Update Bibliography on Self-translation

The bibliography on self-translation has been updated. To download the pdf-file please click here. If you have any suggestions for further entries, please leave a comment. The next update is scheduled for 1st of  April 2018.

Interview with Andre Brink on self-translation

In one of his lasts interviews, South-African writer Andre Brink shares some fascinating insights into his process of self-translation with Maria Recuenco. Brink and Recuenco discuss the differences between translating his own works and the works of others, the idea of being translated by someone else, the notion of translation, the advantage of being a self-translator, his thoughts on collaborative translations etc. I will share some interesting quotes, but I highly recommend reading the whole interview.

On the process of self-translation:

"It is never a mechanical process of translating, it is writing a book and then going back to it and redoing it in the other language. I rewrite it from scratch. Therefore, the two versions are always different" (p. 149)

On the reasons for self-translation:

"I like to be hands on when it comes to the translating. I won’t easily ask somebody else to do it. Or even allow somebody else to do it." (p. 150)

On self-translation being an exception:

"There are still very few writers that do it regularly, all the time they write. Apparently it happens in the Slavic languages more often that writers write in two languages." (p. 152)

On research on self-translation:

 "I would find it very interesting if somebody would write a thesis, for example, about a specific text in two languages and see how it differs, or when it differs, and find out why. That would fascinate me very much." (p. 153)

Reference:
Peñalver, M. R. "Encounter with André Brink: Looking on … Self-Translation." Research in African Literatures, vol. 46 no. 2, 2015, pp. 146-156. Project MUSE, muse.jhu.edu/article/581746.

Cfp: Glendon Graduate Student Conference in Translation Studies (3rd March 2018, Toronto)

Conference: Glendon Graduate Student Conference in Translation Studies
Date and place: 3rd March 2018, Glendon College, York University (Toronto)
Topic:Translation and (De)colonization
Deadline: Abstract 250-300 words by December 1, 2017

Call for papers

Translation has long played a key role in processes of colonization, often being used as a tool of the colonizer. However, as Indigenous peoples and settler allies have progressively worked toward dismantling oppressive institutions and divesting from colonial power, the function of translation has increasingly expanded to include practices that give voice to colonized and Indigenous peoples and move toward justice, reconciliation, and social solidarity. This year’s graduate conference aims to explore the complex, dynamic relationship between translation and decolonization.

We invite proposals for papers from a variety of fields and perspectives that engage with issues including, but not limited to:

• Translation, history, and collective memory
• Translation, solidarity, and social change
• Translation, power, authority, and dominance
• Translation as a tool of resistance and subversion
• Literary translation and self-translation in postcolonial contexts
• Indigenous language preservation and revitalization
• Legal translation and interpretation as a tool for decolonization
• Censorship, manipulation, and historical narratives
• Translation, orality, and transmission
• Voice, identity, and visibility in translation

Our one-day multilingual conference will address these and related topics. We welcome proposals for papers (20-minute presentations) and posters. Those interested are invited to submit an abstract of 250-300 words by December 1, 2017 to transconf2018@glendon.yorku.ca or transconf2018@gmail.com. Submissions should include the title of the paper and the author’s name, affiliations, and contact information.

Call for papers in English, French, and Spanish. To download the cfp as a pdf file please click here.

Trilingual author Ana Cecilia Prenz Kopušar on self-translation

In a recently published article "Reflexiones sobre la autotraducción desde la mirada del autor", Ana Cecilia Prenz Kopuša (*1968 in Serbia) reflects on translating her autofictional novel "Cruzando el río en bicicleta" (2015) from Spanish to both Italian and Serbian.
The three languages don't have equal status for her, she considers Spanish to be "el idioma que me permite ahondar en lo más íntimo de mi persona sin trampas ni escollos" (p. 108), and thus she chooses to write the original in Spanish. She insists that the three texts are not "tres versiones distintas construidas sobre una misma idea" (p. 106), but an original text in Spanish with two faithful translations which have been adapted to each audience:

La traducción al italiano no presentó mayores dificultades. Diría que se trata de
una traducción casi literal. El mundo cultural yugoslavo de referencia y lo narrado
en el episodio presentan la misma distancia cultural tanto con el mundo hispano
como con el italiano. Sin embargo, la traducción al serbio tuvo que ser limada de
esas intervenciones explicativas, obvias para el lector. (p. 111)

Please continue by reading her complete essay here.
Reference: Prenz Kopušar, Ana Cecilia. 2017. “Reflexiones sobre la autotraducción desde la mirada del autor”. El hilo de la fábula, 17, 105–116.

If you are interested in learning more about trilingual self-translations (and can read German), please check out chapter 7 "Dreisprachige Selbstübersetzung" (pp. 197-219) of my PhD dissertation which is availabl online.

Self-translation at ALTA conference 2017

Self-translation was also a topic of a panel at the annual American Literary Translators Association (ALTA) Conference, held October 5-8 in Minneapolis.

Panel: Refracting Meaning in Self-Translation
In recent years, self-translation has emerged as a new and growing field of interest. Contemporary scholars have, therefore, begun to examine how questions of literary creativity and agency can be applied to self-translation. As both authors and translators, self-translators are free to take ample linguistic and semantic liberties with their own work in translation, thus “refracting” the initial meaning of their texts within a new and arguably original work of fiction. In light of current research in self-translation studies, this panel will seek to answer the following questions: What is at stake when we consider how meaning is “refracted”/altered in self-translation? And in what ways can self-translated texts be viewed as new and original works of literature?

Moderator: Genevieve Waite
Participants: Xiaoqing Liu / Rebecca Dehner-Armand /  Kaitlin Staud

Conference, Translation & Minority 2: Freedom and Difference, 10-11.11.2017 Ottawa

Self-translation will be a topic of one of the panels at the international conference Translation & Minority 2: Freedom and Difference taking place from 10-11.11.2017 in Ottawa.

Saturday, 11th November
11:30-13:00 Self-translation - Panel 7 (SMD 125)

• Arianna Dagnino (University of Ottawa, Canada)
  “Breaking the Linguistic Minority Complex through Self-Translation”
• Garazi Arrula Ruiz (University of the Basque Country)
  “When Self-Translation (from Basque) Crosses Paths with Heterolinguism”
• Lucía Azpeitia (Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Spain)
  “Two-Way Minorness: Spanish ↔ Catalan Self-Translation in Spanish Republican Exile”

The titles are linked to the abstracts of each of the talks.
The complete program can be found here.

New edited volume on "Self-translation and Power" published

"Self-translation and power" a much anticipated volume edited by Olga Castro, Sergi Mainer and Svetlana Page has recently been published by Palgrave. You can see the content overview as well as a preview of the book here.

Update Bibliography on Self-translation

The bibliography on self-translation has been updated.
To download the pdf-file please click here.

If you have any suggestions for further entries, please leave a comment.

The next update is scheduled for 1st of January 2018.

Muga pausu batera. Seminar on Self-translation, 14-16.09.2017, Spain

From 14th to 16th September a Seminar on self-translation took place at the Tabakalera International Centre for Contemporary Culture in Donostia / San Sebastián.

Program:

14 September: Introduction and context
Speakers Garazi Arrula and Elizabete Manterola will explain what the self-translation from Basque consists of and will share their research in this field.

15 September: Analysis of a practical case (Eider Rodriguez)
Eider Rodriguez has published three story books: Eta handik gutxira gaur; Haragia and Katu Jendea. She has translated all of them into Spanish herself: Y poco después ahora, Carne and Un montón de gatos; the first two by herself and the third in collaboration with Zigor Garro. In addition, the story «Katu Jendea» was translated to four languages (Spanish, French, Dutch and German) inside the initiative "The Writer and its Translators", and the Basque Institute Etxepare published it in 2012. On the other hand, in 2013, Rodriguez published an anthology of stories in Spanish: Ortigas. Una antología de relatos. Once again, she was in charge of its translation.
In this practical session we will analyse the self-translated work by Rodríguez. We will focus in particular on the story «Gatos», as it is set in Hendaye and reflects its border character through language and narration.

At 1pm, Eider Rodríguez herself will offer a public talk in the Z Hall.

16 September: Analysis of a practical case (Ixiar Rozas)
Ixiar Rozas has published six books in the field of basque literature: Patio bat bi itsasoen artean (poetry); Sartu, korrontea dabil (narrations); Edo zu edo ni and Negutegia (novel); Gau bakar bat (theatre); and Beltzuria (essay).
She has translated four of these books into Spanish herself: Luego les separa la noche; Una sola noche; Invernario and Beltzuria. The last of them translated in collaboration with Jose Luis Padron. In this practical session we will analyse the self-translated work by Rozas.
We will focus in particular on the translation of the book Beltzuria, as it has been recently published, it is a translation carried out in collaboration, and because the story is set in a border area: in Etxalar.

At 7pm, Ixiar Rozas herself will offer a public talk in the Z Hall.

For more information, please click here.

CfP: Vladimir Nabokov and Translation

Vladimir Nabokov and Translation:
Transatlantic Symposium
Lille, France-Chapel Hill, USA
May 17-18, 2018-Fall 2018

No translator and translation theorist has brought an equal amount of attention to the humble applied craft of literary translation than Vladimir Nabokov (1899-1977). Standing at the crossroads of five languages and a matching number of literary traditions (English, French, German, Italian, and Russian), he experienced translation on a level inaccessible to the majority of his predecessors, presaging and influencing our modern understanding of the indispensability of linguistic and cultural interconnection.

Nabokov’s entered literature as a translator. He claimed to have retold Mayne Reid’s The Headless Horseman in French alexandrines at eleven, while his adaptation of Romain Rolland’s Colas Breugnon became the most exacting rite of passage of his career in letters. Yet while the controversy stirred by his rendition of Aleksandr Pushkin’s Eugene Onegin and the methodology of “literalism” he applied therein forever changed the way we conceive of translation today, the totality of his work in translation remains the least appreciated and understood area of Nabokov’s creative enterprise.

To address this omission, Drs. Julie Loison-Charles (University of Lille, France) and Stanislav Shvabrin (The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, USA) cordially invite you to submit a 500-word-long abstract explicating Nabokov’s legacy as translator and translation theorist as well as multiple other areas and instances of his engagement with “the art of verbal transmigration.”

We invite scholars interested in the multiple aspects of Nabokov’s legacy in translation to consider the following lines of inquiry:

* Nabokov as translator (with special emphasis on the vast number of works beyond Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Eugene Onegin);
* Nabokov’s translation theory, its evolution, and legacy;
* Translation as reflected in Nabokov’s works;
* Self-translation;
* Nabokov translated (collaboratively with the author and independently) or retranslated;
* Intersemiotic (audiovisual, cinematic, and theatrical) translations of Nabokov’s works;
* Teaching translation with Nabokov;
* The impact of translation on Nabokov’s writing.

The participants invited by the selection committee will have a choice to present their papers either in Lille, France (May 2018) or Chapel Hill, North Carolina, USA (Autumn 2018). The two sections of the Symposium will work in concert to facilitate collaboration between participants on both sides of the Atlantic: papers will be made available to participants via a platform (written and/or recorded) and participants will be invited to collaborate when they focus on similar topics, to respond to a paper given in the previous section or to publish co-authored essays. This platform may also be used to work with graduate or post-graduate students in collaborative transatlantic seminars in translation.

Please send your abstracts (maximum 500 words, in English or French) to the following email addresses:julie.loison- charles@vladimir-nabokov.org a ndshvabrin@email.unc.edu
If you wish your abstract to be considered for the first installment of the Symposium in Lille, France, please send your abstract by September 1, 2017, and by May 1, 2018, for Chapel Hill, North Carolina, USA.

This project is organized with the French Society Vladimir Nabokov – Les Chercheurs Enchantés, The Université of Lille, SHS (France) (Unit Research CECILLE) and the Center for Slavic Eurasian and East European Studies at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (USA).

Bibliography on self-translation updated

The bibliography on self-translation has been updated. Special thanks to Nami Kaneko for providing some entries for research in Japanese.

To download the new version of the bibliography please click here.