“I Have Heard It Said”: Towards a New Translation of Beowulf
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“I Have Heard it Said”: Towards a New Translation of Beowulf Meghan Purvis August 2012 Submitted for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy: Creative Writing Research School of Creative Writing and Literature, University of East Anglia © This copy of the thesis has been supplied on the condition that anyone who consults it is understood to recognise that its copyright rests with the author and that use of any information derived there from must be in accordance with current UK Copyright Law. In addition, any quotation or extract must include full attribution. Abstract The fields of translation and creative writing have long been seen as entirely distinct, with many writers drawing a distinction between types based on both the level of syntactic experimentation and the background of the translator. While most theorists would disagree, popular opinion (and the opinion of some poet/translators) seems to be that the two types of writing are differentiated by the amount of academic rigour and creative inspiration that goes into each: translation and creative writing are regarded as not merely different kinds of writing, but as involving different ways of writing. This thesis is an introspective exploration into the nature of translation, via a new translation of the Old English poem Beowulf. By translating Beowulf, reporting on that process, and comparing it with my creative work, this work provides an articulation of the creative process that views translation as a particular way of writing creatively that uses a source text as a narrative constraint. This work consists of two components: creative and critical. The creative portion is a translation of Beowulf which breaks the source poem up into numerous smaller pieces presented in a variety of voices, registers, and viewpoints. The critical portion is an examination of how that translation came about, and delineates the entire process, from initial preconceptions to final finished work. It explores the issues of how to domesticate or foreignise a poem so removed from modern England both culturally and temporally, what level of knowledge a translator can or should expect of her readers, and where knowledge and authority can be situated in a translation. The methodology of the critical portion is an analysis of Beowulf's history as a source text and as a translation, a study of translation theories, and an experiential analysis of the process of producing a new translation of Beowulf. 2 Abstract ...................................................................................................................................................... 2 Acknowledgements ................................................................................................................................... 4 1: Introduction ........................................................................................................................................... 5 2: Beowulf Histories and Translations ..................................................................................................... 17 3: Theories of Translations ...................................................................................................................... 40 4: Beowulf ................................................................................................................................................ 76 5: Conclusion ......................................................................................................................................... 147 Bibliography .......................................................................................................................................... 154 3 Acknowledgements This thesis began in many ways when I was a child, with an illustration in a children's book showing a man and a monster locked in a terrible dance. Its genesis as an academic project, however, began at Oberlin College, when Professor Jennifer Bryan stood at the front of a lecture hall and recited the first few lines of Beowulf from memory. I would not be here without her, or without the inspirations and examples of Professors David Walker and David Young, who were my poetry professors at Oberlin; I also would not be here in a more literal sense without Professor Ronald Kahn, who harangued a younger, more timid version of me into joining his cohort spending a semester abroad in London. The four of them have shaped my life more than they realise, and an epic poem is still miles short of expressing my gratitude. I also owe copious thanks to the four members of UEA who have, at various times, been on my team of supervisors: Professor Clive Scott, Professor Denise Riley, George Szirtes, and Professor Jean Boase-Beier. This project could not have been finished without them, and any lingering errors are wholly, and stubbornly, mine. Above all, I want to thank my family, all four of whom have been subjected to enough drafts of this work to violate the Human Rights Act. My twin sister Dara Purvis has read every stage of this work, from research proposal to thesis, and has been forced into becoming conversant in British spelling in order to proofread it. My younger sister Ellen has provided pug-centric comic relief when things became a bit much. My biggest thanks go to my mother, Susan Purvis, for everything, and my father, Jeffrey Purvis, who is still the best editor and writer I know. Alongside them is my husband Luke Jefferson, who I dragged to the 2007 film version and to whom I still owe an apology. You have all made my personal mead-hall louder and brighter and happier than Heorot itself, and this sparrow thanks you for it. 4 1: Introduction On 26 January 2007, Alan Brownjohn included in his Times Literary Supplement (TLS) review of Robin Robertson’s translations of Tomas Transtromer the following observation about types of translation: “Translation”, “version” and “imitation” have become the three loose categories into which efforts to transfer poetry from one language into another are placed, the last suggesting a free indulgence of the translator’s own, preferably charismatic, style. (Brownjohn 2007) Brownjohn also noted that while Robertson identified his work as an imitation of Transtromer’s source texts, and his publishers categorise his poetry as versions, Brownjohn regards Robertson’s translations as close, with “only minor liberties. detectable” (Brownjohn 2007). What began ostensibly as a book review spiralled into five months of vociferous debate in the TLS Letters section. Robin Fulton, in a letter that also accused Robertson of producing translations remarkably similar to Fulton’s own, wrote that Robertson’s poems were “neither dependable translations nor independent imitations,” a system of categorisation that John Burnside, in a subsequent letter, described as “oddly narrow-minded” (TLS, 9 February 2007). Fulton’s response included the complaint that “current literary fashion tends to demote and even denigrate the idea that a translator must give close attention and respect to the words of his (or her) author, an attention which presupposes a knowledge of the language in which the words were originally written”. Fulton’s argument conflates a freer style of translation with a lessened facility in the source language; the overarching complaint, however, seems to have turned the historical overemphasis on ‘faithfulness’ on its head: according to Fulton, it is not the poets producing experimental or free or versions of translations who are undervalued these days, but rather the reliable translators. Brownjohn’s classification of types of translation (not to mention the subsequent months of debate over those classifications) highlights a relationship between translation and original writing that has, although always problematic, become even more complex in recent decades. In the classical and medieval eras, the genre of translation did not exist as such: authors rewrote and 5 reworked texts and presented them as their own work; translation was seen as part of the arsenal of an author’s techniques (Hoenselaars 2006). In the nineteenth century, translation came to be seen as a way of allowing an audience to encounter an author they would not otherwise be able to experience, and evaluations of a translation’s success became centred around ideas of ‘faithfulness’ to the source author’s vision (Bassnett 1988). In subsequent years, and particularly in the latter half of the twentieth century, translation theorists have agreed that translation is a much more complex interaction between source and target authors, texts, and cultures, but also that the target author is fundamentally present in all aspects of the target text (Friar 1971). There remains, though, a gap between how translation theorists conceive of the act of translation and how a wider audience, particularly an audience from the world of creative writing, views translation. A division seems to have arisen between translations viewed as maintaining a close relationship—either syntactically or along other parameters—with their source text (often for an academic audience reading in parallel with that source text), which clings to evaluative standards similar to those employed by a nineteenth-century reader, and more explicitly experimental translations, particularly those produced by authors also known for their creative writing. These translators are often at pains to distinguish their works from other translations, often referring to them as versions, digressions, or simply as works in their own right (See