Literature in Translation

Hi, 

Today I am going to talk about pieces of literature that are being translated from one language to another as well as the positive and negative impacts that translation can have on the work. 

First of all, why would someone wish to translate a piece of literature? What could possibly be the benefits of this? 

Learning a language can be difficult, but reading and understanding literature in an unknown language is impossible. Here is where a translation is always welcomed. By translating a piece of literature, the translator makes it possible for us, the readers to understand its message and its author’s emotions. Consequently, by studying literature in translation we are indirectly studying and understanding more about the author’s culture through the ideas that are presented and the way this is achieved. I would personally classify this as a positive aspect of translating literature as it is a big step towards international mindedness. 

Translation is a useful tool that unlocks the mysteries of a multicultural world, yet it is also a difficult art. When translating a piece of literature it is important to consider both the context in which the original text was written and the one in which the translated text will be published and so, the translator is required to be able to interpret the intended meaning of the original text and transpose it in such a way that the overall message does not get altered and lost in translation. An article published by India Today, presents the story of Feng Tang, a known Chinese author facing great difficulties in his career as a result of one of his works, and that is a translation of 326 Indian poems. Due to the difficulty present in translation, it seems that Feng Tang has failed in the eyes of some elder scholars in producing an accurate representation of the poems, by being to ‘vulgar’. Here it is possible to see how especially in the case of poems, translation is challenging as a result of the different interpretations that people can have in what regards a stanza, a metaphor, or even one single line of a poem. 

Therefore, translation can be seen as a way of successfully spreading the knowledge and values of a culture to different nations, emphasizing the beauty of literature, but it can also have a negative impact if done incorrectly, affecting the image of the work as a whole and potentially the one of the culture it belongs to.