“Twinged by different musics” – the use of dialect and heteroglossia in contemporary Northern Irish translations of poetry Helen Gibson Thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Literary Translation School of Literature, Drama and Creative Writing University of East Anglia July 2018 This copy of the thesis has been supplied on condition that anyone who consults it is understood to recognise that its copyright rests with the author and that use of any information derived therefrom must be in accordance with current UK Copyright Law. In addition, any quotation or extract must include full attribution. Abstract This thesis focusses on three poet-translators from Northern Ireland – Ciaran Carson, Seamus Heaney and Tom Paulin – investigating how and why they choose to insert Hiberno-English dialect and other kinds of language variety (heteroglossia) into their translations of poetry. I examine one text for each translator, all published around the turn of the millennium: Carson’s The Inferno (2002), Heaney’s Beowulf (1999) and Paulin’s collection of translated poems, The Road to Inver (2004). I use a cognitive stylistics approach and close textual analysis to consider the impact of the translators’ linguistic choices on the reader, highlighting how the use of dialect and heteroglossia signals the interpretive qualities of translation. I demonstrate how these texts deviate from the language we might expect in canonical texts – and how they underline the extent to which English is made up of varied discourses, styles and registers. However, I question whether this pluralising of English can be read in line with ‘postcolonial’ uses of translation in Ireland, and suggest that a more nuanced interpretation is necessary. Focussing on what Roger Fowler termed ‘mind-style’, I propose that we should view these translators’ linguistic choices as a form of personal exploration via the translation process. Finally, I highlight the creative potential of these translations: the superimposition of language varieties, environments and temporalities enriches these texts, demonstrating linguistic enhancement over time. In concentrating on target text stylistic choices my research ultimately suggests that translated texts can be more not less marked than their source texts, contradicting received norms in translation studies. I highlight how personal cognitive circumstances influence translation style, creating idiosyncratic texts (idiosyncrasies foregrounded via the comparability of translations). Finally, I emphasise the particularity of the translator’s position in the modern (Northern) Irish context, adding nuance to our understanding of the role(s) of literary translation in Ireland. 2 Contents Acknowledgements Referencing notes Chapter 1 – “An unstructurable sea”: Northern Ireland, translation and linguistic choice 1.1 Introduction – a linguistic dilemma 1.2 Background – the “unstructurable sea” 1.2.1 The unstable state – the origins of ‘the Troubles’ 1.2.2 Cultural impoverishment – linguistic division and colonisation 1.2.3 Social polarity and figuring identity 1.2.4 Three ‘Northern Irish’ poets 1.2.5 Northern Irish poetry 1.2.6 Three translations 1.3 Style, dialect and heteroglossia 1.3.1 Style and foregrounding 1.3.2 Dialect 1.3.3 Heteroglossia and dialogism 1.4 Theoretical framework 1.4.1 Multidisciplinarity 1.4.2 Postcolonial translation studies – Ireland and Northern Ireland 1.4.3 Beyond postcolonialism – hybridity and stylistic variation 1.4.4 Polysystem theory, the individual translator and translational stylistics 1.5 Methodological approach 1.5.1 Cognitive stylistics 1.5.2 Close reading and re-reading 1.5.3 Target text focus 1.6 Research questions and chapter breakdown 1.7 Conclusion 3 Chapter 2 – Visible dialect and the problem of interpretation 2.1 Introduction 2.2 Reading dialect 2.2.1 The “strange discordant noise”: textual effects 2.2.2.1 Reading Beowulf 2.2.2.2 Beowulf – locating the poem 2.2.2.3 Signalling Heaney’s lexical variety 2.2.2.4 Reading The Inferno 2.2.2.5 The Inferno – locating the poem 2.2.2.6 Signalling Carson’s lexical variety 2.2.2.7 Reading The Road to Inver 2.2.2.8 The Road to Inver – locating the poems 2.2.2.9 Signalling Paulin’s lexical variety 2.2.2.10 “If I have rightly grasped your idiom” 2.3 Considering dialect 2.3.1 Translation strategies – metatexts 2.3.2 Foregrounding dialect – foreignization and domestication 2.3.2.1 Domestication and foreignization – multiple audiences 2.3.2.2 An alien reading experience: linguistic reappraisal 2.3.3 Translation and interpretation 2.3.3.1 Do these works consider themselves translations? 2.3.3.2 Translation as reading – plurality of interpretation 2.4 Conclusion Chapter 3 – Subversion: style performs linguistic hybridity 3.1 Introduction 3.2 Subversive language 3.2.1 Approaches to subversion 3.2.1.1 Resistance via dialect – minor and informal 3.2.1.2 Resistance via plurality 3.2.1.3 Postcolonial resistance via linguistic choice 4 3.2.2 Subverting English, subverting literary norms 3.2.2.1 Subversive Heaney 3.2.2.2 Heaney’s heteroglossia 3.2.2.3 Subversive Carson 3.2.2.4 Carson’s heteroglossia 3.2.2.5 Subversive Paulin 3.2.2.6 Paulin’s heteroglossia 3.2.2.7 Differing heteroglossia 3.2.3 Subverting the language of the coloniser? 3.2.3.1 Reading beyond postcolonialism – the importance of plurality 3.2.3.2 Plurality articulates cultural multiplicity 3.2.4 Summarising subversiveness 3.3 Personal hybridity 3.3.1 Questioning the personal 3.3.2 Reading the personal in (translation) style 3.3.3 Re-reading dialect and heteroglossia in translation 3.3.3.1 Carson’s mind-style 3.3.3.2 Heaney’s mind-style 3.3.3.3 Paulin’s mind-style 3.3.3.4 Personal multiplicity 3.3.4 Translation facilitates linguistic exploration 3.4 Conclusion Chapter 4 – Linguistic collision and renewal 4.1 Introduction 4.2 Linguistic clash 4.2.1 Transnational poetry and compression 4.2.2 Enforced dialogue and friction 4.2.2.1 Carson’s dialogism 4.2.2.2 Paulin’s dialogism 4.2.2.3 Heaney’s dialogism 4.2.3 Summarising dialogism 5 4.3 ‘Newness’ via linguistic clash? 4.3.1 Mélange and ‘newness’ 4.3.2 Concomitance in disparate worlds 4.3.2.1 Carson’s converging worlds 4.3.2.2 Paulin’s converging worlds 4.3.2.3 Heaney’s converging worlds 4.3.3 Linguistic regeneration 4.4 Conclusion Chapter 5 – Conclusions: remaking texts via a “local row” 5.1 A “local row” 5.2 Research questions and responses 5.3 Further conclusions 5.3.1 Translation’s personal function: linguistic excavation 5.3.2 Reading dialect and heteroglossia: the complex language of translation 5.3.3 Reading the complex language of translation in a Northern Irish context 5.4 Further areas of study 5.4.1 The use of translation in the north of Ireland (and beyond) 5.4.2 The use of dialect and heteroglossia in the language of the translated text 5.4.3 ‘Anthropological’ uses of translation – the focus on the translator 5.5 A final word: unlocking the word-hoard Bibliography Appendix 1 – The Road to Inver: original poems 6 Acknowledgements I was able to undertake this research thanks to an AHRC Doctoral Studentship. I would like to thank my supervisors, Jean Boase-Beier and Duncan Large, for their unstinting support, thoughtful suggestions and constructive feedback and their enthusiastic belief in this project. This thesis is undoubtedly the better for their interest and direction. I would like to acknowledge the contribution B.J. Epstein and Ceci Rossi made to the shape of this thesis, particularly in its early stages. I must also thank Theo Hermans for pointing me in Jean’s direction, and Jeri Johnson and Caroline Warman for their warm encouragement at the outset of this project. I would like to thank the following for their support, helpful conversations, questions and challenges: Nozomi Abe, Motoko Akashi, Moira Eagling, Lina Fisher, Wanda Józwikowska, Silke Lührmann, Emily Rose, Robert Stock and Philip Wilson. I must particularly thank Rob for his proofreading, but, more importantly, for moral support throughout. My parents-in-law have been enthusiastically supportive of all of my endeavours, including this project. I have also been jollied along by Harriet Barratt, and kept in supplies of stationery, chocolate and, crucially, bottomless cheer by Claire Gale – thank you all. Finally, I would like to thank my parents for their unfailing and generous love and support and for instilling a love of literature in me – and my husband Will for so actively encouraging me in this project, and for being my steadfast champion far beyond it. Last but not least, our two boys Dylan and Noah – you are two very welcome distractions from the literary world, but I hope some of these funny words will one day be yours too! 7 Referencing notes All Oxford English Dictionary (OED) references are to the OED Online: www.oed.com All web addresses, including OED entries, were last accessed on 1st July 2018. Bible quotations are from the Revised Standard Version (RSV), 1971. Original publication details of reprinted texts are given in the main text (where relevant), but not in the bibliography. If a translation is being discussed, then the translator is given as the author in the main text and bibliography. Where a text (which has been translated) is discussed in its own right, the translator is credited in the bibliography but the text is given under the name of the source text author. Where the terms ‘ST’ and ‘TT’ appear (in quotation) they denote ‘source text’ and ‘target text’ respectively. Throughout the thesis, I have used double inverted commas to indicate quotations, and single inverted commas for (non-quoted) meanings, or to introduce key terms.