Book reviewTranslation under Fascism Houndmills, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010. x + 286 pp. ISBN 978-0-230-20354-9 £55
Reviewed by Denise Merkle
Université de Moncton, Canada
Table of contents
This excellent collection of essays aimed at promoting dialogue between historians of culture and translation studies scholars interested in fascism has achieved its goal—and more—by pulling together in a single volume scholarship on translation practices and processes as an integral component of the cultural history of Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, Francoist Spain and Salazarian Portugal. Christopher Rundle and Kate Sturge identified the absence of translation from recent research on cultural policy and practices under European fascisms and have set out “to fill th[e] historiographical gap” (3) in this volume, deftly edited by the tandem. The result is a collection of chapters that provide a comprehensive comparative overview of the workings of international cultural exchange through the prism of translation under twentieth-century European fascisms. The plural “fascisms” is used intentionally here, since the collection makes abundantly clear that the four regimes are marked by clear differences and must not be conflated.