Embassy networks: Translating post-war Bosnian poetry into English
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Francis Jones
Abstract
This article is based on a web survey of on-line and print translations into English of poetry by writers from Bosnia since the 1992–1995 war. Combining insights from Actor Network Theory, Activity Theory and Goffman’s Social Game Theory, it examines the relationships between human and textual agents in the production of poetry translations. It maps these relationships onto agents’ geographic ‘positionality’. Among the findings are:
(1) Poetry translation is produced by networks of agents working across a ‘distributed’ space. This implies that it is simplistic to conceptualise literary translation in terms of one agent’s loyalty to one cultural space.
(2) Translators often carry less power in a production network than an anthology/journal editor or a living source poet.
(3) Networks involving players from source-language regions working in a target-language country are particularly effective in publication terms.
Abstract
This article is based on a web survey of on-line and print translations into English of poetry by writers from Bosnia since the 1992–1995 war. Combining insights from Actor Network Theory, Activity Theory and Goffman’s Social Game Theory, it examines the relationships between human and textual agents in the production of poetry translations. It maps these relationships onto agents’ geographic ‘positionality’. Among the findings are:
(1) Poetry translation is produced by networks of agents working across a ‘distributed’ space. This implies that it is simplistic to conceptualise literary translation in terms of one agent’s loyalty to one cultural space.
(2) Translators often carry less power in a production network than an anthology/journal editor or a living source poet.
(3) Networks involving players from source-language regions working in a target-language country are particularly effective in publication terms.
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Introduction: Agents of translation and Translation Studies 1
- Francisco de Miranda, intercultural forerunner 19
- Translating cultural paradigms: The role of the Revue Britannique for the first Brazilian fiction writers 43
- Translation as representation: Fukuzawa Yukichi's representation of the "Others" 63
- Vizetelly & Company as (ex)change agent: Towards the modernization of the British publishing industry 85
- Translation within the margin: The "Libraries" of Henry Bohn 107
- Translating Europe: The case of Ahmed Midhat as an Ottoman agent of translation 131
- A cultural agent against the forces of culture: Hasan-Âli Yücel 161
- Limits of freedom: Agency, choice and constraints in the work of the translator 189
- Cheikh Anta Diop: Translation at the service of history 209
- The agency of the poets and the impact of their translations: Sur, Poesía Buenos Aires , and Diario de Poesía as aesthetic arenas for twentieth-century Argentine letters 229
- The role of Haroldo and Augusto de Campos in bringing translation to the fore of literary activity in Brazil 257
- The theatre translator as a cultural agent: A case study 279
- Embassy networks: Translating post-war Bosnian poetry into English 301
- Notes on contributors 327
- Index 331
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Introduction: Agents of translation and Translation Studies 1
- Francisco de Miranda, intercultural forerunner 19
- Translating cultural paradigms: The role of the Revue Britannique for the first Brazilian fiction writers 43
- Translation as representation: Fukuzawa Yukichi's representation of the "Others" 63
- Vizetelly & Company as (ex)change agent: Towards the modernization of the British publishing industry 85
- Translation within the margin: The "Libraries" of Henry Bohn 107
- Translating Europe: The case of Ahmed Midhat as an Ottoman agent of translation 131
- A cultural agent against the forces of culture: Hasan-Âli Yücel 161
- Limits of freedom: Agency, choice and constraints in the work of the translator 189
- Cheikh Anta Diop: Translation at the service of history 209
- The agency of the poets and the impact of their translations: Sur, Poesía Buenos Aires , and Diario de Poesía as aesthetic arenas for twentieth-century Argentine letters 229
- The role of Haroldo and Augusto de Campos in bringing translation to the fore of literary activity in Brazil 257
- The theatre translator as a cultural agent: A case study 279
- Embassy networks: Translating post-war Bosnian poetry into English 301
- Notes on contributors 327
- Index 331
