Translating the Untranslatable: The Translator's Aesthetic, Ideological and Political Responsibility

Gillian Lane-Mercier
Abstract

Translation scholars have recently emphasized the importance of the translator's (in)visibility (Venuti) and of the ethical aim of translation (Berman). This paper argues that a) the translation of literary sociolects is paradigmatic of the way in which the translator's visibility is foregrounded within the target text; b) their translation requires a "visible" engagement on the part of the translator which is grounded in an ethics of translation, thus leading beyond the visible/ invisible dichotomy implied by Venuti and the positive/negative ethics dichotomy set up by Berman; c) the comments made by numerous translation scholars concerning the problems raised by literary sociolects reflect some of the contradictions besetting contemporary translation theory.

Table of contents

Few contemporary translation theorists would dispute the now well established fact that translation at once reproduces and generates meaning by way of what could be called the dual dialectics of fidelity and transformation, on [ p. 44 ]the one hand, and of loss and gain, on the other. However, opinions tend to differ on a variety of related questions, such as the very definition of the concept of fidelity, the nature of the transformations that inevitably occur, the types of meanings that are lost and/or gained, and, finally, the status and role of the translator.

Full-text access is restricted to subscribers. Log in to obtain additional credentials. For subscription information see Subscription & Price. Direct PDF access to this article can be purchased through our e-platform.

[ p. 67 ]References

Arrojo, Rosemary
1994 “Fidelity and the Gendered Translation”. TTR VII:2. 147–163.   DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Barthes, Roland
1984Le bruissement du langage. Paris: Seuil.Google Scholar
Berman, Antoine
1984L’épreuve de l’étranger. Paris: Gallimard.Google Scholar
1985a “La traduction comme épreuve de l’étranger”. Texte 4. 67–81.Google Scholar
1985b “La traduction et la lettre ou l’auberge du lointain”. Antoine Berman et al., eds. les tours de babel. Paris: Éditions Trans-Euro Repress 1985 31–150.Google Scholar
1990 “Préface”. Brisset 1990: 9–19.Google Scholar
1995Pour une critique des traductions: John Donne. Paris: Gallimard.Google Scholar
Brisset, Annie
1990Pour une sociocritique de la traduction: Théâtre et altérité au Québec (1968-1988). Longueuil, Québec: Les Éditions du Préambule.Google Scholar
Even-Zohar, Itamar
1978Papers in Historical Poetics. Tel Aviv: The Porter Institute for Poetics and Semiotics.Google Scholar
1979 “Polysystem Theory”. Poetics Today 1:1–2. 287–310.   DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Folkart, Barbara
1991Le conflit des énonciations: Traduction et discours rapporté. Candiac, Québec: Les Éditions Balzac.Google Scholar
Foucault, Michel
1976Histoire de la sexualité I. La volonté de savoir. Paris: Gallimard.Google Scholar
Kadish, Doris
1994 “Translation in Context”. Kadish and Massardier-Kenney 1994 : 26–61.Google Scholar
Kadish, Doris and Françoise Massardier-Kenney
eds. 1994Translating Slavery, Gender and Race in French Women’s Writing, 1793-1823. Kent, Ohio: Kent State University Press.Google Scholar
Koskinen, Kaisa
1994 “(Mis)translating the Untranslatable—The Impact of Deconstruction and Post-Structuralism on Translation Theory”. Meta XXXIX:2 446–452.   DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lane-Mercier, Gillian
1995a “La traduction des discours directs romanesques comme stratégie d’orientation des effets de lecture”. Palimpsestes 9. 75–91. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
1995b “Towards a Rhetorical Practice of Mimesis: Writing/Reading/(Re)Translating Fictional Sociolects”. Recherches sémiotiques/Semiotic Inquiry 15:3. 105–128.Google Scholar
Lefevere, André
1992Translation, Rewriting, and the Manipulation of Literary Fame. London and New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Massardier-Kenney, Françoise
1994 “Translation Theory and Practice”. Kadish and Massardier-Kenney 1994 : 11–25.Google Scholar
Schogt, Henry
1988Linguistics, Literary Analysis, and Literary Translation. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Simon, Sherry
1992 “The Language of Cultural Difference: Figures of Alterity in Cana-dian Translation”. Venuti 1992 : 159–176. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Toury, Gideon
1980 “The Nature and Role of Norms in Literary Translation”. In Search of a Theory of Translation. Tel Aviv: The Porter Institute for Poetics and Semiotics 1980 51–62.Google Scholar
1981 “Translated Literature: System, Norm, Performance. Toward a TT-Oriented Approach to Literary Translation”. Poetics Today 2:4. 9–27. [also: Toury 1980: 35-50.]Google Scholar
[ p. 68 ]
1982 “A Rationale for Descriptive Translation Studies”. Dispositio VII:19-21. 23–39.Google Scholar
1995Descriptive Translation Studies and beyond. Amsterdam-Philadel-phia: John Benjamins.   DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Venuti, Lawrence
1986 “The Translator’s Invisibility”. Criticism XXVIII:2. 179–212.Google Scholar
ed. 1992Rethinking Translation: Discourse, Subjectivity, Ideology. London and New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
1992a “Introduction”. Venuti 1992 : 1–17. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
1995The Translator’s Invisibility: A History of Translation. London and New York: Routledge.   DOI logoGoogle Scholar