the visi- philological aspects include probing into the linguistic, bility of the translator, both in the academic world and in cultural, historical, and aesthetic environments of words the culture in which we live. Interviews with poets and and how these words have been shaped within the con- writers are published in book, journal, and audio form. text of a text. That in itself demands the highest level of The same cannot be said for translators. As far as I know, academic scholarship and should therefore be recognized only one collection of interviews with translators, enti- as such. tled The Poet’s Other Voice: Conversations on Literary Translation Review 1 Translation and edited by Edwin Honig, has been pub- lated to the reading and interpretation of a work original- lished in the United States. Unfortunately, this book has ly written in English, then the pleasures of reading might been out of print for several years. Moreover, special col- be recaptured. Translation practices should be considered lections of poets, writers, and playwrights have found a to be the most powerful tools to counteract the incompre- permanent place in various special library collections hensibility and pretension of contemporary scholarly throughout the country and throughout the centuries. writing. Missing are similar collections for translators. In most cases, the first translations of a new author Today, nations and languages interact at a more rapid from a foreign country appear in literary journals. pace than ever before in history. Wherever we look and However, in our technological age, we have not been listen, the word global assumes its pounding presence. able to build databases that would allow us to find out Only the translator will be in a position to respond to the what works by international authors have actually been needs of a global civilization. Therefore, I would think published in journals. Obviously, such a database could that translators must be allocated a more prominent and be of great value to publishers, teachers, and the general permanent place in the halls of history. reader. On the more academic level, I want to refer to a I do not propose that we build statues for translators; research project that many years ago was initiated by the however, I propose that we give serious consideration to well-known German translator of Samuel Beckett, Elmar recording not only interviews and biographies of transla- Tophoven,* a project that should be pursued in order to tors but also the intense and meticulous activities of the revive and expand the theoretical and practical aspects of translation m tier, so that the importance of translation as the translation process. Tophoven, who dedicated his the backbone of cultural renovation can be studied by entire life to the art of translation, developed the practice future generations. of recording every difficulty he encountered in the text on an index card. He categorized the problems according *In Translation Review No. 9, 1982, pp 24-29, we to word, grammatical, syntactical, cultural, and historical published an article by Elmar Tophoven entitled difficulties.