Email this article Literary translation between Italian and English. Publishing trends in Italy, the UK and the USA
Abstract
Abstract - This study aims to investigate publishing trends in literary translation from English into Italian in Italy and from Italian into English in the UK and the USA over the 2000-2008 time span. The data were retrieved from the Index Translationum, an international bibliography of translations managed by UNESCO, and were then stored in three Microsoft Access databases, one for each country. The databases were analysed according to specific criteria, in order to determine trends concerning the amount of translated literature in the three countries, the main publishing houses dealing with translated works, and the most translated genres and authors. This paper is meant to provide a mainly descriptive, but necessary basis for future investigation of socio-cultural as well as market-led processes underlying publishers’ choices and gate-keeping in literary translation.
Riassunto - Il presente studio si propone di ricavare e analizzare tendenze caratterizzanti il mercato della letteratura tradotta dall’inglese all’italiano in Italia e dall’italiano all’inglese in Regno Unito e negli Stati Uniti. I dati sono stati estratti da Index Translationum, una database bibliografico internazionale di traduzioni gestito dall’UNESCO, e sono stati inseriti in tre database Microsoft Acess, uno per ciascun Paese. I database sono stati analizzati secondo criteri specifici al fine di ricavare trend relativi alla quantità di letteratura tradotta nei tre Paesi, le maggiori case editrici che si interessano di letteratura tradotta, i generi e gli autori più tradotti. Questo studio intende fornire una base essenzialmente descrittiva ma necessaria per studi futuri sui processi socio-culturali e sulle dinamiche di mercato che influenzano le scelte degli editori, determinando così forme di controllo sul mercato della traduzione letteraria.
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