Appunti esame Lingua inglese, prof. Carosso, dispensa consigliata Versions, perversions, animadversions: dilemmas of theatrical translation (Henderson)

Versions, perversions, animadversions: dilemmas of theatrical translation

(Henderson) There are no fixed rules for theatrical translation. No two languages function in exactly the same way; what is alliterative in one language will not be so in another; the image that strikes one language community may not have the same power in another. In terms of prosody, English favours stress, French puts the accent on the final syllable, Italian is a syllabic tongue, with long strings of unstressed syllables. The translator is at the service of the author of the original text and of the target audience.

Difference between dialogue in a novel and a play

The difference between dialogue in a novel and dialogue in a play is that in the former case, it’s the reader who has to interpret, whereas in theatre all interpretation is mediated to the audience by the actors, the director, the designer. The audience is not free to make their own interpretation. In translated playtexts, in addition to the mediation of the director and the actors, another mediator intervenes: the translator, whose choices are not an attempt to replicate, but a kind of approximation of the original.

All translation is culture-bound (ex: absence in English of a distinction between formal and informal second-person singular pronouns constrains the translator to find alternative strategies to communicate different degrees of formality). If a degree of ‘foreignness’ may have a certain effectiveness in narrative prose, it sounds artificial in theatre.

Priority of the written play over the performance

Keir Elam observes that literary critics have assumed the priority of the written play over the performance; since the writer of the play precedes any given performance, it is legitimate to suppose the priority of the one over the other. But the dramatic text is conditioned by its performability, so the written text/performance relationship is not one of priority, but it constitutes intertextuality.

The term ‘performability’ was used by Susan Bassnett to identify a concept that she refuted. Later the written text is the rough material on which the translator has to work and with the written text, he must begin. Shakespeare provides many examples of plays that are barely performable: in King Lear, torrential rain can’t be represented! Some acts are not performable but they’re actable and translatable.

Translation of a play: perspectives

Translation of a play may be regarded from two points:

• Dramatic text: Words on the page. The reader can consider the material, go back and read it over again.
• Translation for the theatre: The translator should be aware of the interpretative flexibility of the text. The audience only has one chance for understanding.

The text of a play is analogous to an architect’s blueprint: it represents a plan and it includes elements that are not visible, as in a text: the actors’ appearance, the quality of their voices, their movements, gestures. There is an infinite range of shades of interpretation, by the same actor in the same play before different audiences; the political or social climate at the time of the performance are important factors too, and, as a consequence, a certain degree of flexibility should be maintained in the translated text.

The translator must beware of the temptation to impose on the text any interpretation not present in the original. This illicit intervention has a variety of forms: addition/omission of elements, modification of register, rephrasing.

Theory of theatrical translation

It’s impossible to postulate a theory of theatrical translation, because there are specific problems represented by individual texts. Eco, for example, quotes from his own or others’ works in order to illustrate the strategies adopted.

There are language universals – characteristics and strategies common to all languages; this is demonstrated by the existence of complex grammatical rules in both Creoles and sign languages. But some factors tend to mask those universals:

• The loss of most inflectional syllables in English has led to the establishment of word-order conventions which must be respected when translating into another language.
• Cultural difference: what is significant in one culture won’t be so in another. Circumscribed language communities may develop codes that are not transparent for others. These codes are active in the spoken but not in the written language, in which they’re accompanied by an authorial comment to assist the reader’s comprehension.

Valerio Fissore insists on the importance of prosody: the translator should be aware of the rhythm and should respect it. Henderson doesn’t agree that the translator should feel bound to rhythm, because...