2. aims of literature under
constraint project
• to elucidate which factors shape and constrain literary
practice
• to explore whether constraints bolster creative activity
3. literary translation is a
constrained activity
• constraints relating to the circulation of world literature in
translation
• constraints relating to the profession of literary translator
• constraints relating to the practice of translation
4. constraint within translation
studies
• the notion of constraint has not yet been adequately
theorised but underpins:
• macro-structural theories of translation, such as
Polysystems theory (Even-Zohar) and sociological
approach to translation (Heilbron & Sapiro)
• practical theories of translation, such as Skopos theory
(Reiss & Vermeer), foreignisation vs domestication
(Venuti)
5. closest to a theory of
constraint
• among major theorists: Toury’s descriptive translation
studies and his theorisation of a scale of socio-cultural
constraints, ranging from rules to idiosyncrasies, with the
« vast middle-ground occupied by inter subjective factors
commonly designated norms. » (Toury 2000: 199)
• among minor theorists: Briggs’s (2012) thesis that
« translation is a form of writing under constraint »
6. aim of today’s talk
• to theorise translation as a constrained activity via an
analytical reading of Kate Briggs’s This Little Art (2017),
which I shall read as a translator’s discourse on practice
and a contribution to theory of translation
7. Le cours, c’est comme une
fleur, vous permettez,
mais qui va passer.
8. always judge a book by its
cover
• published in 2017 by Fitzcarraldo Editions (Jacques
Testard - « the best thing that has happened to the
anglophone literary world in years »)
• part of the « essay » collection (rather than fiction)
• author is identified as « the translator of two volumes of
Roland Barthes’s lecture and seminar notes at the Collège
de France » & she teaches at Piet Zwart Institute,
Rotterdam
9. how is The Little Art
described
• editor’s note « An essay with the reach and momentum of
a novel, Kate Briggs’s This Little Art is a genre-bending
song for the practice of literary translation […] Kate Briggs
emerges as a truly remarkable writer: distinctive, wise,
frank, funny and utterly original »
• supportive review: « Kate Briggs’s This Little Art shares
some wonderful qualifies with Barthes own work » Lydia
Davis, author of Can’t and Won’t
10. ideas that are explored
• translation as a « nearly » or « would-be » practice (in its
writing & its reading)
• => is translation a preparation for writing?
• => is it an amateur’s (or a lady’s) game?
• => is it a love declaration? a critical commentary?
11. complicated love affair
• example of Dorothy Bussy translating as a way of
spending time with and feeling close to André Gide (151)
• « a translator may feel deeply about a given piece of
writing […] but none of this will have any necessary
bearing on whether she - or indeed her work - will be loved
back » (152)
• Anita Raja quoted, talking about translating as a side job
done for pleasure (153)
12. vulnerability of translation
• comparison with a friend who translates academic articles for
a living - they have very different understandings of
translation as a practice. This is evidence of the divide and
antagonism between full-time translators, who suffer from
precarious working conditions, and university translators
(Kalinowski 2002)
• « when people discuss the economic realities of literary
translation, they often point out how difficult it is […] to make
a living out of it […] Insane, then, because the work involved
in writing a translation seems to be so clearly in excess of -
so out of proportion and unbalanced in relation to - its small
material returns » (Briggs 2017: 236)
13. responsability for someone
else’s work
• « translation as the chance […] of being taught by the other’s
writing, where answers to the questions of how to be
responsible for this writing, and whether or not you or I will be
capable of taking responsibility for this writing are, again, in no
way given in advance » (208)
• « as a translator, however collaborative I consider my process to
be, however much my writing, my thinking, depnds on and is so
closely directed by yours […] I am responsible for you » (281)
• subject to harsh reviews that « come with the territory of
claiming to have written a translation, with taking responsibility in
this way for someone else’s prose » (88)
14. translation is a twice-written
text
• a translated text has been twice-written with the « second
writing determined and motivated by its own history and
context and agenda » (87)
• about Helen Lowe Porter’s letter concerning her
translation of Thomas Mann: « I can’t see how she is
exactly wrong; in no way straightforwardly or eventually
wrong - to feel that she has written herself » (92)
• quoting Douglas Robinson: « translators are never, and
should never be forced to be (or to think themselves as)
neutral, impersonal transferring devices » (109)
15. translation as rewriting
• « to want to write is to want to rewrite » (115)
• « I am a translator and a writer, or so I claim, when asked
what I do, professionally speaking. As a way of making the
writing part clear - in case it were not already obvious »
(197)
• « translation conceived as a means of writing the other’s
work with your own hands, in your own setting, your own
time, and in your own language » (119)
16. inventive constraints
• « the genre-defining constraint that makes a translation a
translation is to write the writing again in another language » (308)
• a translation can’t be in principle a great deal longer or shorter
than the original (284)
• « but between myself and myself, I always seem to eventually
come back round to thinking: the constraints on how far I can go,
the limits on my making-up (because this also what translation
involves: making something, making this thing up again), the
limits on doing what I want, are what interest me » (253)
• « the writing of translations is of special interest because it is
especially directed and especially constrained » (256)
17. puzzle-solving
• « the puzzle of how to phrase a sentence - any kind of sentence
- again in a new language is always to some degree
fasinating » (144)
• « my own anxieties over where and how to set this vous
permettez in English […] none of the options I can think of at
the moment - if you will, or if you’ll allow me on this or as it were
or so to speak, with their varying degrees of self-conscious and
knowing self-awareness - feel quite as open or inviting enough,
quite unaffected or non-arrogant enough » (67)
• how do you translate the sources of a text, a lecture in
particular, and especially if they’re wrong (156)
18. translation & Barthes
• Barthes didn’t care for translations, Richard Howard
referenced explaining that he was simply content knowing
his work was translated into English (156)
• translations of Barthes were not produced in order - a host
of haphazard reasons behind this (155)
• Barthes was an amateur translator of haiku, and in relation
to this, but this only, presents translation as a miracle « for
the reason that just this once it doesn’t present an
obstacle to Barthes’s reading » (161)
19. translation of Barthes
• This Little Art provides theoretical reflection on the practice
of translation from perspective of practitioner-thinker
(amateur/lady translator? university teacher?)
• by taking Barthes’s work, and the discussion of the
translation of Barthes’s work as its grounding material, it
effectively re-translates Barthes
• it does so notably by providing an essay that is a « would-
be-novel », or a version of the novel fantasised about in
Barthes’s last lecture course, La Préparation du roman
