14 abr 2006

What poet is not a translator? That's not a rhetorical question, though it could be. That is, what poet does not see translation as a necessary part of "poet training" ? If you made two lists, one of poets who have done some translation and another of ones who haven't, what would you find? I personally find it hard to think that anyone wouldn't believe that translation was as necessary as breathing, yet many of my favorite poets haven't done much if any of it either. And of course poets I don't care for have translated too.

2 comentarios:

jwg dijo...
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nolapoet dijo...

There was a translation panel at AWP, supposedly about publishing translations, for which no publishers showed. However, the panel was ably commandeered by Eloise Klein Healy, Alicia Partnoy, her translator, and another translator (names escape me, as I just woke up).

One thing we came up with was the possibility of getting AWP to *require* at least one semester on poetry translation. Now I know that one semester does not a translator make, and I'm not talking about macaronic bullshit writing exercises. However, if this were required, at least of programs which require minimal second-language reading competency, I am certain that it would change the face of poetry in this country, as well as give poets greater appreciation for that particular art.

I'd like to see more cooperation between foreign language departments and graduate writing programs.