Lesson 13 activities (hands on)
Poetry translation
Activity 1
Read the following text: MAGALHÃES, C. M. Estratégias de Análise Microtextual: Os níveis lexical e gramatical. In: ALVES, F.; MAGALHÃES, C. M.; PAGANO, A. Traduzir com Autonomia – Estratégias para o Tradutor em Formação. São Paulo: Contexto, 2000.
Note: This text is in Portuguese, so you may like to translate this text into your first language to complete this activity. If you don’t have access to this text, you may like to use another text and/or adapt the activity.
Discuss the following questions with your classmates.
Activity 2
Poetry translation: Is it possible?
Read the information about the poetry genre, the challenges of poetry translation, and some approaches to dealing with these difficulties in “The Translation of Poetry,”.JONES, F.R. Translation of Poetry. In: DALVAI, M.The Oxford Handbook of Translation Studies. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012.
Note: If you don’t have access to this text, you may like to use another text and/or adapt the activity.
Activity 3
James Holmes (apud Jones, 2011) establishes three main approaches for the translation of poetry. Read their descriptions below:
- Mimetic: replicating the original form. This implies openness to the source culture’s foreignness (Holmes 1988: 25–6). However, the form may carry different weight in the receptor culture (Hejinian 1998, Raffel 1988)—a five-syllable line feels ‘classical ’in Chinese, for example, but may appear radically compressed in French.
- Analogical: using a target form with a similar cultural function to the source form (e.g. the English iambic pentameter for the Chinese five-syllable line). This implies a belief that receptor-culture poetics has universal value (Holmes 1988: 26).
- Organic: choosing a form that best suits the translator’s own authenticity’ of response to the source (Scott 1997: 35). This stresses the impossibility of recreating the source form—content link (Holmes 1988: 28).
(Excerpts from the text: The Translation of Poetry. JONES, F.R. Translation of Poetry. In: DALVAI, M.The Oxford Handbook of Translation Studies. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012.)
Considering the approaches mentioned above, observe the two translations presented for a poem by Emily Dickinson (1830-1886) to answer the questions below.
Original poem |
Translation 1 |
Translation 2 |
|---|---|---|
| A word is dead
When it is said, Some say. I say it just Begins to live That day. (Written by Emily Dickinson) |
Palavra é morta
Quando está dita, Dizem uns. Digo: inicia A só viver Em tal dia. (Translated by José Lino Grünewald) |
Quanto se expresse
— Dizem — perece Depressa. Eu — discordando — Digo — isso é quando Começa. (Translated by Nelson Ascher) |
Adapted from Sergio Maciel (2018).
Activity 4
Culturemas – what are they and what is the relevance of these terms for translation? Read the article “Os culturemas: Unidades linguísticas, ideológicas ou culturais?” (“Los culturemas: ¿unidades linguísticas, ideológicos o culturales?”) by Lucia Luque-Nadal. The text is available from Los culturemas: ¿unidades lingüísticas, ideológicas o culturales? (PDF, 229KB).
Discuss the following questions with your classmates.
Note: This text is in Spanish, so you may like to translate this text into your first language to complete this activity.
Activity 5
You will find some strategies for translating poetry and culturemas below. Which one(s) have you come across more often? Discuss with your peers and teacher.
Activity 6
Please find below a list of tools and websites that can help you while translating any type of text. Try these tools. Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of each one and how useful they were to you and your peers.
Activity 7
Translate one of the following poems into English or into your first language.
1) No espelho: FILHO, Armando Freitas. No espelho available via the Poetry Translation Center, 2022. Retrieved on November 01, 2022.
2. Cartão-postal sem fôlego: FILHO, Armando Freitas. Cartão-postal sem fôlego available via the Poetry Translation Center, 2022. Retrieved on November 01, 2022.
3. Para Laura: IVÁNOVA, Adelaide. Para Laura. In: ______. O martelo. Rio de Janeiro: Garupa, 2017. Available via the Poetry Translation Center. Retrieved on November 01, 2022.
Activity 8
In pairs, choose two translation strategies you have learnt in this lesson and look for at least two examples to exemplify the use of each strategy. You may like to use intern and external resources to help you translate. Your intern resource is your memory; your external resource is a CAT tool you may use with Corpora.
Share the examples you found with the whole group.
