Philosophy and Translation

FROM TRANSLATION, NO ONE ESCAPES
Presentation of the Journal Doletiana
« Philosophy and Translation »
Nº 4, 2012-2013
Xavier Bassas Vila
University of Barcelona
[email protected]
We dedicate the fourth issue of the journal Doletiana to the theme
"Philosophy and Translation". Whether this subject is actually what is called
a proper "theme" - interest in which has varied enormously throughout
history - or more fundamentally a “practical relation" between two acts of
thought incapable of conversion into one theme, is a question that we will
find analyzed in all the texts, especially in the Spanish translation of a
chapter of Antoine Berman presented at the end of this issue. Accordingly,
the texts included here reflect different perspectives on the theoretical and
practical importance of philosophy with respect to translation, of translation
with respect to philosophy, as well as on their relationship in light of the
numerous forms that this relationship can take.
In this context, we note from the outset that most of the texts presented
here take philosophy as a starting point to move towards translation as the
point of arrival and object of study. They are texts, therefore, which
examine, "the philosophy of translation”, that is, conceptual questions that
the interlinguistic passage has raised in the history of philosophy and
theoretical openings and expansions of its scope proposed by thinkers and
translation theorists. This first set of texts includes, therefore, reflections on
translation closely linked to philosophical questions or to authors who have
developed a theory of translation. Despite the myriad of details that that
distinguish them in their theoretical and stylistic peculiarities, we can
discern two main approaches.
On the one hand, in the texts of the celebrated Michel Deguy and of
Xavier Bassas we can read reflections on translation that take as
fundamental theoretical framework the history of philosophy, more precisely
understood as the history of metaphysics. In poetical writing that is, in
PRESENTATION: «FROM TRANSLATION, NO ONE ESCAPES» itself, both a theoretical approach and philosophical practice, the text by
Michel Deguy takes as point of departure a claim by Tsvetaeva about the
possibility or impossibility of translating Pushkin and proceeds to develop a
non- metaphysical theory of translation as an act of “translation”. Deguy
assumes, in fact, that we cannot approach translation without positioning
ourselves inside or outside a certain metaphysical conception of language as
expression, where "what is said" is a substance and the subject an
interiority. In his non-metaphysical perspective, Deguy then develops his
reflection through cultural and grammatical analyses, and concludes with an
opposition between two worlds and modes in translation:
Les finalités [de l’un et l’autre « monde » de la traduction] sont opposées : dans un cas,
le plus fréquenté, il s’agit de neutraliser Babel, d’abolir la diversité des langues, qui fait
que les humains ne s’entendent pas. Dans l’autre, c’est l’inverse : le champ est la
littérature ; chaque langue est appelée par le trésor de son chef-d’œuvre (de
Shakespeare ; de Molière ; de Dante ; de Goethe ; de Pouchkine ; de Cervantès, etc. ;
ce sont leurs œuvres qui protègent les langues). Traduire ici veut dire « faire l’épreuve
de l’Étranger » ; creuser la différence abyssale, dite de « l’intraduisible », entre les
langues des œuvres.
Xavier Bassas builds the reflections of his text also on the basis of two
modes/worlds in translation, and also on the history of metaphysics. His
text effectively turns on the following question: "How is metaphysics to be
translated". With the aim of understanding the unique translation exercises
carried out by two great thinkers of French philosophy today, Jean-Luc
Marion and Alain Badiou, the author takes the philosophical notions of
"immanence" and "transcendence" in order to apply them to the field of
translation. On the basis of these notions, we can certainly better
understand the work carried out by J.L. Marion to translate Descartes by
Descartes himself, as well as the translation-recreation of Plato's Republic
by A. Badiou. The opposition between the translation work of Marion and
that of Badiou leads the author of the article to finally propose a textual and
conceptual distinction between "immanent translation" and "transcendental
translation".
In this fourth issue of the journal, Doletiana, we find a second approach
that runs through all these texts, appearing very clearly in the articles by
Carla Canullo and Daniel Barreto. On the basis of a conception of translation
as an "act of hospitality", these texts develop the same "ethical paradigm"
of the act of translating along paths which are, however, quite different.
Canullo traces her own journey through the thought of many theorists of
translation and translators –Berman, Ricoeur and Pareyson, among others –
DOLETIANA 4 PHILOSOPHY AND TRANSLATION
2 PRESENTATION: «FROM TRANSLATION, NO ONE ESCAPES» in order to thus bring together the notions of hospitality, metaphor and
“truth to be interpreted". The author notes in this regard that “ ‘passer’ –
d’une langue à l’autre, d’un texte à l’autre, d’une culture à l’autre – est un
geste où se traduit une vérité des textes et des cultures dont la dimension
interprétative n’est pas accidentelle”. The movement of translation
activates, therefore, one truth of the languages and cultures intrinsically
linked to interpretation. On the other hand, Daniel Barreto focuses his
reflections on the thought of Franz Rosenzweig in order to first establish a
fundamental opposition between simple translation of "what is said" and
translation as a creative activity of the language. This opposition also
appears in another form in the text already discussed by Michel Deguy
included in this issue, which allows an intertextual reading to this collection
through the links which the texts themselves create. In a clear and sober
style, Barreto slowly traces the opposition of Rosenzweig in order to
examine universality as a key notion of a non-homogenizing relation
between people/cultures. In this regard, the text of the Bible and its various
translations – beginning with the first Greek version - offer us a privileged
experience and manifestation.
Directly linked with these questions, the text by Salah Basalamah relies
on "Cultural Translation" to expand the possibilities of a "philosophy of
translation" properly speaking. Based on two texts of P. Ricoeur, as well as
those of Ladmiral among others, the author proposes to set out along a
path that leads translation towards the social sciences. In this direction,
post-colonial studies right away offer an expansion of the act of translating
which includes the linguistic, cultural and geographical domains. However, a
philosophy of translation should be extended further and also be “able to
think the transformation of human beings in a more global and
comprehensive manner to include the psychological dimension as well, and
even the spiritual". Translation, in a spiritual and ethical paradigm, thus
crosses the boundaries that confine it as a discipline (academic) and thus
opens it to all areas of life.
***
Research into what we call, conversely, “the translation of philosophy " is
not very much represented in this issue despite the fundamental interest
that this perspective means for us today. Yes indeed, it seems to us
necessary to insist on the importance of language and writing in philosophy,
a discipline subject to the domination of the concept and which often forgets
DOLETIANA 4 PHILOSOPHY AND TRANSLATION
3 PRESENTATION: «FROM TRANSLATION, NO ONE ESCAPES» that without a text there is nothing that we understand by philosophy. In
this respect, highlighting the translations of philosophical texts and
developing critical analyses of the translations themselves are two exercises
that can indeed help us to insist on this “forgotten” textual fact. The work
that these critical analyses carry out on the texts themselves, as well as the
rigorous study of the different levels that compose them (not only the
conceptual and semantic level, but the stylistic, rhetorical etc. level as well
)are an essential tool to remember the textuality of philosophy. Philosophy
is also made of language, of a syntax that reveals a style of writing, an attimes untranslatable lexicon (logos, Dasein, différance, etc. . , see Vocabulaire Europeén des Philosophes. Dictionnaire des intraduisibles,
edited by Barbara Cassin, the best current reference on this subject), and
the analysis of translations becomes a good phenomenalizing principle of
these questions.
This very approach is adopted in his text by Francisco Martín Díez, who
analyses the Spanish translations of the book by Paul Ricoeur entitled
Temps et récit. The author thus makes a study of a philosophical translation
in order to uncover the linguistic and conceptual implications of different
decisions taken by the translator of Ricœur‘s work. Díez focuses especially
on two fundamental notions in the Riœur text: the "mise en intrigue" and
the binomial "avant/amont", which allow him to reflect on the relationship
between
translation
and
interpretation,
translation
studies
and
hermeneutics in the light of Gadamer’s theory. Given the few texts received
that follow this line of study, I simply note a lack of interest shown in this
"critique of translations" at the present moment. In the literary field,
however, it is a little more developed.
The introduction to La Traduction et la lettre ou l’Auberge du lointain
(1985), by Antoine Berman, also devotes some fragments to this critique of
translations, thus concluding the fourth issue of the journal Doletiana.
Thanks to the excellent Spanish translation made by Núria d’Asprer, this
text demonstrates its full potential and the reasons why it has constituted
and continues to constitute an essential and enriching reference not only for
translation studies and for all those people who translate. Notions such as
"word-for-word translation ", “servile translation", "literal translation and
translation to the letter", together with the binomial theory / practice of
translation versus experience / reflection form the conceptual universe in
which the famous Antoine Berman develops a theory of translation that
goes beyond an academic discipline and practice where some wish to
confine the act of translation:
DOLETIANA 4 PHILOSOPHY AND TRANSLATION
4 PRESENTATION: «FROM TRANSLATION, NO ONE ESCAPES» Aussi la traductologie n’enseigne pas la traduction, mais développe de manière
transmissible (conceptuelle) l’expérience qu’est la traduction dans son essence plurielle.
Le parallèle, ici, avec la psychanalyse, le théâtre ou la philosophie ne saurait être assez
souligné.
Connecting in this way translation studies to the fundamental disciplines
for the constitution of our most intimate subjectivity, Berman finally writes
in this respect: “À ce titre, la traductologie ne concerne pas les seuls
traducteurs, mais tous ceux qui sont pris dans l’espace de la traduction.
C’est-à-dire nous tous, en tant que, de la traduction, nul n’est libre.” So, in
a nutshell: "... from translation, no one escapes”.
***
I would like to finish this presentation by thanking the promoters of the
journal Doletiana, Ramon Lladó and especially Núria d’Asprer, the director,
for their invitation to edit this issue , as well as for her constant and patient
help so that these texts could be published here. I must also thank the
authors of the texts for their essential contribution, because the effort to
further research on translation, language and our existence is as necessary
today as it ever was. Because from translation, in fact, no one escapes.
Neither yesterday, nor today, nor tomorrow.
Translator : Eamon Butterfield
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