Email this article From norms to macro-norms? The translation of classics seen in a global, diachronic framework
Abstract
Abstract – Recently, Descriptive Translation Studies has been busying itself with single case studies rather than general surveys, with individual translations rather than normative tendencies. Ostensibly, this has been done in an attempt at avoiding the pitfalls of excessive ‘globalism’, and in order to shift the focus from the pressures exerted by society to the contributions given by translators, each according to his/her habitus. While recognizing the value of these ‘localizing’ studies, the present article argues that there is still scope within the discipline for developing universal concepts capable of connecting different forms of behaviour. Whenever the translation scholar aims at describing a field rather than an individual effort, it may be useful, and indeed necessary, to extend Toury’s concept of ‘translation norms’ both synchronically and diachronically. In the field of classical translation, in particular, the significance of single contributions may be lost if it is not seen in the context of international tendencies with deep historical roots – what the author proposes to call ‘macro-norms’.
Keywords: Descriptive Translation Studies, classics, comparative literature, norms, macro-normsReferences
Agorni M. 2007, Locating systems and individuals in translation studies, in Wolf M. and Fukari A. (eds.), Constructing a Sociology of Translation, John Benjamins, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, pp. 123-134.
Ariosto L. and Harington J. 1591, Orlando Furioso in English Heroical Verse, R. Field, London.
Austen J. 2003, Mansfield Park, Oxford University Press.
Austen J. and De Palma L. 1999, Mansfield Park, Rizzoli, Milano.
Austen J. and Zazo A.L. 2002, Emma, con uno scritto di Walter Scott, Mondadori, Milano.
Bassnett S. and Bush P. (eds.) 2006, The Translator as Writer, Continuum, London.
Bassnett S. and Lefevere A. (eds.) 1990, Translation, History & Culture, Pinter, London/New York.
Berman A. 1999, La traduction et la lettre ou l’auberge du lointain, Éditions du Seuil, Paris.
Bruno, G. 1999, Opere Italiane. Ristampa anastatica delle cinquecentine. Vol II, a cura di E. Canone, Leo S. Olschki Editore, Firenze.
Cronin M. 2006, Translation and Identity, Routledge, Abingdon/New York.
Even-Zohar I. 1978, The Position of Translated Literature within the Literary Polysystem, in “Papers on Poetics and Semiotics” 8, pp. 21-27.
Gouanvic J.-M. 1999, Sociologie de la traduction: La science-fiction américaine dans l’espace culturel français des années 1950, Artois Presses Université, Artois.
Holmes J.S., Lambert J. and Van den Broeck R. (eds.) 1978, Proceedings of the Leuven symposium. Literature and translation. New perspectives in literary studies, Acco, Leuven.
Hulme T.E. 1994, The Collected Writings of T.E. Hulme, Oxford University Press, pp. 59-73.
Kwieciński P. 1998, Translation Strategies in a Rapidly Transforming Culture. A Central European Perspective, in Venuti L. (ed.), Translation and Minority (special issue of “The Translator”, 4 [2]), pp 183-206.
Lambert J. 2009, Measuring canonization: A reply to Paola Venturi, in “Target” 21 [2], pp. 358-363.
Lefevere A. 1998, Translation Practice(s) and the Circulation of Cultural Capital: Some Aeneids in English, in Bassnett S. and Lefevere A. (eds.), Constructing Cultures. Essays on Literary Translation, Multilingual Matters Ltd, Clevedon, pp. 41-56.
Leopardi G. and Galassi J. 2010, Canti, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, New York.
Lianeri A. and Zajko V. 2008, Introduction. Still Being Read after so Many Years: Rethinking the Classic through Translation, in Lianeri A. and Zajko V. (eds.), Translation and the Classic: Identity as Change in the History of Culture, Oxford University Press, pp. 1-23.
Meylaerts R. 2008, Translators and (their) norms. Towards a sociological construction of the individua’, in Pym A., Schlesinger M. and Simeoni D. (eds.), Beyond Descriptive Translation Studies, John Benjamins, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, pp. 91-102.
Morini M. 2006, Tudor Translation in Theory and Practice, Ashgate, Aldershot.
Morini M. 2010, Translating Personalities: A Stylistic Model, in Fusco F. and Ballerini M. (a cura di), Testo e traduzione: lingue a confronto, Peter Lang, Frankfurt am Main, pp. 175-197.
Morini M. 2013, Virgil in Tudor Dress: In Search of a Noble Vernacular, in “Neophilologus” 97 [3], pp.
-610.
Munday J. (ed.) 2007, Translation as Intervention, Continuum, London.
O’Sullivan C. 2009, “Censoring these ‘racy morsels of the vernacular”: loss and gain in translations of Apuleius and Catullus, in ní Chuilleanáin E, Ó Cuilleanáin C. and Parris D. (eds.), Translation and Censorship: Patterns of Communication and Interference, Four Courts Press, Dublin, pp.76-92.
Prunč E. 2007, Priests, princes and pariahs. Constructing the professional field of translation, in Wolf M. and Fukari A. (eds.), Constructing a Sociology of Translation, John Benjamins, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, pp. 39-56.
Robinson D. (ed.) 1997, Western Translation Theory: From Herodotus to Nietzsche, St. Jerome, Manchester.
Simeoni D. 1998, The pivotal status of the translator’s habitus, in “Target” 10 [1], pp. 1-39.
Tasso T. 1971, Gerusalemme liberata, Torino, Einaudi.
Tasso T. and Carew R. 1594, Godfrey of Boulloigne, Christopher Hunt, London.
Tasso T. and Fairfax E. 1600, Godfrey of Bulloigne, or the Recouerie of Ierusalem, I. Iaggard and M.
Lownes, London.
Tasso T. and Fairfax E. 1981, Godfrey of Bulloigne. A Critical Edition of Edward Fairfax’s translation of Tasso’s Gerusalemme Liberata, together with Fairfax’s Original Poems, ed. K.M. Lea and T.M. Gang, Clarendon, Oxford.
Tasso T. and Asolen A.M. 2000, Jerusalem Delivered / Gerusalemme liberata, The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore.
Tasso T. and Wickert M. 2009, The Liberation of Jerusalem, Oxford University Press.
Toury G. 1995, Descriptive Translation Studies and Beyond, John Benjamins, Amsterdam/Philadelphia. Revised second edition 2012.
Venturi P. 2009a, The Translator’s Immobility: English Modern Classics in Italy, in “Target” 21 [2], pp. 333-357.
Venturi P. 2009b, David Copperfield Conscripted: Italian Translations of the Novel, in “Dickens Quarterly” 26 [4], pp. 234-247.
Venuti L. 1995, The Translator’s Invisibility. A History of Translation, Routledge, London.
Venuti L. 2004, Translation, Community, Utopia, Venuti L. (ed.), The Translation Studies Reader, Routledge, London, pp. 482-502.
Virgilius Maro P. and Douglas G. 1950-1964, Virgil’s Aeneid Translated into Scottish Verse by Gavin Douglas, ed. D.F.C. Coldwell, William Blackwood & Sons, Edinburgh/London.
Full Text: pdf
Refbacks
- There are currently no refbacks.
