Paradoxes of translation

Abstract

In this article, I consider what is assumed to be the speculative paradox of translation: that translation is theoretically impossible but actually practicable. My thesis is that this aporia is nothing but a consequence of the limited way in which translation is often conceptualised. In this article, the term ‘translation’ is to be understood as interlingual translation, unless otherwise indicated; more precisely, as literary translation. In order to present my argument, I will examine three examples of translation, namely: (1) the fictionalisation of the translation process in Nicole Brossard’s novel Le désert mauve; (2) Jean-François Billeter’s translation of a poem by the medieval Chinese poet Su Dongpo; and (3) the translation of the words ‘tragedy’ and ‘comedy’ by the fictional character Averroes in a short story written by Jorge Louis Borges. The analysis of these real or fictitious examples of translation will help to introduce the notion of the unspoken as that which cannot be transmuted or recognised as a sign. This ever-present dimension of the translation process will allow me to show that the thesis of fundamental untranslatability is a false aporia, which derives from a reductive understanding of the phenomenon of translation.

A Research on the Translation and Dissemination of Ceramic Culture Based on Live Stream

“…Domestication refers to making the expression of the source language more closely resemble the speaking habits and cultural background of the target language, making the translation easier for the target readers to understand [8]. Foreignization, on the other hand, refers to maintaining the stylistic features of the source language as much as possible and avoiding changing the expression of the source language, so that the target readers can feel the style and characteristics of the source language through the text, achieving a kind of "exotic" translation effect [9].…”

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