From: Hilary Brown <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: CFP: The Author-Translator in the European Literary Tradition,
Swansea University (30.09.2009)
Date: Friday, July 10, 2009 10:23 AM
Call for Papers
The Author-Translator in the European Literary Tradition
Swansea University, 28 June – 1 July 2010
Confirmed keynote speakers include:
Susan Bassnett, David Constantine, Lawrence Venuti
The recent ‘creative turn’ in translation studies has challenged notions of
translation as a derivative and uncreative activity which is inferior to
‘original’ writing. Commentators have drawn attention to the creative
processes involved in the translation of texts, and suggested a rethinking
of translation as a form of creative writing. Hence there is growing
critical and theoretical interest in translations undertaken by literary
authors.
This conference focuses on acts of translation by creative writers.
Literary scholarship has tended to overlook this aspect of an author’s
output, yet since the time of Cicero, authors across Europe have been
engaged not only in composing their own works but in rendering texts from
one language into another. Indeed, many of Europe’s greatest writers have
devoted time to translation – from Chaucer to Heaney, from Diderot and
Goethe to Seferis and Pasternak – and have produced some remarkable texts.
Others (Beckett, Joyce, Nabokov) have translated their own work from one
language into another. As attentive readers and skilful wordsmiths,
writers may be particularly well equipped to meet the creative demands of
literary translation; many translations of poetry are, after all,
undertaken by poets themselves. Moreover, translation can have a major
impact on an author’s own writing and on the development of native literary
traditions.
The conference seeks to reassess the importance of translation for European
writers – both well-known and less familiar – from antiquity to the present
day. It will explore why authors translate, what they translate, and how
they translate, as well as the links between an author’s translation work
and his or her own writing. It will bring together scholars in English
studies and modern languages, classics and medieval studies, comparative
literature and translation studies. Possible topics include:
-individual author-translators: motivations, career trajectories,
comparative thematics and stylistics
-the author-translator in context: literary societies, movements, national
traditions
-the problematic creativity of the author-translator
-self-reflective pronouncements and manifestos
-the author-translator as critic of others’ translations
-self-translation: strengths and weaknesses
-authors, adaptations, re-translation and relay translation
-the reception and influence of the work of author-translators
-theoretical interfaces
Proposals are invited for individual papers (max. 20 minutes) or panels (of
3 speakers). The conference language is English. It is anticipated that
selected papers from the conference will be published. Please send a
250-word abstract by 30 September 2009 to the organisers, Hilary Brown and
Duncan Large ([log in to unmask]):
Author-Translator Conference
Department of Modern Languages
Swansea University
GB-Swansea SA2 8PP
http://www.author-translator.net/
___________________________________________________________________
H-GERMANISTIK
Netzwerk für literaturwissenschaftlichen Wissenstransfer
Humanities-Network for German Literature and Philology
mail: [log in to unmask]
www: http://www.h-germanistik.de
Beiträge / contributions: www.germanistik-im-netz.de/h-germanistik
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