Home Linguistics & Semiotics Translators in search of originals
Chapter
Licensed
Unlicensed Requires Authentication

Translators in search of originals

  • Susan Bassnett
View more publications by John Benjamins Publishing Company
To Publisher Page
Textual and Contextual Voices of Translation
This chapter is in the book Textual and Contextual Voices of Translation

Abstract

This chapter looks at the problems of translating ancient texts that have undergone centuries of textual intervention and manipulation by many different hands. Changing perceptions of the canonical status of ancient works, combined with the textual instability of such “originals,” means that translators can engage with ancient texts in a new spirit of respectful appropriation. Illustrative examples include the work of contemporary translators from Ancient Greek, Latin, Old Welsh, and Old Irish.

Abstract

This chapter looks at the problems of translating ancient texts that have undergone centuries of textual intervention and manipulation by many different hands. Changing perceptions of the canonical status of ancient works, combined with the textual instability of such “originals,” means that translators can engage with ancient texts in a new spirit of respectful appropriation. Illustrative examples include the work of contemporary translators from Ancient Greek, Latin, Old Welsh, and Old Irish.

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Part I. Opening the field
  4. Introduction 3
  5. Part II. Charting the field
  6. The Scandinavian singer-translator’s multisemiotic voice as performance 21
  7. Translators, editors, publishers, and critics 39
  8. The making of a bestseller-in-translation 61
  9. Contextual factors when reading a translated academic text 81
  10. When poets translate poetry 101
  11. Translators in search of originals 119
  12. Part III. Traveling the field
  13. Unraveling multiple translatorship through an e-mail correspondence 133
  14. Silenced in translation 159
  15. The voice of the implied author in the first Norwegian translation of Simone de Beauvoir’s Le deuxième sexe 181
  16. Three voices or one? 201
  17. The voices of Cieza de León in English 223
  18. References 241
  19. Index 263
https://doi.org/10.1075/btl.137.07bas

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Part I. Opening the field
  4. Introduction 3
  5. Part II. Charting the field
  6. The Scandinavian singer-translator’s multisemiotic voice as performance 21
  7. Translators, editors, publishers, and critics 39
  8. The making of a bestseller-in-translation 61
  9. Contextual factors when reading a translated academic text 81
  10. When poets translate poetry 101
  11. Translators in search of originals 119
  12. Part III. Traveling the field
  13. Unraveling multiple translatorship through an e-mail correspondence 133
  14. Silenced in translation 159
  15. The voice of the implied author in the first Norwegian translation of Simone de Beauvoir’s Le deuxième sexe 181
  16. Three voices or one? 201
  17. The voices of Cieza de León in English 223
  18. References 241
  19. Index 263
Sign up now to receive a 20% welcome discount
Institutional Access
How does access work?
Have an idea on how to improve our website?
Please write us.
© 2025 De Gruyter Brill
Downloaded on 29.12.2025 from https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi/10.1075/btl.137.07bas/html
Scroll to top button